Hunters aircraft

As calculations GOT planes shot down.

February 16, 1942 the command of the 23rd Army Corps of the German Army has issued a special order on the exceptionally high German losses from small-aircraft machine-gun fire of the Russian infantry.





Why would Infantry General Albrecht Schubert suddenly occurred to talk about the loss of air? It turns out, for the edification of the soldiers, Marines, because "every attack ground units of the Russian aircraft opened fire on their rifles, and other infantry weapons" at the time, as when a Russian aircraft German soldiers immediately hid in a shelter. "The shelling from the ground - said further in the order - only one air units lost 60 percent of combat vehicles».
The fact that in a short time prior to the appearance of order, the soldiers only four of our infantry divisions - 92 th, 65 th, 259 th and 10 th Guards - rifles, machine guns, anti-tank rifles and light machine guns shot down 129 aircraft enemy. These 129 aircraft have been confirmed as the wreckage of add crumbled in the location of our forces or in the neutral zone.
After receiving information about this order, our General Staff has created a special commission on lessons learned from the destruction of the aircraft non-specialized funds. In the course of the commission's work revealed that the largest number of German planes, shoot down infantry, knocked to the ground, our anti-tank riflemen. Based on these data, it was decided to conduct a special training anti-tank riflemen Metolit conducting anti-aircraft fire, and our experts have developed a special table anticipation for shooting at the planes.
The troops went further and created a special team of hunters planes. They did not wait for German aircraft appear over the positions of our troops and start bombing. Like guerrillas ambush on how to move the enemy convoys, fighter planes ambushed "air path».
In some cases, conditions were attached PTR anti-aircraft battery, and in some activities of CTP trained support personnel anti-aircraft batteries - porters and driving. So, in the defense of Sevastopol commander 533rd battery small-caliber guns senior lieutenant Georgi Valovik finding two orphan PTR left, probably killed by anti-tank riflemen, trained actions of these porters their batteries. The result exceeded expectations - in the first battle of latter-day anti-aircraft gunners shot down two of the aircraft.

Stalingrad brought down the plane of the MFI broneboyschiik Semen Filippovich Antypkin, on account of which, besides aircraft, listed eight more destroyed tanks.