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With the exception of a minor presence around Leningrad, I appeared to slaughter the Soviet air force in the summer of '41.

However as winter deepened they made a reappearance. And all of a sudden my bombing of airfields was not destroying any aircraft. Even though some bombers did get through and dropped some bombs.

Their reappearance was in such numbers and experience that I ended up concentrating my Eastern front air power into only four air groups and gave them a couple of turns of training.

But I still can not seem to get rid of the buggers.

Is it possible for all the enemy fighters to try and intercept and for there to be no bombers. Or is the weather having something to do with it.

I assume you know you have the right airfield because more fighters are defending. Is this assumption correct?

And also, what about CAP. I assume this stands for Covering Air Patrol, but I could find no explanation in the manual. Is the soviet fighters all performing CAP explain why my bombing in winter is mostly ineffectual?

Tah guys and gals!

CAP is supposed to provide a higher number of defensive fighters, but it has no direct affect on bombers otherwise, unless they shoot enough bombers down to stop the attack. Bad weather greatly hampers the Axis ability to hit planes, as the bomb weight drops a lot. Basically, surviving bombers total their bomb weight, and then some portion is thrown out as missing. This is based on experience, the weather and a random factor. Keep an eye on your bomb weight when hitting planes and missing them. Sometimes a low bomb weight will hit planes, but overall it will do less damage than heavy bombs on target.

Originally posted by Greg J:
However as winter deepened they made a reappearance. And all of a sudden my bombing of airfields was not destroying any aircraft.

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The German gets a multiplier to losses for the first 2 turns in airfield attacks against the Soviets. You can destroy a lot of planes in those turns, so its a good idea to use all of your air forces on those 2 turns on airfield attacks. Secondly, the Soviets start with a lot of inferior aircraft, but many begin in the unready condition and after the initial turns and assuming continued airfield attacks after that, the Soviet air groups end up in a severely "beaten down" state, most planes being in the "damaged" (unready) condition. So you have large air groups sending up very small numbers of planes. Thus airfields attacks are easy to make and destroy a lot of planes.

After this though, the Soviet player typically withdraws most of the air force, puts them on training missions until winter. They then return in a much better shape, in terms of readiness and experience, than they were in the beginning of the game, even for those groups still flying inferior planes.

But I still can not seem to get rid of the buggers.

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You won't. They'll harrass and annoy you (depending on how your Soviet opponent choses to use his air force) constantly, making appearances in bad weather, until at some point they get numerous enough to try to take air superiority away from you. They don't always succeed, some German players can control the skies anywhere they want to into '45, but you'll never be able to get rid of them.

Is it possible for all the enemy fighters to try and intercept and for there to be no bombers. Or is the weather having something to do with it.

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Not sure of your reference to bombers here. Fighters will try to intercept airfield attacks and will intercept with twice as many planes if set to CAP, but there are no guaranttees. Intercepts can often fail in bad weather, and the same is true for bombers on airfield and other attacks. Bad weather does create problems, problems the Soviets can take advantage of, which is why the Soviet Air Force is likely to reappear in winter. His bombers may get through because German fighters fail to intercept, and his fighters may intercept the German bombers, because the German fighter escorts fail to protect the bombers.

I assume you know you have the right airfield because more fighters are defending. Is this assumption correct?

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All fighter groups in an HQ will attempt to intercept incoming enemy bombers on an airfield attack. Weather, experience, and readiness will affect how many planes intercept or whether they intercept at all. Air groups on CAP will intercept at a higher strength (and maybe a better chance at success, not sure).

There are not multiple "airfields". This is an abstraction. You are essentially attacking ALL enemy airfields in an airfield attack, which means all planes in the enemy HQ are vulnerable to your attack.

And also, what about CAP. I assume this stands for Covering Air Patrol, but I could find no explanation in the manual. Is the soviet fighters all performing CAP explain why my bombing in winter is mostly ineffectual?

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Air groups on CAP will intercept at full strength instead of half (or lesser) strength, but this means these air groups won't go with bombers on airstrike missions or ground support.

Bombing in winter is often ineffectual. I don't know for a fact, but there might even be some additional penalties for German air groups in winter, I don't know (does anyone else know this?), but winter is often a frustrating time for the Luftwaffe.

Thanks the explanations have been reassuring. Indeed deciding what to do with the Axis airforce in my first winter, has been a frustrating experience. A lot of planes have been sacrificed on pointless missions.