# Best Japanese fighter against USN planes



## Vraciu (Jan 4, 2009)

As in the title, which Japanese fighter (both IJAAF and IJNAF) was the best against USN planes - F6Fs, F4Us, TBFs, SB2Cs?


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## wilbur1 (Jan 4, 2009)

Iwent with the Tony just a better all round fighter in my opinion


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## Thorlifter (Jan 4, 2009)

Yeah, I voted for the Ki-100. The N1K-J George would be my 2nd pick.


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## renrich (Jan 4, 2009)

I have read the KI84 was the best of the Japanese fighters but I don't know if any of their late war fighters had much success. The big scores were usually posted by IJN guys in A6Ms.


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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Jan 4, 2009)

Went for the Zero: biggest terror of the Pacific.


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## Catch22 (Jan 4, 2009)

I went with the Frank, it was basically a US fighter in disguise.

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## syscom3 (Jan 4, 2009)

renrich said:


> I have read the KI84 was the best of the Japanese fighters but I don't know if any of their late war fighters had much success. The big scores were usually posted by IJN guys in A6Ms.



An experienced Japanese pilot in a fully functional and working late war fighter was still dangerous. They didn't have the chance to run up their scores, but they did have successes.


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## Timppa (Jan 4, 2009)

Statistically, as I recall, the Mitsubishi J2M "Raiden" fared the best against USN planes.


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## Venganza (Jan 5, 2009)

I'll admit I don't know as much about Japanases planes as I might, but since when has lack of knowledge prevented anyone from having an opinion (this is America, Dadgummit )? I went with the Frank. Good armament with 2 12.7mm's and 2 20's, relatively fast, and tough, especially for a Japanese plane. My second choice would be the low-wing George - 2 7.62mm's and 4 20's gave it a pretty fiercesome armament, albeit with limited ammo for the 20's.

Venganza


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## renrich (Jan 5, 2009)

I agree that the Japanese pilots who were experienced near the end of the war were still formidable foes, regardless of what they were flying. I have a book by Saburo and he had victories in 1945(I think) in late model Zeros.


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## Thunderbolt56 (Jan 5, 2009)

Thorlifter said:


> Yeah, I voted for the Ki-100. The N1K-J George would be my 2nd pick.




Ditto.


The Ki84 was definitely formiddable, but by the time it entered service, the lack of high-octane fuel and diminished collective pilot-skill kept it from being all it could be.


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## Gnomey (Jan 5, 2009)

Certainly the Ki-100 and the George are the best aircraft on the list although they where not available in large numbers (or relatively large numbers) unlike the Ki-84.

Still the best 2 would of done the best against the USN so I went with the Ki-100.


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## Ivan1GFP (Jan 5, 2009)

My vote is for J-fighters in the following order:

N1K2-J
J2M3
Ki-84

I believe that the Ki-100 was just too slow to be competitive. It was slower than the Ki-61-II that it replaced but was quite a lot lighter and probably moved better.

The Ki-61-I was a beautiful fighter but was just too slow and underpowered. The Ki-61-II was never reliable.

IMHO, all of the late war Japanese fighters were much faster than typical book speeds. US Tests put the Ki-84 at 427 mph and the J2M3 at 407 mph. I am not convinced that high octane fuel did much to improve the performance because the engines were not designed for it.

As for how well they did, The 343 Kokutai was the elite Japanese Navy unit at the end of the war and from the book Genda's Blade, it seems to me that even they were only getting a victory-loss ratio of about 1-2 or 1-3. Their biggest issues were still pilot quality and mechanical reliability of their equipment in all areas.

Regards.
- Ivan.


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## Vraciu (Jan 6, 2009)

I think that N1K2-J and J2M3 were better than Ki-84 or Ki-100 because they have better armament, which was important against well armoured USN planes. Their performance was average, so I think that IJNAF birds were better than those of IJAAF.


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## Soren (Jan 12, 2009)

The Ki-84 was the best of the Japanese fighters, it was the fastest as-well.


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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Jan 13, 2009)

Raiden Jack was a good plane. I think I read one of the reasons it did so well was because it's factory that made it was located near by, so they were able to get spare parts for broken Raiden's much easier. That meant a lot of Raidens weren't forced to be grounded for long periods in order to make repairs.

One other reason the Jack may have had a good kill ratio was because the B-29 bomber flight paths were directly overhead to it on one of the islands it operated from, so to it could quickly go into action and shoot down US bombers. I'm not sure it did really well against enemy fighters, but the bombers were what the Japanese wanted to shoot down most anyway, since they were the biggest threat to Japan.

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## Wayne Little (Jan 18, 2009)

While I am a fan of the Zero, my vote goes to the final version of the N1K series the N1K2-J Shiden-kai.


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## Yoshi Muroi (Mar 7, 2017)

My bet is on the KI84 although it was know the KI100 would beat it in a dogfight if you compare it to US fighters going over 700kph, which would have likely used hit and run tactics, the KI84 was one of Japans fastest fighters, later variants carried 20mm and 30mm cannon instead of the 20mm and 12.7mm giving more powerful guns. it outclasses the F6F and is comparable to the P51 and F4U, even if the KI100 or KI43 was highly agile American planes still would have used hit and run tactics to slower aircraft like the KI43 or Ki100. Finally most planes on the list were outclassed for example the KI61 was comparable to the P40, the A7M was a great 1942-43 aircraft but by 1944-45 it was struggling to keep up with faster American planes, like the zero it started to lack behind in speed, the N1K although very good against USN F6Fs and some ways surpassed it, but other planes like F4Us out ran it meaning the Americans would have used hit and run tactics against it. In late war turning time wasn't a huge factor in the pacific theatre, American pilots were well aware of Japanese aircraft and their ability to turn very very well and always used their superior speed to outrun planes like zeros or KI61s so in my option the KI84 was the most valuable and most effective against the US planes because of its high speeds, excellent armament, good protection and still a very fast turner.

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## Conslaw (Mar 7, 2017)

I think the N1K2 and the Ki84 were both close enough in performance to 1944-45 US types so that a difference in pilot quality - either way, would be more important than which aircraft. Any Japanese type was at a disadvantage to any 1944-45 US type if the Japanese pilot was poorly trained, the fuel was poor quality, the engine was assembled with inferior materials, the plane was overwhelmed by superior American numbers or tactical intelligence (radar vectoring). All of that being said, If I could pick any Japanese type, I would go with the Ki-84.

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## robin banks (May 10, 2017)

I vote Ki-100. Faster climbing AND more agile than Ki-61, which is known for being a pretty good plane (it made life hard for P-40 pilots-- they needed P-38 to counter it). They used the Ki-100s to protect Ki-61s attacking bombers, because they were better at dogfighting. Plus, Ki-100 was easy to fly, which was important when you do not have many expert pilots left!


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## Dan Fahey (Dec 18, 2018)

I chose the ki43.....this plane shot more Allied planes down than any other Japanese plane. 
Just went through a whole study about this plane and its surprising efffectiveness and versatility.


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## Conslaw (Jan 5, 2019)

Dan Fahey said:


> I chose the ki43.....this plane shot more Allied planes down than any other Japanese plane.
> Just went through a whole study about this plane and its surprising efffectiveness and versatility.



I saw that claim on Wikipedia that the Ki-43 shot down more Allied planes than any other Japanese plane, but it didn't have any attribution listed. Unless the Ki-43 shot down a bunch of Chinese aircraft, I would be surprised if the claim is true if only because there were far more A6M Zeros produced. Just under 6,000 Ki-43 were produced versus almost 11,000 A6M.


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## parsifal (Jan 5, 2019)

Depends on the target. Few Japanese aircraft, including the Ki84 could reach the operating altitude of the B-29s. Lightly built aircraft had a hard time against heavily armed and armoured aircraft like the B-24. Certain other fighters, like the zeke were the queen of the battlefield, whilst ever allied fighters tried to mix it in a turning fight.

The best fighter against USN planes is probably the George I think


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## Shortround6 (Jan 5, 2019)

Conslaw said:


> I saw that claim on Wikipedia that the Ki-43 shot down more Allied planes than any other Japanese plane, but it didn't have any attribution listed. Unless the Ki-43 shot down a bunch of Chinese aircraft, I would be surprised if the claim is true if only because there were far more A6M Zeros produced. Just under 6,000 Ki-43 were produced versus almost 11,000 A6M.


I don't believe there were thousands (or even high hundreds) of Chinese planes to shoot down. And the Americans, British commonwealth and Dutch also didn't have several thousand aircraft in theater in 1941/42. While numbers certainly went up near the end of 1942 the quality of the Allied planes and pilots was also going up.

what bothers me about this whole "success" story is that the production of the Ki 43 seems to be as follows.

1941..........157 planes
1942..........616 planes
1943........1546 planes
1944........2801planes
1945.........748 planes

given the quality of the Japanese pilots in 1944/45 and the quality of the Allied pilots in 1944/45 one would assume (with all the risk that entails) that most of these thousands of victories scored by the Ki 43 were in 1942-43 or about 40% of the production. I am sure that the Ki 43 did shoot down some allied planes in 1944-45 but is glory days were over.

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## CommanderBounds (Jan 5, 2019)

Unfortunately it is not the most well documented or proven aircraft but I imagine the Japanese A7M Reppu "Sam" would've been a one of the best fighters against US aircraft if it had been fully realized before the end of the war. It appears it suffered from the lack of a good powerplant to push the design along as intended and would also have suffered in it's effectiveness at the hands of Japans extreme pilot losses towards the end of the war. I am also partial to it because I share it's allied codename. What are your opinions on it?


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## vandee (Sep 10, 2019)

I went with the George. I read the George was built to take on Hellcats. It was a good dog fighter and built rugged. Saburo Sakai
flew them a few times, they can't be bad! To me it looks like a P-47 with a buble canopy that's framed. John


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## Macandy (Sep 13, 2019)

Nothing the Japanese were developing had a hope. Everything was last year’s model in penny packets.
It’s kind of forgotten the US was building thousands of jet fighters in 1945.

Equipment Orders Canceled by the United States during WWII


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## Admiral Beez (Nov 3, 2019)

I voted Ki-84, but I almost voted Ki-43 Oscar since it did obtain air supremacy for the IJAAF over China, Malaya and DEI. Plus the Oscar is the only Japanese fighter I’ve actually seen in person, at Seattle’s Museum of Flight.


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## Admiral Beez (Nov 24, 2019)

Vraciu said:


> As in the title, which Japanese fighter (both IJAAF and IJNAF) was the best against USN planes - F6Fs, F4Us, TBFs, SB2Cs?


Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka. Blast past the F6F and F4U and kill the TBF and SBC in their CVs. If the hair splitters don't like this one, then the Suzuka-24.


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## Nick Sumner (Jan 13, 2020)

CommanderBounds said:


> Unfortunately it is not the most well documented or proven aircraft but I imagine the Japanese A7M Reppu "Sam" would've been a one of the best fighters against US aircraft if it had been fully realized before the end of the war. It appears it suffered from the lack of a good powerplant to push the design along as intended and would also have suffered in it's effectiveness at the hands of Japans extreme pilot losses towards the end of the war. I am also partial to it because I share it's allied codename. What are your opinions on it?



If anyone is interested, I have posted two photoshopped images of A7Ms in this thread Drake's Drum

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## Conslaw (Jan 16, 2020)

Against F4U-4s and F7F and F8F as well as P-47N, P-51H and maybe even P-80s, the A7M's chronological peers, it's too little too late.


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## TheMadPenguin (Jan 31, 2020)

*Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka*


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## fubar57 (Jan 31, 2020)

TheMadPenguin said:


> *Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka*


I don't think it collide with too many USN planes


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## TheMadPenguin (Mar 17, 2020)

fubar57 said:


> I don't think it collide with too many USN planes


One to a customer.


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## taly01 (Mar 17, 2020)

On paper the Ki-84 looks the best but it was not considered to turn better than a Mustang by Japanese pilots, the Nakajima designer of the Ki-84 was proud of designing the controls "heavy" so it could not over-control at high speeds, as this had been a cause of break-ups in the Ki-43, but this G limited its high speed maneouverability also.

The N1K2-J has a great reputation and was rated by British test pilot Eric Brown, but I have recently read Japanese accounts that they had some high speed dive failures at only mid 400mph levels! Also the N1K2-J did NOT have rear seat armour according to Japanese wiki!

This only leaves the Ki-100, and although a bit slower max speed, its climb and turn rate is superiour to the others, has good pilot armour and it has very strong dive characteristics and could dive with Mustangs. Good Japanese Ki-100 pilots said they had no fear of P-51's, and F6F and F4U were no problem (sic).

So Ki-100 and it could be made for carriers also

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## Hardlydank (Mar 18, 2020)

I say the Ki-84 was the best. It was the fastest, was quite well armed, and had armor. It's similarity to the Ki-43 and Ki-44 probably also helped production and pilot conversion.


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