WW2TV Horvath lecture/presentation

[harryurz]

In a wider context it seems to me that WW1 and WW2 fighter pilots of all nations were of a similar personality; very young, intuitive, well-educated, self confident, often petulant men full of enthusiasm and highly motivated, dutiful and dedicated (tho sometimes fearful) to their task. Yet only a few were gifted enough to become adept at their profession; essentially shooting down or killing other fliers. The Hawks and pigeons scenario.......?


These who regularly claimed enemy aircraft shot down or destroyed were all however at the tender mercy of their respective air force administrative infrastructure; namely the dreaded intelligence departments, who collated their reports, often asked awkward questions and continually doubted their eye witness accounts.

So surely if some 'aces' were making exaggerated claims it was the job of the ever pragmatic Intelligence Officer to moderate these claims and restore reality?
But in the case of overclaims it could be deduced that the IO's were more lax or tolerant in allowing claims (due to pressure from COs, high command, for the sake of morale or being simply bullied?)

All fighter pilots over-claimed, to me it appeared most IO's allowed them to?

[keith A]

Cheers Stig

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by Stig Jarlevik

In 1941 over France the RAF was over claiming around 5 to 1, Ultra told the British about this.
Cheers
Stig

Did it? I have not read the ULTRA 1941 (except for one message!) but I would be quite surprised if regualr fighter loss reports were being recorded from France where the units could use long-established landline communications. I have looked at several months of 1942 and found that material from the Western Front is very rare, most of the traffic coming instead from the Mediterranean.

[keith A]

I think it's a bit unfair to claim the Luftwaffe is being unfairly scrutinised. The desire and popularity of researching aerial claims is relatively new and the investigation of the Luftwaffe does yield valuable information about how accurate British Commonwealth and American (as well as Russian, French, Polish etc.)were. Often it can be seen that the death of an aircraft is claimed by both sides in the same air battle.

To ignore the credibility of the claims of the Luftwaffe aces because the RAF, USAAF is not being researched to the same extent is not a valid argument. From my own reading the RAF has been evaluated, discussed and published in a myriad of books and other media, to the extent that we are able to identify where overclaiming has occurred. However the RAF aces such as Johnson, Finucane, Bader, Stanford Tuck, Malan, Beurling, Caldwell etc do not have the same world-wide interest as Hartmann and Barkhorn. The details of their combats are easily found and consequently their records are easily investigated and explained (I would recommend Anthony Cooper's books on the Kenley and Darwin Wings for forensic examination of overclaiming). The 100s and 100s of claims by the high scoring Luftwaffe aces until recently have been accepted despite some obvious issues as to their accuracy. Russian records now allow us to examine how accurate they really were. The lack of desire or interest to investigate American air aces to the same extent may have a number of reasons.

What I would say is if you are interested in researching the allies overclaiming there's no better resource than this forum and the books, blogs and websites of it's many authors and contributors. The advantage is that unlike the Luftwaffe very few Allied pilots shot down five or more in a single mission (and almost all of those are Americans), let alone seventeen in a day! If you are not then THAT is the reason the Allies do not get the same focus. Those of us who spend a lot of money and time buying and reading the works in print already know a lot of the answers because we asked the questions. There's still work to do on the RAF but the scores are already in. Faced with an intelligence requirement that after the 1941 campaign (overclaiming still allowed Allied bombers to hit targets with minimal losses, while Luftwaffe "aces" chased Spitfires around the sky to put another bar on the tail) demanded reasonable accuracy. As the war progressed the RAF could address issues such as effectiveness of it's pilots and it's aircraft. Massive overclaiming by fighter pilots chasing "ace" status does neither of these.

best regards

Keith

[NickM]

Originally Posted by VtwinVince

You make some good points Keith. BTW the list of individuals who seem to be on some personal mission to besmirch all things German does not include you, and if I neglected to respond to some points raised, my apologies. Regarding the astronomical claim numbers on the eastern front, I think the early part of the campaign was the 'happy time' for Jagdwaffe pilots, when the equipment and aircrew gaps between the two air forces were fairly wide. Having said that, and only as a general statement, the quality of both aircraft and crews in the Red Air Force caught up fairly quickly.

Well, not JUST the East had a 'happy time' for the Jagdwaffe: When the 109E7s and F4s reached North Africa, the DAF was still stuck flying Hurricane MkIs and MkIIs--and the various P40 variants didn't quite close the gap either. Over the Channel The Spit Mk V was badly outclassed by the early mark FW190As (that being said, being careless or overworked on the Channel front could get a fellow killed very quickly--even before the Spit Mk IX arrived). And I am not even factoring in the the large number of very experienced German Pilots who were still serving in the units on the Channel and North Africa.

NM

[VtwinVince]

Good points Nick, although like any ongoing technological contest, there was a swing back and forth when one side 'caught up' with the other, not unlike the first conflict.

[NickM]

Yup, the tech advantage traded hands several times throughout the war, but the number of experienced pilots only went one way for the Jagdwaffe after 1942