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Luftwaffe and Axis Air Forces Please use this forum to discuss the German Luftwaffe and the Air Forces of its Allies. |
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#31
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Johannes, please send me an e-mail address in PM. I will send you stuff to see.
Gabor |
#32
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Quote:
His claims are detailed with time and place while for most pilots we don't even know the date. |
#33
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
I would say that any discussion about patterns without relevant German combat reports is a little bit pointless. There is a significant difference between overenthsiasm, not unusual in desperate dog fights, and deliberate fake claims.
In regard of the German victories, there was a lot of overclaim since the beginning of the war. It becomes apparent when one compares details of losses. The problem is, apart of lack of combat reports, that quite too often essential details like time & place are missing. Also exact circumstances of Allied losses are often not known. Thus matching of both contains a big grain of salt. I suppose that proper scrutiny of ETO/MTO aces would lead to quite dramatic conclusions. Aside, shared kills and friendly fire are also to be considered. Still, without combat reports nothing can be said for sure. |
#34
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Hi Franek
We known also all the date/time/place/type of Luftwaffe claims, these can obviously be compared to Allied losses. A.S.M claims seem to have survived for most of the war, these do give a pilots report of the combat, munitions used, height, direction of attack e.t.c, and the witness completes a separate report. Abschussemeldung papers seem to survive from the pilots only, and are much rarer, but with Barkhorn I think I have about 130 of these. Basically Barkhorn can be investigated until the end of 1944, and has been and the conclusion is that though sometimes mistaken, Barkhorn was honest. Each nation had a different score procedure, the English added-up shared claims, the Italian's I believe, and as strange as it sounds shared in a claim i.e if a pilot shoots down an enemy ALL his staffel get the claim. But within the Luftwaffe they followed the Luftwaffe rules within JGr.Ital. But ALL nations over-claimed, ALL nations had basically liars. But those exposed as over-claimers within the Luftwaffe all shared certain patterns in their claims, there are others being exceptional pilots who also had these patterns that were honest like Marseille, but these patterns are so profound that I cab pre-guess the dis-honest guys, and usually can associate them with certain comrades that helped each other, sometimes I just cannot see how they did it, but they did. We have established through Russian losses that Maximilian Stotz was a little less than honest. With 4./JG54 and JG76 he would possibly have been in collusion with Hans Philipp, then he seems to have lost the opportunity for quite some time to over-claim, the Hans Hahn borrows him for a short while and both their claims are extraordinary in numbers, then Hahn is gone and Stotz goes to 6./JG54, shortly after he is in collusion with Reinhold Hoffmann, Stotz is lost and then Hoffmann is in collusion with Emil Lang, again they make extraordinary claims, claims that have been investigated by losses expert and proved to be largely over-claims, and sometimes just plain false claims, in fact Lang's "record day" would seem to have been planned, Lang had pre-chosen his wingmen according to Norbert Hannig, who I think was not involved in Lang's over-claiming, according to Hannig Lang set out to set the record! Keep well Johannes |
#35
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Thank you Johannes, documents sent in e-mail.
Gabor |
#36
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Hi Johannes
To the best of my knowledge, a lot of German claims/credited victories of 1940-41 period are often missing essential details like time and place. Even so, a close comparison with the available Allied data suggests, that there are some errors in the records, whatever the reason. Thus a thorough analysis of combats in the period is often impossible. With many aircraft and combats around, narratives are often essential to establish what had actually happened. The verification system is irrelevant, and no one can be called a liar as long as it can be proven that the report filed is a complete fiction. Mind you the situation that there is a claim and a loss in the same location just indicates a probability and is not a fact. I have came across numerous such cases, when it turned over aircraft were lost due to different causes rather than enemy action. Best wishes Franek |
#37
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Hi Franek
You are correct about the mikrofilms. Basically earlier claims are typed-out per Staffel or occasionally Gruppe, then abruptly in late July 1942 this become daily claims in two groups East and West for all units, however some units are late in joining the daily claims. With the earlier type lots of units sheets are missing, in fact sometimes just a single page is missing for a Staffel, but I'll know exactly how many claims are on a sheet, and the time period as they run in almost exact datum order, but the sheet do not they might appear on the mikrofilms in an order such as 2,1,3,4,6,5 e.t.c, but are usually actually numbered themselves. The mikrofilm daily sheets(all hand written) are only really complete between October 1943 when JG1 starts daily mikrofilm entries and the end of September 1944 when JG5 stops making daily mikrofilm entriies, and October 1944 would seem to be a huge month for them, but sadly all missing. Also for January 1944 in the West only the A.S.M entries have survived. But generally daily mikrofilm entries are good until the end of 1944, but become incomplete for some units during December 1944.. There are also the daily A/S.M mikrofilms from the beginning of the war until they just get added to the daily mikrofilms There is also surviving for partial K-L only actual listings for individual pilots like Emil Lang and Walter Krupinski, but only up to summer 1944. So for the missing periods we rely on flugbücher, abschusselist, KBT papers, Leistungbücher and Staffel/Gruppe Tafel. Also there are mikrofilms that list claims by Staffel by amerk number, but these give time and date only, no type/pilot e.t.c, but most are missing the Staffel whose earlier typed-out mikrofilms are missing anyway, but in some cases like 8./JG5 they are there, so I know the dates and the times of this staffel claims, but not the claimant, but can them compare with Leistungsbücher and flugbücher to fill in. You may remember Jochen Prien's earlier publications like JG3, he previously had this form of mikrofilms and added in those he knew from other documents, but also guested some of the others. I have details of 67,000 confirmed claims, and a few thousand unconfirmed claims, but would say that the true total of confirmed claims would be 70,000- 75,000, probably closer to the smaller number. With flak claims, there are the unit claims that survive, but when the daily mikrofilm entries started they became added for all flak units on a separate sheet with each day. Looking at them it would appear that flak claims were shared by many units all given the same time/type. The most complete units for claims on all forms of mikrofilms are JG2, JG52 and JG53, the worst JG1 and JG5. The mikrofilms are extremely accurate, but have gaps, and the gap period are exactly know. Keep well Johannes |
#38
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Hello Johannes and others
This may,perhaps,help to understand the complexity of approvals using microfilms or not. During a bombing of Berlin in november 1943,documents confirming or not "abschusse" were destroyed. OKL asked all units to send to R.d.l.u.Ob.d.l. before 01/04/44,a summary table of the victories already approved or REJECTED,copies of the claims of victories transmitted before 25/11/43 and not yet approved. The claims mentioned in the OKL list preceding 25/11/43 come from a RECONSTRUCTION:it's easy to imagine the risk of omissions,confusions..... Obviously,this does not clear the 'cheats' but it's a link in a complex chain wich does not help to see clearly. If we add to it other links of chain where all the criteria requiring a real homologation are not met,we find "experts" with suspect scores, I have an exemple wich seems very telling to me: Staffelkapitän report on 95° to 98° "abschusse" of Lt Heinrich Sterr (27/03/44) 'This report cannot be written because the person concerned is also the Staffelführer Sterr,Lt and Staffelführer Gruppenkommandeur Report During an entire group takeoff to counter an attack from Petchory airfield,seven Il-2 were shot down as well as five Yak-9.Lt Wolf shot down two Yak-9 and one Il-2;Lt Sterr three Il-2 and one Yak-9:Lt Jung,Resch and Uffz Kraft each one Il-2;Ofw Grollmuss and Fw.Bungert each one Yak-9. Let us say the participants and Witnesses,all the planes were observed until their destruction,wich makes these claims certain. As they are presented by serious pilots experienced and talented,they cannot be doubted. The group therefore requests confirmation of these "abschusse" both for the pilots and for the unit Erich Rudorffer,Major and Kommandant of II/JG54,QG,25/05/1944. They were approved because Rudorffer says that the pilots were serious (ah!),it's interesting on the part of a guy whose many of his claims are suspect. Michel |
#39
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
Hi Johannes
That is my point. Whatever the reason, the problem is that we cannot recreate course of events with the available data. Let's pick a famous pilot, and try to verify his score. If we have a loss in appropriate time and place, then it is a success. Nonetheless we also find a number of claims in the same area and approximate time, and a number of unassigned claims, where it is not known if they are relevant or not. Hence, we cannot say if the pilot in question is reliable or not. Even if we had those data, then there is a problem of verification of the Allied losses. We often do not know exact circumstances and place of loss which is essential. This is especially valid for aircraft lost over continent. Nonetheless in several cases we can find out that the reason of particular loss was technical, collision or friendly fire, thus not relevant to the German claims. I am far to make a general statement, but based on fragmentary research, the German overclaim over England and France 1940-1941 was heavy, much heavier than widely believed. Does it mean that the claimants were dishonest? Some perhaps were, but I guess that in most cases the reason was exactly the same as for Allied pilots in the same period - in the mess of intense dog fight they were unable to properly assess results of combats. The bigger combat, the larger overclaim. Even in such cases it is possible to work out what was going on, but extensive narratives are just essential. The extensive collection of Allied combat reports helps to make some order, but as long as there is a gap on the German side, I am afraid never to be filled, we will never know for sure. BTW Interesting to note that JG 2 claims are one of the best covered, as I have a lot of problems with them in 1941. Best wishes Franek |
#40
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Re: Barkhorn: claims vs. victories
A short note from one who had not went very deep on claim/overclaim research.
Air fighting was most of time very different on the Eastern Front that in the NW Europe, being much less "concentrated" over the very long Eastern Front. Jagdfliegern often operated in pairs or fours there, so making things much easier to us, later day reserachers. Air fighting there was so different that the LW learned that it was best to give some retraining to the units transferred from East to West, so that they relearned the fighting tactics used with bigger formations. Juha |
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