Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aircraft and Vehicles => Topic started by: killjoy1 on September 20, 2013, 01:25:39 PM
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Thought I would post this video on B-24's.
Ford built a plant to mass produce them. Hitler had no idea you could make bombers this fast.
http://www.youtube.com/embed/iKlt6rNciTo?rel=0 (http://www.youtube.com/embed/iKlt6rNciTo?rel=0)
Does the ball turret on the AH B24 lower after takeoff? I never knew that.
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Thought I would post this video on B-24's.
Ford built a plant to mass produce them. Hitler had no idea you could make bombers this fast.
http://www.youtube.com/embed/iKlt6rNciTo?rel=0 (http://www.youtube.com/embed/iKlt6rNciTo?rel=0)
Does the ball turret on the AH B24 lower after takeoff? I never knew that.
:airplane: Convair (Consolidated merged with Vultee in 1941 to form Convair) set up an additional factory in Fort Worth, Texas, and 30,000 workers built 3,034 additional Liberators there. Additionally, Douglas Aircraft Corporation built about 964 B-24s in its factory in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and North American Aviation built about 966 in Dallas, Texas. The largest Liberator factory was Ford's huge new factory built at Willow Run, Michigan, which turned out 6,792 completed aircraft and 1,893 disassembled, crated airframes for final assembly elsewhere. In 1944, the Willow Run factory alone turned out 92,000,000 pounds (42,000,000 kg) of airframes, nearly equaling the production of the entire Japanese aircraft industry that year, or almost half of the entire German output. Peak production by all factories produced a B-24 every 55 minutes. These factories and several major depots also performed many conversions, often of hundreds of aircraft. This lead to more than sixty different designations for variations of the B-24 airframe. There were bomber, patrol bomber, reconnaissance, cargo, tanker, trainer, experimental, civil, and other variants.
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If you know what to look for you can tell a Ford built Liberator apart from the others. Windows in the nose were different for one thing.
A lot of the Vets I talked to about the B-24 said the Ford built airplanes weren't as good of quality as those built by Consolidated.
Another oddity about B-24s...on most of them the nose wheel doors opened outward when the gear is down....on some the doors opened inward so no door was exposed when gear was down.
When we gave rides in the airplane we would let the passengers get up and move around as soon as the gear was up. The brief to them said when told to take seats you should go back where you were for takeoff. Most pax were seated in the waist area with 1 or 2 seated near the nav station aft of the flightdeck. We were giving a ride and told the Flight Engineer to "set them down" since we were in the pattern and about to lower the gear. He gave us the clear and shortly after we selected gear down. Now the nosewheel on the -24 rotates about 250 degrees or so up into the fuselage. When gear down is selected the nosewheel swings over the top, pops the doors open and drops into position...very dramatic if you're down in that area (one of the things I did when working up on the airplane, crawled around and watched things work so I'd have a clue if things didn't work at sometime). Anyway, we selected gear down and heard the nosewheel drop out followed by a scream. Huh?! The B-24 is very, very noisy...well over 100 db in the cockpit yet we managed to hear someone scream. Hmmm. Sent the FE to check and he found one of our Pax had decided to hide in the nose for the landing not realizing the bottom of the airplane was going to open when the gear went down. The FE yelled at him to stay put (didn't want him crawling past the gaping nosewheel hole) so he "cowarded in place" until we were on the ground. :D
And yes, the turret retracts into the fuselage for landing and takeoff. If not it would drag when the aircraft was rotated for takeoff.
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A fun read is a book titled "Slacks and Calluses: Our Summer in a Bomber Factory". It's a story about two school teachers who take summer jobs building B-24s in the Consolidated plant in San Diego. Enjoyable read.
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When we gave rides in the airplane
I *loved* my ride in it. Must be incomparably greater to fly it! <S>
(http://electraforge.com/brooke/flightsims/b24_flights/pics2005/aIMG_010_4151_waistgun.jpg)
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Must be incomparably greater to fly it! <S>
I have to admit I much preferred being in the front over the back!! And at first it was all about me getting to fly the airplanes but very, very quickly it became about the veterans who flew these aircraft during WWII. I was so very fortunate to be able to meet and talk to so many of them. How lucky? We had dinner one night with Bob Morgan (Memphis Belle) and Paul Tibbets (Enola Gay). And it wasn't just the well known folks, it was the everyday airman that "did his job", guys like Al and Frank.
(http://home.gci.net/~sncdfalk/bombpics/waistgunners.jpg)
These guys were B-24 waist gunners. They were shot down, aircraft spinning out of control with them pinned in the waist unable to bail out. They thought they were going to die but a wing came off the airplane and they were thrown out through a waist window where they opened their parachutes. They were captured and spent the remainder of the war as POWs. The winter of '44-'45 they were forced to march (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_March_(1945)) as the Russians closed on their camps. After giving them a ride in the airplane they thanked me! I had to explain they owed me nothing, I thanked them for their service.
Another was the B-24 pilot who was shot down over Europe. His family surprised him with buying a plane sponsorship in his name, then the entire family went for a ride in the -24. I put him in the right seat and let him fly the airplane, first time he'd been in one since bailing out. His family was able to see him at the controls....our eyes seemed to "sweat" a lot that flight. The kicker is he was wearing the B10 jacket he bailed out in (stillhad the rip in it where it snagged as he bailed) and he had the wooden eating utensils he had carved and used while a POW.
It was great flying the airplane but I feel as if it was something I had to do, we owe the veterans that much.
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It is so great to meet those folks, as you say. My great fortune is to live near The Museum of Flight in Seattle, which every few months or so, has panel discussions with WWII pilots and crew, where people get to meet them and hear their stories. I feel so lucky for that. <S>!
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Much awesomeness in this thread.
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Ford built a plant to mass produce them. Hitler had no idea you could make bombers this fast.
Fatso Goering had told him Americans were only good at making razor blades.
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I have to admit I much preferred being in the front over the back!! And at first it was all about me getting to fly the airplanes but very, very quickly it became about the veterans who flew these aircraft during WWII. I was so very fortunate to be able to meet and talk to so many of them. How lucky? We had dinner one night with Bob Morgan (Memphis Belle) and Paul Tibbets (Enola Gay). And it wasn't just the well known folks, it was the everyday airman that "did his job", guys like Al and Frank.
(http://home.gci.net/~sncdfalk/bombpics/waistgunners.jpg)
These guys were B-24 waist gunners. They were shot down, aircraft spinning out of control with them pinned in the waist unable to bail out. They thought they were going to die but a wing came off the airplane and they were thrown out through a waist window where they opened their parachutes. They were captured and spent the remainder of the war as POWs. The winter of '44-'45 they were forced to march (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_March_(1945)) as the Russians closed on their camps. After giving them a ride in the airplane they thanked me! I had to explain they owed me nothing, I thanked them for their service.
Another was the B-24 pilot who was shot down over Europe. His family surprised him with buying a plane sponsorship in his name, then the entire family went for a ride in the -24. I put him in the right seat and let him fly the airplane, first time he'd been in one since bailing out. His family was able to see him at the controls....our eyes seemed to "sweat" a lot that flight. The kicker is he was wearing the B10 jacket he bailed out in (stillhad the rip in it where it snagged as he bailed) and he had the wooden eating utensils he had carved and used while a POW.
It was great flying the airplane but I feel as if it was something I had to do, we owe the veterans that much.
:airplane: Outstanding :salute I just wish there was some way that the young Americans of today could somehow "live" the years from 1941 to 1950 or so, then I believe we would have a much better country than we have today. To much "How can I live off the government", instead of independently supporting themselves. Regardless of your political leanings, without the attitude and character of Americans in the 40's and 50's, such as the men in Colombo's story, that was indeed, the greatest generation of Americans.
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Clarification on the thread title:
They built a B-24 every 55 minutes. It took much longer than 55 minutes to build a given B-24.
The industrial effort to produce B-24s was simply incredible. It was larger than any previous industrial effort I am aware of.
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Fatso Goering had told him Americans were only good at making razor blades.
A B-24 is just another kind of razor... ;)
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Clarification on the thread title:
They built a B-24 every 55 minutes. It took much longer than 55 minutes to build a given B-24.
The industrial effort to produce B-24s was simply incredible. It was larger than any previous industrial effort I am aware of.
:airplane: There were, at one time, with all the production lines involved in the B-24, 1 B-24 every 55 minutes, but not at any one production line. When the figures were put together, it worked out to be one every 55 minutes. With any production line of aircraft, the learning curve for each assembly person on production line was steep to begin with and as experience was gained, the amount of time to execute ones function on the line was greatly reduced. I think the time frame of 55 minutes was somewhere around early 44 to end of production, not the whole production run as a whole.
The only other production line which was of this magnitude was the "Liberty" ships which the ship yards around the U.S. were turning out.
One other amazing thing was that you could get your High School Diploma one day and 6 weeks later, on your way to France or someplace to "kill" someone for the U.S. One of the really great movies was "Saving Sgt Ryan", starring Tom Hanks and if you haven't seen it, you need to!
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Saving Private Ryan, Enemy at the Gates, Das Boot, Downfall, and Dark Blue World are the top "must see" war films of all time IMHO.
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Surely not Enemy At The Gates - the German "Stalingrad" is miles better.
I'm told Come and See is also on the must-see list, though I've not done so.
Sorry thread creep.
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My Mother installed wiring harnesses in engine nacelles for B24's in a Pratt and Whitney plant during the war..
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Saving Private Ryan, Enemy at the Gates, Das Boot, Downfall, and Dark Blue World are the top "must see" war films of all time IMHO.
I agree with most of your list but no mention of Tora Tora Tora, Midway, Patton, Battle of Britain, Flyboys, Redtails, Iwo Jima or a host of others?
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Sure, but that is my top short list. I'd also add The Admiral.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBQotim_ZHA
The older movies from the 50s-70s are getting a bit long in the tooth, and deserve proper remakes, or at least digital restoration/enhancement. Red Tails was horrible, just horrible, and Flyboys was mediocre at best.
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Surely not Enemy At The Gates - the German "Stalingrad" is miles better.
Yes, Enemy at the Gates, and don't call me Shirley. ;) It is perhaps a bit stylized and theatrical, but that makes it better in my opinion; more "Soviet style". I agree that Stalingrad is a great movie, and would be a given on a longer list of "must see" movies.
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There's also a new Stalingrad movie from the Russian perspective. I've not yet had the chance to watch it, but it looks interesting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Da3EgZUA0Y
Thomas Kretschmann, who played the lieutenant in the German Stalingrad movie, plays in this one as well.
No wonder I've not found it yet... It's not released in the west until October.
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Also, if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend the series Band of Brothers. Episode #2 (about D-Day) . . . wow! Band of Brothers is visually awesome like Saving Private Ryan, but 100 times better because it is almost all true events instead of made-up stuff.
I'd also add in as being excellent: 12 O'clock High and 30 Seconds Over Tokyo.
I didn't like Enemy at the Gates as much because the story would have been much better if they just didn't mess up the real story for stupid Hollywood reasons.
Come and See as too weird for me to like it. Not bad -- just that it wasn't for me.
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Surely not Enemy At The Gates - the German "Stalingrad" is miles better.
I'm told Come and See is also on the must-see list, though I've not done so.
Sorry thread creep.
Enemy at the Gates was awful. It covers roughly two pages of what is a fantastic book of the same name by William Craig, and even then it takes liberties with the history.
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Jean-Jacques Annaud took the title from the book, but the film is not based on the book itself, but on war stories told about Vasily Zaitsev. To say that it is an awful film and compare it to a book it's not even based on is an injustice. It is a great film on its own merits.
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Jean-Jacques Annaud took the title from the book, but the film is not based on the book itself, but on war stories told about Vasily Zaitsev. To say that it is an awful film and compare it to a book it's not even based on is an injustice. It is a great film on its own merits.
The film was based not on Craig's excellent book, but on "War of the Rats" by David Robbins. Robbins claims to have interviewed Zaitsev - causing Zaitsev to suffer a heart attack in the process. Entertaining book, well-written. The movie did what most movies do, and tried to make history "more exciting" for the general populace.
- oldman
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Thanks Oldman, I've got to get me that book. :aok
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The film was based not on Craig's excellent book, but on "War of the Rats" by David Robbins. Robbins claims to have interviewed Zaitsev - causing Zaitsev to suffer a heart attack in the process. Entertaining book, well-written. The movie did what most movies do, and tried to make history "more exciting" for the general populace.
- oldman
I'm not sure even Hollywood could out do the stories in the book Enemy at the Gates. That one, the Cornelious Ryan trilogy, Simon Wiesenthal's "Murderers Among Us", Don Burgett's "Curahee" and Guy Sajer's "The Forgotten Soldier" were burned into my brain as a teenager. I read all of though multiple times and they still get picked up and read again all these years later.
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Factual/historical books are seldom good film material. They're simply not structured or focused enough. Btw. Enemy at the Gates was not a Hollyweird film.
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Factual/historical books are seldom good film material. They're simply not structured or focused enough. Btw. Enemy at the Gates was not a Hollyweird film.
Where the book would work would be in a Band of Brothers, The Pacific sort of mini series as it does follow certain soldiers from both sides from beginning to end. Doubt there would ever be a market for it for obvious reasons, but at least for me it really humanized that part of the war.
Guess we derailed this thread. Sorry bout that :)
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Guess we derailed this thread. Sorry bout that :)
Every thread gets disrailed. What's new?
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Good war movies I could add :
Talvisota (1989) (winter war) (only Das Boot is more realistic )
9th company (Russians in Afghanistan)
71 Into The Fire (Korea war)
The.Front.Line.2011 (Korean war)
We where soldiers (vietnam war)
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Don't forget "the Cruel Sea" based on a wonderful book written by a Seaman who was with the Merchant Marine .
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Saving Private Ryan, Enemy at the Gates, Das Boot, Downfall, and Dark Blue World are the top "must see" war films of all time IMHO.
:airplane: One war time flying movie involving the P-47D40's and D25's was based on the 57th Fighter-Bomber group operating in Italy! It starred Edmon O'Brien and was titled, I think, Fighter Pilot! A lot of actual combat film used during the movie.
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oops forgot the "Audie Murphy" bio-pic . Every part of it was true , infact some of it was underplayed as requested by Mr Murphy himself. The guy was nuts in a very good way .
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:airplane: Convair (Consolidated merged with Vultee in 1941 to form Convair) set up an additional factory in Fort Worth, Texas, and 30,000 workers built 3,034 additional Liberators there. Additionally, Douglas Aircraft Corporation built about 964 B-24s in its factory in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and North American Aviation built about 966 in Dallas, Texas. The largest Liberator factory was Ford's huge new factory built at Willow Run, Michigan, which turned out 6,792 completed aircraft and 1,893 disassembled, crated airframes for final assembly elsewhere. In 1944, the Willow Run factory alone turned out 92,000,000 pounds (42,000,000 kg) of airframes, nearly equaling the production of the entire Japanese aircraft industry that year, or almost half of the entire German output. Peak production by all factories produced a B-24 every 55 minutes. These factories and several major depots also performed many conversions, often of hundreds of aircraft. This lead to more than sixty different designations for variations of the B-24 airframe. There were bomber, patrol bomber, reconnaissance, cargo, tanker, trainer, experimental, civil, and other variants.
My Uncle Al, my Dad's big brother, was a B-24 co-pilot flying missions out of Italy against targets in southern Europe. His copy of Stephen Ambrose's The Wild Blue is filled with annotations like "I flew this mission" and "I remember that". Uncle Al told me that the B-24 tankers which flew fuel to forward airbases were grimly nick-named "C-one-oh-BOOM!" because of their tendency to explode when the electrically-operated gear was retracted right after take-off. When asked why he did not parlay his wartime service into an aviation carreer, he replied, "It was cold and noisy and uncomfortable and hard physical work... and people were shooting at us! It was not a positive experience."
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oops forgot the "Audie Murphy" bio-pic . Every part of it was true , infact some of it was underplayed as requested by Mr Murphy himself. The guy was nuts in a very good way .
His book, "To Hell and Back," is excellent.
So is "With the Old Breed," by E. B. Sledge.
To anyone who has never read a book about war (not AH folks, but all the others I meet out there in the world), my recommendation is: if you read only book about war, read "With the Old Breed."
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oops forgot the "Audie Murphy" bio-pic . Every part of it was true , infact some of it was underplayed as requested by Mr Murphy himself. The guy was nuts in a very good way .
:airplane: If memory serves, he was the most decorated soldier in WW2! Got to shake his hand once in Atlanta, at Hangar One, a FBO at the old Hartsville International airport. He and some other people had stopped for fuel and a meeting and he was sitting in the "lounge" where most people waited for fueling and etc. I did not want to pry, we just chit, chatted and he finally ask me what I thought of the westerns he was making, and I said I really hadn't seen any, but I did see "To Hell and Back", and he just laughed and said it was a lot of fun to make! Nice and very brave man!
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There was a New Zealander who won the VC twice, of all things. Quite unbelievably, he lived to tell the tale.
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"Most decorated soldier of WWII" is such a broad definition it is almost impossible to make a choice. Does a MOH equal a VC? What about the Ritterkreutz?
However Murphy was one of the most decorated soldiers for sure.
There is one major difference between the Allied and the German medal systems. Almost any medal in the British or American services could be won independently of each other; even a VC or MOH could be won by a single act of heroism. The German system on the other hand was progressive: Your first act of heroism won you the Iron Cross 2nd Class. Your second act of heroism won you the Iron Cross 1st Class. Then there were three classes of the German Cross to be won for heroism equaling the Iron Cross, but not justifying the Knight’s Cross. Then for your umpteenth act of heroism you could win the Knight's Cross. Then there were Oak Leaves to be won for your Knight's Cross, and after that Swords, and after that Diamonds.
Only one person managed to win all that and Gold Oak Leaves for his Knight's Cross: Hans-Ulrich Rudel. He was one of only 27 men to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, and the only one to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds. Rudel flew over 2,500 combat missions and destroyed 800 vehicles, 519 tanks, 150 artillery guns, a destroyer, two cruisers, one Soviet battleship, 70 landing craft, 4 armored trains, several bridges and nine aircraft in aerial combat. He was such a menace on the Eastern Front that Stalin placed a bounty on his head. He would be my bet as the most decorated soldier of WWII, regardless of nationality.
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Yes, for the record, I should make it clear I wasn't trying to imply X was more courageous than Y. Things I read about what these guys did just makes my head spin.
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Yes indeed. Again because of the progressive nature of the German system, it is hard to compare awards. Someone with the Oak Leaves is not necessarily braver than someone with just the Knight's Cross; he just was brave on more occasions. How does this compare to the VC or MOH? Impossible to tell really, since they're all different.
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Only one person managed to win all that and Gold Oak Leaves for his Knight's Cross: Hans-Ulrich Rudel. He was one of only 27 men to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, and the only one to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds. Rudel flew over 2,500 combat missions and destroyed 800 vehicles, 519 tanks, 150 artillery guns, a destroyer, two cruisers, one Soviet battleship, 70 landing craft, 4 armored trains, several bridges and nine aircraft in aerial combat. He was such a menace on the Eastern Front that Stalin placed a bounty on his head.
Without meaning to start a fight, have you seen any sources, independent of Rudel himself, who confirm all this? I know that all of the above is now commonly accepted, but I've never seen confirmation beyond Rudel's say-so. And frankly, I've never trusted his accounts.
- oldman
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:airplane: If memory serves, he was the most decorated soldier in WW2! Got to shake his hand once in Atlanta, at Hangar One, a FBO at the old Hartsville International airport. He and some other people had stopped for fuel and a meeting and he was sitting in the "lounge" where most people waited for fueling and etc. I did not want to pry, we just chit, chatted and he finally ask me what I thought of the westerns he was making, and I said I really hadn't seen any, but I did see "To Hell and Back", and he just laughed and said it was a lot of fun to make! Nice and very brave man!
He was the Sgt. York of WWII . I'll have to read "To Hell and Back" . I was shocked at how much was left out of the film . I loved his Westerns and being only 31 I wish I could have seen them when they first came out . I found out about him through my Grand farther who got me to watch "To Hell and Back" with him one Saturday afternoon when it was on TV .
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Without meaning to start a fight, have you seen any sources, independent of Rudel himself, who confirm all this? I know that all of the above is now commonly accepted, but I've never seen confirmation beyond Rudel's say-so. And frankly, I've never trusted his accounts.
- oldman
Official records show he flew 2,530 combat missions, so that is beyond dispute. Remember he flew in combat from 1939 to the end of the war. 519 tanks is one tank for every five missions or so; hardly unreasonable on the Eastern Front. 800 soft skinned vehicles is even less unreasonable considering on the Eastern Front Stukas were armed with 20mm cannon instead of machine guns. A single strafing run could take out a whole column of trucks. The ships he sunk is verified by the Soviets.
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Official records show he flew 2,530 combat missions, so that is beyond dispute. Remember he flew in combat from 1939 to the end of the war. 519 tanks is one tank for every five missions or so; hardly unreasonable on the Eastern Front. 800 soft skinned vehicles is even less unreasonable considering on the Eastern Front Stukas were armed with 20mm cannon instead of machine guns. A single strafing run could take out a whole column of trucks. The ships he sunk is verified by the Soviets.
...so....no...?
I wish I could find it again, but I recall a British analysis of what-killed-German-tanks in Normandy. A comparatively small percentage were destroyed by aircraft - many fewer than everyone's general perception. So I'm not open to the notion that Rudel killed one tank for every five sorties he flew. PLUS I never could understand how anyone flying a plane in a combat area could have the time, much less the visual acuity, to determine whether he had destroyed, damaged or simply hit a tank.
There's also quite a dispute as to who sank the Marat; see, e.g., the discussion in http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showthread.php?t=3972.
I've no evidence that he didn't do all these things, of course, I was just wondering if there were some confirmation, apart from Rudel himself.
- oldman
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I haven't even read Rudel's book... But what is in dispute? His official Luftwaffe record? Or his own stories in his book? His decorations certainly aren't in dispute, are they?
The comparison to western-Allied fighter-bombers is not very relevant I think. Rudel mostly few dive bombers and dedicated CAS aircraft. A comparison (if it exists) to the effectiveness of Il-2 units against German tanks might be more appropriate.
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I haven't even read Rudel's book... But what is in dispute? His official Luftwaffe record? Or his own stories in his book? His decorations certainly aren't in dispute, are they?
Ah, sorry, thought I'd made myself clear. I question his claims. And many of the stories in his book. The remarkable thing about both is that I've never seen any confirmation of them from anyone else.
The comparison to western-Allied fighter-bombers is not very relevant I think. Rudel mostly few dive bombers and dedicated CAS aircraft. A comparison (if it exists) to the effectiveness of Il-2 units against German tanks might be more appropriate.
Could be, could be, but so far as I know the British study is the only one where people actually went onto the field, counted the destroyed tanks and determined what destroyed them.
- oldman
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Well if the Western-Allies had "cannon birds" the result would have been different. The cannon armed Stukas carried gun cams so at least his 200 or so tank kills in the Ju 87G is in little doubt.
This is guncam footage from Rudel's Cannon Bird destroying landing craft. He claimed 70 of them:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU6OK1zSxKg
Other guncam footage show the effectiveness of the BK37 armament against Soviet armor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E46J7LzeI-c
When you see them blown apart or fireball it leaves little doubt as to the outcome.
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Well if the Western-Allies had "cannon birds" the result would have been different. The cannon armed Stukas carried gun cams so at least his 200 or so tank kills in the Ju 87G is in little doubt.
Typhoons carried cameras as well during their rocket attacks! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrdfbrwcuM8
It could be that all of Rudel's film was analyzed by Luftwaffe intelligence people, and that they confirmed 200 tank kills. But I've never seen anything that suggested that was done; we have only the propaganda films you've posted. If a tank explodes or catches fire, as these films, then clearly that would be reliable evidence of destruction. Bottom line, though, we're still relying on Rudel, so far as I can tell, except for the half-dozen tanks (were they all Rudel's?) in the propaganda movie.
- oldman
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The second video was not Rudel.
This is what I don't understand: Rudel's kills must have been witnessed by his squadron mates to be officially recognized by the Luftwaffe. And they were officially recognized by the Luftwaffe or Hitler wouldn't have decorated him personally would he. I'm not sure how you can "prove" a kill record beyond that. How can you prove any wartime record beyond what was done at the time. Can anyone corroborate say Pappy Boyington's claims today?
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Rudel's kills must have been witnessed by his squadron mates to be officially recognized by the Luftwaffe.
Hah! That's my original point! I have never seen anything which says that Rudel's kills were witnessed by anyone. In fact, I think it's unlikely that they would be, inasmuch as each Stuka pilot would be hunting his own tank (or truck, or gun emplacement, or - if he was emulating his leader's boast - the occasional Il-2 to clobber with his last 37mm round).
I think that the Luftwaffe had a fairly lax standard of kill confirmation, air-to-air, air-to-ground, air-to-sea (in the case of the Marat, at least). They talked a good talk, but there are too many inconsistencies in claims made vs. kills which actually occurred to make me believe that the Luftwaffe standards were as rigorous as the US or British, who had routine gun camera film which was routinely examined by independent intelligence officers (hence, Boyington). Caldwell, for example, thinks that Luftwaffe claims of 8th AF bombers may have been double the actual number, and he relates the account of JG26 strafing downed gliders in Normandy and claiming air-to-air kills. Reminds me of Tokyo Rose, and the claim totals are completely beyond the scope of any other country's experience - Russia, Japan, anyone.
I don't really want to start that broader argument now, but in Rudel's case, in particular, there seems to be absolutely no independent confirmation of virtually anything he says.
- oldman
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Luftwaffe victory confirmation procedures after the Battle of Britain were as rigorous, or even more so than those of the Western Allies. The major difference between the German and Western Allies' method of scoring victories was that the Germans were not allowed to share a victory. Their cardinal rule was: "One pilot-one kill." In contrast Allied pilots were allowed to share victories. If two pilots fired at an enemy and it went down, each Allied pilot received one-half of the kill. Carried to absurdity, it is conceivable that an Allied pilot could become an ace with ten or more half-victories, never scoring any victories of his own. The Luftwaffe system of awarding victories was impartial, inflexible, and far less prone to error than the American or British method. That is not to say that errors were not made.
The Germans recorded victories in one of three categories: Abschuss (Destroyed), Herausschuss (Seperation), and endgueltige Vernichtung (Final Destruction.) These three categories were used for assessing "points" towards awards. Only an enemy aircraft in an Abschuss category was counted towards the pilot's overall victory tally. A pilot that brought down an enemy plane with a Endgueltige Vernichtung of a damaged aircraft was not awarded credit for the "kill", however he did earn "points" for the aircraft's destruction.
Following the policy of "one pilot-one kill", the investigating authorities would determine if the claiming pilot was solely responsible for the destruction of the enemy plane. Every Abschuss had to be observed by a witness: either a ground observer of the encounter, the pilot's wingman, or a Staffel-mate. Witnesses were necessary unless the victor's aircraft had been fitted with a guncam and the destruction of the plane or the vanquished pilot's bailout had been recorded on film. or if the wreckage of the downed pilot or other crew members had been captured by German forces. In effect: No witness or tangible evidence - no victory.
Every Abschuss had to be confirmed by the Oberbefehlshaber der Luftwaffe or Commander in Chief of the Air Force. Luftwaffe pilots were at all times required to note their geographical position as well as the type and number of the aircraft in enemy formations engaged. Pilots were required to log the exact time of a kill, while he maneuvered for a tactical advantage over the remaining enemy aircraft! In addition, he had to observe other actions in the air in order to be able to witness victories by his Staffelmates. Upon landing, the claimant prepared his Abschuss report for review by the immediate supervisory officer, who either endorsed or rejected the claim. If endorsed, the pilot's report to the Geschwaderstab, or Wing Staff, which, in turn, filed its report and sent both to the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM), or Air Ministry. After checking all the papers that were submitted, the official confirmation was prepared and sent to the unit. This very long bureaucratic proceedure sometimes took as long as a year. In 1944, another authority was created: the Abschusskommission, which received all reports on crashed aircraft remains found by search units. This commission checked conflicting claims between antiaircraft batteries and fighter pilots, and awarded credit for the victory to one claimant or the other. This system ensured that no more credits would be awarded than wrecks found.
The German system of confirming aerial victories was very effective in keeping human errors and weknesses within limits. Despite this, the Oberkommando der Luftwaffe, or Luftwaffe High Command, considered the large victory totals during the early days of the Russian campaign as incredulous. On many occasions, they accused the Jagdgeschwader Kommodores of exaggerating the victory scores. In effect Goering was calling the frontline pilots liars. This was one of the grievances that brought about the Mutiny of the Fighters, or the Kommodores' Revolt Conference, in Berlin during January, 1945.
When a German fighter pilot scored a victory, he would call "Horrido" on the radio. This distinctive announcement of victory alerted his fellow pilots to watch for a crash or a flamer, as well as notify ground stations, which helped to confirm many victories.
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Their cardinal rule was: "One pilot-one kill."
Point of Order, M'Lud,
Agree with pretty much everything above, however one does very rarely (ie. definitely not standard operating procedure) come across something like "I.Zus.Arb.mit" for shared claims.
I freely concede this was extremely rare - I can think of only one instance, IIRC a Wellington over Biscay.
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As you say in, extremely rare cases the victor could not be determined, and in such cases no one got the victory. The victory would rather be assigned to the staffeln (squadron), and not appear on any single pilot's record.
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Oldman, look at it this way:
According to American records the US lost 45,000 aircraft.
According to British records the RAF lost 22,010 aircraft.
According to Soviet records they lost 106,400 aircraft (yes, that's one-hundred-six-thousand-four-hundred aircraft).
Unless you're prepared to concede that Allied pilots were so inept that they crashed all these aircraft on their own... Then somebody must have shot them down...
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Unless you're prepared to concede that Allied pilots were so inept that they crashed all these aircraft on their own... Then somebody must have shot them down...
These figures are losses from all causes. In the US case, for example, less than half of the 45,000 are combat losses, and that's the total for all theaters. The Soviet losses break down to something like 88,000 combat aircraft losses, again apparently from all causes. If one assumes that the same proportion applies - that is, that roughly half of the Soviet losses were due to actual combat - then 100 German pilots claimed to have shot down one-third of all Soviet planes lost in combat from fighters, bombers, ack, whatever. I have real trouble with this. The "rules" you recite I've seen often. They are just that - rules. Similar rules applied to American bomber gunners, and we know how those claims turned out.
Again, I didn't want to further hijack this thread into the broad topic of the accuracy of German claims. I just wanted to know if anyone had seen anything specific confirming Rudel's unusual accomplishments.
- oldman
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Oldman, we've had this discussion before. On the Eastern Front the Luftwaffe claimed the destruction of 77,000 soviet aircraft, including 45,000 in air combat. The Soviets claim they lost a total of 106,400 aircraft to all causes, including 46 000 lost in air combat. (Krivosheyev, Grif sekretnosti sniat, 1993). The Germans claimed fewer soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat than what the Soviet records show they lost in air combat. The Germans were under-claiming.
Also I fail to understand why you think the German claims are inflated. "Bud" Anderson flew 116 sorties with the 362nd FS in a target-scarce environment (some US pilots never saw an enemy plane) and scored 16.25 victories. If he had flown 1,000 sorties in the same environment and not improved his skills at all, he would still statistically have ~160 victories. More likely he would have had more than 200 if we consider him becoming an "experten" like the Luftwaffe 100+ aces; men of tremendous abilities in air combat. Are the Luftwaffe claims then so unbelievable when their top aces were flying in a target-rich environment and flew thousands of sorties? Mathematically it seems inevitable that they would rack up these numbers.
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Oldman, George Frederick "Buzz" Beurling shot down 27 aircraft in just 14 days... That's more than 1/4 way to 100 victories in just two weeks of fighting in a target-rich environment, but he never got that chance... After landing back in Britain, he was then sent to Canada to join a Victory Loan Drive, selling war bonds. His fighting days were over.
Had he flown for Germany he would have fought until he either died, or the war ended.
Do you still have "real trouble with" the 100+ victories of German "experten" ?
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Do you still have "real trouble with" the 100+ victories of German "experten" ?
*sigh* I suppose that I was the first to raise this, but I'd still like to keep it to Rudel.
Nevertheless, lest you interpret my silence as assent, the answer to the above question is "yes." No other combatant power - not Russia, Japan, England, China, the US, anyone, regardless of how long they were at war, produced even one pilot who claimed 100 victories, much less 100 pilots making that claim. So I think it's reasonable to be skeptical from the start.
The explanations I've seen for why the Germans were so wildly different from everyone else don't overcome my skepticism. "Target-rich environments" work two ways, as we see even in AH, because often it means you're outnumbered and that means you're likely to get killed. "They flew for the whole war" doesn't work because the Russians and Japanese - whose pilots, like Germany's, flew until they died - did, too, and also because Germany's greatest ace flew for "only" two and one-half years of the war, significantly less than Johnnie Johnson or Saburo Sakai, for example. I hope we can all discount the "they were super pilots flying super planes" explanation.
I've seen the technique you refer to here - Toliver and Constable's book comes to mind - where one takes a known rate of kills and extends that over a longer time period. But that calculation doesn't account for risks, particularly for the increasing risk of making an error as a pilot is exposed to constant combat. Sooner or later the odds catch up with most everyone - except for these 100 charmed German pilots (and all the others who didn't quite make the 100 mark but were really close) (and there were several hundred of these).
Then I wonder whether anything could be gained by being generous on kill confirmation? Many people think that the 8th AF did that with bomber gunner claims in order to the boost morale of people exposed to a dreadfully-high risk of death. For the Germans, of course, being able to boast of a pilot who single-handedly could destroy hundreds of tanks, or a bunch of pilots who could shoot down hundreds of planes, was consistent with both propaganda and Nazi doctrine, not to mention perking up the morale of the troops.
AND THEN, just as I was about to hit the "Post" button, I thought I should make sure that it was really only 100 German pilots claiming over 100 victories each (it was really 103), and I stumbled on this quote in Wiki:
"In the 1990s, the German archives made available microfilm rolls of wartime records, not seen since January 1945, available to the public.[6] These showed that while in theory the Luftwaffe did not accept a kill without a witness, which was considered only a probable, in practice some units habitually submitted unwitnessed claims and these sometimes made it through the verification process, particularly if they were made by pilots with already established records.[6] In theory the Luftwaffe did not accept shared claims, but it happened. In theory each separate claim should have referred to a particular aircraft, but in practice some victories were awarded to other pilots who had claimed the destruction of the same aircraft.[6] In 1943 the daily OKW communiques of this period habitually overstated American bomber losses by a factor of two or more. Defenders of German fighter pilots have always maintained that these were reduced during the confirmation process. But the microfilms prove this not to be the case.[6] Some 80 – 90 percent of the claims submitted were confirmed or found to be "in order" for confirmation up to the time the system broke down altogether in 1945." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_World_War_II_aces_from_Germany. Hey, it's Wiki, but it lists some sources that we can check out when we have more time.
So at the end of the day I think to myself, "super men or generous confirmations?" One of those seems more likely to me.
- oldman
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Show me another CAS pilot with 2,500 combat sorties, and I'll show you another Rudel. What you say about the increasing risk of death is true... But these very few lucky souls did survive long enough. Rudel was shot down 39 times. Late in the war he had his right leg amputated below the knee due to injuries sustained in combat, but he continued to fly. He was incredibly lucky. Günther Rall was shot down eight times and survived the war. He was incredibly lucky. Erich Hartmann as you say flew only two and a half years, but he still flew 1,404 combat sorties... against an enemy fielding inferior equipment, pilot training and unit tactics. Hartmann would not have been able to achieve the same tally in the west, nor is it likely he would have survived the war. Hartmann was never shot down, but had to ditch 14 times for other reasons and he survived the war. He was incredibly lucky. Germany lost more than 30,000 pilots in WWII... A very exclusive club of pilots were lucky enough and skilled enough to become "experten". The rest became fodder in the great meat grinder that was WWII.
Now, I consider this debate closed. If you chose not to believe the German claims then so be it; in the great scheme of things what does it matter. Some people still don't believe NASA landed on the moon, because it seems so difficult and improbable and the evidence could have been faked.
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oldman how many missions did Allied ace pilots fly compared to Lw ace pilots?
Iirc an American combat tour was 75 missions. Hartmann flew some 1200 missions.
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oldman how many missions did Allied ace pilots fly compared to Lw ace pilots?
Iirc an American combat tour was 75 missions. Hartmann flew some 1200 missions.
Couldn't tell you what a Russian combat tour was. Or Japanese.
I'm looking forward to reading the Wiki sources. Some day.
- oldman
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Ivan Kozhedub, the leading Soviet and overall leading Allied ace flew his first combat mission on March 26, 1943 and scored his first 20 kills during the course of 146 sorties, 90 of which were escorts, 39 ground force cover, 9 armed reconnaissance and 8 scrambles. In total he claimed 62 personal victories flying 330 sorties.
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I worked at Willow Run back in the late 80's early 90's in the same hangars the 24's were built. The old hand crank elevators used to get to the tail sections were still there!
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I worked at Willow Run back in the late 80's early 90's in the same hangars the 24's were built. The old hand crank elevators used to get to the tail sections were still there!
:airplane: Wow! Great info! I lost my mind for a little while in the middle 60's and was flying C-46's, hauling Ford Motor Company auto parts to Kanas City for assembley! Stayed on that job for only 3 months! Got tired of getting feet wet every time you flew through a rain shower, no on board radars and in the spring of the year, March, April and May. That area is refered to many times as "thunderstorm alley", and by golly they are correct. I don't think I flew one trip in 3 months, that I didn't have to deviate around something, whew!! :cheers:
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There is a US post-war assesment of German gun camera footage from 1944 that finds a direct correlation between the rank of the pilot and the likelyhood that a claim was confirmed as a kill. The higher the rank of the pilot, the more likely that their claim would be confirmed as a kill. This was true even when assesment of the gun camera footage (against B-17s and B-24s) showed that the claims of higher ranked pilots were no more likely to be accurate than that of pilots of lower ranks. There was a clear case of confirmation bias in German 'verification' of claims.
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Do you have this "assessment" ?
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Coincidentally the more skilled you were (in LW) the more rank you had and the more probable was that you could shoot somebody down and the more probably you could reliably conclude if somebody was actually going down.
Statistics, oh what a can o' worms.
-C+
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As a higher ranking German officer, you had a good wingman staying with you in the battle, and also see to you don't die (and confirm your kills).
The best German pilots tallied hundreds of kills against inferior enemy on eastern front ( seal-clubbing) until mid-44.
The best had the latest planes, and best wingmen.
The best German pilots on western front who flew only against western allies had less success, more than 100 kills
was uncommon.
Surviving as a German fighter pilot on the western front flying active from 1939-45 could well be a lotto-win equivalent.
One that made it was Karl Borris, he had 43 kills including five 4-engined buffs.
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Heinrich "Pritzl" Bär was the leading Luftwaffe ace on the western front who also survived the war. He was only beaten in victories in the west by Marseilles. Bär had 125 kills in the west and 96 in the east.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinrich_B%C3%A4r
There were only eight Luftwaffe pilots who got credited with 100+ victories in the west: Hans-Joachim "Jochen" Marseille, Heinz "Pritzel" Bär, Kurt Bühligen, Adolf "Dolfo" Galland, Joachim Müncheberg, Werner Schroer, Egon Mayer, and Josef "Pips" Priller. Of these Bär, Bühligen, Galland, Schroer, and Priller survived the war.
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There is a US post-war assesment of German gun camera footage from 1944 that finds a direct correlation between the rank of the pilot and the likelyhood that a claim was confirmed as a kill. The higher the rank of the pilot, the more likely that their claim would be confirmed as a kill. This was true even when assesment of the gun camera footage (against B-17s and B-24s) showed that the claims of higher ranked pilots were no more likely to be accurate than that of pilots of lower ranks. There was a clear case of confirmation bias in German 'verification' of claims.
Please list your source(s) for this. I've never heard about it before, and I'd like to read it. Thanks! :salute
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Not sure how true this is but apparently Bar crashed while training in a Harrier. He was unhurt, but reportedly said, "add another destroyed allied aircraft to my score".
63tb
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The Germans claimed fewer soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat than what the Soviet records show they lost in air combat. The Germans were under-claiming.
Due to few facts that I can get into later, I have a hard time believing you could have read this from anywhere.
Have you actually read a source which says the above?
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I believe I stated my source in the post you're quoting.
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I believe I stated my source in the post you're quoting.
Krivosheyev? Ok, I understood that was for the Soviet losses alone.
I've read a slightly different story. For example during a period in the Kursk battle (5.7 -8.7 1943) Soviets reported 566 aircraft lost while Germans claimed that they destroyed 923 Soviet aircraft. Thus over claiming by 38,7% based on the Soviet loss reports. I'm not claiming this to be the absolute truth either. During the research of Finnish aerial victories it was found that there were clear gaps in the Soviet loss records on certain time periods especially on the Northern part of the front (where JG 5 operated). So it could well be that these gaps existed on other parts of the front as well where Germans were solely operating.
Sources:
POHJOINEN ILMASOTA (NORTHERN AIRWAR) by Hannu Valtonen
SUOMEN ILMAVOIMIEN HISTORIA 26 FINNISH AIR FORCE HISTORY: Aerial Victories part 1 by Keskinen & Stenman
Blindly comparing some total loss/victory figures together like that won't yield any accurate results. I guess I need to obtain the book from the author you mentioned and see how the figures are handled in that book and what conclusions exactly the author makes.
All nations, including the Germans, overclaimed, some more, some less.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_and_overclaiming_of_aerial_victories_during_World_War_II (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_and_overclaiming_of_aerial_victories_during_World_War_II)
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It probably varied over time and fronts. Remember some claims never were filed at all... if the would be claimant didn't survive the encounter. Some units were wiped out and no one on their side really knew how many they took with them. War is not an exact science, however, in total the Luftwaffe claimed fewer Soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat than the Soviets reportedly lost.
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however, in total the Luftwaffe claimed fewer Soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat than the Soviets reportedly lost.
Well, since you repeated this claim, could you give me an exact quote from that source of yours? I'd like to know whether it was Mr.Krivosheyev who made the claim in a published book or if it was you who pieced it together from figures in his book.
EDIT/I googled the book. So the book is "Losses in the Armed Forces"? So does it directly compare Luftwaffe claims to Soviet losses or do the Luftwaffe claims-figure you mentioned come from a different source?/EDIT
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The Soviets claim they lost a total of 106,400 aircraft to all causes, including 46 000 lost in air combat. (Krivosheyev, Grif sekretnosti sniat, 1993). The Germans claimed fewer soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat than what the Soviet records show they lost in air combat. The Germans were under-claiming.
After cross-checking from Geust & Petrov's excellent Red Stars 4, even without reading Krivosheyev's book, I'm sure that ~46,000 -figure entails all combat losses, not just air combat losses. So the 46000-figure includes combat losses of all causes like, AAA, weather, getting lost and so on.
Also it is good to remember that Soviet losses also include the aerial/AAA victories of other nations which fought alongside of Germany.
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Are you suggesting the Soviets lost the other 60.000 aircraft to accidents? That's absurd. The Soviets lost 106,000 aircraft to all causes. At most 20-25% might have been destroyed in accidents leaving some 80,000 aircraft to the Germans with about half lost in air combat. The Germans claimed 77.000 soviet aircraft destroyed, including 45.000 in air combat. This distribution of losses is also close to what the Western Allies suffered.
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Are you suggesting the Soviets lost the other 60.000 aircraft to accidents? That's absurd.
One never knows. People often underestimate how many aircraft were lost to accidents. For the US, by way of example:
276,000 aircraft manufactured in the US .
43,000 planes lost overseas, including 23,000 in combat.
14,000 lost in the continental U.S.
Source: http://www.wwiifoundation.org/our-mission/wwii-facts-figures/wwii-aircraft-facts/
So of 57,000 planes lost, well over half of them were lost in non-combat circumstances.
And that's the good old U.S. of A., where the kids flying these contraptions generally had at least an automotive background.
- oldman
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I may have gotten the German claims from "Hitler's Luftwaffe", Tony Woods, Bill Gunston, 1997. I don't quite remember.
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A better source Oldman is http://www.usaaf.net/digest/index.htm
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A better source Oldman is http://www.usaaf.net/digest/index.htm
Agreed, although the numbers appear to be the same.
15,000 guys killed in continental US training accidents. That's the equivalent of a standard US Army division in that war.
http://www.usaaf.net/digest/t213.htm
- oldman
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That sounds excessive considering the RAF lost 70,253 airmen killed or missing on operations. Out of these 47,268 were lost by Bomber Command who also lost a further 8,305 in accidents (about 20%), according to http://www.amazon.co.uk/Right-Line-Role-RAF-World/dp/1848841922.
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This is an interesting statistic from your source Oldman:
"Almost 1,000 Army planes disappeared en route from the US to foreign climes. But an eye-watering 43,581 aircraft were lost overseas including 22,948 on combat missions (18,418 against the Western Axis) and 20,633 attributed to non-combat causesoverseas."
Out of 22,948 combat losses 18,418 was in Europe. I wonder how many of those "non-combat causes" were in the Pacific.
(http://historylink101.com/ww2photo/fighter-crash.jpg)
On a carrier these damaged aircraft would be dumped overboard. Marine aircraft would be bulldozed off the runway to make way for the others. In Germany, Russia or Britain these aircraft would have been repaired and put back into service.
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Are you suggesting the Soviets lost the other 60.000 aircraft to accidents? That's absurd.
Well you still didn't tell me exactly what your source says. Does it mention the 46000-figure as only air combat or all losses? Per Red Stars 4 I'm positive it means all losses.
Here posts someone who seems to have read the book:
BTW Soviet combat losses were 46,100 aircrafts, not 75,400-82,200 (G.F. Krivosheyev, ‘Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the twentieth century’, London, Greenhill Books, 1997)
- 20,000 aprox. in air combats
- 26,100 aprox. because of flak and other causes related in combat
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?p=1437751 (http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?p=1437751)
So yes, I'm suggesting that the 46000 means all combat losses.
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You may be right that I've misunderstood the scope of that number. I don't have time to dig through the books right now, but I will at some point.
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You may be right that I've misunderstood the scope of that number. I don't have time to dig through the books right now, but I will at some point.
:airplane: Not trying to get in this discussion, because honestly, I don't know, except that we lost as many aircraft in training and mechanical problems as we did in combat. I know that when crew members were "debriefed" after missions, many times, 3 or 4 gunners on 17's and other bombers would all claim a kill on the same aircraft. Those were honest mistakes as I don't think any those guys would purposely lie just to get a kill. I would think that everyone would be surprised if they knew the actual number of aircraft shot down and those lost to problems to and from the targets. Either way you look at it, those young men were a brave bunch, knowing that most would not live to fly 25 missions, until early 45.
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Hi Earl,
Here's a couple of attachments I used on this BBS once before - first one shows the chances of surviving a tour of X mission based on an overall loss rate of Y, second shows actual loss rates month by month during WWII for the bombers of the 8th Air Force and of RAF Bomber Command.
With the table, the number of missions is down the left, the % loss rate is across the top (it actually goes from high rates to low rates, I should really re-do it so the losses are low at the left and high to the right), and the % chance of survival is what appears in the cell.
Bottom line is, a majority of crews can expect to survive a 25-mission tour if loss rates are below 2.5%. (This is only of course operational losses, so with training accidents and the like one would want it to be a little lower.)
Fairly stark stuff for the 8th Air Force in 1943.
(http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad212/mhuxt/rates.jpg)
(http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad212/mhuxt/comparative-1.jpg)
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You may be right that I've misunderstood the scope of that number. I don't have time to dig through the books right now, but I will at some point.
Well when you casually make as big claim as this (We are talking about all Luftwaffe kills of the whole big eastern front after all.) and considering that there isn't a shred of truth in it, I most certainly want to make it crystal clear to everyone who is reading this thread that such a claim has nothing to do with reality before it becomes another "well established WWII-fact".
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That remains to be determined...
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I think I know where the discrepancy comes from, but I'm not 100% certain yet...
The Soviet figure of 46,000 lost aircraft in combat induces aircraft destroyed by enemy aircraft, ground fire and missing in action/failed to return.
The Luftwaffe figure of 45,000 Soviet aircraft destroyed in air combat includes Soviet aircraft shot down by Luftwaffe aircraft, and ground fire.
The Luftwaffe figure of 77,000 Soviet aircraft destroyed includes Soviet aircraft shot down by Luftwaffe aircraft, ground fire, and destroyed on the ground by bombing and strafing.
Apparently the Soviets did not consider uncrewed aircraft destroyed on the ground as "combat losses".
I'm not 100% sure yet, but I'm still investigating.
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Found another which gives comparative loss rates on operations to targets in Germany. I guess this is what people mean when they say the 8th daylight campaign against Germany was not sustainable without lots and lots of long-range escort craft.
(http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad212/mhuxt/vsGer_zpsbf8ccf91.jpg) (http://s937.photobucket.com/user/mhuxt/media/vsGer_zpsbf8ccf91.jpg.html)
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At a 9% loss rate (typical for most of 1943), the odds of your aircraft going down in 5 missions is 38%, 10 missions is 61%, 15 missions is 76%, 20 missions is 85%. This doesn't include the odds of you being killed in a bomber that makes it back.
Those are some grim odds.
A great book that covers the US 8th AF action in this regard and many other aspects is "Masters of the Air," by Miller. Wonderful book.