Victory ratios: Malta, October 1942

[Kryten]

Originally Posted by DavidIsby

Could anyone direct me to a source for victory ratios for the October 1942 air campaign over Malta?

I do not believe that Brian Cull's two standard works on this subject have this information.

I would ideally like to see a specific Spitfire vs. Bf 109 comparison, but I realize how problematic such ratios are to identify from contemporaneous documents.

thanks
David Isby

I dont think you could draw any factual conclusions of Spit to Me109 performance as they were fighting completely different wars, not to mention the Italian RA were also a major player!

the JG/RA strategy was to write down the defending RAF fighters to enable the bombers to interdict supply convoys and prevent the resupply of the garrison starving Malta of food, ammunition, fuel, spares and reinforcements, removing the threat to thier own supply lines to N Africa!

whereas the RAF's goal was to defend against the bombers and keep interdicting the Axis supply lines accross the Med!

the upshot of this is that whilst the Luftwaffe and Italians wnated to draw the RAF fighters into combat so they could be destroyed, the RAF priority was to destroy as many bombers as possible not waste aircraft duelling with Italian and German fighters, it's very similar to the BOB in that respect.

In light of that its not really practical to compare only two of the combatants!