Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

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Carl Schwamberger
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#16

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 18 Feb 2017, 01:26

tramonte wrote:
RichTO90 wrote:Losses to enemy action are somewhat fragmentary and basically run from March 1942 to December 1944. In that period they total:

2,814 single-engine fighters
495 twin-engine fighters
117 night fighters
2,599 ground attack
2,315 bombers
8,340 total

That includes all operational units as well as JG Ost.
German produced in 1942-1944 total 68 497 fighters, ground-attack aircraft, bombers, transport, reconnaissance and sea planes.So those losses in Eastern Front have been about 12,1% of German aircraft production.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_ai ... rld_War_II
That leads me to the question of what the same class of losses on the Western or Mediterranean Fronts were in the same years?

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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#17

Post by Stiltzkin » 18 Feb 2017, 03:23

There is some information in the USSB Survey
Insufficient oil had an impact on flight training hours.
http://www.allworldwars.com/The%20Defea ... Force.html
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/AAF-Luftwaffe/
The Luftwaffe 33-45 has some further statistics.


In "Stärke, Verteilung und Verluste der deutschen Luftwaffe im zweiten Weltkrieg", Gröhler gives information on losses per sortie on the EF in 1944 0,00703 losses per sortie, in the West 0.0537. 5% is the tolerance limit.
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DefeatGAF01.jpg


Carl Schwamberger
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#18

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 14 Mar 2017, 04:42

Still asorbing this. The German losses in the west or Mediterranean from the 4th qtr 1942 are remarkable. Collecting similar data for Soviet, Brit, & US aircraft losses seems necessary now. The Italians strike me as insignificant after 1942.

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tramonte
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#19

Post by tramonte » 02 Jun 2018, 22:31

It's little bit misleading talk about "losses" when counting damaged aircraft too. It should be to just take those written off aircraft.

Besides in the case of Luftwaffe we should focus much more KIA and MIA pilots. Let's not forget also that the battle value of Stukas, Jabos and bombers in western front after 1942 was zero. When Luftwaffe was able to use them only in eastern front it tells most of the story of VVS's competence compared to RAF and USAAF.

About 74% of Luftwaffe aircraft losses were in war against western allies. We should also remember that just about 40% of Luftwaffe written offs were combat losses. Americans had 95 000 written off aircraft but just 24 000 of them we lost in combat (shot down or not returning). People are too easily forgetting that majority of aircraft losses (written off) were not in combat. Luftwaffe had rule of write off aircraft if damage was 60% or more. In fact it's obvious that many aircraft in 1944 were written off even with smaller damage rate.
"Military history is nothing but a tissue of fictions and legends, only a form of literary invention; reality counts for very little in such affair."

- Gaston de Pawlowski, Dans les rides du front

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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#20

Post by Stiltzkin » 03 Jun 2018, 06:45

Besides in the case of Luftwaffe we should focus much more KIA and MIA pilots
219,087 KIA up to december 1944, so 53,496 KIA on the EF and 147,101 MIA of LW personnel of which 48,284 on the EF, for a total of 101,753 KIA/MIA vs 264,435 for other fronts (62%). Note that a substantial amount of LW personnel in the East were reformed Felddivisionen, to compensate for personnel shortages.
I would rather focus on the accidents, because those rise exponentially (lack of fuel/training, lower quality of pilots). Replacing aircraft was not that difficult.
Anyway, with the impact of the Eastern Front on personnel and resources, the LW had no prospect of securing the skies over central Europe, but many people also fall for the trap of believing that with the absence of the EF, there would be no impact on the air war.
The Soviets also managed to regain the initiative without air superiority, being financially and qualitatively incapable to compete with the Luftwaffe and did not decide to invest into a strategic air campaign at all (a wise choice).
With this in mind, it is irrelevant if the arms race will still continue. Investing into "unmatured" equipment will not provoke a sudden change.

Observe the balance and losses by enemy hand, in regards to accidents (BA-MA RL 2III/624, in "Illusion der Wunderwaffen"), Deployed, Claimed Success, total loss, 10% of aircraft and 5% of personnel (5% is the critical value of sustainment, so to speak):
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Carl Schwamberger
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#21

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 03 Jun 2018, 15:09

tramonte wrote:.. We should also remember that just about 40% of Luftwaffe written offs were combat losses. Americans had 95 000 written off aircraft but just 24 000 of them we lost in combat (shot down or not returning). People are too easily forgetting that majority of aircraft losses (written off) were not in combat.
This appears to be the reverse of the numbers I've usually seen cited. Since the number of deployed operational aircraft any date were far less that the total manufactured to that date this might make sense, but I am wondering about the reasons or categories of aircraft discarded/lost. Totals written off from all manufactured tells us one thing, numbers from those actually deployed/operational tells us another thing. Both analysis, and others, are necessary to understand the entire event.
Luftwaffe had rule of write off aircraft if damage was 60% or more. In fact it's obvious that many aircraft in 1944 were written off even with smaller damage rate.
This would reflect a declining ability to repair aircraft? Of that high hour aircraft were discarded due to short remaining useful hours?

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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#22

Post by Account deleted » 12 Jun 2018, 08:50

Where I can find informantion about 77,000 claims of luftwaffe? I tried find about it, but there is no proper reference about it.

Here is the total Luftwaffe aerial claims i 1939~1945 I found. These are include claims of flak assigned luftwaffe.

http://www.asisbiz.com/Luftwaffe/Luftwa ... 941-C.html
Totally 73,692 claims.

https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/l ... 945.41298/
Totally 63,324 claims.

According to Tony Woods, Luftwaffe claimed 32,073 victories in Eastern front. Here is the excelized file I arranged.

https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/e ... st-1408035


On the contrary, I found that soviet air force claimed 77,000 victories.

According to Оперативное искусство советских ВВС в Великой Отечественной войне by Ivan timokhovichi (former soviet major general), Soviet Air Force claimed total 77,000 aerial victories, include 48,000 claims of VVS, 3,930 claims of PVO, 4,900 claims of AV-MF.

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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#23

Post by AriX » 07 Jan 2019, 21:29

Ruskis claimed to destroy in air 55.000 german aicraft + shoot down21.000 by ground fire :lol:

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tramonte
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#24

Post by tramonte » 04 Feb 2020, 20:33

AriX wrote:
07 Jan 2019, 21:29
Ruskis claimed to destroy in air 55.000 german aicraft + shoot down21.000 by ground fire :lol:
I never thought they claimed 76,000. Their claims were unbelievable and especially when claiming that they caused more aircraft losses (destroyed/written off) to Luftwaffe than western allies in 1944.

The Soviet Claim:
-17,500 caused by Soviet Union
-17,050 caused by Western Allies


In reality from Jan to Sept ( 9 months ) 1944 The Luftwaffe losses were
in Eastern Front: 3,255 total operational or non-operational ( 2,185 operational )
in West, Mediterranean, Reich: 11,697 (of which operational 8,029)

Now compare the Soviet pseudo reality claims and facts. This kind of Soviet pure propaganda nonsense makes people doubting all Soviet data even if it (sometimes) is reliable. So in fact Luftwaffe lost 3.6 and 3.67 times more in West/South/Reich than in Eastern Front during Jan-Sept 44 period.

Source: BArch RL 2-III/944, BArch RL 2-III/945 and BArch RL 2-III/946Note: data for some classes of auxiliary aircraft is excluded from the above table, since the documents list only the losses of auxiliary aircraft, not the number of aircraft available

According Williamson Murray Luftwaffe losses from 21 June 1941 to 31 Dec 1943 were:

Eastern Front: 8,619 (operational losses) and 9,948 (operational and non-operational)
West/South/Reich: 9,488 (operational losses) and 13,387 (operational and non-operational losses)
Luftwaffe lost 13,134 aircrew in Eastern Front and 17,673 in West/South/Reich

It should be also very important to remember Luftwaffe losses before Operation Barbarossa: 6,732 aircraft and 11,068 aircrew men (2,613 officers). This is serious impact to Luftwaffe when about 11,000 best trained airmen were lost before 21 June 1941. This is one of those things many mainstream historians even military historians tend to ignore. RAF played quite a role decimating the cream of Luftwaffe.

Source: Murray, Williamson. (1996). Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe 1933 – 1945.
"Military history is nothing but a tissue of fictions and legends, only a form of literary invention; reality counts for very little in such affair."

- Gaston de Pawlowski, Dans les rides du front

Politician01
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Re: Aircraft losses in the Eastern Front

#25

Post by Politician01 » 04 Apr 2021, 16:14

tramonte wrote:
04 Feb 2020, 20:33

According Williamson Murray Luftwaffe losses from 21 June 1941 to 31 Dec 1943 were:

Eastern Front: 8,619 (operational losses) and 9,948 (operational and non-operational)
West/South/Reich: 9,488 (operational losses) and 13,387 (operational and non-operational losses)
Luftwaffe lost 13,134 aircrew in Eastern Front and 17,673 in West/South/Reich

Source: Murray, Williamson. (1996). Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe 1933 – 1945.
Appologies for reviving a year old thread - but might you be so kind to provide the pages? Because I have Murrays book and while he gives German losses for the period June - December 42 and January - November 43, December of 43 is missing as well as the year 41 and the first half of 42.

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