That ticks off most of the boxes on the “Is this an urban legend?” checklist. Funny story, but still.
I think there is a reasonable argument to be made than in Europe, at least, Allied dominance of the skies was not because their planes were that much better, but simply because they overwhelmed the Germans with superior numbers, and secondarily for superior aerial warfare doctrine, but operational and strategic. German planes were very fine aircraft and got better as the war went on, but they simply did not have enough of them, didn’t have enough pilots, didn’t have enough fuel, and expended a lot of time and energy screwing around with wasteful nonsense like the Me-163. You can argue all day over whether a Mustang was better than a Thunderbolt was better than a Spitfire XIV, but what’s for sure is that ten of them were a lot better than one FW-190.
That is a valid point and carries over to WW2 tanks as well. Still, why don’t we distill it this way; given the choice of any prop driven fighter operationally available up to VE Day; which one would you want to park your butt into for one on one combat? Given the way I’ve flown most of the WW2 MS flight sims (Yeah, I know that isn’t the same as the real thing but bear with me.) My best flying was with the Spitfire IX or the F6F. I greatly liked the P-47D but preferred climbing fast to diving fast.
Interestingly enough, the role of the 8th AF in the 6-7 months leading up to D-Day was to basically wreck the Luftwaffe, with the actual bombing role being secondary.
Essentially once they got drop tanks, the 8th AF used the bombers as bait, with the hopes of drawing up a strong Luftwaffe response, and then using superior US fighter numbers (P-51s with drop tanks) to shoot them down wholesale.
And it worked like gangbusters. As we all know, there was very little Luftwaffe activity over the Normandy invasion beaches, or even for that matter, anywhere in France or the Netherlands. By the end of 1944, the fighter threat to B-17 formations was pretty much over with, and they stopped manning every gun position.
Which reinforces **RickJay’s **position even more…
The P-39 has all that armor around the pilot, and a guy who flew one wrote that it didn’t climb quickly enough to engage attacking bomber formations.
I’ll pick the P-39.
I wish this would meme would just die. The Soviets used the plane very successfully as a fighter with many aces being made. It was sleek and could maintain a competitively high speed against contemporary 109s. They learned to zoom in at speed, engage at close range with the heavy firepower and zoom out to set up another pass. As long as they stayed out of vertical fights and kept their energy up they were in good shape.
The plane was used for ground attack also, but generally with bombs, the cannon was useful against soft targets. You have to remember that they had a very solid heavy attack plane in the Il2.
The Soviets had some very impressive airplanes in mid to late war with the Yaks and La variants. Some of these were armed with the Soviet’s own N 37 cannon that was probably inspired by the P39’s huge cannon, but was much more effective.
All that said, choosing a ‘best’ WWII fighter rrally is an exercise of context.
You haven’t figured out that I am a coward? Flashman of the air?
Armor and it isn’t fast enough to catch the guys I am supposed to fight.
My kind of airplane!
The grain of truth there is that Johnson’s unit, the 56th Fighter Group, was positively reluctant to convert to the P-51, and given their excellent record were allowed not to. They were were the only remaining P-47 group in the 8th AF at the end of the war in Europe, and even flew a version of the a/c which no other unit received, the uprated P-47M (basically the P-47D powered by the heavier Very Long Range P-47N’s engine).
Some other 8th AF units never liked the P-47 (like the 4th FG which had earlier flown reverse Lend Lease Spitfires) others were relatively neutral, but as mentioned the P-51 allowed longer range missions necessary to the overall effort, besides giving much more fuel persistence for combat within range of where P-47D/M’s could also go.
In the Korean War there was some reaction against the (by then) F-51D by F-80C units which converted back to it in 1950 to achieve more endurance in close support missions from Japan, and more airfields in South Korea which could accommodate them. At that time many asked, and eventually the FEAF leadership questioned (due to mounting losses to AA fire later on, in 1951), whether it wouldn’t have been a better idea to switch back to the F-47. There were still 100’s of F-47’s in existence in 1950, but the Far East Air Force had maintenance know how and spares for F-51’s since they’d operated it and not the F-47 right before the KW, and operational F-51’s sent to Korea were mainly in the western US (Air National Guard etc), F-47’s were mainly in the east. In that case the vulnerability of the liquid cooled engine of the F-51 was often on relatively shallow missions into enemy territory where a little extra flying time if hit would enable the pilot to avoid capture. In WWII long range air combat, fighters didn’t often make it home after enemy a/c hit their engines, that was the exception rather than the rule even with air cooled radial fighters.
Armor on US WWII fighters was not typically heavy, only able to stop rifle caliber machine gun bullets and HE cannon shell fragments. The heaviest armor was on a/c of countries which had more experience losing lots of pilots to being shot in their cockpits. The Japanese Type 4 (Frank, sometimes called Ki-84) had 13 mm armor behind the pilot, P-51D’s they encountered in 1944-45 had mainly 6mm behind the pilot.
The Hawker Hurricane probably deserves a mention somewhere in here, for no other reason that it was the plane which won the Battle of Britain.
Yes, the Spitfire is the plane most associated with the conflict, but the Hurricane was fielded in far, far greater numbers than the Spitifire during the proceedings.
Country…% of Total Warmaking Potential (1937)
United States…41.7%
Germany…4.4%
USSR…14.0%
UK…10.2%
France…4.2%
Japan…3.5%
Italy…2.5%
Seven Powers (total)…(90.5%)
And you take that of all these countries, the only one which didn’t suffer direct damage to the country in any significant form was America, you can see why the US was able to do what it did.
Interesting points, but I don’t believe that the superior range of the Zero was the most critical factor.
The Allies were caught with their pants down and were completely unprepared for the capacity of the Japanese to actually outperform them at multiple levels.
The attack on Pearl Harbor, for example, had three different types of A/C with considerably different air speeds and from six carriers. The US wasn’t able match that coordination for a couple of years into the war.
It simply was not possible for the Allies to defend the DEI. Full stop. Yes, the Allies were surprised by the Zeros, but the Japanese controlled the air and sea and it would be months before the Americans were able to attempt anything on that scale.
The Japanese benefited greatly from strategic surprise in their early conquests. Even besides the tactical surprise at PH the general US consensus was it would have to fight them perhaps in 1942, when the US forces wouldn’t have been really ready anyway, but definitely not ready in late '41. And Britain had war experienced forces but that was heavily compromised by the needs of the European and Mideast theaters so it had limited and generally inferior second string forces in the Far East. So sure that’s the overall setting.
However again especially on the eastern route of Japanese conquest (Formosa>PI>eastern DEI) as opposed to western (Malaya>DEI) those were air/sea/land campaigns. Conquest required landing, landing required control of the sea, which required control of the air, which meant superior fighter forces. The longer the range of fighters which could achieve air superiority, the fewer longer steps could be made, much faster advance. And no way to speed it up with shorter legged fighters. Long range fighters which could achieve air superiority were a major advantage. The IJN controlled the air at long range in those campaigns because of the long range of the land based Zero units, basically just two (Tainan and 3rd Air Groups).
The proficiency of USN and IJN carrier forces in 1942 proved closer to equal as shown when they faced each another in the four carrier battles that year. The Zero was also an excellent carrier fighter and its superior escort range an advantage over the F4F in that role. But the shorter range of the carrier attack a/c and bombers and the nature of carrier warfare meant the Zero’s range wasn’t as decisive in that role. And F4F and Zero units, all factors material and human, proved almost exactly equal in fighter combat (around 115 actual kills of Zeroes by F4F’s and actual kills of F4F’s by Zeroes in 1941-42, counting in each side’s loss records including carrier and land based operations, but not counting victories against other types of a/c nor considering either side’s victory claims). That was in contrast to several:1 real kill ratio achieved mainly by the land based Zero units v USAAF, RAF and KNIL (Dutch) fighters in the early campaigns.
The Allies wouldn’t have necessarily succeeded in the defense in the early campaigns, but the very rapid movement, distance spacing of attacks which delivered such a large area of conquest in such a short time required the Zero’s superior range.
This is a fascinating juxtaposition between an encyclopedic knowledge of WWII A/C but the characterization of the sea battle is completely uninformed.
Unfortunately, I’ve got to fly back to Japan tomorrow and am too busy to put together a decent response, but I’ll take care of that later. Perhaps as late as next week. My apologies.
However, I would like a cite for your assertion that the above was enabled by the superior range of the Zero and that that was a key factor.
I did enjoy that. Wasn’t aware of the P-47’s contributions in the Pacific (except for a vague notiion about late-war P-47N escorts). That cite mentions flying Thunderbolts off escort carriers? Did they LAND on small carriers, or just fly off to land bases? Wow.
