Quote:
Originally Posted by FLYBOYJ  Thanks Udet - I know we (the West) have been enlightened with new information regarding Soviet Pilots in Korea since the 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union. Although many old Korean War vets have come foward to confirm what was already known, I believe a lot of the "newer" stories by some of these guys and authors who document their claims is nothing more than repeated Soviet propaganda carried down over the years and it's apparent by the the claims made by the Soviets. There is no denying that US (UN) claims were also exaggerated but if you put it in perspective the US (UN) air-to-air victory claims are a lot more believable than some of the BS put out by the Soviets. Bottom line Soviet lied. |
Well there is actually the obvious fact of overclaim made by Soviet pilots against UN air forces which cannot be denied. Before treating them as liars, some might want to check the actual nature of the combat records made by UN pilots. First as mentioned, the 792 kills claim made by US pilots is false all the way for sure although many have and still do assume that this is fact, as well as the B-29's gunner claims and stories of huge attacking numbers of MiGs which were also false.
Anyways, there's always the mention of Soviet propaganda, when actually the soviet involvement was secret, wonder which would be the purpose of that propaganda? For example, on April 22 1952, Colonel Yevgeni Pepelyayev (21 kill ace) was awarded with the Golden Star of the Heroe of the Soviet Union. A particular characteristic of the ceremony was that Pepelyayev have civilian clothes, and in the speech there was no mention of the actions why he deserve the award.
Maybe you're talking about modern russian propaganda which I would rather call bragging and is widely used by Western enthusiasts and veterans as well.
Now the actual losses admitted by Soviets was 335, 231 for the Chinese and about 46 for the Koreans. That comes to 612, pretty close to the 792 that's true although the latter number would be F-86 only kills, now we're talking about 600 MiG-15 losses from all causes. Indeed, the main cause of MiG loss was actually the uncontrolable spins which the MiG desing notoriously featured and contrary to UN pilots, Communist didn't wore G-suits over Korea, that resulted in several losses in air and outside air-combat. Several US pilots actually claimed the spinning MiGs as victories, James Jabara for example claimed once a victory when seeing a spinning MiG-15 that had previously been seen by his wingman, but anyways I wouldn't call him a liar would I Flyboy?
3041 UN aircraft were lost in Korea,
Of this number:
41 have no reason given
11 are listed as lost for unknown reasons
164 list a reason but no category
991 are non-combat losses (crashes in training, landing/takeoff from carriers, typhoons, accidents, etc.)
1,150 were lost due to AAA damage,blew up in midair
683 were combat losses (non AAA inflicted)
Of that 683 --
4 were midair collisions (3 with MiG-15s, 1 with a Po-2)
12 were claimed by the KPAFAC
14 were claimed by the PLAAF
15 were claimed by both the PLAAF and the VVS
227 were claimed by the VVS
407 were lost in strafing runs, bomb runs, accidents in combat, etc.
You can check at Kornwald
Korean War Air Loss Database (KORWALD), the most reliable source for US Korean war air losses.
Numerous russian scholars point that the UN side too often explained losses due to MiGs as technical (« Instrument malfunction » or « fuel exhaustion »)
We can verify this for example using some of Maj.Pepelyayev record on
Yevgeny Pepelyayev - top Russian ace :
"On April, 3, 1951 on April 3 three MiGs of the 176th GvIAP were shot down by the American Sabre pilots (one of them by James Jabara) and only one F-86A was downed by Kapetan (Captain) Ivan Yablokov - the one flown by Ronald Shirlaw (POW) "
However to the data of the USAF shows this plane is lost, ostensibly, for only technical reason: «Instrument malfunction, fuel exhaustion»
See :
KORWALD Loss Incident Summary
KORWALD Loss Incident Summary
Date of Loss: 51/04/03
Tail Number: 49-1173
Aircraft Type: F-86A
Wing or Group: 4th Ftr-Int Gp
Circumstances of Loss: Instrument malfunction, fuel exhaustion, bellied in on river bank 10 mi NW of Kaesong
Another example : " next day April 4 the MiG-15 pilot Starshii Leitenant (1st Lt.) Fiodor A. Shebanov scored the first victory of the 196th IAP when bagged one F-86A (not admitted by USAF but confirmed by the guncamera footage and the fact that a Soviet ground party led by Major V. P. Zhuchenko found the Sabre's wreckage in the ground)"
Apparently, Russian ground search group finds the F-86A on the ground, however according to official loss-count that day, April, 4, 1951, the USAF had not lost any F-86A. Search here if you like :
KORWALD Date of Loss Report
Third example : - " 7 April the MiG drivers of the 176th GvIAP shot down the F-80C of Jack Thompson (downed by Boris Obratsov) and the B-29A BuNo 44-86268 (by Ivan Suchkov);
- on April 10 again Fiodor Shebanov shot-up the F-86A BuNo 49-1093 and his buddy the WW2 ace Kapetan Aleksandr Vasiko bagged the F-80C of Douglas Matheson (KIA). "
Jack Thompson's F-80 shows up :
KORWALD Loss Incident Summary
as hit by ground fire...
but not F-86A BuNo 49-1093 and Douglas Matheson's F-80.
Now the same situation appears with the US side claiming something that doesn't appear in Soviet records, the best example would be Russel Brown's famous first jet vs jet kill.
The fact is that the actual real UN actual air losses by MiGs will not be known for sure for a long time. Spurious claims were certainly made by the two sides, for example the numerous F-86 kill claims made by Soviet pilots were in many cases, if indeed real, other types of US/UN aircraft as Western fighters were often misidentified. Same situation of overclaiming appeared during the BoB, over the Eastern Front or in the Cold War air battles over Korea and Vietnam (yes the 2:1 kill ratio is too, but I'll leave this for another day maybe). Most of the time, overclaiming if motivated by a socio-political issue (i.e.: propaganda if you like), the fact that the military shows the people what it wants to see.
This quote might explain better (
Air Combat Episodes) :
Turning to the question of aces, we would to place our attention on the question of those achievements which are found in our sources of information. As is known, any sort of validated statistics, which lay out the results of the combat work of Soviet pilots in Korea has not been published up until the present time. On the other hand, the success of our American rivals has been widely published in the mass information media of both that time and in the latest works on the history of the conflict. But at the same time, as to this information, which sharply differs from our own, alas, we have not been able to correct the accounting or, at the very least, find any which is more correct that what we present in the following recounting. At that time, documents in our archives on Soviet aviation units were only permitted access for the internal use of the VVS, whereas the Far Eastern Air Force of the USAF controlled the data which was released for public use. But the public at that time was only interested in the valor shown over "Mig Alley" in what was otherwise a completely unpopular war. In this, the attempts of journalists to wipe the smoke of minimizing the losses and maximizing the victory claims from the eyes of the public was simply inevitable. Remember that this was the epoch of the "Cold War" and it was completely natural that papers publish the achievements of simple American buddies who were protecting the ideals of freedom in the face of the "Red Menace"and racked up one victory after another - this was what they got even if the reality was taking losses. The creator of the classic work "The US Air Force in Korea 1950-53", Robert Futrell, sets the number of Sabre losses in air combat in Korea as around 58. This number is found and frequently cited to us in the pages of the translation of the anthology by James Stewart, "Air Power - The Decisive Force in Korea".(11) (12) Several years later, a new figure appeared - 78. Now many Western researchers, drawing from the document "Sabre Measures (Charlie)", published by the USAF in 1970, were advised that 103 Sabres were lost in aerial combat in Korea. But even that number is wrong! In accordance with the document, the 103 Sabres lost were lost between June 1951 and July 1953. But why not for the entire war? And why do the researchers, reading from one and the same primary sources, determine a new figure every ten or fifteen years? For that reason, we can frequently not speak about the victory claimed by a Soviet pilot without having the losses admitted by the American side on the same day the claim was made. Perhaps we will find out - in another ten years.
Linear Mode
