The Victories of Luftwaffe Experten (Ost) - New Considerations

[Broncazonk]

I am re-reading E.R. Hooton's, "War Over The Steppes ~ The Air Campaign on the Eastern Front 1941-45.

Page 166: "...the desperate need for them (Russian replacement pilots in 1942) meant the 'foals' (sherebyat) went to reserve units for operational training sometimes with as little as three (3) flying hours in their log books, while others as late as 1943 had just 15-20 hours. There was little gunnery or aerobatic training, which some schools banned, and to increase their flying hours 'foals' ferried aircraft. Even operational training was restricted to an average 12.5 hours for a combat pilot (fighter, assault, bomber) in 1942, rising to 17 in 1943 and 20.5 in 1944."

Next paragraph describes how student pilots were nutritionally starved during flight training, "...one pilot reported he and three (3) comrades had to share a loaf of bread and a tomato, (for the day) while others survived on weak pea soup that left them without the strength to fly. At one gunnery school students lived on cabbage leaves and potato peels (scavenged) from trash bins."

The next paragraph explains that *on any given combat mission* in 1942, 1943, and 1944, well over half (1/2) of the Russian pilots were flying their very first combat mission.

And, "...in May 1943, in Sudet's 237th ShAP/305th ShAD all but two (2) airmen were flying their first combat mission."

*** So...if any of the above is factual, I'm moving back into the, "maybe Hartmann, et. al., were not over-claimers after all," category. (I'm thinking maybe the Russians were lying after all in their record-keeping.)

An experienced Luftwaffe fighter pilot would be scoring at will, no? Every day--every mission--even 5, 6, 7 victories a day. (It wasn't really "aerial combat," more like aerial murder, and simple aerial murder at that, no?)

Also, this explains why so many Experten in the East *died almost immediately* after being transferred to the West--they never developed the skills--didn't have the experience--to kill wolves, because they had spent the last few years murdering lambs.

Bronc

[Nick Hector]

Surely the truth is in the losses.

We pretty much see the same amount of overclaiming in the west as what we do in the east.

[HGabor]

It is highly unlikely. Service histories of Soviet warplanes, tanks, etc. are well documented from the factory gates to their loss. Especially from 1943. The Soviet loss records do not lie, because they are the prime documents which help to identify missing and recovered aircrews based on reported engine numbers, AC serial numbers. (We also saw plane recovery where we already knew what the IL-2 engine number should be prior to digging it out - and it was a 100% match to the Soviet loss-report which pointed to that location.) And most importantly the same sets of reports confirm some Axis pilots' claims to over 90%, while for only 20, or less % for others... But this information has been on this forum for many years now.

Experten stories are only 'cosmetics' which cannot hide the massive overclaim rate of some pilots let it be in the East, or in the West.

Gabor

[Nick Hector]

Originally Posted by HGabor

It is highly unlikely. Service histories of Soviet warplanes, tanks, etc. are well documented from the factory gates to their loss. Especially from 1943. The Soviet loss records do not lie, because they are the prime documents which help to identify missing and recovered aircrews based on reported engine numbers, AC serial numbers. (We also saw plane recovery where we already knew what the IL-2 engine number should be prior to digging it out - and it was a 100% match to the Soviet loss-report which pointed to that location.) And most importantly the same sets of reports confirm some Axis pilots' claims to over 90%, while for only 20, or less % for others... But this information has been on this forum for many years now.

Experten stories are only 'cosmetics' which cannot hide the massive overclaim rate of some pilots let it be in the East, or in the West.

Gabor

Exactly

[Larry deZeng]

Fighter pilots have HUGE egos and that leads to wild exaggeration and outright lies on the part of some.

L.

[Nick Beale]

Originally Posted by Larry deZeng

Fighter pilots have HUGE egos and that leads to wild exaggeration and outright lies on the part of some.

L.

A combination of competitive young men, few women, horsepower, adrenalin and benzedrine, I suspect.

[Broncazonk]

Very well. The Russian records are correct and certain Luftwaffe pilots were dishonest in their mission reports and victory claims. Bottom line: an enormous amount of time and work has been expended in answering this question (by multiple historians on this forum) and I believe and trust the results of their dedicated investigative efforts.

But now we have a new--rather obvious--mystery: *why didn't* the Luftwaffe produce multiple Experten with 300+ historically verifiable victory claims? In all honesty, there should be at least one with 500 historically verifiable victory claims, no?

The Luftwaffe went east with a core number of fighter pilots who had combat experience in Spain, Poland, France and Britain. And from the very beginning, in 1941, the Russians were putting up poorly-trained (barely able to fly) pilots that were flying vastly inferior aircraft, in astonishing numbers.

This trend continued in 1942, 1943 and 1944. On any given combat mission in 1941, 1942, 1943, and 1944, well over half (1/2) of the Russian combat pilots (in a vast formation) were flying their very first combat mission. In May 1943, in Sudet's 237th ShAP/305th ShAD all but two (2) airmen were flying their first combat mission.

** In these circumstances, why didn't the Luftwaffe produce Experten with incredible but valid victory totals?

We are missing a piece of the puzzle, I think...

Bronc

[James A Pratt III]

Note food was in short supply in the USSR in WW II/GPW period see the book "A Taste of War". I would also like to point out there were a lot of under trained RAF and USAAF aircrew thrown into combat during the 1940-43 period.
As for the IL-2 many of their gunners according to BCRS Vol 4 lacked training and some got sent there because they had done something wrong that would have got them sent to a penal battalion. The BCRS volume also talk about the lack of training of a lot of VVS aircrew.

[Andrey Kuznetsov]

Hello Bronc,

Maybe you remember the thread of 2017 with your participation about "War Over The Steppes:
http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showth...ht=War+Steppes
The beginning of that closed thread is more or less informative.

I should add that the book in question is full of strange statements.
For example the statement "On any given combat mission in 1941, 1942, 1943, and 1944, well over half (1/2) of the Russian combat pilots (in a vast formation) were flying their very first combat mission" is absolutely incorrect. To date on https://pamyat-naroda.ru/documents/ has uploaded a lot of scans of regiments' diaries with day-by-day list of missions with the names of all participated pilots in each mission. You can personally check whether the statement you quoted is true.

There were definitely serious problems with training etc., but still the picture was less apocalyptic than can be concluded from the book.

Originally Posted by Broncazonk

...the desperate need for them (Russian replacement pilots in 1942) meant the 'foals' (sherebyat) went to reserve units ...

It is unclear where he got the idea that young pilots were called "foals". It sounds strange. Pilots who were not put into operation yet or inexperienced pilots were called "young pilots" or, more unofficially, youngsters. This Hooton's statement is a trifle, but it creates an additional feeling of falseness.

The same is for the statement "... two aircraft ("para"), commonly described by the very un-socialist term of ‘Master’ and ‘Slave’ (vedushchiy i vedomyy)".

"Vedushchiy" (= ведущий) is a leader or, literally, "the one who leads", vedomyy (= ведомый) is a wingman or, literally, "the one who is being led. It is a great error to translate it as "master and slave" with the emphasis on the "non-socialist" nature of the terms. Neither in the Soviet nor in the Tsarist Air Forces, the terms "master and slave" were impossible in principle.

Best regards,
Andrey

[edwest2]

Hello Andrey,

Thank you for this clarification.

Best,
Ed West