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Myth: Polish pilots weren't very skilled. They made it up with their aggressiveness and bravado, but suffered heavy losses for the same reason.
This one is clearly my favorite :-). In fact, at the outbreak of World War 2, they were possibly the best trained pilots in the world. Because of the relatively small size of the pre-war Polish Air Force (for a country of size comparable to France), only select few of the many candidates made it through training to the combat units.
The training programme at the Aviation Cadets School in Deblin and the Advanced Flying School in Grudziadz-Ulez was very demanding, both with regard to flying and shooting skills, with constant competition among the pilots, each striving to do their best. Let me describe just one exercise, as recollected by F/Lt Stanislaw Bochniak: a colored, small parachute was thrown out of the cockpit in flight. The trainee, always keeping it in sight, had to climb 300-400 meters (1000 ft) above it, stall into a spin, and recover at just the right moment to fire exactly one shot with his camera gun. In most cases, not only did they not lose sight of the parachute, but "scored" on the shot! In first line units - unlike in other air forces of that time - dogfight training in various configurations (one vs. one, one vs. two, section vs. section, or even squadron vs squadron) was a constant issue, and gunnery competitions were also regularly staged.
It's no wonder then, that a few years later these pilots were to be considered the best among the RAF, especially when compared with the run-of-the-mill RAF or even Luftwaffe pilots (which - of course - does not mean that both these airforces did not have good or outstanding pilots). The combat record of Polish pilots, with a consistently high victory/loss ratio, also speaks for them. On April 11, 1942, when an aerial gunnery competition was staged within the 11th Fighter Group, the three competing Polish squadrons - 303, 316 and 315 took the first three places out of 22 competingsquadrons, 303 Squadron coming first by a healthy margin. These high standards were sustained throughout the war, with pilots from combat units on rest from operational duties taking part in the training of rookie pilots.
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