Finnish Air Force claims and losses (fighter squadrons)

[Juha Tompuri]

Confirmed, it was fully described in Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32, p. 6. The same people. There is a Russian combat report done by Shynkarienko. It was the 1-st Soviet claimed air victory in Winter War too.

No any comabt between Uuttu and Pokryshev.

As at my previous post.

Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32

From what year?



Regards, Juha

[Swing]

Confirmed, it was fully described in Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32, p. 6. The same people. There is a Russian combat report done by Shynkarienko. It was the 1-st Soviet claimed air victory in Winter War too.

No any comabt between Uuttu and Pokryshev.

As at my previous post.

Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32

From what year?



Regards, Juha

It is not a monography, it is a number of articles of Slon-76 in "Istoria Avjacji" (History of Aviation) magazine, 2005

[mirekw]

Hi Juha
"Uuttu shot down the future Soviet ace Petr Pokryshev" it i rather impossible, he was not involved in this combat. No info in Shynkarienko's combat reports about such air duel. According him Finish pilot did not even open fire. Russians very fast shot him down.

"From what year?"
I do not know? I would like to know this too? it is a top secret of editor this magazine, no any info about the year of edition inside, outside this magazine. This is not any joke but a fact, magazine was printed in Moscow, chief editor was Aleksandr Bulah.

regards,
mw

[Juha Tompuri]

Confirmed, it was fully described in Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32, p. 6. The same people. There is a Russian combat report done by Shynkarienko. It was the 1-st Soviet claimed air victory in Winter War too.

No any comabt between Uuttu and Pokryshev.

As at my previous post.

Oleg Kisielev's monography about I-16 in Wintr War in: Istoria Avjacji no 32

From what year?



Regards, Juha

It is not a monography, it is a number of articles of Slon-76 in "Istoria Avjacji" (History of Aviation) magazine, 2005

Thanks again
So... he (sincerely) wrote it before knowing about the Uuttu combat report.

Regards, Juha

[Juha Tompuri]

Hi Juha
"Uuttu shot down the future Soviet ace Petr Pokryshev" it i rather impossible, he was not involved in this combat. No info in Shynkarienko's combat reports about such air duel. According him Finish pilot did not even open fire. Russians very fast shot him down.

That is if relying on the info from just one side.

IIRC the incident is also mentioned at Pokryshev memories?
The Finnish plane being a trainer VL Tuisku???
Just from my memory.

Regards, Juha

[mirekw]

The attack was done only by one zvieno of 3 I-16s, there were no Pokryshev among attackers. So it is logic, if he was not involved in air combat, he could not have damaged plane in this duel, this is my opinion.

During return fligh over front line his plane was hit by ground fire, bullets damaged oil radiator and he was forced to land, the engine stoped to work.

Regards
mw

[Juha Tompuri]

The attack was done only by one zvieno of 3 I-16s, there were no Pokryshev among attackers. So it is logic, if he was not involved in air combat, he could not have damaged plane in this duel, this is my opinion.

During return fligh over front line his plane was hit by ground fire, bullets damaged oil radiator and he was forced to land, the engine stoped to work.

According to one sided data, yes.

Regards, Juha

[durb]

Uuttu´s combat report is that he did get good hits on the lower surface of fuselage of a I-16, after which black smoke came from the engine couple of times and the plane went down with white smoke trail. However he did not see the plane to fell and crash down in flames. Which leaves it "probable" and open to speculation. The first confirmed Finnish air victory without any doubt was one of the SB bombers shot down on that same day - from them you get all the solid evidence you need: confirmed Finnish air victories with documented wrecks and Soviet loss records matching with claims.

However, I would be interested more about the real number of confirmed or probable claims of Bulldog pilots of LLv 26 in Winter War, because in Finnish literature the number of 6 Bulldog air victories is often mentioned although the number of actual claims seems to have been less.

There is also some difference of the number of confirmed Finnish air victories in Finnish history books and websites. I have learned that 207 is the usual "confirmed" number, but also such figures as 195 and 218 "confirmed" have been presented. I wonder what is the the current Finnish "officially confirmed air victory" count of Winter War according to latest research and how it is distributed between the pilots of different air units - Llv 24 and 26, Koelentue, other units?

When it comes to probables - well, only "confirmed" are the ones which interest me. As one ace pilot proudly said: "There are no probables in my score".

[Juha Tompuri]

Uuttu´s combat report is that he did get good hits on the lower surface of fuselage of a I-16, after which black smoke came from the engine couple of times and the plane went down with white smoke trail. However he did not see the plane to fell and crash down in flames. Which leaves it "probable" and open to speculation.

As mentioned earlier, Uuttu did not claim the plane being even shot down.
He just reported hitting a I-16 to the same place which was mentioned at Soviet reports as a reason why one of the planes of the group fell down.

When it comes to probables - well, only "confirmed" are the ones which interest me. As one ace pilot proudly said: "There are no probables in my score".

Sometimes also the probables are at least as interesting.
An example:
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 9&t=169874

Regards, Juha

[durb]

Well, on all the controversial Finnish air victory claims this comes to the top: the downing of two German Ju 87 by the pilots of Llv 26 on 3.10.1944 somewhere between Kemi and Rovaniemi. It has stirred lots of discussion and up to this day no any evidence from German sources has been found to confirm the loss of two Stukas in air combat vs. Finnish Brewster fighters. To my limited knowledge these Ju 87 "kills" were accepted and confirmed by Finnish Air Force as legitimate air victories.

http://soc.history.war.world-war-ii.nar ... in-lapland
http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive ... 00079.html
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 1&start=30
http://seura.fi/sota/sotablogit/mika-ku ... -arvoitus/
http://lansipohjanhylyt.blogspot.fi/201 ... liset.html

[mirekw]

Hi
The time, which we all used for our deep discution takes much more time then time of one such duels. It was seconds or a few minutes and huge emotion/fear. There are many reports written by young pilot about their "confirmed" succeses/victory. If one man takes them seriously the war would last much more shorter.

I know many reports, where pilots put a ot of energy writing about own succeses and in fact they did not do any damage.
The facts, the true many times look quite different.

If the attack was done by 3 pilots without Pokryshev, he coulnd not be counted as a victims of Uuttu fire. Many pilots had seen a lot of hits on enemy planes and after these machines landed on own airfield without any damage.

Regards
mw

[Juha Tompuri]

There are many reports written by young pilot about their "confirmed" succeses/victory. If one man takes them seriously the war would last much more shorter.

Yes.

I know many reports, where pilots put a ot of energy writing about own succeses and in fact they did not do any damage.
The facts, the true many times look quite different.

Yes, using and comparing the data from both sides usually gives the best results.

If the attack was done by 3 pilots without Pokryshev, he coulnd not be counted as a victims of Uuttu fire.

Yes.
And if the attack was done with 5-6 planes, with Pokryshev, he could be counted as a victim of Uuttu fire.

Many pilots had seen a lot of hits on enemy planes and after these machines landed on own airfield without any damage.

At those cases I doubt the hits have in reality been seen.
And there are cases where the reports were not written honestly from the begining.

Regards, Juha

[durb]

The whole Uuttu case is a bit confusing - he did not even claim a air victory but only to have damaged I-16 (hitting it and seeing smoke coming from the plane). It seems that it was only afterwards when he was declared by other people to have scored the first Finnish air victory. When was Uuttu "officially" declared as the very first Finnish pilot to score air victory? Whatever, it certainly is not Uuttu´s fault that his claim of possible damaged enemy plane stirss so much discussion - I believe that Uuttu made his combat report in good faith - the question is how other people interprete his combat report. The whole issue would be quite forgotten and Uuttu credited with just "probable" if it were not that Uuttu has been declared as the pilot who scored the very first Finnish air victory. Just for interest - were there Finnish ground observers seeing this air combat and making a statement of smoking enemy fighter going down and thus confirming Uuttu´s air victory?

The "official" Soviet version which I have read in Red Stars. vol. 7. states that Pokryshin force-landed due to engine failure. However it seems that there is also a version in which he attributes the engine failure caused by ground fire? Where did that came from? And could it be possible that Pokryshev genuinely thought that his plane was damaged by ground fire when it was caused by machineguns of Bulldog? Was he taking part in combat or not - he belonged to 4th escadrille of 7 IAP like Shinkarenko & Co - thus could have been taking part in combat vs. Uuttu and the damage of "ground fire" caused by the machineguns of Bulldog?

Had Soviets some really good reason to hide or "manufacture" the facts of this particular air combat like excluding Pokryshev from the combat when he actually was there? When I have read Red. Stars, vol. 7 it shows that Soviet reports revealed unpleasant things: friendly fire cases, accidents, orientation mistakes etc. - to me they seem to be quite honest admitting things that went horribly wrong.

Of course the Soviet air victory claims were wildly exaggerated - specially the extraorbitant claims of Soviet bomber gunners - but that does not mean that we should consider Soviet data as "falsified" in every case. There may be some rotten apples in the basket but it does not mean that the whole basket with all of its apples is rotten. Although 7 IAP overclaimed grossly 68:8, it does not mean that they would have been systematic liars in everything.

I tend to believe that every air force knows and records its losses at unit level accurately. The claims can be whatever, but unit commanders have no reason to hide their losses of planes and pilots. What propagandists make up of "total losses" to fool public opinion is another thing - unit records are not for common public but confidential documents for military use. There is no reason to falsify them for propaganda purposes.

[mirekw]

1. The problem is how now we define a: victory or shot down or claim? What it does means for us? What kind of damage define of such victory, only total 100 % destruction?

2. Next is true /untrue data/reports vs. deliberate lie/s

I do not belive (I have not seen any special reason for lie). that Shynkarieno raports is a deliberatly lie. He wrote what he presonaly saw. when attack was done by his zvieno (3 I-16) no other zvieno/ did particpiate in this sudden attack. Russian had attacked first on Finnnish plane from above and behind. No special dogfight. There were only 3 Soviets pilots who did participate in this battle, if there were more all would be mentioned by the name, it were counted in their battle history - for rewards (medals, money etc.). There were many cases, when Soviets have credited a vistory as a one of 6-10 or even 20 particpiants in the air battle (like for example over Chałchyn-Goł).

Basic tactical Soviet air unit was zveino - 3 planes, all participiants in this attack are known, there are not among them Pokryshev. Shynkarieno had mentionend all bothers in arms from this combat.

Black smoke from I-16 engine only menas that pilot added gas (accelerated), pushed the throttles. The same resultes were observed many times with escaping FW 109 and Me 109, and many Allied pilots truly belived that they got a lot of hits on them - were credited with victory/shot down or damage. In fact FW 190/Me 109 were fast escaping from the battle with no battle damage.

I do not belive too, that Uuttu had lied, he in a few seconds observed some very fast pictures and written what he had written. The interpretation of his report it is a different case.


regards
mw

[Seppo Koivisto]

According to Ilmavoitot 2 Uuttu's victory was confirmed by HQ without witnesses. There must have been some sort of inteligence information to back Uuttu's report, like intercepted radio messages.