New Military History Blog - first post about loss of Ju 188 in the East in 1944

[edwest2]

Hello Dan,


Your comment at the end of the article ignores many other issues. In the East, depending on location, 50 to 60 tons of supplies had to be flown in daily. The transports were sometimes shot down or crashed in reasonably good shape but were no longer airworthy, or were later destroyed on the ground. The Americans and British were not always in agreement. This was not a war of straight mathematics but a very large number of factors. Everyone was clamoring for priority of some kind: conflicts over who gets more fuel for American or British tanks and so on.

The war in the air was part of the war on the ground. Again, mistakes were made, by both sides, or depended on the changing war situation. Allocations were not made by the numbers but depended on what was available.

The Battle for France saw - with all due respect - lesser British aircraft being sacrificed to a superior German fighter force.

A bullet by bullet, engine by engine comparison is too narrow.



Best,
Ed