German fighter production in World War Two: Truth,

Legend or Myth
Many books and articles has been written about German aircraft
production, especially of Bf-109 and Fw-190, but a few of them are based
on research. Instead, we have endless copies of known data and texts
originated several decades ago, without critical thinking and analysis.
Many figures are taken for granted as true, although they are dating back to
the Nazi period. One of such figures are the number of fighters produced by
Germany, which are elevated to the level of myth.
It is necessary to have critical analysis in this field of wartime production.
The Nazi Germany allegedly produced more than 30,000 Bf -109 aircraft
and 20,000 Fw -190. But is this true?
Deeper analysis leads to the unambiguous conclusion that these numbers are
not even close to the reality.
The Nazi propaganda, in order to promote their production and economic
capacity significantly exaggerated the number of produced aircraft and other
weapons.
Goebbels, the Reich Minister of propaganda, had the task to publicly reduce
the impact of Allied bombing, publishing falsified data.
In such way, they were all happy and satisfied, the Hitler and Goebbels and
industrialists, all but the German pilots on the fronts which did not have
benefits of this amazing production.
On the contrary, they complained about the lack of operational aircraft in
the same time ( 1944 and 1945 ) when the propaganda published an
unprecedented achievement of production.
Of course, the Allied bombing campaign was not crucial to the Nazi
manufacture of weapons, but it was not insignificant, as Goebbels claimed,
and as many believe today.
For example , the bombing of Schweinfurt 1943 destroyed a large
percentage of ball bearings required for the production of weapons,
however, in the words of Albert Speer, this was offset by imports from
Sweden.
Despite these measures, the production of aircraft and other weapons has
inevitably fall down.
It is true that the factories, because of the bombings, were deployed to
various locations but during such deployment, the production capacity was

inevitably reduced, especially as the raw materials and skilled labor were
increasingly scarce.
It should also be borne in mind that in the chaos of the last year, or so, of the
war, much of the data of actual production were irretrievably lost so the
exact numbers will never be determined, and it is a matter of speculation.
However , it is possible to get approximate data, by indirect methods.
Despite these facts, many authors, without any logic, state the figures of
German aircraft production with precision to one aircraft !!!! as if it is
possible to specify it in such precision, which is complete nonsense.

According to the book " Luftwaffe " - Murray , (data from German sources),
we can see the following:
Table 1: The newly produced, including repaired after damage, single engine
fighters (hereinafter s.e. ):

June
1134

July
1263

Aug
1135

1943 year
Sept
Oct
Nov
1072
1181
985

Dec
687

total
7457

Of these, the newly produced s.e. fighters were, Table 2:

June
Bf-109 663
Fw-190 109

July
704
169

Aug
515
159

Sept
525
167

Oct
556
127

Nov
472
114

Dec
total
350
3785
oko 70 915

It is evident that:
1 - The total number of newly produced s.e. fighters in this period was
about 4700.
2 - Total number of newly produced and repaired ( ie, total delivered) s.e.
fighters was 7457 which is 58 % more than the newly manufactured.
____________________________________

Delivered to the Luftwaffe, in 1944 ( " Luftwaffe " - Murray , the German
archives ), Table 3:

Jan
Feb March April
s.e. fighters 1300 1000 1370 1720

May
1907

June
2177

total
9474

1 - In January 1944, the Luftwaffe had 1560 s.e. fighters in disposal, on all
fronts.
2 - During the period Jan - June 1944 total losses were 4200 fighters ,for all
reasons. - (" Luftwaffe " - Murray, p. 276 )
3 - During this time, 9474 s.e. fighters were delivered.
This represents a total of about 11,000 s.e. fighters ( 1560 + 9474 ) in mid
1944. If you deduct the total losses in this period ( 4200 ), the result is that
the Luftwaffe at the beginning of July 1944 had around 6800 s.e. fighters in
its disposal.
However, according to the German data, on July 1944, the Luftwaffe had
1523 s.e. fighters. !!!
Taking into account the reserve and the training units , the huge difference
nevertheless exist in the number of fighters actually in the field and the
number that were supposed to be if the production was what Goebbels
published in its Nazi publications.
This clearly shows that the data on the production of new fighters were
greatly exaggerated. In order not to take the wrath of Hitler, Minister Speer
and industrialists are published exaggerated information about their own
production, encouraged in this hoax by Goebbels propaganda.
Thus arose the strange assertion which still resists the common sense,
because no one has seriously investigated this issue, that the Allied bombing
of German production facilities was ineffective and failed to give any
results, but to the contrary, that the production at that time, allegedly has
greatly increased !!!
However, the number of German planes on the front lines, at these times,
was relatively small and could not be increased by propaganda
announcements.
Many German pilots say that in 1944 they have been outnumbered 10 times
by the allies, at the East as well as at the West front.
In the "German Air Force 1933-1945 ", we can find :
" On June 5, 1944 officially Luftwaffe on the Western Front had about 800
aircraft of all types, of which 170 single-engine fighters."
However, on 6. June 1944 , during Normandy invasion, the presence of the
Luftwaffe was barely noticeable. During the whole day on the Western
Front, less than 100 sorties has been made, 70 of these by the single-engine
fighters. "

This clearly shows that there was large discrepancy between official data on
the number of available aircraft and the actual numbers in the front lines.
The "Luftwaffe combat planes and aces ", Christy,1981, Blue Ridge , USA,
gives more precise information about the production:
" Soviets produced about 130.000 military aircraft from 1939 to 1945,
which was almost three times that of German production . "
This could be close to the true.
According to Wikipedia, and numerous other sources, the Nazi production
was as follows, Table 4:

Fw-190
fighters
Fw-190
assault
Bf-109

1943

1944

1945

2171

7488

1630

Total
during war
13376

1183

4280

1104

6634

6150

13790

2970

30483

This is obviously greatly exaggerated, and is based on common Nazi

wartime propaganda.
____________________________________________________

Focke-Wulf Fw-190
Wikipedia ( English) for Fw -190 production, states, Table 5:
A-0

A-1

28

102

A-2
and
A-3
910

A-4

A-5

A-6

A-7

A-8

A-9

976

1752 963

701

6655

910

That source further states: " The number of around 13,000 aircraft of A
version probably involves repaired and modified aircraft, which was a
common practice, eg , the A-5 was modified to the A-8. It was a common
practice that the new serial numbers has been given to the planes
composed of damaged earlier versions. "
Until a few years ago, the production data for Fw -190 in official literature,
were as follows in Table 6:

A-1
102

A-2
426

A-3
509

F
936

G
517

D-9
694

A-4
894

A-5
723

A-6
569

A-7
80

A-8
1334

The " Fw - 190" - William Green , states:

" Revised F and G versions were based on version A and it is not possible to
determine with any certainty how much newly produced and how much
modified aircraft were delivered.
Version D-9 was produced in slightly less than the 700 of the new airplanes.
Version A-9 was a modification from version A-8, with a strengthened wing
leading edges and engine BMW - 801F power plant of 2000 hp but
produced in a small numbers. It was conceived as an armored fighter for
the collision attack (Rammjager) ,and had only two guns of 20 mm. "
( Recently, we can find circulating some suspicious sources in the literature
stating that as many as 910 examples of A-9 was produced, apparently
the figure invented just to satisfy the overall number of supposed 20.000
Fw -190 planes built !!! ).
In the Swedish study " Fw -190 variants in detail " - IPMS Stockholm , in
1997 , we can find the following production data, Table 7:
A-2
420

A-4
A-6
>900 569

A-7
80

A-8
F
1334 545

G
800

It further says : " For many variants of Fw -190, finding the actual number
of aircraft produced is impossible task because the large number of damaged
aircraft converted into factories and then shipped to the units again, under a
different serial number, as the same or different version. Parts of the
damaged aircraft were again assembled to a completely new aircraft and also
shown in the total number of aircraft produced. Many aircraft are also
assembled in the field, in the front line workshops. "
"An example of this practice is the Fw -190 F-8 on display at the National
Aerospace Museum in Washington ( NASM ). The original serial number
was of A-7 version , and after modification it was given a new serial number
and was converted to the F -8 version, as it was re-delivered to the front . "

Fw-190 F-8

Wikipedia (Deutsch) gives this production of Fw -190 aircraft by version,

Table 8:
A-0
28

A-1
102

A-2
420

D-9

D-11

D-13

1422

17

A-3
532

A-4
909

F-3
and
F-8
3826

A-5
680
G-3
and
G-8
696

A-6
1067

A-7
620

A-8
5929

A-9
660

Total, all
versions
16910

It is also stated:
" This number includes the aircraft damaged in the fighting, refurbished and
put back to the front units. The exact number of such retrofitted aircraft, and
number of fighters actually produced is not known."

In the " Fw -190 Aces" - Weal, we can find the following:

" Although on the "paper" they had incredible production figures, the fact is
that during the Allied landing in Normandy, the Luftwaffe had significantly
fewer fighters in the Western European theater of operations, than during
landing at Dieppe two years earlier. "

" During the whole day, June 6th 1944, the day of the Allied landings, the
Luftwaffe conducted a total of about 100 sorties against the Allied forces
and the Allies were performed approximately 14,000 sorties. "
" On that part of the front where the landing was made, the Luftwaffe had
only a few fighters and in the wider area about 30. "
For example, fighter regiment JG -26, which was commanded by German
ace Joseph Priller had, as he said, only 2 fighters in the landing zone. " !!!!

All this figures doesnt support fairy tales about enormous production in
1944.
This is more than clear evidence that the Germans were chronically short of
needed aircraft, and that remarkable figures of seemingly overwhelming
production were just a fabrication of Goebbels propaganda machine.
According to the German pilots, the Allies had about 10 to 20 times more
planes than the Germans had.
But astonishingly, these false data of German wartime production resists the
judgement of time, to this days.
___________________________________

For a fighter Fw -190 D-9, German official data for the number of aircraft in
the operational units, are:
1 December 1944 - 124 aircraft
31 December 1944 - 183 aircraft
This is also in great discord with the production statistics.

" Fw -190 Aces of the Russian Front" , states:

" In May 1944 it were on the whole Russian front only two fighter groups
(Jagdgruppe 1 and 2, of the fighter regiment JG -54 ), equiped with Fw 190s, about 80 in total. A year earlier it was 5 fighter groups of Fw -190
fighters on the Eastern front. "
This clearly shows that the production of German fighters in 1944 was not
nearly that of what Goebbels presented to the world. He was a master of
deception.
In fact, in 1944 the Luftwaffe suffered from a chronic lack of fighters, on
the Eastern as well as on the Western front, while simultaneously
announcing the thousands of fighters produced every month !!!

Fw-190 D
________________________________________________

Messerschmitt Me -109 fighter

Wikipedia, and many other sources state that the production of Bf -109
fighter, by version was ( Table 9 ):
B
341

C
58

D
647

G-4

G-5

G-6 *

1242

475

E
F
G-1
3500 3444 167

G-2
1586

G-10 G-14 K
**
**
12000 2500 5500 1600

This source also gives these notes:

* - Contradictory reports from the factory and from RLM ( Reich Air
Ministry) which do not provide very accurate data of the total number.
** - Mostly refurbished and modified from earlier versions .
According to official figures, by the end of January 1945, it has been
delivered about 1100 Bf - 109K fighters, but in the units, at the same time,
according to the official data, at the end of January, there were only 314
fighters of this version.

Bf-109 K

Bf-109 G-2

Production of Bf -109 fighters was priority, through the end of the war.
This fighter plane was, till the end of the war, one of the best fighter
anywhere in the world, which by the overall characteristics, more or less,
could have been challenged only by the few Allied fighters: Yak-3 , Yak9U , La-5FN, La -7, Spitfire IX and XIV, and Mustang. It was on the top in
speed, acceleration (often overlooked), maneuverability, handling near the
stall and armament.
It is no wonder that the Hundert Neun was a favorite mount of the
German aces, and not without reason. In it, they felt pretty safe and

superior. Of course, new inexperienced pilots had no chance against the

numerically much superior opponents, even in the Bf-109.
The publication " Wings of Fame " - vol 11 , Aerospace Publishing , London
,1998, states :
" Version Bf-109 G-10 was modified and updated version of the previous G
-6 and G-14, to the K-4 standard, except that it applied DB-605 D and
DM engines. The K-4 used DB-605 DCM engine."
" The only difference between the later version of the G-6 and G-14 was in
the position at the radio antennas. "
Later versions of the G-6 practically did not differ from the G-14, and later
versions of G-14 practically did not differ from G-10 version. Etc, etc. It is
thus, very difficult, in fact impossible, to determine how many were newly
produced and how many were modified from earlier versions. To the
Germans it was unimportant. What was important: to get as many of these
aircraft as possible, with the latest systems which were available at that time,
regardless of the official version number, especially in the later war years.
Therefore, anyone who is trying to make a clear production boundary
between various versions, will undoubtedly be found itself in the field of
wide speculation.
___________________________________________________
" Me-109 " Caidin Martin,1968, USA, states:
" Delivery of Me-109G in 1943 amounted to 6418 aircraft, in 1944: 14212
and in 1945: 2969. "
" By the end of the war it was delivered 30573 Me -109 fighters, but the
data are subject to suspicion especially when you take into account that
many damaged fighters were refurbished, repaired and re-supplied to the
unit. "
That is true.
In " Bf -109 F / G / K aces" - Osprey, Weal, we could find:
" In September 1944 the German production hit a record 3013 singleengined fighters supplied the Luftwaffe , including the newly restored and
repaired aircraft. "
" It is supposed that 1500 Bf - 109K was delivered."

Bf-109G-6
Strength in the units:
The "Rise and Fall of German air force ," states:
- "In early June 1944 , the Luftwaffe throughout the Eastern Front had in its
disposal only 395 s.e. fighters, and on 1.January, 1945 a total of 360 s.e.
fighters".
British historian Caldwell, in "Luftwaffe over Germany ", states:
" In 1943, a total of 29132 aircraft left the factory including repaired and
reconditioned aircraft. Of these 11241 were s.e. fighters, including 8497
Bf -109 aircraft, and 2744 Fw -190 ".
(About 3 times more Me -109 than Fw -190 ).
German historian Werner Girbig states that the ratio of fighter aircraft on the
Eastern Front was as follows: mid- 1943 about 5:1 in favor of the Soviet air
force, in 1944 10:1 and 15:1 in 1945.
This also clearly indicates that there has been no trace of stunning German
production.
"During the landing at Normandy, 6 June 1944, the entire Luftflotte 3 on
that day performed a total of 100 sorties, including about 70 from the singleengine fighters. "
" 14 August 1944 the entire Luftflotte 3 ( Western Front ) had in its disposal
only 75 single-engine fighters. " - Luftwaffe , Murray.
When the Allies conducted airborne operation "Market Garden" in
September 1944, which represented the largest such operation on the
Western Front, on the first day of the attack, Luftwaffe performed only 50 to
70 sorties. - "Rise and Fall of German air force ."

From all of this, it is also clearly indicated that some of the stunning
production figures during 1944 was nothing but the wishful fantasy of
German Nazi officials.
According to the German High Command, strength of the single-engine
fighter in operational units was, Table 10:
1.nov.
1942
1514

1.may
1943
1582

1.july
1943
1850

1.nov.
1943
1720

1.mar
1944
1747

1.may
1944
1650

1.july
1944
1523

1.sept.
1944
1610

As can be seen, the greatest numerical strength was achieved in July 1943 ,
reflecting the preparations for the largest battle of Second world war, the
Kursk battle.

Bf-109 G-6

In the " Bf -109 F / K," German historians Willy Radinger and Wolfgang
Otto, stated:
" Until 31.07.1943 , the German factories were delivered the following
number of Bf -109G fighters: Regensburg - 1699 , ERLA - 1521, WNF 2355.
By the end of 1944 the Regensburg factory alone delivered 856
Bf -109 K4 fighters, and from the beginning of 1945, there is no accurate
data. "
We can see that actual data of total production can not be determined.

The same authors state, for the Bf -109G version that the number of aircraft
delivered from Regensburg factory was, for the whole year: in 1942 - 488 ,
in 1943 - 2168, in 1944 - 6316 (of which 856 K-4 version), which
represents about 9,000 fighters in total. It should be noted that these are not
all newly produced fighters.
Russian author Firsov, in his book " Bf -109 ", Moscow, 2001, states that
by the end of November 1944, 534 Bf -109K fighters were delivered. By
the end of the war about 1,200 of these aircraft was delivered. It probably
refer to newly produced, not repaired aircraft.
Table 11: Official number of delivered s.e. fighters in year 1944
May
1907

June
2177

July
2687

Aug.
2779

Sept .
3031

Oct .
2735

Nov.
2776

Dec.
2424

In the postwar study of the U.S. Department of Defense, titled: "U.S.

Strategic Bombing Survey ", the following was stated:
"Minister Speer in his reports has declared production of allegedly 36,000
single-engined fighters in 1944. "
"However , this drastically exceeds the number of fighters that the
Luftwaffe could count on, including losses in the transport. It is known that
the Fuhrer demanded miracles from his subordinates in charge of
production. Many were dismissed if they did not fulfill his demands. Under
such circumstances, it seems likely that production information was
furnished by the will of Speer, who was responsible for war production. "
Furthermore the study states:
From the German official data, it is shown that the number of fighters in
units in 1944 increased slightly compared to 1943, while at the same time
production was alleged to be much higher than the losses, by more than
16,000 s.e. fighters !!!
At the same time, the commander of the training units have complained that
they have a serious lack of training aircraft. Due to the lack of aircraft in
1944, the number of hours of training for the pilots in Luftwaffe was
reduced to about half the number of hours in 1942. This strongly suggests
that the official German data concerning production has been significantly
exaggerated. "
"The key to this mystery can be found in the report made by
Mr.Wagenfuehr, the Speer 's head of statistics, which for the 1944 states: "
The large increase in production was not based on solid foundations. The
source of these discrepancies can be found in the fact that the planes that
passed repairs after damage in the fight, counted as the newly produced. "

The study further states:

" Without doubt, in the German war statistics there is a huge discrepancy
between production losses and the number of aircraft in units. Production of
all operational aircraft states as approximately 39,000 aircraft in 1944.
Strength of the units at the beginning of the year was similar to the end of
the year. Number of aircraft lost and written off in that year was about
22,000 aircraft, and it is unknown what happened to some 17,000 aircraft. "

----------------------------------------------------------------------------From all these sources it is clear that high percentage of the total fighters
delivered, represented repaired planes also, which were put back in the
units after sustaining some damage.
Hence, in the first approximation, from all mentioned data, it can be
concluded that, out of the total of about 30,500 Bf -109 fighters delivered,
about some 20,000 were newly manufactured aircraft, and the rest were
refurbished after some damage and put back into the units. The official Nazi
statistics included them all in the total number of airplanes produced. !!!
There is no reason to believe that a similar percentage is not applied to the
Fw-190 fighter so that a total number of newly built Fw-190s was most
probably around 12,000, out of alleged about 20,000 deliveries.
The exact number will never be known, of course, because many files and
records have been destroyed.

Jet aircraft
Allies in the war produced a very small number of jets. British by the end of
the war had only one operational squadron of Meteor and the Americans
only a few prototypes of YP-80A dedicated for operational testing. Until
the end of 1945 there were frequent explosions and the disintegration of the
turbine engines so that in August 1945 the plane was completely grounded.
Until then, there has been 15 crashes and six pilots killed. Not until 1946
was the aircraft ready for operational use.
In contrast to this, it is commonly stated that the Germans were produced
about 2000 jets in war, all together, but again, the actual number of these
aircraft in units doesnt confirm and support this allegations.

Me-262
An example of discrepancies also exists in the number of jet fighter Me262. While statistics alleged that by the end of 1944, there were about 600
of these aircraft produced, the units at that time had only about 40 aircraft
of this type.
Chairman of the Board of Messerschmitt company, Mr. Seiler, made a
statement that he could not understand why there is so much difference in
the number of aircraft produced and the number of aircraft in the operational
units."
In March 1945, only 130 of these jet aircraft were available in the units.
In spite of generally published number of 1200 to 1400 Me-262 produced
(depending of source), it is probably that the actual number is not more than
800, and of these, and less than half participated in combat.

All this clearly shows that, generally, in 1944 the Germans had a small
number of fighter aircraft on all fronts, and this fact was reflection of the
small and insufficient production.
Despite these facts, the widespread common and professional literature is
still packed with misleading information of more than 50,000 allegedly
produced German s.e. fighters, Bf-109 and Fw-190 !!!
It is obvious that the manipulation by such information has been elevated to
the perfection, and that the Goebbels has done its job well, but it is the high
time to get rid of such propaganda.
Nenad Pavlovi , Dipl. Ing.
Aeromagazin, Belgrade, June 2014