Rene Fonck Victory Analysis

[JG1Schorner]

I was wondering if anybody has done a dispassionate analysis of René Fonck's victory claims. MvR, for instance, has been analyzed to death and the claims of many the other Commonwealth and German aces have also been scrutinized. However, I have never seen such a case by case analysis of Fonck's claims.

Now I know a fair amount of René Fonck "common knowledge". As a fighter pilot he preferred to fly alone, was not considered a good leader, was known for being a superb shot, used hit and run tactics, had a couple of six kill days, never had his plane hit, and claimed 125, of which 75 were allowed. As a person he was arrogant, boastful, generally disliked by his contemporaries, never was well received by he French public, and did not do anything to improve his image with his actions during WWII.

What I find interesting is that Fonck's biggest supporters tend to use his 125 claims as evidence that he must surely have scored more than 75. His biggest detractors look at the same 125 claims and come to an entirely different conclusion - if he had 50 bogus claims then surely many of the 75 allowed would also be bogus. In either case, subjective "René Fonck common knowledge" is used to back up the arguement. What I was hoping for was a cold analysis of his claims on a case by case basis, without consideration for René Fonck the man or René Fonck the fighter pilot.

P.S. I did try the search function and most of what I saw centered around Fonck's personality and skill, but very little delved into the specifics of his career.

Hi,

After I read your post, I checked Over the Front by Franks/Bailey, but none of his listed victories give details of whom might have fell victim to his guns. Maybe someone has done this analysis for you already? If not, and you were to take on this daunting task, might I suggest that you obtain a copy of The French Air Service War Chronology, 1914-1918 (Bailey/Cony), as well as The Jasta War Chronology (Franks, Bailey, Duiven). With these, you can cross-reference French victories with German losses.

Be prepared to scan many,many maps, looking for some obscure places that may not exist anymore! Sometimes a match is only a person's best guess; details such as time and location, may be missing. When you're finished, please post your results on the forum, I would love to see them!

regards

Sounds good,then maybe aces other then Bishop can get a certain amount of "flak"

[willycoppens]

Hi,
Sorry that I cannot give an answer to your post, but it reminded me of a question I have had about René Fonck. Long ago I read René Fonck's " Mes Combats ", aka " Ace of Aces ". I have always wondered if it is an historically accurate piece of literature. Certainly M.Fonck showed his understandable patriotism, but I wasn't sure about some of the details, which, I suppose, would include victory claims. Any enlightenment would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks, Willy

Hi,

I think that matching claims is a rather new phenomenon. Only now do we 'armchair historians' have such a large variety of books about claims/losses (thank you Norman, Bill, Rick and others). All this is made possible by the excellent research of source documentation that continues in our field.

Anyway, it never seemed necessary many years ago to research the validity of a claim. Maybe we are not as trusting (or in some cases respectful! ) of our heros these days. I guess it is the passion of our hobby to document the truth about these pilots and their accomplishments. I have found through my research though that we must be cautious not to categorically deny a claim do to lack of evidence, as research is still on-going in this category. Although we have information that is useful in proving that a victory occurred, there is no assurance that we are 100% correct about our conclusions. Also, the lack there of doesn't always mean the pilot purposely lied about the victory.

It is always nice when we can say so-and-so shot down a certain somebody, and for me it is fun to do this kind of research, but I personally don't want my research to ultimately discredit a pilot, as these things happened a long, long time ago. Who am I to think that I am the final word on it.

regards

[Billy9]

THere is a book by Jacques Mortane, I don't have it with me and I can't remember the name, but it names the victims of several of the French aces, and I believe Fonck is one of them, I know Guynemer is one.

Bill

[duedicoppe]

Dear winged warrior,
I agree perfectly with you. I did an extensive matching work on the Italian front with my partners Roberto Gentilli and Antonio Iozzi for our work about the Italian aces of WWI. We wrote in the Introduction that when we use the words "no confirmation" for some claims, it means precisely that there are no confirmation and nothing more.
Happy landings
Paolo

[vb136]

To Billy9,


Bill,
The book is called Carré d'As. I can not vouch for the accuracy of the content. Mortane obviously had access to a German loss-list.

[JG1Schorner]

Thanks all for the reading tips.

On the subject of matching claims to known facts, it is MHO that this can be done without being disrespectful. For instance, the fact that MvR has a few claims that were known to have gotten away hardly detracts from his accomplishments. I feel the same way about the Commonwealth aces with their OOCs. They flew, they fought ... that takes more guts than anything I have ever done. The French, and Fonck in particular, are very much a blank spot for me. I have read some first hand accounts by French pilots, but I have rarely come across the sort of dry, factual analysis that seems to be pretty common for the air war over Flanders.

[Barrett]

Matching not only Fonck's but most French claims is usually an exercize in frustration. The info available in published sources is extremely sketchy ("scout" or "biplace" on 4 October 19mumble-mumble) and apparently often wrong. The French were nowhere as thorough in their documentation as the Brits or Germans: frequently the time is missing, and geography can be approximate. Therefore it's highly unlikely that we'll ever ID Fonck's victims. Just FWIW, I'd be surprised if his verified ratio matched MvR's, not because of any particular fault but simply because vR's ratio was so very high: 73 or 74 of 80, depending upon sources.