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Admiral Beez wrote:

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While I enjoy the show Dogfights on the history channel, http://www.history.com/minisites/dogfights/ the bias or dominance toward Allied (almost always America) accounts of combat is becoming tiresome.

- June 1, 1944, Erich Hartmann shoots down four US Mustangs in a single mission over the Ploieşti oil fields
- October 25, 1944, Hiroyoshi Nishizawa shoots down two USN Hellcats (his 86th and 87th victories)
- October 6, 1951, Yevgeny Pepelyayev, shoots down two USAF F-86, plus a pair on both Nov 8 and Nov 28, and another on Nov 29.
- April 24 1967, Nguyen Van Bay shoots down a USN F-8C and a USN F-4B in a harrowing dog fight

I've never watched a whole episode of the show (but seen many discussions of various episodes on the a/c interest type web boards). My impression of the main problem with the show is that it makes limited or no attempt to ascertain the other side's account *of the specific combat covered*. Your proposal would seem to be to give one sided accounts of other combats by pilots of other countries. That would balance it more in a way, but wouldn't really deal much with the basic problem as I see it.

ie. did Hartmann really down 4 P-51's in one mission, or is it at least reasonable likely? I don't know, I've just seen web board stuff that Hartmann's claims v the 15th AF don't check that well, and that some who have 'verified' his victories really mean that over the entire front on a given day the total number of opposing planes lost was greater than or equal to the number of his victories, not counting any other Axis claims or perhaps not even considering the reported causes of the Allied losses. That's a very optimistic type of analysis (from the ace's POV). Nishizawa claims would be harder to nail down (that was a big day, and Japanese records of it aren't very complete to say who fought whom) so maybe it's a better case to put on TV?

The Pepelyaev case is pretty clear. On Oct. 6 '51 2 F-86's were lost in air combat, v. total Soviet claims of 6. I guess that might meet the plausibility hurdle that he scored both, for a TV show, but not highly likely, it wouldn't seem. One of those F-86's 49-1319 was recovered intact, that's also interesting; the other was 50-671; 50-670 and 49-1178 were both damaged but repaired and lost in later incidents. Nov 8, 49-1388 was lost v 3 Soviet claims, Nov 28 50-673 was lost v 9 Soviet claims; also interesting because the pilot, Dayton Ragland, was the only African-American flying F-86's in combat at the time, he survived as POW then tragically went MIA in Vietnam; 49-1129 was damaged that day, repaired and was still in service postwar. [Adding, F-86 48-301 was damaged in combat Nov 29 v 5 Soviet claims; it was apparently cannibalized for spare parts because written off in December with no further incidents known]. The Chinese were also active by then, but no claims known for those particular days. Those are the only F-86 losses to any cause those days, no issues of debating loss cause, except 49-1166 was lost in Japan the 28th to FOD engine failure, but it's tinfoil hat stuff to attribute that to a Soviet pilot in Korea IMO. (sources: primary records).

April 24, 67 the VPAF 923rd Regiment MiG-17's claimed 3 F-4's, 2 by Nguyen and his wingman, no F-8's (Topczer "MiG-17 and MiG-19 Units..."). Some websites like to match any US loss to opposing claims even if they have to change the type from what the other side claimed, maybe that's where the F-8 came from? An F-8 of VF-24 was lost that day, same time but different location from the battle over Kep w/ 923rd, it took a direct hit from large caliber AA. Topczer unfortunately does a similar misleading thing in his appendix though, crediting one of those F-4 claims as the F-4C of the 354th TFS lost that day, but to AAA in a pretty clearly different incident again different place, the 923rd made all those claims in one combat. Of the VF-114 F-4B's at Kep, who actually did report encountering MiG-17's the plane lost, that of LtCdr C.E. Southwick, reported itself hit by AAA before the MiG's appeared, after the air combat he found he couldn't transfer fuel, and ran out of gas on the way back. One can evaluate that last loss as one wishes, but the other two are real 'Hail Mary's for any likelihood of verifying those claims. (source "Vietnam Air Losses" by Hobson). Again it would be real in-the-weeds stuff for a TV show, but omitting known facts about verfication, or biasing them toward verification, just isn't worthwhile even as TV, IMO.

Again I'm not saying that issue is limited to non-US pilots, not at all. In fact the prototypical case that turned me off to even bothering to watch that show is people discussing the episode presenting about the USN's 'Swede' Vejtasa in an SBD at Coral Sea, credited with 3 Zeroes. But the Japanese accounts of that battle seem pretty detailed and clear, that combat matches up to one with Zuikaku's fighter squadron, and they didn't lose any. And that's been in print, by a highly respected author (John Lundstrom's "The First Team") for over 20 years. Vejtasa was a brave pilot, reported what he thought happened I'm sure, and some of his later victories (in F4F) do check out (same general statement would apply to the other pilots above probably). But I don't see much historical value in the presentaion method as is, and presenting one sided accounts from other AF's doesn't help IMO.

Joe