Subject: Aircrew casualities
From: Guy Alcala
Date: 9/29/03 9:27 PM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id:
ArtKramr wrote:
Subject: Aircrew casualities
From: Guy Alcala
Date: 9/26/03 3:15 PM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id:
ArtKramr wrote:
snip
If I think back to the
missions I flew with the 344th and had to name a "typical" mission, I
couldn't
do it. We had no typical mssions.. Each one was unique, except of
course
for
the milk runs, which in themselves were not typical.
Sure, but we're looking for statistical data on survival rates, and so far
the
only such data presented in the course of this thread is that which I
provided in
that post. Everything else has been perceptual or anecdotal. We now have
some
actual data (limited to a single mission though it is, and only 60 B-17
combat
losses out of the 4,688 B-17s combat losses in the European war as a
whole),
which
is more than we've had otherwise.
Guy
You are only saying that because you never had to fly the Schweinfort
mission.
If you had there would be no way in hell you would call it typical.
Juvat has already pointed out that I specifically stated that my comments
referred
to the mission tactics, techniques, and weapons employment. As he says, the
losses
were unheard of _to that time_
That alone makes it atypical.
, but as I pointed out in my reply to one of
his
posts, not all that un-representative of subsequent similar missions.
Regensburg/Schweinfurt was the deepest penetration of Germany to date
Again. atypical.
but
the
results were similar on other missions, if not quite so extreme.
Not so extreme?. Hardly typical.
In the case
of
first Schweinfurt, the German fighter controllers guessed right for the wrong
reasons;
Irrelevant to the guys who got hammered and those who were lost.
they'd re-positioned much of their fighter force to hit the
Regensburg
force when it returned to England. That force continued on to Africa, but
the
Schweinfurt force came in and returned on virtually the same track (neither
force
had the range to take anything other than the most direct route to the
target), so
the fighters hit them instead, both coming and going. The only reason they
were
able to do so in that case was owing to English weather, and the decision by
BG
Anderson to delay the takeoff of the Schweinfurt force for several hours as a
consequence. Sometimes things don't break your way.
Tell me about it.
Find me
one guy who went to Schweinfort and said it was just another mission like
all
others. No big deal. Nothing special. Find me just one such guy. Guy you
post a
lot of good stuff here, but sometimes you just slip away from reality.
How about several guys who went to Regensburg, who Middlebrook interviewed
(and he
interviewed crew from every single U.S. bomb and fighter group that took
part in
the mission, as well as German crew from every single fighter gruppe, and RAF
pilots from all the RAF fighter squadrons)? It really all depends on where
you
were in the formation, and your perspective.
Y'mean if we put up 56 aircraft and 55 were lost but one got back unscathed we
could write the mission off as a milk run due toi that one plane?
Middlebrook wrote:
"Two of the groups in the leading combat wing - the 96th and 388th - had
never been
under serious attack and had so far suffered no casualties [Guy note: on the
way in
to Regensburg; the 388th subsequently lost one a/c that ditched short of
Africa
after being damaged by flak over the target). Several men in these groups
refer to
the Regensburg mission as 'almost like a milk run'. But the officer
observing from
the tail turret of the leading plane had been sending a steady stream of
reports
about the action which had been taking place further back in the force and
reporting those losses which he could see. LeMay was well aware that his
force had
taken heavy casualties."
Hardlly typical or a milk run in spite of what one flight had experienced
So, several of the crews who Middlebrook interviewed considered Regensburg
"almost
like a milk run," despite the fact that the percentage losses were actually
higher
(16.4% vs. 15.7%) than the Schweinfurt force suffered.
Looks like those "several crews " got it wrong.
There were also units
on
the First Schweinfurt mission who suffered no or low casualties, and may not
have
even seen a German fighter. For those units and crews it was a milk run _for
them
personally_.
Why do you keep evaluating based on "several crews" We evaluate by overall
losses, not by "several crews" To those who never flew a mission. all missions
are milk runs. It all depends on who's ox is gored.
Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer