This happend in the MONTH of July and it was ONLY the III./ JG 2 that did it. Perhaps are the figures wrong but I got them from the Swedish author Crister Bergströms book Tyska flygarer under andra världskriget .
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No offense intended. I know you are citing another.
I am merely demonstrating the fact the Luftwaffe repeatedly made claims that do not match reality because that is how the Third Reich operated.
My numbers cited above were pulled off of the JG 2 Wikipedia page. Feel free to compare and contrast.
Bergstrom is a prolific writer on the Luftwaffe, but I cannot attest to his sources. It is certainly possible, but the Luftwaffe’s over inflated claims might be his rationale for making the statement. As Graf said, it is difficult to swallow.
That is Bernard Law Montgomery’s foolishness. It is not even close. But nice try.
You are right about Luftwaffes propaganda claims Bergström write that to but this in July is probably right that gruppe had some good pilots like Assi Hahns and Egon Mayer
In English, there is an old saying that ‘every dog has his day’. Perhaps it is true, I don’t know. All I can say is Luftwaffe claims rarely match Allied losses despite the existence of many elite Luftwaffe pilots.
Of course, when the head of your air force spends most of his time eating, drinking, shooting morphine and collecting art; is a hard count of how many airplanes you actually have really important? Goring was probably seeing double every time he visited any given airfield.
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The Liftwaffe did count different than the Allies.In English, there is an old saying that ‘every dog has his day’. Perhaps it is true, I don’t know. All I can say is Luftwaffe claims rarely match Allied losses despite the existence of many elite Luftwaffe pilots.
Of course, when the head of your air force spends most of his time eating, drinking, shooting morphine and collecting art; is a hard count of how many airplanes you actually have really important? Goring was probably seeing double every time he visited any given airfield.
If two Luftwaffe pilots shoot down a Spitfire both get a kill.
If two RAF pilots shoot down a BF 109 each gets half a kill.
Also the Luftwaffe counted kills on ground as a kill while the Allies did not.
Also, every side claimed vastly more kills than they achieved. If the kill counts were accurate then every side would have run out of planes, tanks and men by about 1942 (assuming their entire production was available by that date). On the reverse side, there was a tendency to use accounting tricks to reduce losses, such as the German practice to count only tanks that were completely destroyed as a loss.
Any bomber that lands back at base, regardless of what repairs it needs, is counted as a non-loss. So imagine an allied bomber making an a bombing run, that get attacks by two fighters and the local flack defences. One engine is damaged, belching out clouds of black smoke, and the bomber jettisons its load without performing a proper bombing run. Both fighters and the AA gunners claim a kill. The bomber crew returns and claims they released their bombs over the target. End result: the Germans claim 3 bombers destroyed and the Allies claim a successful mission. The real result is there is a field somewhere vaguely near the target with some new ponds and a repair workshop with some extra work.
Still sacrificing a regiment to capture some radar seems like a harsh exchange to me, even for Brits sacrificing Canadian ground troops for the sake of English pilots.
You make a valid point, the entire operation was mourned as a defeat while lionizing the military participants. It was a great propaganda victory for the Reich. Based on the published version of events, you could not be more correct and comparing this to a 'victory' along the lines of Montgomery blowing the Allied advance is very understandable.
However, there is another side of the story. von Rundstedt put it best when he said both the Germans and the Allies would analyze every aspect of this operation, and the Allies would learn much from this and would not make the same mistakes twice.
Militarily, it became a laboratory over what to expect when the real invasion began. The positives were it convinced the Germans a landing over open beaches without a harbor could not be made. Per Mountbatten (a man I truly do not like merely because his son is so loathsome) OPERATION JUBILEE proved to the British a landing supported by artificial harbors would be very feasible and is when the Mulberry projects began. Key personnel were released into the French backfield with support and expertise for the Resistance.
Covertly, American Rangers who had been training in Scotland with several attached OSS killers handled the radar technicians to extricate and document what could be seized (The OSS men and Ranger commanders were specifically given covert orders to kill the radar technicians if everything went south). In part, the radar equipment, documentation, and photographs were sent to MIT in Boston to the Rad Lab, out of which even further countermeasures were developed to affect Wurzburg such as enhancements to dispersion techniques regarding Chaff/Window, Jostle, Piperack, and Mandel.
What I failed to mention was Ian Fleming (yes, that Ian Fleming) and 30 Commando grabbed one of the new 4-rotor Enigma Machines (Shark) and turned it over to Bletchley Park.
In the end, during the fighting withdrawal, a subsequent and coordinated attack of specific targets by fighter-bombers covered up the use of carefully placed demolitions by the spec-ops teams, concealing the loss of equipment to the Germans.
Consider it a gambit in chess. It will not be the first time, and far from the last, innocent people die for a covert mission not having any clue what they were doing or what they had actually achieved. Losses were dreadful both to ground and air personnel. To the spymasters, it was a worthy trade; the value to the air campaign alone - as this is specifically a thread about air combat - seems to be very valuable even before the recovery of a working Enigma. However, feel free to make your own appraisal.
P.S. Why on this forum does von Rundstedt's name show as misspelled? Someone should look at that.
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First time I hear that two pilots from Luftwaffe can get a kill from one plane is that really corekt?
Agree but sometimes could it happen the opposite. 6th of December in Africa claimed Marseille two kills of Hurricanes and an another pilot claimmed one Hurricane fact is that five Hurricanes was lost that day.
Afaik it is corect and is also the reason for the huge dispariy of Luftwaffe and Allied pilots in kills.
Germans, Allies and Soviets also counted lost tanks different.
That makes perfect sense. I never understood the ridiculously high kill counts for pilots on the Eastern Front. Killing planes on the ground is a cheap way to make ace, but c’est la vie.
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It could also have been that some of the pilots saw double because of to much schnaps.
The allies also tended to rotate their pilots to training units or other duties after a certain time. This spreads out the number of kills over a larger number of pilots.
fter WWII there was widespread disbelief among allied nations that claims made by German Fighter pilots were legitimate. A number of incorrect explanations were given as to the reason why, including:
- the numbers were “points” used for awarding medal, not kills
- all of a units kills were added to the commander’s score
- air to ground victories were included
- kills were exaggerated for morale and propaganda purposes