Mozzie...!

[Psycho Bass Guy]

True for FW 190 and Me 109 pilots, but the few fighter Me 262s only got into the hands of very experienced pilots or even aces. That didn't help you though when a rednosed Mustang strafed you on the ground at the airfield or you lacked kerosene and ammo for longer engagements.

True, but what few aces remained were literally writing the book on its tactics in combat. It flew, accelerated, and climbed faster than anything they had every piloted to return in (see the ME-163) and had a much wider turn radius than even they were used to. The difference in acceleration and accompanying gravity alone probably inadvertently felled nearly as many ME-262's as US .50 shells. The US and Soviets studied the ME-262 for almost five years trying to figure out what to do with it and took nearly ten to come up with consistently superior craft. It wasn't until the MiG-15 and F-86 that the ME-262's potential was fully realized.

The P-38 did well in the Pacific, but Luftwaffe pilots were largely unimpressed. Of course it was at the time the only US fighter with the range and altitude capabilites to guard the B-17 and -24 fleets.The Luftwaffe pilots respected the Thunderbolt though it wasn't really what they regarded a proper fighter.

...but that didn't stop the Jug, the P-38, and the Mustang from chewing them up fairly regularly in the air and on the ground, cementing the idea of air superiority in the US military psyche. In a small irony, "Warthog" is just the A-10's unofficial name. Officially, they are the "Thunderbolt II," and were the Cold War guardians of Deutschland to make it a bigger speedbump for the hordes of T-72 and T-80 tanks from the Warsaw Pact had the scripted version of WWIII ever have been fought with conventional weapons.

[uwe]

Is there anything a Lightning could do better than an Me 109 Gustav other than longer range and higher altitude? It couldn't outspeed it and not outclimb it, I have doubts whether it could outdive it, the Gustav dropped like a stone. And horrible turn radius the Gustav had, the P-38's was probably even worse.

I agree that by 1944, the Luftwaffe consisted of a tiny minority of Experten and a mass of freshfaced kids with too little flying experience. Four war years had taken their toll.

And the Me 262 introduction was delayed for no good reason. What flew in late 1944 was hardly different to the prototype that flew three years before, had that plane be produced in massive quantities from 1942 onwards, you can bet that two years later an improved B version would have been an even more formidable weapon (though pressure on the Allies to develop something similar would have probably seen them bring out a mass-produced jet fighter earlier too). That said: Good that we lost and that the war didn't last any longer than it already did (more Germans died and more assets in Germany were destroyed in the last 12 months of the war than in the five years of war before)!

One thing I smiled about yesterday was what Russian pilots said about the FW 190 A subversion with the four 20 mm cannons and two cowling machine guns (you could heap a lot of weaponry on a Focke-Wulf and it still wouldn't fly as nasty as an Me 109, it was a great gun platform). Those FW 190ies had a habit of doing frontal attacks on Russian aircraft because they would smother anything with shells and the air-cooled engine could take a few shots from the opponent too, they almost always came out as winners. That changed though when the Russkies took a liking of the lend-leased P-39 Aircobra, not only because it could stand Russian winter cold and still get off the ground like no other fighter, but because of its solitary 37 mm gun in the propeller hub. "You just needed to hit with one shell with that in a frontal attack and the engine of the FW 190 was destroyed and its pilot most likely dead". The Focke-Wulf pilots changed their tactics subsequently!

[godofthunder]

 Aside from the firepower the P-39 had good radios something Soviet aircraft lacked.

[uwe]

That was a weakness of the Red Army as such. Only one out of five T-34s had radio. Communication was made with handsigns and signals. It greatly hampered tactical flexibility of an otherwise very good tank and was responsible for the high Red Army tank losses. Tanks could be replaced, but the experienced crews could not.

The P-39 was one ugly duckling, but if you look at the Russian aircraft of the time, it somehow fitted the mold! And a 37 mm gun is reassuring.

Speaking of reassuring, so was the Henschel 129 tankbuster:



75 mm is kind of ample for most purposes really.

[TBird1958]

Gotta find a Ki 109 pic.......

[uwe]

Look at these Japs, ripping everything off even back then!!!  (It's a joke, Hieronymous, as your former Axis buddy, I am the only one allowed to make it here!)

No idea these existed, I'm crappy at Japanese WW II aircraft, so this was then a "Flying FLAK" for the B-29s if I'm not mistaken? Kind of desperate if you ask me.

They certainly wouldn't have needed it for US-tanks, 20 mm cannons would do just fine against those ...  

[TBird1958]

There you go.

I'll admit to not knowing much of anything about this plane, my next door neighbor when I was young had built the model - I remember the kit's box art, vividly depicting several B-29's with shattered wings from this plane...........

I still think that anybody that flew in WWII had to be a courageous soul.   

[Big_Stu]

They certainly wouldn't have needed it for US-tanks, 20 mm cannons would do just fine against those ... 

That's a bit overkill for a Ronson isn't it?

[uwe]

Look who's talking!!!   With the quality of home produce Limey tanks, you guys should have been grateful for anything!

"Ronson Lighter" is mean, mean, mean for the Sherman, but also hilarious. Love it.

If truth be told: From above into the engine, even 20 mm shells could do serious damage to most tanks (eg even the T 34), that was their badly armored Achilles Heel.

With a 75 mm, otoh, you could probably destroy four "Ronsons" if they were nicely parked behind each other.  

[TBird1958]

  German Armor, for all it's good points in battle it broke down and needed service far more often than Allied stuff - keeping them fueled was aproblem too.

[uwe]

True. Undermotorized and gas guzzlers. Anything larger than a Panther was diminsihing returns. The Kingtiger guzzled 1.000 liters at 100 km range, a gun platform with limited movement. With less than 10 hp per ton of weight.

Rest assured, whenever the Sherman/Ronson outnumbered Panzer IVs, Panthers, Tigers and Kingtigers 10:1 - and most of the time it did - it didn't fare too badly!

[TBird1958]

I think we just sent so many over that you finally ran out ammo! 

[TBird1958]

I recently read a good side-by-side history/comparison of Rommel and Patton, as part of it U.S. armoured doctrine of the period was explained. Interestingly, the idea was of course to make rapid, mobile thrusts along with motorized infantry - set battles with the opponents tanks were to be avoided. Shermans were mobile, easily mass produced and importantly, transported across the entire world on railroads, or in the holds of Liberty ships. By contrast no Tiger moved any distance without a special railroad flatcar of which there were very few of.......
U.S. M-10 and M-36 Jackson are 90mm gun Tank Destroyers, they are Sherman chassis, designed to give a somewhat better account of themselves head-to-head with German tanks.

[Big_Stu]

"Ronson Lighter" is mean, mean, mean for the Sherman, but also hilarious. Love it.

It's a contemporary quote of the time, from their British crews, taken from Ronson's own slogan
http://www.finepipes.com/articles/ronson-lighter.html

I thought the Matilda was a tough nut to crack, but didn't have much to pop back with was more than a match for the Panzer I & II that it was intended to be up against.

[uwe]

Almost all French and English tanks were overarmored and underarmed at the beginning of WW II. German tanks initially went the other way, the Blitzkrieg demanded quick armored divisions, basically search and destroy. Tiger and Kingtiger were anything but Blitzkrieg - they were products of their time, post-Stalingrad and North Africa defeat, Germany was already on the defensive and these tanks were largely defensive weapons that were supposed to stem the tide of T-34s and Shermans - both tanks much more Blitzkrieg than their mighty German opponents - rather than conquer anything swiftly on agile missions. By 1942 all the German Reich had to conquer was the shortage in raw materials.

The first modern tank of WW II was the T-34, ahead of Panzer I, II, III and IV as well as any Western Allied tank of the time. The latter day much improved Panzer IV, Panther, Tiger and Kingtiger were all rushed reactions to the T-34. But you could build two T-34s in the timespan you needed to build one Panther. At half the price and half the raw materials. And T-34 production speed even doubled in later years as the Russians gained experience while German Panzer production periods became longer and longer.