Also, is it true that the russians later got the upper hand in air superiority not just through vast numbers, but through design and pilot training? Where the later era yaks and MIGs and laggs really a worthy opponent for the bf 109 and the fw 190?
You can expect a lot of walking, and then you die.
The Soviet Air Force in the western military districts was caught almost entirely on the ground during the opening stages of Operation Barbarossa. By midday of June 22, more than 1,200 Soviet aircraft had been destroyed, almost all on the ground. Not only did the Germans achieve strategic surprise, the Soviet Air Force was hampered by the need for orders. Only when orders came from above could pilots take to their planes and fight the Germans. By then, airfields had been bombed, planes had been destroyed, and ground crews scattered.
With no planes, pilots and ground crews were either swept up by the advancing Germans or dragooned into ground units that did little except die ingloriously. According to German figures published in a 1993 Russian collection of papers, 2.56 million Soviet soldiers were captured in the first five months of the war.
The conditions in the POW camps were horrific, partially due to the unexpected numbers, and partially due to deliberate neglect. By Jan. 1, 1942, nine in 10 of the Soviet pilots in the western military districts on June 22, 1941 were dead.
Thank you! Good answers.