Armee de l'Air ground losses May-June 1940

[takata_1940]

Hello Juha,

So from these numbers and the number from your message one can also make a following calculation 815 - 340 = 475 and then the "grey area", those 220 out of 340 survivors which were not anymore combat ready. So it seems that some 475 were lost to all causes between 10.5. - 24.6.40. Would you like to comment these numbers?

Situations de Armée de l'Air :

10th May - Colonies (135)
- 105 North Africa
- 20 Lebanon (Syria)
- 10 Indochina

10th May - France (815)
- 280 Combat Units Total Strength
- 145 Second Line (as reinforcement or overhauling)
- 145 Training Units (non combat ready)
- 135 Depot (unavailable; non combat ready stock EAA.301)
- 035 Depot (recieving equipment EAA.301)
- 075 Repair Workshops (rebuilding) -> most of them would be lost or captured

Already lost : 65
Exported : 60

July, 1940
- Place / Flyworthy / damaged or destroyed :
- North Africa = 55 / 50
- Lebanon = 15 / 5
- Indochina = 10 / -
- France = 120 / 220
- Total = 200 / 275

I guess you can do the math with that.
:-)

Regards,
Olivier

[Juha]

Thanks a lot, Olivier
very much appreciated. And it is nice to notice that Pierre Leyvastre's 33 years old article is still relevant. It was a bit older than I remembered and in late 1973 the magazine wasn't yet divided to Air Enthusiast and to Air International and was a monthly publication called Air Enthusiast.
I have a question on MS 410s but opened a new thread for that question.

Thankfully
Juha

[takata_1940]

Originally Posted by Juha

Thanks a lot, Olivier
very much appreciated. And it is nice to notice that Pierre Leyvastre's 33 years old article is still relevant. It was a bit older than I remembered and in late 1973 the magazine wasn't yet divided to Air Enthusiast and to Air International and was a monthly publication called Air Enthusiast.
I have a question on MS 410s but opened a new thread for that question.

Thankfully
Juha

Hello Juha,

I hope it was helpfull, but let me add something :
Those numbers (rounded) are those from the French archives. But, they have to be cross-checked as with other data. We found discrepancies with other findings. They have to be carefully used as the situation on 20th July 1940 is somewhat inacurate and very difficult to fix.
We didn't do it for the MS.406 at this point and, there is a good possibility that some data are just wrong. But it's the best source I had to show my point (beside the H-75 about which the work is already done by Lionel Persyn, so I won't post the data here).

Regards,
Olivier Bacca.

[Alex Smart]

Hi,

Just to say in support of Oliver, The Les Butler/Tony Woods luftwaffe Claims lists has for the period 20-9-1939 to 18-6-1940 some 244 claims by Luftwaffe pilots.

The Mushroom book Fighters over France & the Low Countries gives for the period 10-5-1940 to 18-6-1940 a number of 62 lost.
The Butler Woods list for the same period gives 223 as claimed.

Alex

[Lucien]

Pierre Leyvastre who passed away a few years ago was, to my point of view, the most serious and most knowledgeable French air historian. A very discret, almost shy person, he knew pretty well what he was writing about. And even 30 or 40 years later his works is, as you put it, still relevant. A former figther pilot himself of which flying career was marred, then stoped by health problems, he spent a lifetime researching AA records.
Few people know it, but Pierre Leyvastre was the author of the French parts of the William Green/Macdonald magnificent serie "War planes of the second world war" published in the late sixties...

[Juha]

Lucien
thanks a lot on info on Pierre Leyvastre. I have Vols 5 - 8 of Green's "War planes of the second world war" series and I bought them mainly because of the info on French a/c in them. By that time I already had rather good info on British, US, German, Japanese and even on Italian a/c but to get info in English or in Finnish on French a/c was a problem and the info on them in those volumes of Green's series seemed good and I was very satisfied to my buy.Also the article in Air Enthusiast seemed very professional and that was the reason that I tried to memorise the main facts mentioned in it.

Alex
I also had Mushroom book Fighters over France & the Low Countries and my adding produced the same result. On claims, it seemed than some Bloch 152s were claimed as H-75s and also probably some of the numerous Spitfire claims were in fact against D.520s. I mean there were too few Bloch 152 and D. 520 claims so there must have been rather many misidentifications. The target identification was a problem in all AFs and probably still is.

Olivier
thanks for the clarification.

Juha