soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Some weeks ago I asked under this subject about an episode Cairncross
mentioned as most important in his memoirs. About an attack of the Red
Airforce against Luftwaffe airfields in May 1943 - well before "Zitadelle",
the famous battle of Kursk.

The sucess of 600 destroyed aircraft seemed somewhat high and I never heard
before about it. But I was no expert on Kursk so I asked here. I got only
two direct replies to the question, by LouisC and Geoffrey Sinclair. Both
never heard of it and doubted that it happend. So for me the issue was
closed - obviously Soviet propaganda or a lie for/by a red spy.

Just by chance, a short time ago I came over an old German book on Kursk:

Janusz Piekalkiewicz: Unternehmen Zitadelle (1983)

With mild interest I run over the pages around May and my eyes were catched
by a small image of a German bomber Ju-87 riddled by 100s of small holes.
Looked much like result of a ground attack. Text: "Orel area, airfield
Karatschew, begin May 1943; after attack by soviet Tiefflieger (low level
a/c) on the base of Stuckageschwader 2 "Immelmann""

Two pages further I found the event. According JP at Thursday, 6th of May
1943 the Red Airforce launched a massive strike against German airfields.
The SU (and probably Luftwaffe too) expected begin of Zitadelle for 10 to
12th of May. Soviet chief of the operation was Airmarshall Nowikow. The
attack startet in early morning against 17 airfields of Luftflotte 4 and 6
from Smolensk to the Sea of Asow at a frontline of 1200 km. It was planned
under extreme secrecy. Any written, telegraph or telefon message about the
operation was forbidden. The SU losses: 21 aircraft.

In the morning of 6th and 7th May it was repeated, but with less sucess.
Total results were 1400 missions, 122 a/c lost and "according soviet
statements over 500 German aircraft destroyed." JP further: "This attack
series is described as the greatest operation of the Red Airfleet in the
Second World War." (pp. 94f)

How reliable is JP and his book? JP may be the second most printed WW2
historian in Germany. First is Paul Carell - by his large postwar print
he was probably the most read nazi propagandist of the 20th century. But
unlike Carell, JP was neither SS member, nor active involved in the holocaust,
nor writing with nazi attitude. I noted JP wrote about anti- guerilla
operations as "clean ups" without to mention any massacre. His portrait
of the eastern front as something like "fair warfare" without crimes is
like Carell.

That bias is probably due to the (german) main sources JPs book is based on.
That may caused too that operational victories of German units were much
more mentioned than of any Soviet. It has sometimes the style of the OKW
reports - Soviet sucess is only detectable by withdrawl of German units.
German loss numbers are only rarely mentioned - Soviet ones often. In case
of the German loss numbers often or always "according Soviet sources" is
mentioned. By the Soviet loss numbers never a sources is given - probably
from "official" German sources, no reason to question it ;)

All in all its a typical western cold war book. Form that perspective the
May Attack issue seems well based on something real. Even the number of 500
fits somewhat to the 600 Cairncross was told. Now in this case the number
of destroyed aircraft the Soviets could only get in reliable way by the
German loss reports of the airfields and Luftflotten. So by Ultra and the
main source for Luftwaffe Ultra was Cairncross himself. That makes me
assume that the 600 may even closer to reality because he could notice
a lie if he came over a summary report by the Luftflotten or one prepared
in Bletchely. That posibility would prevent any try by his spy handler to
feed him such propaganda as "payment".

What matters me most, how could it happen that no military expert here ever
heard of the largest operation of the Red Airforce in WW2? Are your books
on Kursk still all biased by Cold War attitude? Red Army as a stupid animal
like large mass overwhelming anything but without much brian - something
that attitude I noted by Carell.



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