Battle Of Britain, 70 Years Ago

I had considered that, but that is what appears odd to me: I would have thought the Brits, since they were fighting longer, would have had a larger number of high-scoring aces as compared to the Americans, but that doesn't really appear to be the case.

Unfortunately, fighting longer also meant a greater chance for RAF pilots to get shot down themselves - particularly as the Germans were relatively much stronger in the air at the start of the war (and had more experience and better tactics than the Brits).

This also should have contributed to more Brit aces, since they initially had the Germans "all to themselves." As the war progressed more and more American pilots were looking for fewer and fewer german planes.

Yes but there was effectively a "lull" in the European air war between the Battle of Britain and the start of the great air offensives against Germany. I'm not saying there wasn't air combat but it was (relatively) at a much lower level of intensity than the great air battles of the Battle of Britain and what was to come over Germany later.

I recently read a book from the German point of view "Jagdgeschwader 26" was the title, I believe. In many cases the author was able to compare Allie claims and German claims for the same battle. The author made it sound as if the allies were constantly claiming twice the number of victories as they actually achieved. I guess gun cameras aren't always definitive.

Very few planes were fitted with gun cameras during the battle of Britain, however, I can believe this contention. Everyone chronically over-claimed - British, American, German, Japanese and Italian - that issue is not in doubt. A quick read through of the reports written by the two sides of the same engagement will quickly convince you of that! It's just very difficult to sort through the information provided by tired and/or adrenalin fueled and stressed pilots after a dogfight. What I'm saying is that if allied pilots are overclaiming by a factor of two, German pilots are probably overclaiming by a factor of three.

With my original question I was really asking if the RAF operations/tactics were significantly different from the Americans and could those differences account for the apparent disparity in the number of high-scoring aces? Or did different assigned responsibilities offer the Americans more opportunities?

I'm afraid I really don't know. I know the RAF was doing a lot of ground-attack missions (tactical air support) in the middle years of the war, and the USAF was doing top cover for the bombers with its Mustangs. Perhaps that made a difference?

"I'm afraid I really don't know. I know the RAF was doing a lot of ground-attack missions (tactical air support) in the middle years of the war, and the USAF was doing top cover for the bombers with its Mustangs. Perhaps that made a difference?"

I know the RAF was handling night bombing operations - did they even have fighter support for those missions? That alone would make a huge difference, I would think.

No fighter support for night bombers. Perhaps some escort over the channel on the way there at dusk and on the way back at dawn, but unlikely to bump into german fighters there.