and that includes the AA guns also... sortie ratio's in the desert where not particularly high (for obvious reasons I guess) but indeed its confirmed that the minimum monthly demand for supplies by the LW in early 1942 was 9k tonnes of supplies...I'll have to check showalter's date/essay on sources on that... I think he pegged LW operational aircraft at that time as 542 but I'll confirm later for sure
the africa corps itself minimum demand was 60k tonnes per month (3 mechanized divisions with about the strength of a single US armored division between them)
the largest ever supply was in feb 1942 with 56k tonnes of supply being delivered (so everyone was constantly short)
It just seems terribly low.
If we assume around a 2 ton bomb load, plus at least as much fuel, plus things like ammo, thats 5 tons.
Less than 4 sorties per plane per MONTH, and thats assume the crew, support crews, etc etc live off sand...
I think there may be a mistake in the figure ssomewhere.....