Suggested Readings

[Scorpiоn]

One of my few posts that isn't a question...

I invite an argument to my statement, but I'm pretty sure the reality of war, even in things like the Battle of Britain, were skirmishes rather than great confrontations.

[WebbPA]

I'll look into it but I suggest that each side grossly overestimated the losses of the other side.  If you were to to check the losses which each side admitted I think you would find they were about 10% of what the other side estimated.

This gives me a chance to pass on another piece of gory war trivia - on what date in history did the most American military die?  (Hint - it wasn't 6/6/44)

[Felix/FFDS]

http://www.brooksart.com/BoBloss.html


Claims vs actuals.  One has to be carefuly when reading about "claims"

The link I state above indicates a daily tally of losses during the BoB.  Sept 27 1940 shows a LW/RAF split of 55/26 losses, on that day alone.

Losses of German tanks totalled approx. 300 tanks, with Soviet estimates at a similar number.

While the numbers were considerable, I seruiously doubt that there were 1M pieces of armour, total, among the combatants.

I'd have to do more serious research on the subject, though.

[Hagar]

[quote]I heard the Soviets lost over 1 million pieces of armour!

[Felix/FFDS]

[quote]

This gives me a chance to pass on another piece of gory war trivia - on what date in history did the most American military die?

[Scorpiоn]

Well, it had dawned on me that the claimes were a "bit" more exagerated than usual with 173 Soviet claims, vs. 26 actual German losses.  But nonetheless quite impressive.  For that level of claims to take place, there has to be a lot of skirmishing taking place in the sky.  Awesome, even if no one gets shot down!

Duel for the Sky deals only with air power, and my million knowledge comes from le brain, not the book.  Although I find your facts much more probable, Hagar.  Perhaps the USSR lost 1 million armour peices throughout the whole war?  I'll look into it.

My book also covers the BoB, and it states the RAF had a tendency to exxagerate claims much more than the Luftwaffe, whom had much more accurate claims.  In the RAF's defence however, 109s (and perhaps others?) did dive to escape danger, giving RAF pilots the impression they were crashing.

[Felix/FFDS]

[quote]

My book also covers the BoB, and it states the RAF had a tendency to exxagerate claims much more than the Luftwaffe, whom had much more accurate claims.

[Hagar]

[quote]My book also covers the BoB, and it states the RAF had a tendency to exxagerate claims much more than the Luftwaffe, whom had much more accurate claims.

[Scorpiоn]

This isn't the only book I have, but it is the most complete.  Most of my oter books concentrate on machines rather than battles.  And of course, the great factor here is...  money.  My mother previously said I could get a book a month, which is pretty good, but now that my dad is out of a job, she seems to have come down with amnesia.

[Hagar]

You don't need to rely on books. There are many articles on the WWW you can find with a quick search on Google. I use the RAF official BoB site to verify my own information. http://www.raf.mod.uk/bob1940/bobhome.html
Remember that the daily reports are the official records of the time, not the revised figures. There are also excellent documentaries shown on TV but these are not always historically correct. I can't recommend a definitive history as many of them contain inaccuracies. Len Deighton's "Fighter" is one of the better ones but even this has been criticised in some quarters.

In the end you have to read as much as you can on the subject & draw your own conclusions.

PS. I read several reviews on Duel for the Sky. One complaint was that "lack of space prevented the inclusion of a bibliography, which is too bad given that he appears to have done a great deal of research." Not knowing his sources makes the "facts" he based it on dubious to say the least. IMHO

[WebbPA]

I'd have to venture that it was one of the bloody US Civil War battles - not Gettysburg, though.

You were partly right - it was at Gettysburg.  About 25,000 if I recall.

[Felix/FFDS]

[quote]


You were partly right - it was at Gettysburg.