Top Fw 190 aces

[Johannes]

Hi

I do have access to Russian losses. I used Nowotny's units claims to suggest who he was working his fiddle with. The one name that should have stood-out but didn't was Rudolf Rademacher, yet one that did was Gerhard Loos, as well as a known associates of his Anton Döbele and Karl Schnörrer. So even the myth about the most successful Schwarm would be incorrect. Same with Hermann Graf, Alfred Grislawski didn't actually have much contact with him within JG52, moreover Grislawski did very well later, while Graf did not.

I would have guess Tegtmeier was honest by his score pattern, and Kittel's though having many multiple in a day, is not that outrageous.

With Nowotny I believe he was in competition with Günther Rall, which he was always going to win, whatever Rall claimed, Nowotny would claim more, and you can see that Nowotny's accomplices were rewarded in claims themselves, in fact nowhere else have I seen such volumes of rewards, the only other groups to come anywhere near them are Emil Lang/Reinhold Hoffmann/Alfred Groß, then Max Stotz/Hans Hahn and Joachim Kirschner/Hans Grünberg, later with JG27 Heinrich Bartels, with Hermann Graf/Ernst Süß/Leopold Steonbatz/Johann Kalb/Hermann Wolf, and then Erich Rudorffer/Kurt Tangermann.

Rudorffer, Nowotny and Hahn used their authority and Kommandeur to abuse the system, as did Kirschner with JG27 only.

With Erich Hartmann it''s much less obvious, there is no association with Hans-joachim Birkner like we should find if the wingman theory is correct, but perhaps Herbert Bachnick and Werner Puls.

What are your opinions on:-

Rudolf Rademacher
Gerhard Thyben
Heinrich Sterr
Heinz Wernicke
Albin Wolf
Ulrich Wernitz
Werner Lucas
Werner-Kurt Brändle
Walter Oesau
Wolf Ettel
Walter Dahl
Viktor Bauer
Leopold Münster

Keep Well

Johannes

[knusel]

Good evening,

why do you think Soviet loss records are complete ?

Cheers,

Michael

[Johannes]

Hi Michael

You pose an interesting question. Answer is I don't know if they are complete.
However if they were incomplete then it would be the same fate for all the great aces i.e all would be "over-claimers", but the work of Daniel and Gabor Horvath(verified victories-top JG52 aces over Hungary 1944-45. is quite clear that some pilots over-claimed a lot, others like Barkhorn and Lipfert were very accurate i.e their claims matched these Russian losses . It's the same for the mikrofilms.....there must be so much missing, but it's always the same pilots non-accounted for .....like Tanzer, all his comrades are matching what we expect, so why just his missing?

Research showed that Barkhorn "over-claimed" as he neared "300", but we now know that this period i.e 1945 not covered by the mikrofilms was basically not researchable as the dates and types provided were another Hans Ring game, this was proved by documentation that show four claims by Barkhorn not covered by his abschüßelist. Therefore it is very unlikely that Barkhorn suddenly started "over-claiming". It will be the same with Hartmann i.e the dates we have for him in 1945, are very likely to be largely incorrect, but unlike Barkhorn he did "over-claim" earlier, and is likely to have continued to do so.

Kind Regards

Johannes

[HGabor]

For the periods later in the war (i.e. 1944-1945) when the Soviets were completely winning on the Eastern Front, when their records were not being stored in major population centers which were being bombed relentlessly (ex Berlin, see Verified Victories pages 18-19 for more information), when without accurate documentation the resupply of units would be impossible, when the excavation of aircraft wreckage and exhumation of fallen personnel matches 100% with the documents and their location contents, when not only the combat losses but also the write-off/accidents/ferry accidents/all-the-above are documented, when the receipts [HA! these are invoices!!!] of air frames and engines that are available for pickup at the specific BAO, when one is able to track the life journey of an individual air frame from the factory to the junk heap, when the in-and-out documents for units are available listing not only air frame numbers but also engine numbers, when (in this case moving to ground units) one has to go to Russian archives to gather information on Sherman tanks because the US Army did not keep its records on its own material (!), I'm probably missing a few ... that's when you know you re dealing with a complete loss record corpus.

To the points Johannes makes, exactly! Missing aircraft loss data in an archive that only affects 1 pilot is non-logical, it would affect a lot more than only 1 pilot... but this is not the case. Some pilots (again one will have to read into Verified Victories) even have what we called "unclaimed claims" confirmed by Soviet loss records, so the records don't only oppose the Luftwaffe documentation in ways which "hurt" the scores of pilots, but in cases they actually "boost" their scores [boost as in they CAN be verified! this is extremely exciting]. These cases occur when pilots write about their exploits yet don't have them listed in their claims lists (ex Lipfert and his Bf 109 claim or his drunken IL-2 claim or his Boston claim...

This is why we know the loss record is complete, because it contains losses for situations which one cannot even think/dream about, because it cover all scenarios with little/no errors, and that is the true reality of war.

Inversely, why do we know that the Luftwaffe losses are incomplete? Well because diaries and flight books and letters and personnel loss cards and a thousand other documents point to additional losses which are not described in the main loss record books (these and the fact that many were destroyed after the war). Well using these same type of diverse material on the VVS, one finds that the loss records contain all these losses, and in cases even more.

Cheers,

Gabor

[knusel]

Good afternoon,

the other day I heard that the Luftwaffe scored 45.000 Eastern front kills. Is it possible to estimate how many Soviet losses were atttributed to aerial combat and thereby calculate the general overclaiming average ?

Cheers,

Michael

[HGabor]

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, Verified Victories: Top JG 52 Aces Over Hungary 1944-45, page 200, plus obviously the rest of the book

Cheers,
Gabor

[knusel]

Found it at the German amazon:
https://www.amazon.de/Verified-Victo...ps%2C97&sr=8-1

Have a nice weekend,

Michael

[HGabor]

Yes, that's it. Have a nice weekend to you too.
Gabor

[Johannes]

Hi Michael

Gabor has answered the question about hoe reliable Sowiet losses were. In additional he e.mailed me with some stark words i.e The sowiet losses are "amazingly detailed and absolute trustworthy"

Kind Regards

Johannes

[knusel]

Good evening Gentlemen,

OK...but JG52 is a pure Bf109 unit.
To resume the Fw190 topic: in March 1943 12./JG2 transitioned from Fw190 to Bf109. Was this before or after Georg-Peter Eder claimed his 8Mar Spitfire ?

Best greetings from Switzerland,

Michael