Alarmstart East: The German Fighter Pilot's Experience on the Eastern Front 1941-1945

by Patrick G. Eriksson

For anyone interested in the air war 1939-45, the information provided here is of inestimable value. There are no more than a handful of WW2 Luftwaffe members alive today. Patrick Eriksson had the foresight to record these experiences first-hand before it was too late. Some witnesses ended up as senior fighter controllers, The recollections and views of the veterans are put within the context of the German aerial war history. By no means all the witnesses were from the ranks of the so-called 'aces'. It was on the Eastern Front that, essentially, much of the Luftwaffe was destroyed, and this is the subject of the second in the author's trilogy. Death wasn't always in the air: '"Quick, get out of the plane, the airfield's been overrun." German tanks ran over German wounded. Our emaciated infantrymen threw away their rifles, fell into the snow after a few metres, and died.' (Pilot Hans Grunberg.) Towards the end in the Stalingrad pocket pilots were so starved they could no longer turn tightly in aerial combat without passing out.

Genres: World War II

315 pages, Hardcover

Published October 15, 2018

Reviews

[KOMET]

ALARMSTART EAST is representative of what is likely to be the final story (much of it told first-hand from the few surviving veterans) of what the air war over the Eastern Front was like for the German fighter pilots who fought there between 1941 and 1945.

This is a very solid, very well researched book, with photos - many never before seen - from the private collections of several of the Luftwaffe fighter pilots the author had interviewed over many years, as well as diagrams and illustrations which give the reader a palpable sense of what life at the front was like for these pilots, ground staff, and support personnel. There is also a chapter that examines and evaluates the various criteria the Luftwaffe used for assessing the aerial victory claims of its Jagdflieger (fighter pilots).

For any aviation enthusiast, "ALARMSTART EAST" is an excellent reference source for learning about the nature of the air war over the Eastern Front between the Luftwaffe and the Soviet Air Force during the Second World War.

[Marc]

In the second book of Patrick Eriksson's series on the experiences of German fighter pilots during World War II, the focus this time heads to the Eastern Front and the war with the Soviet Union. Initially enjoying fantastic success, the Luftwaffe eventually went from having control of the skies to being a collection of under-strength units scattered across the various regions and offering token resistance much of the time.

The book is full of personal recollections from various Luftwaffe pilots who served all over the Eastern Front and flew combat against the various planes and units of the VVS (Russian Air Force). There was a marked contrast between the VVS at the beginning of the war and that which began to emerge after the Battle of Kursk in 1943, and this is discussed by several of the pilots. Not surprisingly, there are several differences of opinion on the quality of planes and pilots in the VVS, as well as the tactics used by both sides. Personally, I liked this aspect of the book best: the actual recollections of those who were there and how it was to live, fight and die in the air over the Eastern Front.

Given the tremendous size of the Eastern Front itself, the Luftwaffe ended up splitting up units and it was very common for one Gruppe to be stationed in a completely different region from the other Gruppen of any particular Geschwader. Eriksson does a very good job of keeping track of where units were located, but this led to an endless stream of numerical designations in many instances and my eyes tended to glaze over whenever several units were mentioned in one bunch.

The subject of victory claims is a common theme in the book, and there's a chapter near the end which explains the rather complex system used by the Luftwaffe to award victories to its pilots. Since there were dozens of Luftwaffe aces who claimed 100+ victories on the Eastern Front, this is an important chapter in the book, but a bit of a grind to get through. Many of the top aces such as Hartmann, Barkhorn, Rall, Nowotny, and Graf are discussed by those who served with them and I came away with a bit of a different view of a few of them.

While I feel the first book in this series, Alarmstart, was better overall, this one is worth reading as well. Now I just need to wait for the third one which the author mentioned several times!

[Ethan Symon]

This book is fantastic. It's filled with stories directly from the Luftwaffe pilots who served on the Eastern front given to the author, accompanied with detailed research recorded with clear passion makes this a must read.

[Pedro Plassen Lopes]

A more scholarly book. Provides a good explanation for the high scores achieved in the eastern front.