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

AIR SUPERIORITY
Shturmoviks, MiG-3s, Pe-2s, and Tu-2s-some 3,600 in the first 3 months.
Then production accelerated swiftly to over 25,000 aircraft in 1942.40 This
was comparable to the 1942 output in Germany of over 27,000 planes, but
the Germans were fighting on 2 other major
The German drive on Moscow, slowed down near Smolensk in August
and September because of the diversion of Guderian’s Panzer Group to the
south to help in the Ukrainian campaign, got rolling again in good weather,
became bottomless bogs in the rainy season, or as the Russians style it, the
infamous rasputitsa (season of mud). Tanks and trucks were immobilized,
aircraft, operating from primitive airstrips, were forced to stand down.4’ It
was not until mid-November that the drive on Moscow could be resumed,
a drive that reached some 50 miles from the city. Again nature intervened,
this time with freezing cold and snow, and the non-winterized Luftwaffe
became a semi-immobile force of frozen planes. The Soviet Air Force had
two advantages in the battle for Moscow: accustomed to cold-weather
operations, its planes were prepared for the freezing temperatures, and the
rapid German advance served to extend logistics and only primitive airstrips
were available, while the Soviet retreat meant that the VVS was both
shortening its supply lines and falling back on relatively well-equipped airfields.
In addition, the considerable assets of Moscow’s PVO aviation were
merged with Frontal and Long-Range Bomber Aviation in a unified command
under the control of the head of the Red Army Air Force, thus facilitating
economy of effort and enhanced flexibility. According to the
Russians, the VVS flew over 15,000 sorties to the Luftwaffe’s 3,500
between mid-November and December 5.43
The Soviets under Zhukov’s plan for counterattack by all 3 Russian
Fronts in the Moscow area got off the mark on December 5, and by the 25th
the German threat to Moscow had been eliminated. Zhukov’s Western
Front was supported by Frontal, PVO and Long-Range Aviation, the latter
a misnomer for a force that “bombed and strafed his [German] infantry
marching formations, tank and truck
The other two fronts were
also ably assisted by their air components. The Soviets had marshalled
around 1,200 aircraft to half that number for the Luftwaffe. The combination
of withdrawing aircraft from the Eastern Front to aid in the Mediterranean
theater and the severe losses incurred in using bomber-type planes
(Bf-1 lOs, He-1 1 Is, and Ju-88s) for close-support reduced the number of
aircraft available drastically. In December 1941, the VVS finally attained
air superiority in some localities, which went a long way in restoring a modicum
of aggressiveness in the Soviet pilots.
192