Case Studies in the Achievement of Air Superiority - Air Force ...

LUFTWAFFE AGAINST POLAND
eight Battles again attacked the Germans in the Ardennes. Of the attacking
aircraft, only one returned badly damaged; the remainder had all been
10~t.67
It is worth underlining the fact that its massive air operations cost the
Luftwaffe heavily. On May 10 the Germans lost eighty-four aircraft (including
forty-seven bombers and twenty-five fighters)-more aircraft than it
would lose on any day of the Battle of Britain. On the following day, the
Germans lost a further forty-two aircraft (including twenty-two bombers,
eight dive bombers, and ten fighters).68 Allied losses were no less
but of course the Germans enjoyed a considerable quantitative advantage
over both opposing air forces (which was magnified by the fact that a substantial
portion of the RAF had remained in the British Isles for air defense
purposes and was consequently not involved in the battle for air superiority
over the Western Front).
On May 12, Guderian’s panzer divisions began crossing the Semois
River. Allied air attacks, especially by Battle bombers, caused the Germans
considerable difficulties, including forcing Guderian to move his headquarters.
Defending German fighters and antiaircraft guns inflicted heavy casualties
on RAF bombers, shooting down eighteen of the fifty aircraft. But
the French were able to inflict some painful casualties on the Luftwaffe.
Five Curtiss fighters caught twelve Stukas returning unescorted from a raid
and shot all of them down.70 Unfortunately, the general air superiority
that the Germans enjoyed over the Ardennes made such incidents the
exception.
By May 13 German armored forces had come up on the Meuse
between Dinant and Sedan. By the 14th Guderian had his infantry, supported
by artillery and Stukas, across the river and busily engaged in
punching through French defenses. Even more important was the fact that
the Germans had managed to bridge the Meuse and began moving armored
forces across the river. The threat posed by this German thrust and the
collapse of French units produced by the Luftwaffe’s Stukas and German
infantry finally awoke the French high command to the danger. Desperate
calls from the French led the RAF to throw its bomber forces against the
growing German penetration. Their effort aimed at destroying the bridges
thrown across the Meuse by German combat engineers and at attacking
German columns moving up to and across the river. The results were a
disaster for the RAE Luftwaffe fighters and antiaircraft savaged attacking
formations. The official history records the RAF’s losses as thirty-five out
of sixty-three Battle bombers dispatched and five out of eight Blenheim
bombers dispatched (or forty out of seventy-one aircraft-a loss rate of
fifty-six percent of the attacking force).’’
Still, these operations caused the Germans serious difficulties. The war
diary of XIX Panzer Corps (Guderian’s force) noted that “the completion
of the military bridge at Donchery had not yet been carried out owing to
83