The attrition of the Luftwaffe in the East was much less than that inflicted in the West/Mediterranean.
In 1941 and 1942, attrition in the East was the most significant loss upon the Luftwaffe. In 1943 it wasn't, but that was a function of the Luftwaffe shifting it's operational tempos out of the Eastern Front
but it was all replaceable given production of aircraft and pilot training.
Except they were not. The Luftwaffe proved just as unable to replace the attrition inflicted upon it in 1942 as it had in 1941 or 1940.
A declining fraction of the Luftwaffe was present in the East; Barbarossa was the peak of the Eastern commitment and every year was a decline in proportion of the Luftwaffe present.
Which went in lockstep with it's decline as a proportion of the Luftwaffe's forces.
Certainly there were notable instances when the Luftwaffe 'surged' and dominated certain battle spaces, like Romania in early 1944, but that was by far the exception and proved that despite the VVS numbers if the Luftwaffe could ever scrape together enough fighters they could dominate the skies.
Except they don't prove that. If anything they prove the opposite, since those attempts by the Luftwaffe to dominate those battlespaces
were defeated by the VVS.
despite inflicting heavily disproportionate losses on the VVS (and again during the Orel Bulge offensive).
Which means nothing more then that the side with fewer number of aircraft in a air battle gain important intrinsic advantages that lets them inflict lop-sided . If you bother to look into the instances of air-air combat during D-Day, you'll find that the Luftwaffe there also managed to inflict dispproportionate losses upon WAllied air forces.
As to the contention that the fighters in the East were the best the Germans had... I know Bergstrom asserted that based on their kill totals, but most German pilots worth their salt that appeared in the East racked up much higher kill totals in the East than in the West.
Which you base on nothing. There are multiple German hundred+ aces who flew on both fronts and managed to achieve roughly equal kills. One such rarity, Heinz Bär, actually managed to achieve more kills in the west then he did in the east. In fact, some of Germany's hundred+ kill aces (like Hans-Joachim Marseille and Adolf Galland) achieved all of their kills in the west (incidentally, Hartmann was of the opinion that Marseille was the better pilot and would have surpassed him if he hadn't been killed by a air accident). It wasn't at all due to the fact that the cream of German aces were any better then their Soviet or WAllied counterparts... they simply were kept in combat indefinitely while the Soviet and Anglo-American aces were only engaged for a limited amount of time before being rotated out. If you were to ask me who would win in a dogfight between Erich Hartmann, the top ranked German ace, and Ivan Kozhedub, the top ranked allied ace of WWII with 62 confirmed kills (64 if you count 2 P-51 Mustangs he shot down when they mistook him for a German), I would reply "flip a coin and bring popcorn". Ivan flew against as great or greater odds as the German pilots and lived to tell the tale. In fact, while his plane was occasionally badly damaged, he was never actually shot down whereas Hartmann in turn was shot down 16 times. Same with Marmaduke Pattle or Richard Bong vs Hartmann. Or any 1 vs 1 combination of those four.
And yes, before you start talking about how that isn't significant, the fact that the top Soviet and WAllied aces were just as good as the top German aces matter because these are the pilots who really mattered. WWII air combat was always defined by the scores of a small handful of aces. Some German pilots took that to extremes, but the trend was universal, with the top 10% of pilots on all sides responsible for about 80% of the kills. Less skilled but still well-trained pilots would learn how to survive, and maybe pick up a kill here and there, but they lacked the true fusion of abilities ever to become top scorers. Poorly trained pilots (which chiefly came from the early-war VVS and mid/late-war Luftwaffe) tended to just die. Many pilots could manage to fly well enough to get an enemy in their sights, but most lacked the shooting ability to inflict lethal damage once they'd done so.
By 1943, the VVS had plenty of the first and second category of pilots I mentioned above. The Germans, for their part, maintained a static pool number of the first category (most of whom were still on the Eastern Front), suffered from a dwindling number of the second, and had a skyrocketing increase number of the third.
But Soviet recovery was a function of the Luftwaffe pulling their fighters out of the East
Incorrect. Soviet recovery was a function of the reorganization of the VVS's logistical and training operation as well as the creation of a solid corps of Soviet aces during the course of 1942, with the result that by 1943 Soviet pilot training was better than their Luftwaffe counterparts. The transfer of fighter aircraft was second to that. The air environment on the Eastern Front was one of almost continual combat in very dangerous circumstances, as most battles took place under 10,000 feet. There was no rest for the Luftwaffe or VVS pilots, both of whom were forced to constantly give battle regardless of their own state whereas the WAllies had more choice in the matter until mid-'44. The psychological strains (for both the Germans
and the Russians) were immense, and many couldn't handle them, snapped, and died.
Those few pilots who
did survive this murderous environment attained a level of skill that few others have ever reached. Not because they were supermen, but because by necessity they were pushed far beyond the limits of what other pilots had to endure. It didn't make them unbeatable, but it did make them very very good.
However the resources that went into AAA could have gone into cheaper artillery or be moved around by rail to various important rail junctions or supply dumps that were attacked by Allied bombers in operational bombing missions IOTL, which weren't defended enough.
Actually, they were defended quite adequately. The problem for the Germans was that the WAllies and Soviets were willing and able to suck up the losses inflicted upon their tactical air forces by heavy AA fire.
Rail mobility would be a major factor in moving them around or even defending against ground attacks by deep penetration raids by Allied AFVs.
Rail mobility is not responsive enough to effectively respond to AFV raids and is too inflexible to respond to the rapidly changing conditions of mobile warfare. It would be easy for the Allies or Soviets to trick the Germans to commit the artillery in the wrong place and then use their armor or air power to cut the rail lines.
Agreed, but avgas demands were much lower in the West than West by 1943 IOTL
It's not just avgas demand, but also avgas supply. Without having to make as much fuel for tanks and trucks to fight in the east, the Germans can instead direct that crude oil to be made into much more avgas.
Sure, but that would be a far less difficult task with the air dominance that the Wallies were able to achieve IOTL by 1944.
Which the WAllies likely won't be able to achieve until 1945-46.
Sure, because it wasn't about the ground war specifically. It does however touch upon the effects of the ground campaign aiding the destruction of the German war economy along with strategic bombing.
Except the ground campaign didn't just "aid" the destruction of the German war economy, it
caused the destruction of the German war economy well before the strategic bombing campaign did. By the time.
However the impact of the bombing is undeniable on the war economy, specifically in the realm of transport within Germany and oil production.
Both of which came too late to matter.
The transport plan in France too is undeniable, same with the interdiction efforts in Italy.
Which would certainly have still occurred without the strategic bombing campaigns, likely more rapidly and more effectively with the additional resources involved. Indeed, it would probably wind-up being where the bulk of the Luftwaffe would die instead, as they have to oppose the destruction of infrastructure in north-west Europe and Italy in order to prevent the WAllies from landing there.
I doubt that they could have been spent more effectively on the ground war given the huge resource diversion they caused in German production away from the front,
Which was of the wrong nature to influence the ground war.
the damage they inflicted on
Which was minor until mid-'44, by which point the Luftwaffe had already been ground down.
the Luftwaffe from having to fight rather than picking it's battles as it had done along the Channel for years
The Luftwaffe couldn't pick its battles along the channel any more then it could over the Eastern Front or Homeland. It
has too challenge the WAllies over the French Coast in order to try and prevent them from obtaining the conditions to invade. The only place the WAllied air forces can't afford to choose to pick their battles prior to mid-'44 is over Britain.
s and inflicted a hugely disproportionate casualty rate on the RAF
Which the introduction of new WAllied aircraft in 1943, most particularly American fighters, would handily solve.
and the damage to German industry in the process.
Not significant until very late in the war.
during the Iraq wars pretty much demolish Iraqi CiC.
No it didn't. Iraq CiC remained quite perfectly intact throughout the Gulf War. Iraqi units were able to effectively communicate with each other and their higher command throughout the war. The air campaign actually did exceptionally little damage to the Iraqi combat capabilities... it was Iraqi incompetence that made coalition victory so lopsided.
It started in 1944 and was initially written to provide lessons to aid the air war against Japan, which had still been ongoing.
Then it was re-written too hastily.
Didn't I say that? Of course it would have taken longer, it doesn't mean that the air war would work at the same rate.
You did, in fact, claim that the strategic air war would have continued basically at the same pace as OTL without the ground campaign. You then reiterate that claim here:
What would have happened at the same time is the destruction of the Luftwaffe, destruction of oil, and smashing up of transport.
Despite the fact that with more fuel available to it, the Luftwaffe would have lasted longer and delayed the destruction of oil and smashing up of transport.
Sure, thanks to Stalingrad the war in the East had turned around, but the Soviet offensives in 1943 and on directly benefited from the strategic air war hitting German industry starting in March 1943 with the Battle of the Ruhr and siphoning of German fighters West.
Not really. The effects of air support in the meatgrinder offensives like Kursk and the D'niepr struggle were at best mildly additive. The Battle of the Ruhr was too late in the year and too minor to have much of an impact: the Germans were able to paper over the damage in a few weeks and ultimately their armaments production for '43 was doubled. The OTL Soviet advances would certainly have still happened in 1943 without the strategic bombing campaign. Case in point: in the two months of defense and offensive combat during the Battle of Kursk, involving tens of thousands of close air support sorties from both sides in the course of two months, the Soviets recorded the loss of only 30 tanks to enemy aircraft.