Allied Versus Russian Aircraft During WWII
 

With BoM in dev, it got me thinking of the what-if-scenario I'd rather be playing if hostilities between the Soviet and Western forces broke out with the fall of Berlin and nukes were still unavailable in the short-term.

I found this on "War History Fans" http://www.warhistoryfans.com/allied...ii-197772.html

Question posed by cptsully: In all my reading, I have never read a "what-if" scenario concerning a head to head match up between Allied and Russian aircraft in WWII.

Obviously, there was never any reason for the two to meet in battle, but as far as I know, they never even shared the same sky together. Anyone have any information otherwise?

And what about a head to head? Who would come out on top?

I know very little about the Russian pilot training or doctrine.

Thoughts anyone?

R

Response by ramjb:

well, you've got a certain lack of info then . Because Soviet and western allied aircraft did indeed fight each other during WW2. In the last days of the war the eastern and western front came up so close that it was not rare for soviet planes and US/British planes to find each other over the skies of germany. And in some places things went sour because of wrong identifications.

there are several instances of this,I'm talking now by memory as books aren't readily available for me, but I know for sure Ivan Khozedub's got two P-51s to his personal kill tally, which he got when a flight of US planes misidentified his radial-engined Lavochkin and attacked the soviet planes thinking they were FW-190s.


Anyway who would come on top?. Good question. Western air power doctrines were very different from soviet ones. The Soviet frontline aviation (VVS) was a primarily tactical air force designed and emphasized on CAS and low altitude operations. Their designs were for the most part excellent at low but lacking at high altitudes. Their design philosophy was into specialized tools. Polivalence was never a strong point in the soviet designs. Their fighter design, for instance, emphasized nimbleness and lightweight aircraft with very high power to trhust ratios, low wingloadings and relatively light weaponry, but had almost no focus in provision for external ordinance for air to ground missions, had generally short ranges, etc.
Strategic bombing was neither a priority nor a perceived need.

Western power air forces were focused on the whole opposite side of the spectrum. In general they were excellent machines at top altitudes, heavy planes of high wingloading, not that good thrust to weight ratios, and some serious raw firepower. This meant the fighters, for instance, weren't as nimble as the soviet ones, but were able to fight well at all altitudes. It also meant that they were capable of several tasks at hand, the same plane being able to do a 1000mile escort trip at 28000 feet, and then to go on a treetop-level jabo strike on the next sortie loaded up with 2000lbs of bombs and rockets.

Those examples of design differences are to pinpoint the fact that both air forces were very different in their purpose and were night and day in what it referred to doctrines of air power usage. This translated not only in different designs but in different practices aswell. Soviet machines were never built with attention to detail, they were generally speaking crudely built and finished up as they were perceived as dependable items that woudln't last long in frontline use. Western designs were much more durable, better built and rounded up. And that is just one other difference between both.

Wich of both were better? Which of both would prevail in a full scale war?. My opinion: western allied power would shred the russian air forces to bits. It's pretty much based on factual reasons and doctrical beliefs I hold, but also because of some factual evidence. I'll try to explain myself:



1-Combat record vs a dying force:

From 1943-1945 (roughly speaking, from the Battle of Kursk onwards) german air numbers in the East were outscaled by the soviet by a huge margin, the more as the war progressed. Even handicapped by being an air force consisting of 95% of unexperienced pilots and only a 5% core of excellent, battle hardened and experienced aces, with almost no middle ground between them, and because of constant (And progressively worse) fuel problems, the german Jagdwaffe caused an aberhating proportion of losses to the soviet air forces, totally out of scale with the odds involved. The Luftwaffe was built around and had doctrines more similar to the US and british ones than to the soviets (in fact it could be said that US and British AFs had doctrines similar to the german, but that's another debate ), and the pounding the Red Air Force received at the hands of such a devalued, lacking on numbers, lacking on resources and, at points, desperate Luftwaffe point out that the Soviet design and doctrine practices weren't the best around.



2-Altitude is life:

The most vital law in air combat, which holds as much truth today as did in 1915, is that he who holds the altitude, holds the advantage. The soviet designs were, all, without exception, extremely handicapped at anything over 4500m because of a lack of interest in developing proper high altitude engines/planes/doctrines. For them, the battle was to be fought down low near the troops. For the western powers the battle was to be fought up high, escorting heavy bombers in their way to target. Thus naturally when both forces were to encounter, most times the soviets would rarely hold altitude advantage. And even if they would have it, it would be at a cost of a seriously degraded performance on their machines vs planes that were flying at their sweet spots. If altitude is life, Soviet designs allowed for a pretty short one.


3-doctrinal vacuum.
Western powers had given ample thought, and had battle hardened experience, into the field of CAS (close air support): the use of air power to influx the battlefield below. They had dedicated air forces to that task (notably the 9th Air Force in the USAAF, or the whole of the Tactical Air Force, was dedicated to it). Thus, they were very experienced in the part of the air spectrum where the soviets were the strongest: low level fighting, air support, fighter-bomber runs or low level strikes. The planes weren't the best for the task (a plane with a heavy turbosupercharger that's worthless at low altitudes is handicapped at clo alts vs a plane that has none, for instance) but the doctrines, experience, and indeed plane quality was still there. Thus, the western air forces would've been a tough adversary for the Soviets in their own turf, so to speak.

However, Soviet doctrines had always neglected high altitude designs and doctrines, had given almost no thought to high-level strategic bombing, and had no real experience in countering high-level bombing raids (the luftwaffe had not done a single strategic bombing effort in the east since 1942). Thus even while there was a dedicated part of the Red Air Force for strategic high altitude defence (Voyska-PVO), they didn't had the planes, they didn't had the doctrines, and most of all, they didn't have the experience to face a determined strategic effort, much less coming from the likes of the US 8th or 15th AFs, or the British Bomber Command, which had been battling it out over the III Reich for three years in a row.

Said it in other words: the low level fighting would be undecided, even if the soviets had a slight advantage here, the western powers had both the doctrines and war experience to give them a tough fight and draw the fight there...
but when the 1000-strong US bomber B-17,B-24 and B-29 formations covered up with hundreds of battle hardened long-range escorts start appearing at 30.000 feet over Moscow, and more importantly, over the strategic industrial centers beyond the Urals, the whole soviet war effort would be sold out, with pilots with hardly any battle experience, in planes gasping for air, facing hundreds of battle-hardened veterans in planes that shined at altitudes over 5000 meters. It would be a butchery, both up on the sky and down where the bombs would fall.

And when the 1000-strong british bomber formations covered by the best night fighter intruders in the world at the time would follow up by night, the soviets would directly have nothing to stop them (there was not a single instance of anything resembling an effective night-fighter in the whole of the Soviet Union well up to the mid-50s).

In a few days (not months or weeks. Days. as soon as the first massive bombing over Moscow would happen) a lot of the VVS fighter effort at low levels would be distracted to defending against air raids over the vital centers of the Soviet Union...thus suddenly the number of fighters available to conduct the tactical warfare the soviets so much trusted on would be severely curtailed, and suddenly the tactical battle would turn towards the western side as a result (not unlike what happened with the luftwaffe after most of its fighter force had to be redeployed to the Reich so they could defend against the 8th AF raidS).

Not only that, given that the soviet designs were highly specialized in nimbleness and ability at low altitudes they were desperately unnefective at high altitudes, and the pilots weren't experience in that sort of war either. So any fighters distracted from the VVS into the PVO, would also be at a severe disadvantage against the american raids and would mean little difference in the long run. As time passes by, more and more fighters get away from VVS into PVO and suddenly the tactical presence of the Red Air Force suddenly stops being a factor (again, not unlike what happened after most of the german jagdwaffe was forced to stay within the Reich to defend against enemy raids. The luftwaffe never was a tactically offensive weapon ever again after 1943 and the 8th AF strategic campaign over Germany)


In other words, if I'm to be asked who would've won such an air war, there's little doubt: the western air forces would absolutely destroy the soviets. It would be costly and would take time, but it's plain to see that if all things are considered, the total advantage held by the western powers in strategic bombing and high altitude operations would totally tip the scale towards them in not a too long time.

Wasn't there a role distinction between the Yak's, Mig's and La's? Especially when looking at the aircraft guide of Il2 for the Mig3...
Advantages:
• Fastest high-altitude interceptor of 1941;
• Stable gun platform;
• Excellent maneuverability at high angles of attack;
• Good maneuverability at high altitudes;

Some thoughts and comments on the subject please.

Some holes in that opinion. First off, the guy assumes that the long strategic raids would hit all the Soviet weakpoints. It is not so simple.

Second, even if the aerial battles over 6000m would be carnage to Soviet aircraft, still the CAS missions would be well received by them. Both the Yanks and Soviets had a strong mudmoving department. This leads to considering the potential the Red Army had in 1945. On th ground methinks it wouldn`t be so easy for US/GB against reds. Wars IMO are still won on the ground, not in the air.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_battle_over_Niš

I find the thoughts of ramjb very questionable.

1) If the soviets were so lacking at high altitudes, why didn't germans fight them there? Probably because there was no one to fight.

2) What was the effective range of those B17, B29 raids? I guess Moscow was out of their reach. Not talking about Ural at all. And try to think about bombers without support of P51s.

3) Kill ratios were pretty balanced since La7 and Yak3 were introduced. Also pilot training was much better than in 1942 at Stalingrad. I heard that some went to combat missions with less than 4 flight hours.
I recommend reading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavochkin_La-7

Only 115 La-7s were lost in air combat

and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakovlev_Yak-3.

Consequently, the Luftwaffe issued an order to "avoid combat with Yak fighters without an oil cooler under the nose and with an inclined aerial mast below 5000 m"


4) Allies didn't face the best german pilots since BoB. Also germany itself was poorly defended by minor Luftwaffe forces. Making conclusions based on fights when luftwaffe was outnumbered even worse than on the eastern front is not helping either.

5) The soviets had high altitude fighter planes. Mig 3 had been around since 1941. And they had maybe 3 000 of them.

I could a pit picky here (and/or wrong) but I thought the Russians were Allies?

The non aggression pact with Germany did not mean they were at war with West.

A personal view is that if the war dragged on then the USA/UK forces would win the air battle but I doubt that it would have lasted long. The Russian Army had large numbers of heavy tanks and the allies didn't.

If the USSR could get the initial strike then their army had a number of advantages.

The close support low medium air war is probably too close to call, strategic long range missions the Russians didn't have a chance but it would take time to make a difference

I'm not sure the number of Soviet tanks would have been as great a factor. USA/UK probably would have had control of the air, which would have put the tanks at risk, just as it did to German tanks in western Europe.

Then again, if we had gone after the Sovs, would the remnants of the German army have gone with us? They still had a lot of men under arms at the end of the war. Given the German fear of the communists "barbarians", and being re-supplied with Allied materiel, maybe the Red army would have been given a bloody nose.

Just my take, and really, who knows?

binky9

Dammit! I forgot that if .50cal could take down a Tiger tank then they would obliterate those tiny T34 and IS2!

I'm joking here :-)

I agree with Carguy and Rumcajs.

Russian would need a plane to intercept the heavy bombers at high altitude... La-7 best altitude was 6km and it was a very agile plane compared to late 109s (with gunpods because of the weak firepower) and 190s. Plus it could mount 3 Berezin B-20 over the engine, and that was really a great weapon. Still the Mig3 could have been improved...

US would still have air superiority because of the range of the P-51 but I'm not sure if they could actually CAP russian airbases: US planes need to go under 2km to get the Russian... A Yak3 or a La-7 would jump on them easily. And what about AA production?

Instead what about IL2s attacking US ground forces? 20mm shells were quite inefficent against it the german had to go at ground level to hit IL2's radiators. What about attacking them with .50cals? What about P47 and P38 fighting at that low altitude.

If (and this is a big IF) the russian could not quickly respond to the heavy bomber threat maybe US could do some damage. Infact I think that reaction should be the main factor and the russian did great in that (and they were desperate too at the start of the war...).

But I still have my doubt that they could really win the war against the Red: as carguy says the wars are won on the ground and there the Russians should have a great advantage.

I don't think the idea of the Western and Soviet forces clashing is as far fetched a "what if" scenario as some may seem to think.

Stalin was always incredibly critical of Western Democracy and the capitalist system which, understandably, played a major part in the non-aggression pact with the National Socialist regime. During the early stages of Nazi rule, the more radical groups (Essentially, as crazy as it sounds: The left wing Nazis... the Socialist element within NS) within the NSDAP called for more than just a non-aggression pact and, in communication with Trotsky at the time, even tried to form an alliance of sorts with Communist Russia..... of course these ideas were stamped out rather dramatically by the Hitler supporters within the party with the "Night of the Long Knives" resulting in Otto Strasser, upon hearing of the execution of his brother Gregor, forming the Black Front and going into hiding having been declared public enemy No. 1 by Hitler and pursued constantly by the SS and Gestapo.

Of course, we all know what happened to Trotsky in the end.

General Patton was also no fan of his Soviet allies, comparing them to "Mongolian Bandits". He also expressed a certain sadness, later on, that the Allies didn't march straight through Berlin and into Moscow.

On May 7th 1945, whilst in communication with US secretary of War Robert Patterson, Patton said the following:

"Let's keep our boots polished, bayonets sharpened, and present a picture of force and strength to the Red Army. This is the only language they understand and respect."

When challenged, Patton responded:

".....we have had a victory over the Germans and disarmed them, but we have failed in the liberation of Europe; we have lost the war!"

As you can see from the above.... war with the Soviet Union was actually far from unimaginable. I would go so far as to say it's actually surprising it didn't happen.

Of course, instead, we got the Cold War.

..... and Rocky 4 LMAO

:D

You are right. At the end of WWII there were first pieces of Mig 13 available. They had problems and got canceled but still check their parameters http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_I-250 .

BTW both sides the Russians as well as the western allies had plans to continue the war. Stalin refused with words "And who would feed them? (he meant the west Europe citizens)". The red army generals were pretty confident they could see the Atlantic ocean in weeks.

On the other hand it's true the war was lost to Stalin. Large part of Europe was left under his dictation. That's why WWII didn't end in 1945 but rather 50 years later.

Search youtube for "Blood upon the snow". It's a series of 10 parts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hilY...feature=relmfu

Sadly it's all part of the human condition I think.

Yesterday's allies are tomorrow's enemies and all the photos of handshakes, smiles and pats on the back are, generally, just that.... photo opportunities and propaganda to keep the folks back home smiling.

I can't remember the source (I believe it was one of the MI5 directors) but I read an interview many years ago in which it was stated that, during the Cold War, our intelligence agencies spent more time scuppering the plans of American, French and West German spy networks in Great Britain than they did chasing Russian secret agents around. :D

In war, and politics, there are no friends.... only convenient deals.

Russian ground forces would dominate the battlefield and capture all continental Europe in perhaps 2 years. They were master of blitzkrieg. Remember the Operation Bagration , where the whole German center group was crushed in matter of months if not weeks, or the same fate of the unscarthed Japanese Manchurian Army. Allied airpower was impressive, but they lacked a specialized anti-tank aircraft. In Korea, US Army found themselves in trouble even with a handful of North Korean T-34.
Strategic bombing was the best weapon the Allied had in the war. It wouldn't work due to the huge range to Moscow and Leningrad. And if something goes bad, the Russian can still spam an armada of copied Me-262. They have enough materials and pilots for this.
Sorry guys but I think right after WWII, the Western Allied was completely unprepared for a new conflict with Stalin.

Well, then there is also the issue of logistics and whether the Soviets would have been able to sustained their efforts. Both however would have long supply lines to contend with.

What does the stats show in terms of plane types and numbers? Also, 1/2 the armed forces of the US was deployed in the pacific (me thinks) at that time.

What if a Japanese conditional surrender was accepted (after hostilities between the Soviets and Western Allies commenced). The whole pacific fleet could have been deployed to Russia's ...erm... eastern border. Would China have joined in with the Russians? How many infantrymen would/could they have fielded combined?

Anyway, I don't think the tactical impact of the US/UK bombers should be dismissed too easily in regards to what involvement they could play on a moving battlefront. Take the Arden for instance after the weather cleared.

Anyway, keep the comments coming. Yak vs Mustang, would these have been the air supremacy fighters of both sides and how would they stack up against each other? Maybe Tempests as well....
Sherman vs T34?

Just throwing this out here, if the war had continued, would we have seen another A-Bomb drop... hmmm. Now there is some thinking material...

And weren't the bombs US dropped over Japan made in Germany? As far as i know the nuclear program was a disaster without results before the war ended and suddenly they had two bombs. One of them had the shape of the conventional German bomb just larger.

Undoubtedly! After the "success" it had in Japan, I doubt the US would have been able to help themselves.

Another interesting permutation is if Hitler was assassinated/deposed and the Nazis joined the allies in a war against Communism.......

WW2 is fascinating because its history is filled to the brim with possible outcomes, different routes that could have been taken...etc... most of the things we take for granted now about that particular period in history was little more than a series of bizarre accidents at the time.... with far reaching consequences.

There are some compelling arguments that back that belief. It is agreed by many now that the uranium(?) they used in the bombs were taken from a captured U boat. There are some who believe that the Germans had actually used nuclear weapons of some description on the Eastern front also.....

None of this will ever be proven either way, of course, until the secrecy is lifted on all the files and that ain't happening for some time.

Well this leads me to the idea of a nuclear war simulator. Imagine you are in a bunker dug 100m bellow surface and pressing the "I Win" button. We shall ask Luthier to bring this to the sequel after they have Battle of Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk and Berlin finished.

LOL. Well.... does "Defcon" count? Each game only tends to last about 4 minutes, you set up your "defences" and then sit back and watch everyone die. :D

Shouting "I WIN!" has never sounded so hollow. :D

Sorry, but thats completely bullshit! Some years ago the grandpa of my wife was telling me from the war! He was MG gunner in a SPW from a german Panzerdivision in Russia. He told me the war in the east was terrible (he was there for 2 years in the middle and south of Russia)! There were masses of enemies and as a gunner there was no reason for aiming, just pull the trigger and you hit a target!
But compared to the Invasion in the Normandie it was nothing!(that's what he told me)
In the Normandie he was a veteran (EK II and 2 times seriously injured) and what he saw there was incredible! Masses of weapons! They dont has any chance to do something against the allied troops. Hunderts of planes in the air was making it almost impossible to drive in tank or vehicle! After some days he surrenders cause he said there was no chance to do anything!

I am not sure one can accurately predict a conventional war between the western allies and the USSR in 1945. The soviets, despite their seemingly enormous amounts of men and material, would have been at a considerable disadvantage if the war had gone on for quite some time.

1.) As incredible as it sounds the Red Army was running out of men at the end. The losses it suffered were horrendous and while they still had tanks, artillery and aircraft by the thousands they had trouble replacing their infantry losses. If the war had turned into a war of attrition they would have faced even more serious manpower shortages.

2.) The soviet war economy was totally focused on building tanks, artillery and combat aircraft - their entire logistical system was depending on allied deliveries. Soviet truck building was inadequate even before the war and once it got underway the production was little more than a trickle to douse a forest fire. It was not before some serious shipments of US-made trucks arrived that the Red Army got any kind of strategic mobility. So initially they had enormous strategic mobility but after a while, with losses due to accidents, wear&tear and enemy action growing, they would become less and less able to stage far-ranging offensives.

3.) Fuel was the other major achilles heel of the Red Army. It was dependent on oil coming from the Caucasian fields and the Allies had airfields within striking distance. A crippling blow to soviet oil production was theoretically possible ... and it would have been just as effective as the attacks against the german synthetic fuel works in 1944.

On the other hand the Red Army had a considerable numerical superiority over the allied ground forces - at least initially - and combined with the fact that allied ground forces just weren't used to considerable losses and an enemy on par with them the Red Army may very well have given them a beating.

This discussion is just a theory crafting based on personal preferences. Yes it is extremely hard to make predictions even if we are talking about alternative WWII results. So just a few notes
1) War of attrition was exactly the thing the Germans failed to win after their blitzkrieg failed.
2) There have ever been only two commanders who thought it was a good idea to attack Russia. Their names were Napoleon and Hitler. They both underestimated the Russians. So whenever i hear people making such assumptions that it was possible to fight the Red Army back to Russia i have to laugh. There was a good reason western allies didn't do that. Also Stalin knew why he had to share the victory with US/GB.

Hold on a second and I will edit that Wiki page up and correct it for you.

Of course but I see it also on the opposite side: there would be no lack of men but an issue with public opinion about the number of casualties. And against the experienced Russian ground forces I'm quite sure that number would be really big... IIRC the best of "German" ground forces was still on the East (since Germans' priority was Russia) and still US/UK lost many men.

Why does this thread come up as infected in Chrome?

But say that the US makes two A-Bomb strikes against Russia, I have no idea at the time what targets would have been even thought of... but what happens then?

Look at the fight in the Pacific, how long would that have continued and how would that have ended without those 2 horrific strikes against Japan...

The Allies faced with another down in the mud, costly front, would that have been used again... makes you think...

No one is doubting the Russian backbone in WWII, but there are a lot of factors to take into account for sure...

There is strong belief that the two A-bombs the US had were not US made. That the uranium was made in Germany and that the Germans sent an U-boat with the material to Japan right before the WWII ended in Europe. When the Germans capitulated all German boats received an order to go to nearest allied port and surrender. The U-boat was somewhere in Atlantic so it went to an US harbour.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_submarine_U-234
http://www.orau.org/ptp/articlesstories/u234.htm
OK two A-bombs would not be effective against Russia (no Moscow couldn't be bombed). And the US was far from producing more of those. And would the U-boat had surrendered if the war didn't end? Too many questions there. Let's live in peace and be happy the war is over and we can amuse ourself flying planes in WWII sims.

There is no doubting that Germany helped advance both the US and Russia back in those days...

Anyways this is a "what if..." discussion, so many possibilities and all would have just resulted in more un-needed death... The war ended where it should have.

Now I am in Canada waiting on a patch from some russians for a very cool WWII flight sim... its all good... but I still prefer the Spits to anything :)

Me too. Claims that home.arcor.de has in some way been compromised and that content on this thread originates there.

That is the reason I think that time would have had a big meaning here. Russians would partly succeed in driving Yanks back to France if they attacked rightaway after conquering Berlin. Every history buff knows that western Alies did plan a what-if scenario against Stalin. And there is much material to think that German forces (even if short of basicly everything) would have been succesfully deployed against the Red Army, if given the American resources.
Also, both sides did not have their front lines at the same strenght in every single spot because both were stretched pretty much. A well planned strike by either one of them could inflict serious damage. That said, IMO allies would need some time to get organised while the Reds could take the nominal superiority both on the ground and in the air.

4) Allies didn't face the best german pilots since BoB. Also germany itself was poorly defended by minor Luftwaffe forces. Making conclusions based on fights when luftwaffe was outnumbered even worse than on the eastern front is not helping either.




Forgetting North Africa.

Ok you are right. The point was that main german forces were alocated to the eastern front. So drawing conclusions of air superiority based on results of fighting luftwaffe in 1943 - 1945 is misleading. The Russians in 1945 were much stronger opponent than the Germans during the last three years of WWII.
We play this "what if" game here so i ask you a question.
Q: As the Western Allies would react if their losses skyrocketed up? Would they be able to bear hundred thousand killed within a month?

yes, it already happened before during WWI

That's my avatar/sig picture. I doubt there's suddenly a virus in there. :rolleyes:

Mostly this tread is about how an air war between the two sides would have played out. I'd love to play a scenario with P47's vs IL2's or Lagg's vs P51's. Maybe scramble missions of Migs to intercept massed bomber formations...

Couple things though:
1. Agree that the first side that would have taken the initiative would probably made major advances. Maybe the Soviets would even threaten the Western Allies (WA) ports. US probably would have pulled out of the war if this happened. At least with direct intervention.

2. My perception is that the Western Allies forces were not too badly equipped (e.g. navy, tanks, artillery and logistics). They were lacking in man power though, but would they not have a material advantage? Would liberated France not be a major contributor in this scenario?

3. Strategic high level bomber strikes against Russian airfields; could this have swayed the air power balance in favour of the WA?

4. Lets say it went in favour of the WA, how could they have approached the vast Russian country side and the winter differently from the Germans? To have won, would they have had to take Leningrad & Moscow?

The American public would never have accepted the huge losses of men in such a scenario. Also the strategic capabilities of the allies wouldn't have had any effect in a short term, the reds would already be doing a "Dunkirk Part deux" before any effects of strategic bombing would have had any effect. The Russians had a clear tactical superiority and that would've forced the allied high altitude fighters to fight at a serious disadvantage, P-51 vs La-7 at 1-3000 meters altitude, bye bye little pony.

Here I disagree. The VVS paid a high price for its enormous growth in 1943 and that price was the insanely low training it gave its aircrew. The number of soviet veteran aircrew, while always rather small in comparison to the size of any force, was considerably lower than in other air forces - even at the end of the war. A fresh american or british pilot had more flight hours than a soviet pilot with a few weeks of frontline experience ... and therefor more routine in handling his aircraft.
Secondly the VVS was always a rather rigid and inflexible institution when it came to tactics and doctrine (as was the whole Red Army, which is why the Wehrmacht could withstand it as long as it did) and did not make most of its forces. Often enough lives were squandered by utterly inimaginative tactics which in the end got the desired result but at a higher cost than any other air force would have been prepared to pay.

It's not so much the performance envelope of the aircraft involved but the considerable difference between pilot training, doctrine and tactics that set the two sides apart.

This is the common mistake people do. You underestimate the advance the Soviets had done since 1943. I've already posted that link but let me say that again.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavochkin_La-7

Only 115 La-7s were lost in air combat

Do you still think they didn't move a huge step forward? Sure it's a commonplace the Soviets fought by their numbers. It still was probably true on the ground. But in the air things had already been different.

I stand by my words. Using wiki as source is not exactly helpful to any discussion since it can contain virtually anything ... It is very difficult to get an accurate picture of soviet capabilities and achievements because of the utter distortions that entered soviet archives on behalf of Stalin. Secondly just listing one thing and trying ot impose it on the whole of the VVS is simply pointless. The number of La-7 lost in combat is one aspect of a large number: relative ratio between the various soviet types, lack of fighter forces of the Luftwaffe and its allies, mission profiles, actual engagements between La-7 and the Luftwaffe (and what types they encountered), ... That list is very long.

Post-war several german officers were hired by the US Army to produce a load of memoranda on a load of things to get the perspective of their former enemies on their own strengths and weaknesses but more importantly to get a more complete picture on soviet capabilities and faults. And most of these german officers (Army and Luftwaffe alike) attibute the soviets an utter predictability when it came to tactics, a lack of flexibility and gross negligance of command, control & coordination. The soviets just had the numbers to get away with it.

PS: Taking the La-7 is a bad choice, anyway, since according to all the information I have they were issued only to specific regiments and were freed from the tight doctrinal leash the VVS kept on its fighter forces. That allowed them more freedom and gave these units a better chance to enter combats from a position of advantage. The big rest of the VVS, however, wasn't freed from the doctrinal straightjacket.

I agree on the training of these pilots but I think we have to remember that many Western pilots actually didn't see combat over Germany: so they learned the theories of fighting, but could not practice aerial engagements (above all in a "many vs many" environment).

Ok, IL2 it's a game, but I think it can be useful to understand that some types of plane need time to be flown correctly: take Spitfire vs 190 and how a Blue pilot's skill has to evolve to be successful in that fight. If both the pilots have the same low experience who's in advantage there? The pilot in the unforgiving plane has to be patient and unexperienced pilot are not patient at all.

Now translate all with the La-7/Yak3 - P51/P47.
I just can see the guys who attacked Ivan Kozhedub: they had the energy advantage, the positional one and probably could ambush the russian...

You are right about wiki. Also one good example of VVS performance is not enough to make a general claim.

This may be something trustworthy:

http://lend-lease.airforce.ru/englis...ikov/part4.htm

A.S. When did well-trained cohorts begin to arrive in the combat regiments?

N.G. Somewhere in the second half of 1944. We fought the second half of the war in modern equipment and had acquired good combat experience. The loss levels in combat regiments were dropping and regiments began to demand significantly fewer replacements. From this came the possibility of pilots being sent directly from flight school to reserve air regiments [ZAP], where their instructors were combat-experienced pilots. At the ZAPs young pilots practiced only combat flying, and in a quite serious manner. After the ZAPs these pilots moved on to combat regiments with good combat habits. The ZAP was one of the most needed and effective components of the Soviet school of combat training.