German combat claims

Of course Western Front fighter pilots had the disadvantage (with daylight raids) of thinking that they’d knocked down a B17 or whatever and it limping along to be finished off by another fighter, or alternatively simultaneous attacks on the same bomber.

JC

I agree with you Gnome. That scenario described by Contact seems unlikely, especially since I recall Wg Comm Ron Watts telling me that when attacking another aircraft at night they usually had no idea what it was – as it was pitch black often if under cloud. They simply had to rely on the ground operators who directed them onto the target – vand the ground guys assumed it was German as it was on radar but had no IFF. Ron said a lot of Allied aircraft were accidentally shot down by Allied nightfighters – I guess if their IFF packed up they were seen as hostile.

So how could a German pilot recognise a Mossie in the pitch black, I think it’s be difficult. And also then distinguishing it as a fighter instead of a bomber. Na!

That website I mentioned belongs to Tony Wood. But for some reason it doesn’t seem to be working right now, perhaps if you try again later or maybe he’s moved.

Something has certainly gone wrong with that link – here is the new one it seems …

http://www.luftboard.ndo.co.uk/tonywood.htm

I don’t have any numbers or proof of this but I read somewhere that the number of Russian losses was comparable to the number of claimed kills by Germans on the Eastern front. Maybe western front pilots overclaimed to keep pace with their Eastern front comrades. 😉

Hard to say Dave, I would think it unlikely, but there was a lot of kudos in shooting down a Mosquito.

And the argument that a night fighter pilot might find himself attacking a heavily armed fighter (and therefore what? turn away?) is a bit thin for two reasons, both of which the German air defenses were completely up on:
1. The significant majority of Mosquitoes over Germany were either bombers or recon aircraft
2. Every interview or book etc. I’ve read from the night fighter perspective makes it very clear that the air war was no quarter “me or him” thing – attacking bombers was dangerous, flying around at night in a war zone was dangerous, landing was dangerous (o/a intruders).

So I don’t think it’s reasonable to suggest a night fighter would have second thoughts about chasing or firing on a Mosquito, on the contrary they’d love to bag one and put in considerable effort to do so. And that’s because they were a pain, comparatively invulnerable (altitude & speed) and therefore a challenge. I think, with respect, the propanganda is the Contact magazine article – give the lads a boost sort of stuff.

cheers, gnome

Thanks guys for all your input. Plenty of food for thought there.

Dave

Never heard of that, best ask on the 12 O’clock High board, someone there will know. If it was true, was that reversed when the 262B was operational ?

Dave

I have just read in a recently acquired copy of RNZAF Contact magazine, from January 1945, the following which has an interesting twist regarding claims I think.

“German Air Defences Hampered
The deterrent effect of the Mosquitoes is in many ways as important as the actual destruction of enemy fighters. The German night-fighter pilot never knows now whether, instead of attacking a comparitively lightly armed bomber, he will himself be attacked by a heavily-armed and very fast manouvrable fighter. Our offensive Mosquitoes are regarded as such that if a German pilot succeeds in shooting one down he is allowed to count this as two aircraft destroyed.”

Is this true, or propaganda?

To be fair, the RAF was overclaiming by a similarly large amount too.

This subject is a minefield. There is a lot of difference of opinion regarding the combat claims of the Luftwaffe.

The book Luftwaffe Fighter Aces By Mike Spick (ISBN 1-85367-560-19) deals with the subject in some detail. I’m not in agreement with everything that he writes in that book, but the basic conclusion draw, is that the amazing tallies of victories cradited to some of the german fighter aces boils down to difference in operational culture of the fighters and superior tactics in the first half of the war, and survival of the fittest in the later part of the war.

There can be no doubt that during the early part of the war, the German Jagdwaffe had a huge tactical superiority over over the rest of Europe. Their use of open line abrest formations was far superior over the tight formations flown by the RAF for example. Early on, that must have contributed to a lot of victories.
The operational culture of the Jagdwaffe was very different from that of the RAF. The RAF was a team effort, while the Jagdwaffe was more of an individual effort by a team of experten. It was the leader of a flight, be it in a Staffel, gruppe or geshwader strength, that did the shooting. The sole purpose of the others was to cover his back from any nasty surprises. Thus, the leader was always in the best position to take on the enemy in good tactical situations. To take an example, on the 18th of august 1940, Gerhard Schöpfel leading jagdgeshwader 26, surprised Hurricanes of 501 Squadron near Dover. Having the tactical edge, he ordered the whole geshwader to remain on guard high above, while he swooped down alone and picked out four of the Hurricanes in less than two minutes, before the rest of the formation joined in. Had it been the RAF in the same situation, the whole formation would probably have gone down into the fight and the individual scores would have been lower, though the total score should have been roughly the same. This is not an isolated incidence, but the norm.

On the other hand we know, that the Jagdwaffe was overclaiming about 2 to 1 during the BoB, so can we then devide their scores by two?

Yes they used gun cameras, and no they didn’t include ground kills in totals { only the USAAF did this }. It can be said that the Eastern Front was a target rich environment, but by the same token having 10 Yak-3s on your six while your shooting down another wouldn’t make things all that comfortable I would say! In the early days the Luftwaffe had a field day over Russia , but by 1943 Russian pilots and aircraft were on a par, and so were their tactics. Hartmann didn’t even start his career until the ‘field days’ were over. Aces like Galland, Priller and Marseille fought only in the West where ‘we’ like to believe the pilots and aircraft were far superior.
There was a slightly different system when it came to shooting down the heavies over Europe, with knocking a bomber out of formation qualifying for a partial kill. For a more detailed answer try here, but be warned some may well be fed up with the question that is asked more than a few times…
http://disc.server.com/Indices/3051.html

Dave

Did the Luftwaffe use gun cameras?

Thanks for these comments guys. Clearly, German pilots had the opportunity to rack up many more kills (longer frontline service, etc), but this doesn’t completely address the question of just how accurate their claims tallies were. Whilst some of the kills were undoubtedly over home territory, this alone doesn’t guarantee accuracy (look at the RAF during the BoB), so how do we know their tallies are accurate? How were they verified that supposedly makes them more accurate than RAF tallies?

Gnome’s point about no fixed duration combat tours is the key issue here. In addition, many of the very high scoring aces, such as Eric Hartmann and Gunther Rall, achieved tha majority of their kills on the Eastern Front, which those who are still around will tell you, was a highly “target rich environment”!

That website I mentioned belongs to Tony Wood. But for some reason it doesn’t seem to be working right now, perhaps if you try again later or maybe he’s moved.

http://tonywood.cjb.net/

Another good site is the Luftwaffe Experten Message Board

http://p069.ezboard.com/bluftwaffeexperten71774

Good luck

Apologies for the lack of factual comment at this time (Monday morning, at work) but there is a web-site out there with all the various claims etc. made by the various German fighter units, by front, by year. I have the link on my home PC and will post it this evening.

As to whether that illuminates the issue of claims vs fact I do not know – except to say that BoB was an “away” fight whereas all homeland defence claims would be easy to verify (o/a smoldering wreckage lying about the place). Eastern front of course would have fluctuated between “home and away”.

Another factor to consider is that German pilots didn’t have the, shall we say, comfort of a tour type arrangement. They fought until they died, were captured or the war ended. Hence the large scores (and immense combat experience) racked up by some.