Poltawa air raid, summer 1944

[Kuba Plewka]

I'm looking for informations about german air raid on Poltawa air base - exact date and info about unit engaged.

Thanks!

Kuba

[Nick Beale]

Excuse the advertisement but there's a short account of the raid in my book "Kampfflieger Vloume 4", just published by Classic.

From the American side, Roger A. Freeman's "Mighty Eighth War Diary" gives a good breakdown of the units involved and their losses.

Alfred Price's "Last Year of the Luftwaffe" also covers the raid.

[Andrei Demjanko]

Hello !

The date is night 21-22 June 1944, The German units engaged were KG27, KG53 and KG55, KG55 had their target Mirgorod, were USAAF fighters were based, but almost all aircraft of this unit failed to locate Mirgorod and were ordered to bomb Poltava. The Soviet air unit defending Poltava that night was 802 IAP PVO (with Yak-9's), Soviet pilots failed to made contact with intruders.

Some German bombers bombed Mirgorod and Piryatin, but caused only light damage


Andrei

[Flitzer]

I'd suggest finding a copy of The Poltava Affair, by Glenn B. Infield, 265 pages,
Macmillion Publishing Co., Inc. (1973).

[Carl-Fredrik Geust]

A more recent book is Mark J.Conversino: Fighting with the Soviets - The Failure of Operation Frantic 1944-1945, University Press of Kansas, 1997. ISBN 0-7006-0808-7. Recently a number of books have also been published in Russia and Ukraine,
Carl