Talk:Interflug

Schoenefeld airport was located in the GDR, just south of West Berlin, not in East Berlin.

Schoenefeld is in East Berlin

South-East, if you must. Check the Atlas.

Schönefeld is outside of Berlin, at the south-east-Border of the city.89.197.187.72 (talk) 11:56, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Efficiency of the airline

There are no references or numbers provided in the article with regard to efficiency of soviet planes vs. comparable western planes, or of the operation as a whole. Depending on fuel prices, the airline may have been very profitable, as was the case with Aeroflot, even though the latter was very inefficient as it did not fulfill the market demand. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.164.150.2 (talk) 01:17, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I added this part originally. Can't quote directly the exact page number but I remember from reading Alan Watson's The German Question (written in 1994) and David Marsh's works that Interflug before German reunification had long been a thorn on the GDR's finance even before the Soviet Union's glasnost cut off most financial subsidies to East Germany. It is not real original news to anyone who lived through German reunification. Even the author of ddr-interflug.de site hints that the purchase of A310 was because the efficiencies of Il-62 were not enough to sustain the airline. If you like you can search New York Times or Air Transport World archived news on Interflug from 1990 and 1991 - they had plenty of periodical news coverages about Interflug's financial plights. The best of all, they are available now to anyone on the net, often free of charge. --JNZ (talk) 02:39, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

This article contains several errors (including the number of planes owned by the airline) which I have tried to address. Regarding the Ilyushin planes, Interflug claimed to have been the largest 'non-Russian' operator (mostly IL-62Ms) with 24 examples (other non-Russian airlines did operate more than that total, but always in a combination of owned plus leased aircraft) and they were certainly not inefficient for their time (although they would be considered so by standards of today's airliners). CSA also had a large fleet and operated them from 1969 right through to 1997. Although their fuel burn rate was higher than planes such as the Boeing 707, as noted, fuel prices in the DDR were lower than in the west, and Interflug also modified some of its planes to lower fuel use. Conversely, the IL62Ms were relatively easy to maintain and had a better accident record than comparable western planes planes (eg Boeing 707, DC8, VC10 etc). The plane would not still be in civilian use today (42 years after its introduction) if it was inefficient (compare this with how long the VC10 and Super VC10 stayed in civilian use). It is a fair assumption that if Interflug had been operated with greater financial asumen rather than by government dictates, it may well have made a very healthy profit. Finally, the three IL-62s owned by Interflug were 'acquired' by the united German airforce after unification (not sold to them), and were only sold some years later to other airlines. Aria613 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aria613 (talk • contribs) 19:21, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Communist planning, Communist bureaucrats, Communist inefficiency - is it an unbiased encyclopedic aricle or an ideological American or Nazi pamphlet? Roobit (talk) 15:46, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

• Well, the ideology behind the airline was Communist. If reliable sources say so, then I don't see why not to describe them as such too. WhisperToMe (talk) 03:18, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

'The ideology behind the airline was Communist.'

This is very funny indeed. The last time I worked for Interflug, the 'ideology' behind it consisted of moving people and goods safely from A to B and to make good money.

Many parts of the article sound like excerpts from Cold War era news reporting, but we live in a different world now and should be able to obtain better information. It is so easy these days.

Since this article fails to describe Interflug accurately and is full of misconceptions of the past. I suggest getting rid of the 'ideology' first.

--195.246.100.57 (talk) 10:17, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Interflug was more than just an airline

Wikipedia is fully ignorant of the fact that Interflug was much much more than just an airline. It served as a kind of umbrella for all commercial aviation activities in East Germany. The Interflug company consisted of five divisions:

• Airline (Verkehrsflug), operating An-2, An-24, Il-14, Il-18, Tu-134, Il-62, A310, L 410, DHC-8
• Air Traffic Control (Flugsicherung)
• Airports (Flughäfen), Berlin-Schönefeld, Dresden, Leipzig-Schkeuditz, Erfurt, Barth, Heringsdorf
• Agriculture Flying (Agrarflug), operating L-60, An-2, Z-37, PZL-106, PZL M-18, Ka-26
• Remote Sensing, Industrial and Research Flying (Fernerkundung, Industrie- und Forschungsflug), operating Il-14, L 410, An-2, Ka-26, Mi-8

--195.246.100.57 (talk) 10:17, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your input. Indeed, this information could well be included in the article. Do you have a reliable source which can be used as a reference? Best regards--FoxyOrange (talk) 10:31, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

• I thought it over and have arrived at the conclusion that it might be best to leave the article as it is now, only focussing on the airline business. Simply put, it is impossible to define where Interflug begins or ends, because of it having been entangled with the communist system: In the end, anything in East Germany was owned and operated by the state. Thus, one could start and describe Interflug as a paramilitary unit of the National People's Army: The National Defense Council had direct authority over the "airline". Further research would be needed, but I'm pretty sure that anything that had to do with aviation (air traffic control, airports, agricultural flying, "research" flying [i.e. surveillance/reconnaissance missions]; that's what was mentioned in the above post) were also under (indirect) military command. And now, one has to ask/find out: Were those really operated by Interflug GmbH, or rather by the East German Armed Forces under the [seemingly civilian] Interflug branding?--FoxyOrange (talk) 13:34, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

I thought it over and have arrived at the conclusion that it might be best to leave the article as it is now, only focussing on the airline business.

That would be perfectly ok for now. However I suggest adding an appropriate remark to the article to clarify that it currently describes only the airline part of Interflug. This is especially important, because the article mentions 8,000 employees, but this number (although too high) did apply to all five divisions of Interflug. The airline division employed 2,000 people.

In the end, anything in East Germany was owned and operated by the state.

This is almost correct, but not entirely. There were still thousands of private businesses, but only small ones (e.g., bakeries, metalworking shops, butcher shops, you name it).

...it is impossible to define where Interflug begins or ends, because of it having been entangled with the communist system

I strongly disagree. It is not impossible, but actually very easy to do. Interflug's scope of operation and its boundaries were always clearly defined. Since Interflug and its history has been well documented, it should be possible to do some research instead of letting our old assumptions and prejudices slip into this Wikipedia article. It is supposed to be an encyclopedia after all.

Thus, one could start and describe Interflug as a paramilitary unit of the National People's Army

I am sorry, but that is rather absurd. Only in a state of war, the East German military could have drawn all Interflug resources (aircraft, pilots, etc.). This setup was very similar to the one in the United States. Most Interflug pilots had the status of military reserve officers, but they were not employed by the People's Army nor did they report to the military.

While it is correct to say Interflug's airline division had to align itself with government politics and was also used as an instrument of foreign politics, it has never been a paramilitary unit, not even remotely resembling one. I am talking about peace times here.

Some confusion may have been caused by the TG-44 unit of the East German Air Force. This unit operated Tu-124, Tu-154, Il-18, Tu-134 and Il-62 for government flights, some of these aircraft wore full Interflug livery and Interflug registrations. This 'camouflage' was deemed necessary to obtain flying permits over/to foreign (western) countries more easily. However, these aircraft were neither owned, operated nor maintained by Interflug.

On a small scale, TG-44 pilots were also assigned to operate regular Interflug revenue flights. This agreement between Interflug and the Air Force served the only purpose to maintain currency of the military transport pilots by 'collecting flight hours', which would have been difficult otherwise because of the low utilzation of government aircraft.

--195.246.100.57 (talk) 08:36, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Dear 195.246.100.57, I very much appreciate your explanations and (obvious) profound knowledge. Still, it would be even better if you could provide us with some reliable sources which could be used as references to further improve the Interflug article. Especially concerning the scale on which military pilots were operating regular Interflug flights (which you are calling "small"). Best regards--FoxyOrange (talk) 09:05, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia giving birth to a new rumor

"Analysts identified the price war on holiday flights out of West Berlin as one of the factors responsible for the demise of Laker Airways in 1982."

The cited source (Der Spiegel magazine) does not contain this unbelievable statement. It does not even claim to present the view of any analyst. Laker Airways gets only mentioned in relation to its short lived Berlin-Athens flight, which was successfully undercut by INTERFLUG. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.246.100.57 (talk) 03:03, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Y I've just removed this statement (indeed, it was unreferenced). Thanks for having informed us about the problem.--FoxyOrange (talk) 08:22, 17 December 2013 (UTC)