# Bomb sights for light bombers.



## davebender (Nov 13, 2011)

The A-36 discussion has gotten me wondering what bomb sights were employed by other WWII era light bombers.

Ju-87, Ju-88, Me-210, Me-410.
…..Stuvi 5. A purpose built dive bomber sight for these purpose built dive bombers. Everything I have read suggests it was state of the art during WWII.

USN SBD.
IJN Val.
…..These purpose built dive bombers employed a telescopic bomb site. Superficially both bomb sites appear similar mounted on top of the instrument panel and extending through the windscreen.

USN SB2C
IJN Judy
…..Did these late war naval dive bombers have an improved bomb sight? 

Me-109 ground attack variants.
Fw-190F Fw-190G
? Did these light bombers have a bomb sight?

A-36 dive bomber.
Apparently none. However that sounds incredible as the A-36 was supposed to be a bomber.

P-38 ground attack variants.
P-40 ground attack variants.
P-47 ground attack variants.
P-51 ground attack variants.
F6F ground attack variants.
F4U ground attack variants.
? What sight was employed when dropping bombs?

Hurricane ground attack variants.
Typhoon
Tempest
Mosquito light bomber variants.
Beaufighter bomber variants.
? What sight was employed when dropping bombs?

A-20 light bomber.
A-26 light bomber.
? Did they use the Norden sight?

Soviet Pe-2 dive bomber.
?

Soviet Il-2 light bomber.
? What sight was employed when dropping bombs?


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## barney (Nov 13, 2011)

I can answer the question for the P-51D - no bomb sight except the K-14 gunnery sight had range marks for rockets. 

A P-51D could carry anywhere from a 100 to a 1000 pound bomb under each wing. However, carrying 2 1000 pound bombs restricted the aircraft to straight and level. First select Both or Train on the rocket control panel. Then switch left and right to arm. If Both is selected pressing the button on top of the stick dropped both bombs. Selecting Train dropped one bomb each time the button was pressed. In case of an electrical failure the bombs could be dropped mechanically by way of two levers in the cockpit but could not be armed. 

The only other information I found was that when vertical avoid side slipping when bombing or a bomb could go into the propeller.


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## Siegfried (Nov 13, 2011)

The standard mid-late war british bombsight, the Mk.XIV (known as the T.1 when made in the USA by Sperry) could level bomb with only a 10 second straight run required. It could also glide/slide/shallow dive bomb down to 5000ft.

It was fitted to the Mosquito as well as the Lancaster. Unlike the Lotfe 7 or Norden it could not track the ground and calculate wind drift, that had to be entered manually, but it did allow manouvering as well as shallow glide bombing.

I believe the standard German fighter Revi gun sight had a second adjustable cross hairs bar; the pilot adjusted this according to an ofset angle determined by the expected release speed, altitude, dive angle etc. He aimed at the target, pulled up and released when the second recticle crossed the target. This is probably the way Me 109s attacked and sank/damaged the cruiser HMS Fiji. 

Spitfires when bombing just aimed with their gun sight at a 45 degree dive, pulled up, counted to 8 and released. (Sptfire versus the V weapons Osprey books).

Low level bombing was purely intuition AFAIKT.


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## Airframes (Nov 13, 2011)

The Mosquito normally used the Coarse Setting bomb sight, although the MkXIV was used by Pathfinder aircraft for precision marking.
Typhoon, Beaufighter, Spit etc, employed the normal gunsight, with the pilot allowing a few degrees left of centre, depending on angle of attack.
Contrary to popular belief, giro sights such as the MkIX, XIV etc, were not widely deployed, as they were only effective above a certain height, that is, approximately 12,000 feet plus, which was above the average altitude for light, or strike, bombers like the Mossie, and ground attack aircraft such a the Typhoon.


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## davebender (Nov 13, 2011)

> Revi gun sight had a second adjustable cross hairs bar; the pilot adjusted this according to an ofset angle determined by the expected release speed, altitude, dive angle etc. He aimed at the target, pulled up and released when the second recticle crossed the target


How did accuracy compare to purpose built bomb sights such as the Stuvi 5?


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## Siegfried (Nov 13, 2011)

The Stuvi was far more accurate, a proper solution; the revi was just a broad guide. There is a article on Finnish use of the Stuvi 5B on Ju 88A4 by Jukka?. A good crew could get two bombs within 20ft close enough to knock out tanks in a 22 degree dive starting at 8000ft and pulling out at 5000ft.

The pilot of a German aircraft was expected to do mental calculations, know the dimensions of of wing spans and targets sizes to estimate range using the recticle. The recticle gave a stedomentric guage of range, but there was no adjusting it to get a readout.

AFAIKT Stuvi required the target to be lined up on release so it required a snub nose aircraft (eg Me 410), nose plexiglass eg Ju 88 or alternative a steep dive (ju 87)

This is why the TSA-2D was so important. It would have allowed long nosed aircraft such as Do 335, FW 190, Ta 152 and Me 262 (which did see some service) to accuratly deliver bombs from tree top up to 3000m and of course the Ar 234 as well. It also would have allowed bombing through cloud base. I suspect use of EGON (Oboe Like) blind bombing day or night was more important in european conditions at other times, for that a level bombsight is not required. Fighters would be able to do most of the Luftwaffes bombing work; bombers were getting unaffordbable and inopperable.


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## parsifal (Nov 14, 2011)

My understanding is that mosquitos used a range of bomsights, starting with the Mk VII "wimperia" and moving up to the Mk IXs and Mk XIVs. Mossies also were fitted with US sights, Norden and Sperry of various marks.

Whilst the Mk VII was really only ever used for training in the Mosquito (because of speed limits I think) I was unaware that Pathfinders only used the Mk XIV.

British Bombsights were as a generalization simpler than the US types, and could not compute certain external effects. I am unaware of any serious disadvantages arising from this. There was an advantage arising from this simplicity....they were easier to use, and easier to train bombardiers how to use them....


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## Edgar Brooks (Nov 14, 2011)

RAF fighters used their standard gunsights, plus a lot of skill and practice, since, once the bombs had gone, they reverted to being fighters. Tempests never carried rockets or bombs before the end of the war, and, although I stand to be corrected, I'm doubtful about the Beaufighter carrying bombs as well. The Spitfire V (early) IX would have used the GM2 MkII*, while the Typhoon started with the same sight, but rocket-firers went over to the IIL, which could be adjusted, to allow for rocket-drop, then returned to normal use. Low-back Spitfire XVIs were fitted with the gyro gunsight IID.


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## gorizont (Nov 14, 2011)

IJN late-war dive-bombers used improved gun-bomb sights - Type 2 and Type 3 1"Gou" Gunsight Model 1 (the latter differed by its collimator opposite to optical tube of the previous and its improved calculation unit).
You can find their pictures at ŽË@”š@Æ@€@Ší for instance.

Their difference from earlier Type 1 gun|bomb sights (used in Val's) is that with those sights used a separate calculation unit (as far as remember it called "inclinometer"). The radio operator/gunner input data (drift, speed and angle of dive) into it and by linkage it turned a mirrow in the sight to shift a mark (reticle) image according the calculated corrections. But I don't know if it worked in shallow dive about 20-25 degree.

For horizontal bombing from the late 1942 they prefered to use collimator bombsights with vectoring calculation mechanism. It allow to obtain more accuracy (comparing for example with Norden) while bombing from low level and middle level flights (usually from 100 meters up to 1000 meters, not higher than 2 km). 
Usually they were used on two-engine bombers but something of this kind was planned to be installed on Tenzans from 1944. 

All the US fighter bombers used through the whole war just a conventional gunsight Mk8 - as a SB2C Beast. As far as I know they were in this area left behind by even Japanese.
Only at the end of war for the F4U-4 there was designed a bombing system for toss-bombing but I'm not sure it was really installed before Japanese capitulation.
But for US pilots such equipment played not so importent role as for Japaneses and Germans - USA had an opportunity to train their pilots and bombardiers more properly and had such an advantage as "bigger battalions" - more dropped bombs gave an icreased chance to hit the target.

For Soviet aviation - Il2 hase a standart collimator gun - bomb sight PBP-1B - which name usually decoded as "the sight which beats a pilot just once but hurt" - because at forced landings the pilots striked their heads against it not seldom and often - to death). So from 1942 those sights were often uninstalled and pilots aimed through mark on the cocpit front window and mark at aircraft cowling.
And there weren't any special sighting device for horizontal bombing.

I don't remember which sight was used for dive-bombing in Pe-2 but I'm sure that all the corrections (drift etc) were calculated by pilot just mentally (a drift figure were calculated - mentally too - by a navigator and transferred by interlink phone to a pilot).


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## davebender (Nov 14, 2011)

Did any of the RAF standard fighter gunsights contain rudimentary bombing capability similiar to the German Revi gunsight?

Do we have historical accuracy data for the Fw-190F/Fw-190G and Typhoon when dropping bombs?


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## gjs238 (Nov 14, 2011)

It would be interesting to see a comparison of USN/USMC vs USAAC dive bombing equipment, procedures, and results.
I ASSume that USAAC A-24's and A-25's had the naval sights installed?


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## mudpuppy (Nov 14, 2011)

This is an interesting discussion and I've enjoyed reading (learning) so far. I wish i had information other than a vague recollection of instructions, somewhere, for WWII fighetr pilots in a ground attack role. It may have been some of the pilots manuals posted here in the past.

I did find this one interesting site on the development of targeting computers (early analog computers) as bomb-sights. But it appears the earliest examples here would still have been for the larger birds:
Glenn's Computer Museum

Regards, Derek


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## Siegfried (Nov 15, 2011)

Mechanical analog computation sounds mysterious and difficult but it was really:
1 Numbers are represented by shaft rotations.
2 Two sets of variables can be added or subtracted via a differential gearbox as on a car.
3 A variable can be multiplied by a constant via a step up or step down gearbox
4 Two variables can be multiplied/divided by converting to logarithems using cams (spiral if neccesarry), adding/subtracting via differntials and then converting back via anti-log cams.
5 Tracking servo motors were often used to lighten loads and facilitate interronection of shafts. In the case of early US Mk7 director several men simply read out the dials of intermediate calculations and then used 'follow the dial' to re-enter. For instance the initial calculation that converted angular to cartesian co-ordinates.

Trigonmetric and ballistic data can be encoded onto cams: usually 3 dimensional cams which can be rotated and sliden along.

These were cast to shape and then fine ground.

Integration could be performed via something called a "Faraday Disk Integrator"

Differentiation (to get a speed) was usually in the form of adjusting a small variable speed electric motor: the speed of the motor or postion of the adjusting dial then gave the speed or 'rate' of the object.

The technology used in the Norden had long been used in naval guns and FLAK artillery predictors albeit in bulkier form.

To get a firing solution and fuse setting time an officer would make an initial estimate, this would be fed into the predictor which then automatically made several further estimates by repeatedly clutching in the flight time of the shell.


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## Siegfried (Nov 15, 2011)

parsifal said:


> British Bombsights were as a generalization simpler than the US types, and could not compute certain external effects. I am unaware of any serious disadvantages arising from this. There was an advantage arising from this simplicity....they were easier to use, and easier to train bombardiers how to use them....



The method of employ of the Norden was to adjust variable speed drives which then tracked a fixed object (or moving ship) on the ground. This then allowed calculation of the wind drift of the bomber (or shift of the target) and therefore and automatic calculation of the offset required, which was then automatically entered into the system. The Bombardier made adjustments to the tracking motor and the correction could be passed straight into the autopilot. The Norden required at least a 30 second straight run.

The German Lotfe 7 and British SABS II worked the same way.

However the M.XIV one had to enter the wind drift or target motion manually from either an estimate or meterological aircraft etc.

However it had other advantages, it required only a 10 second steady run up, allowed a lot of manouvering in the start of the runup. It also allowed shallow dive bombing which the Norden (nor Lotfe) could; of course the Luftwaffe had the specialised Stuvi 5B for realy dive bombing.

There were a few other Luftwaffe sights around, something called a BZA (bomb ziel automat) it was used on fairly shallow attacks eg Ar 234.


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## gorizont (Nov 15, 2011)

USAAF results for usage of dive - bombers? 
They abandoned usage of A-24 and A-25 and completely shifted to fighter-bombers as an addition to horizontal bombers.
There is about nothing to compare with USN practice and results in dive-bombing.

As far as I know USAAC A-24's and A-25's indeed had the naval sights installed. Moreover Navy Mk.8 reflectoe sights were used on P-47's and rary P-51's so there were no need to replace them on Sharks and late Banshe's by any army airforce sight.


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## gorizont (Nov 15, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> The method of employ of the Norden was to adjust variable speed drives which then tracked a fixed object (or moving ship) on the ground. This then allowed calculation of the wind drift of the bomber (or shift of the target) and therefore and automatic calculation of the offset required, which was then automatically entered into the system. The Bombardier made adjustments to the tracking motor and the correction could be passed straight into the autopilot. The Norden required at least a 30 second straight run.
> 
> The German Lotfe 7 and British SABS II worked the same way.
> 
> However the M.XIV one had to enter the wind drift or target motion manually from either an estimate or meterological aircraft etc.



During WWII in bombsights were used mainly three principals of calculations. I'm not sure that I use here correct name - it's a direct translation from Russian/ So the first is "base-measurement calculations" - at Japanese early war bombsights as used on Kates for example. The second is "vector - measurement calculation" used first time by GB at WWI. At WWII it used in their sights mainly by Japanese - their were more accurate while bombing at low level flight and took less time to complete aiming but was less accurate while bombing from high level flight.
The third is "synchronous measurement calculation" and used in Norden, Lofte ans SABS. Their main drawback was that the synchronious calculation mode worked at a level not less than 900-1000 meters.



Siegfried said:


> of course the Luftwaffe had the specialised Stuvi 5B for realy dive bombing.
> 
> There were a few other Luftwaffe sights around, something called a BZA (bomb ziel automat) it was used on fairly shallow attacks eg Ar 234.



As far as I know BZA was a computing unit for Stuvi 5. It was used only multiengined bombers and automaticaly produced corrections after the data(speed, drift angle of dive etc) had been input into BZA. On a panel of Stuvi 5 was a switch with two positions - "BZA" and "Hand-" as far as I remember. At Ju-87's data was to input manually.


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## gorizont (Nov 15, 2011)

It's interesting that GB and USA used on their single-engined torpedo-bombers more sophisticated torpedo sights (their called them "directors") than Japanese (Germans hadn't got single-engined torpedo-bombers at all in exception of experimental ones) but their bomber-sights for dive - bombing were much more simpler (just ordinary reflector sights) and based exceptionally on mental calculations of the pilots. Even on post-war Skyraiders.


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## Siegfried (Nov 15, 2011)

Thanks gorizont. This is obviously a subject you have interest in. The term "tachimetric" sometimes spelled "tachymetric" is often used meaning 'speed measuring' with reference to some computing bombsights as well as FLAK predictors or directors.
There was a soviet/russian bombsight used of this kind as well, from 1942 or so I believe?

Primitive computing guns sights measured angular rate (from a rate gyro or generator) and added an offset in consideration of projectile flight time. More advanced systems converted to cartesian coordinates. I ammagine it was the same with bombsights.


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## gorizont (Nov 15, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> Thanks gorizont. This is obviously a subject you have interest in. The term "tachimetric" sometimes spelled "tachymetric" is often used meaning 'speed measuring' with reference to some computing bombsights as well as FLAK predictors or directors.
> There was a soviet/russian bombsight used of this kind as well, from 1942 or so I believe?
> 
> Primitive computing guns sights measured angular rate (from a rate gyro or generator) and added an offset in consideration of projectile flight time. More advanced systems converted to cartesian coordinates. I ammagine it was the same with bombsights.



Not fully corrected to my point of view. As far as I know the first method of calculations what I meant ("base calculatiuons") was much more simpler. While aiming a bombardier measured by countewise clock the time of flight along a path named "base". In the sight there was a part which was an analog of that path (a segment). The calculations were based on ratio between this path and projected path to the target (which calculated with adjustments of the angle of line of sight to the target compared with the angle of the line of sight to the end of the path from the point of start of time estimation etc) so roughly it was based of proportional measurements of the line dimension (not the angular) and time.
The early war German bomb sights were of that design.

All the WWII lead-computing gun sights were of a tachimetric (angular measurements by gyroscops) design but not the all bomb-sights a fortiori fire control systems.
For example US navy GFCS Mk.37 is often mentioned as fully tachimetric, but it was a linear one and the only thing that created an affinity between it and tachimetric systems that Mk.37 had an input from stabilsing gyro which measured just yaw pitch and roll of the own ship not a parameters of a target.

About russian bomb-sights: up to the middle of the war most of the bombers used for level bombing bombsight OPB-1 ("optical sight for bombing mark 1") in many different modifications. The mods were of the same method of functioning but differed by a rate of automatization of input and calculations.
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It was much simpler than Norden. It is about similar to Japanese Navy Type 90.

There was a bit more sophisticated OPB-2 but had a limited usage ( File: 
File: ). It was about of a similar design as japanese Type-1 (improved Type 90) as I guess.
There were night bomb sights NSPB -4 and -7/
File:
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In 1941 our engineers designed PS-1 -for level bombing but it had a limited usage through the war. 
File:
It was of the same method of calculations as Norden or Lofte or Sperry. But it had only limited usage. I don't exactly know why but guess that the reason was the difficulties in manufacturing such a complicated piece of equipment for the war years. Maybe it was of flawed design as in the middle of the war they were removed from Pe-8 and was changed for OPB-2 and NSPB-4.
I found notes that it was used only on Tu-2 and some Pe-8 and Er-2.

For dive-bombing during the war there was just PBP-1 in many modes slightly differed in disign and mainly (I suppose) by their reticles.
It was a simple reflector sight/
File:
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It was used on Pe-2, Tu-2, Il-2, and Yak and La fighters.

There was also a primitive PNB-2 for low-level bombing.
File:


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## davebender (Nov 15, 2011)

*Spring 1944. Savio River bridges in Italy.*
P-47. No flak. 50% hit within 180 feet of target. 30 bombs required for 1 hit.
P-47. Medium flak. 50% within 300 feet. 84 bombs required for 1 hit.
P-47. Heavy flak. 50% within 420 feet. 164 bombs required for 1 hit.

Sending an entire P-47 Fighter-Bomber Group to score a single bomb hit on a bridge or other such target is crazy. Why didn't we provide them with a proper bomb sight so they could put the P-47s heavy bomb load (sometimes 2 x 1,000 lb) on target?


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## Siegfried (Nov 15, 2011)

davebender said:


> *Spring 1944. Savio River bridges in Italy.*
> P-47. No flak. 50% hit within 180 feet of target. 30 bombs required for 1 hit.
> P-47. Medium flak. 50% within 300 feet. 84 bombs required for 1 hit.
> P-47. Heavy flak. 50% within 420 feet. 164 bombs required for 1 hit.
> ...




I don't think its too difficult to build a toss bombing sight.

You have a 3 dimensional conical cam encoding ballistic data for level flight.
Rotate in speed, slide along for current altitude, output of the cam is
bomb lead, tells you where the bomb is going to hit.

Then you a second cam with the same data for say a 45 degree dive.

If the bomber is in a 22.5 degree dive you do a weighted average of the two cams.

You now have impact point for any speed, altitude and dive angle, which could be used to adjust a recticle.

Better still have a mechanism to latch in and keep track of target during a pullup so 
that when the tracking mechanism and impact point mechanism coincide (electrical contact)
the bomb is tossed.

When attacking tanks FW 190 just slid the bomb along the ground with a time delay fuse, quite accurate apparently.


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## gorizont (Nov 15, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> I don't think its too difficult to build a toss bombing sight.


 
Maybe not too difficult but it seems to me that such devices was started to be installed on US aircrafts only after WWII.

From "Aircraft Profile 150":
"Forty - eight F4U-4 aircraft mounted the AN/ASG-10 Bomb Director Mk1 Mod1 "toss bombing" equipment.
While in level flight prior to dive attack, the AN/ASG-10 power was switched on and the gyros caged and uncaged. After entering the dive with proper sighting allowences set on the gun sight, the bomb release was pressed. At the proper point in the dive, the indicator light would come on for the pull-out to be begun. During pull-out the bomb was automatically released to hit the target."

according to inks I have found tests were completed not earlier than in July 1945:
http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=AD0492160
TYPE TEST OF AN/ASG-10.
Corporate Author : NAVAL RESEARCH LAB WASHINGTON DC
Personal Author(s) : Fuller, I. W. ; Burnett, M. L.
Report Date : 02 AUG 1945
Abstract : The AN/ASG-10 is a 'Toss-Bombing' director. Its purpose is to enable aircraft to execute glide bombing attacks from increased altitudes (approximately 1700 to 11,000 feet) with a high degree of accuracy. The results of the type tests show that the equipment will work satisfactorily over a temperature range of minus 30 C to plus 50 C at low humidities. If the equipment is to be operated under humid conditions, the wire used in all the units and all cables should be vinylite covered wire. It is also desirable to treat the MPI potentiometer and the test switch so that humidity will not give low leakage resistance.

Maybe so late appearence of such a system on US single-engined single-seat aircrafts was due to US heavy engagment in rockets design. They prefered that type of aircraft weapons and rather late found out that rockets even Tiny Tim couldn't allow to hit all the type of targets. Just a oversight.


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## Siegfried (Nov 16, 2011)

This is more or less how the TSA-2D worked. Some were used on Me 262. They worked best on jets because they made use of an accelerometer during the pullup to keep track of the sudden altitide change whose variable resister picked up vibration from the piston engine; appropriate filtering hadn't been developed yet.

The German dislike for solid propellants in part stems from shortages of propellant
chemicals (glycol?) which were needed for explosives and their apparent inaccuracy.
Nevertheless they did develop them, they were to use a cluster of 15 or so hollow charge warheads for AT use.
"Fleischer: German air dropped weapons" has a few pics.


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## davebender (Nov 16, 2011)

That only applies to large rockets such as the V-2. The R4M FF rocket used Diglykol solid fuel. So did the X-7 wire guided AT missle. Panzerfaust rocket motors used low tech compressed black powder.


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

davebender said:


> *Spring 1944. Savio River bridges in Italy.*
> P-47. No flak. 50% hit within 180 feet of target. 30 bombs required for 1 hit.
> P-47. Medium flak. 50% within 300 feet. 84 bombs required for 1 hit.
> P-47. Heavy flak. 50% within 420 feet. 164 bombs required for 1 hit.
> ...



Thats intersting. Thought it might be worthwhile to compare with the hits scored by the LW against the illustrious 10 jan '41. At the time of the first strike against her, Illustrious was steaming at about 25 knots, but in a relatively straight line, because she was launching and receiving aircraft (this did cease as the attack developed. There were no defending fighters and flak I would described as light to moderate. The target was about 700 feet long by 50 feet wide (roughly) The first attack was by torpedo bombers on the Battle Fleet, in which torpedoes missed after avoiding action had been taken. The second, which occurred at about 1235, was carried out by 25 or more Ju 87 and about 17 ju 88 dive-bombers which attacked with great determination and skill, by elements of Geislers naval attack corps. .

In this attack H.M.S Illustrious was severely damaged as a result of 6-direct bomb hits and several near misses, which caused fires and disabled her steering gear. Her casualties were 83 killed, 60 seriously and 40 slightly wounded, including several officers. H.M.S. Warspiie also sustained slight damage from a near miss. During this attack one Fulmar and one Swordfish were shot down, their crews being saved, and two enemy aircraft were shot down by gunfire. 

The Ju 88s had a bombload of up to 6600 lbs, but in practice tended to carry 2000 lbs internal and 1100 lbs external. the Ju87Rs that were also present were the long range version of the Stuka would normally carry a 551lb bomb on the centreline plus 4 additional small bombs under the wings (however i doubt these were being carried, except if they were anti-personnel bombs). I know that the ju88s wrere carrying 1000 pounders and 500 pounders, so the likely total carried by the strike could be as high as 17 1000 pounders, and 59 x 500 pounders.

Putting all that together thats a total of 76 bombs dropped for a total of 6 hits. Thats pretty good shooting by the LW. however, in the hours after that initial attack, there was a further strike by about 40 aircraft, and another the next day by 70 German bombers (the majority D/B) These two additional raids manage to score an additional two hits. So, overall, for the committment of 150 aircraft a total of 9 hits were achieved. The majority of those aircraft were either level bombers or Ju88 divebombers, though there were a substantial number of Ju-87s involved. The Ju87s were considered by far to be the most deadly and accurate naval bomber available to the Germans. Anyway, I estimate that those 150 bombers would have dropped around 350 bombs at least to achieve 9 hits, mostly at low altitude, mostly against a stationary target, mostly with little fighter cover and moderate flak protection. thats a hit to miss ratio of 2.5%. 

That was by aircraft with bomsights and well trained crews, against a target at something like 10 time the area of the bridge you mentioned. if we assume a target 10x the size of the bridge, that could be interpreted to mean that a LW bomber force attacking that same bridge might hit the bridge once per 400 sorties......

Kinda brings your criticism of the p-47 forces back into perspective i think, and debunks the claim that bombsights make for accurate bombing, sorry, it does nothing of the sort. More than anything for a tactical bomber operating at low level it gets down to pilot skill and bombing conditions at the time....things like weathyer, flak, enemy fighters and the like


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## gorizont (Nov 17, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Thats intersting. Thought it might be worthwhile to compare with the hits scored by the LW against the illustrious 10 jan '41. At the time of the first strike against her, Illustrious was steaming at about 25 knots, but in a relatively straight line, because she was launching and receiving aircraft (this did cease as the attack developed. There were no defending fighters and flak I would described as light to moderate. The target was about 700 feet long by 50 feet wide (roughly) The first attack was by torpedo bombers on the Battle Fleet, in which torpedoes missed after avoiding action had been taken. The second, which occurred at about 1235, was carried out by 25 or more Ju 87 and about 17 ju 88 dive-bombers which attacked with great determination and skill, by elements of Geislers naval attack corps.



Yes, but you forgot to mention, that the Brits forces were "the main forces of the Mediterranean Fleet, consisting of H.M. Ships Warspite and Valiant with H.M.S. Illustrious and 7 destroyers", and all their AA guns repulsed the attacks not only Illustrious ones.
I suppose that she hardly hadn't made evasive manuevers at the moment of dropping bombs at her - at the aproaching of the germans she had to manuever so far as at the moment she hadn't launch a big group of aircrafts.
I'm sure that you have mistaked by writing that there had been no light flaks. She had since 1940 16 × QF 4.5 inch naval gun (eight × two-barreled) and 48 x QF 2 pounder naval gun (6x eight-barreled) - so she alone had got six "octopuses" - and there had been some at other ships of the tactical force.
Valiant which AA guns fired at LW dive-bombers too had 20 x QF 4.5-inch dual-purpose guns (10 x 2), 32 QF 2-pounder anti-aircraft guns (4 x eight-barreled); 16 x .5-inch machine guns : (4 x 4)
Warspite had 8 × 4 inch Mk XVI anti-aircraft guns (4×2), 32 × 2 pounder anti-aircraft guns (4×eight-barreled), 4 × quadruple 0.5 cal machine guns
About "no fighters" - "During this attack one Fulmar and one Swordfish were shot down, their crews being saved, and two enemy aircraft were shot down by gunfire." As far as I can see - at least a few fighters were in the air.

By the way In 1941 Ju-87 and -88 had Revi-12 installed on them for dive-bombing.

But I have to mention that at the end of war attacks on heavy ships became more difficult - besides more capable CAPs for Allied navy force light AA became much more numeruos (up to handred and a half barrels in up to about 50 mountings, for instance HMS Howe in 1945 had 10 × 14 inch guns, 16 × 5.25 inch guns, 32 × 2-pounder anti-aircraft guns, 14 × 40 mm Bofors AA guns, 65 × Oerlikon 20 mm guns), so in 1941 chances to hit for example Brit ships were much more higher.

I wonder how many flaks defended Savio River bridges. Just for comparison.


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## Siegfried (Nov 17, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Thats intersting. Thought it might be worthwhile to compare with the hits scored by the LW against the illustrious 10 jan '41.



This date preceded the introduction of the Stuvi 5b with BZA computer that that made it possible to dive bomb accuratly at shallow angles (eg 30 degrees or less), many Ju 88s apparently had their dive brakes removed which must had added to their speed. It also likely precedes the Lotfe 7 level bombing sight. I think early 1942 was the introduction date for both bombsights.

Ju 88's would mostly be releasing their bombs simultaneously or in short stings. Hitting a moving target can be difficult, it requires special training which the Ju 87 pilots had to develop but only some had.


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

RN AA despite the heavy number of tubes in the was not all that effective due to a number of factors. The fire control mechanisms used by the Brits was faulty which made it less effective than it could be. This was especially true when the targets were making frequenbt changes to altitudfe and/or speed, which is [recisely what happened in the battle. FKX formed a rough clover leaf around the carrier and proceeded to attack from many different directions and made constant changes to altitude speed and direction of attack. The range of the 2 pdr was so limited that it really only was a point defence weapon, meaning that a ship could only provide very limited fire support to nearby ships. The fire of the destroyers was limited by the lack of a fully Dual Purpose main armament (and in any case was not available at all during this battle...neither were the cruisers) . Norman Polmar in his description of the battle gives a good exlanation of what was happening. It is theoretically possible to claim heavy flak, but in reality it was quite light and certainly inneffective. 

Compared to the barrages that could be put up later in the war, and the the accuracy of that AA fire, it is valid to describe the AA fire as light and inneffectivefor the first attack. Moreover, not all of the limited firepower that was available could be directed to the LW bombers. It is often forgotten that the LW was supported by a torpedo attack at the same time as the bombing attacks were delivered so this enabled the Germans to line up and deliver their attacks at a rather leisurely pace. There were also other aircraft in the vicinity that did not target the carrier....

I am also fairly sure that the TG was on rationed ammunition because of where it was at the time of the attack, and because the fleet had been under more or less continuous attack all morning and more generally since January 8th. 

Lastly, the actual dispositions of the escort at the time of the attack further restricted the amount of supporting AA fire that could be put up in defence of the carrier. At the time of the attack, all three cruisers were more than two miles from the carrier, assisting a destroyer that was experiencing mechanical difficulties. The two battleships were in position, but they were also tasked to provide cover fire for the merchantmen they were escorting so they were not as close to the carrier as they should have been . In any event, the battleships came under attack from 10 stukas themselves, whilst 42 or so attacked the carrier. This meant that at the very time they should have been supporting the carrier, they were busy also defending themselvesMoreover the att 

In the whole attack, a total of 5 LW aircraft were shot down by aircraft and AA. It has been estimated that AA fire accounted for three of these losses were from the AA guns. Compared to losses inflicted later in the war, this was a light toll. Sth Dakota at Snata Cruz, for example is credited with no less than 12 aircraft in a single day by herself, against a similar number of attackers


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> This date preceded the introduction of the Stuvi 5b with BZA computer that that made it possible to dive bomb accuratly at shallow angles (eg 30 degrees or less), many Ju 88s apparently had their dive brakes removed which must had added to their speed. It also likely precedes the Lotfe 7 level bombing sight. I think early 1942 was the introduction date for both bombsights.
> 
> Ju 88's would mostly be releasing their bombs simultaneously or in short stings. Hitting a moving target can be difficult, it requires special training which the Ju 87 pilots had to develop but only some had.



Regardless of whether the LW a/c had bomsights fitted or not, or had older style bomsights, with the exception of PQ17 I cannot think of a more accurate attack made on the RN during the war.


I agree that hitting a moving target is hard, but it was less hard for the Germans on that day. At the time of that attack, Illustrious was steaming in close escort to a supply convoy and had just completed her flying operations. These two elements to her disposition restricted her speed and her ability to manouvre.

Your comment about lack of proper training for FKX pilots is only partially true. Ther may have been a few new recruits here or there that lacked adequate training, but overwhelmingly FKX was a well trained and experienceed unit. It was the main antishipping weapon of the LW,. The unit had been responsible since the outbreak of the war for dispatching roughly 700000 tons of shipping and many Allied. It was THE premier anitshipping unit in the LW arsenal.


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## davebender (Nov 17, 2011)

What sort of comparison is that? Hitting a maneuvering naval vessel is much more difficult then hitting a target on land. Naval AA fire is normally a lot heavier too. 

Do we have historical records of P-47s attempting to bomb a warship steaming at 25 knots?


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## davebender (Nov 17, 2011)

The didn't always drop bombs on maritime targets. He-111s and Ju-88s sometimes carried torpedoes for naval attack. They also employed skip bombing from an altitude of 45 meters, most famously at Bari, Italy during late 1943.


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## Siegfried (Nov 17, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Regardless of whether the LW a/c had bomsights fitted or not, or had older style bomsights, with the exception of PQ17 I cannot think of a more accurate attack made on the RN during the war.



The blitz on HMS Illustrious 70 years ago - timesofmalta.com
"The Luftwaffe returned after refueling rearming in Sicily to give the final blow. The fleet went to Illustrious' aid put up a heavy barrage. Fulmars from Illustrious fought to save the ship retired to Malta to refuel rearm to again return to the fight shoot down at least 5 Stukas. She was still 40 miles from Malta."

It seems the Illustrious was rather heavily defended and quite mobile during the second attack in which she was heavily defended by the AAA of other ships. The presence of so much AAA and fighters would have spoiled the aim of the bombers. Ju 88's were not capable of the vertical dive of a Ju 87 and at the time lacked the computing bombsight so much less accurate with only standard sights. The Luftwaffe had to learn to attack moving ships, it had trouble at Dunkique.

"HACS" the "High Angle Control System" had limitations as a AAA director but it was repeatedly modified so that around 1940 (from wiki)

Tachometric and radar additions:

"The RN moved quickly to add true tachometric target motion prediction and radar ranging to the HACS by mid 1941. The RN was the first navy to adopt dedicated FC AA radars. However the system, in common with all WW2 era mechanical AA fire control system still had severe limitations as even the highly advanced USN Mk 37 system in 1944 needed an average of 1,000 rounds of 5-inch ammunition fired per kill.[22] In 1940 the Gyro Rate Unit (GRU) was added to the HACS system, an analogue computer capable of directly calculating target speed and direction,[23] converting the HACS into a tachymetric system.[24][25] Also in 1940, radar ranging was added to the HACS.[26] The GRU and its associated computer, the Gyro Rate Unit Box (GRUB) no longer assumed straight and level flying on the part of the target. GRU/GRUB could generate target speed and position data at angular rates of up to 6 degrees per second, which was sufficient to track a 360 knot crossing target at a range of 2000 yards"


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## Siegfried (Nov 17, 2011)

davebender said:


> The didn't always drop bombs on maritime targets. He-111s and Ju-88s sometimes carried torpedoes for naval attack. They also employed skip bombing from an altitude of 45 meters, most famously at Bari, Italy during late 1943.



The Germans didn't have good air dropped torpedoes, this is one area in which the Italians were the world leaders, so the Germans resorted to using Italian torpedoes.


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## gorizont (Nov 17, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> The Germans didn't have good air dropped torpedoes, this is one area in which the Italians were the world leaders, so the Germans resorted to using Italian torpedoes.



I suppose from the start to 1944 the world leader were Japanese not Italians. 
As far as I know Germans rejected of pure Japanese aerial torpedo design as difficult for maintanence (they recieved from Japan several dozens of thier Type 91 airial torpedoes as far as I remeber) but used a principal of roll control originally implemented in aerial torpedo design by japanese during both air and water paths of trajectory in late-war mods of F5B.
But anyway Italian aerial torpedoes up to middle of the war were of a better design and capability than Germans (of Norwegian origin).


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## gorizont (Nov 17, 2011)

davebender said:


> The didn't always drop bombs on maritime targets. He-111s and Ju-88s sometimes carried torpedoes for naval attack. They also employed skip bombing from an altitude of 45 meters, most famously at Bari, Italy during late 1943.



Early at war up to 1941 he-115 was the main torpedo - bomber of LW. Germans started to improve their torpedoes and produced more capable torpedo-bombers too late and not in suffucient numbers.
Skip bombing was a prefereble method of attack by Condors (I suppose from 1940) but in 1941 Germans abandoned it due to rather heavy losses among FW-200's despite of its effectiveness. Not complitely but sure as standart practice.


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## Grampa (Nov 17, 2011)

Erik Wilkenson developed the m/42 bombsight for saab b17 1942 that alloved to do tossbombing on the target whit great accurate. in 1952 the USA where impressed by the late developed BT-9 and bougt some Bt-9D for there attackplanes. does anyone know whitc plane where equippment whit that device? 

Here's a link of swedish sights. sorry but they are in swedish so plz ask me if you have question if there something in there you whanna know about.

Innehll i avsnittet Bevpning


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## gorizont (Nov 17, 2011)

Grampa said:


> Erik Wilkenson developed the m/42 bombsight for saab b17 1942 that alloved to do tossbombing on the target whit great accurate. in 1952 the USA where impressed by the late developed BT-9 and bougt some Bt-9D for there attackplanes. does anyone know whitc plane where equippment whit that device?
> 
> Here's a link of swedish sights. sorry but they are in swedish so plz ask me if you have question if there something in there you whanna know about.
> 
> Innehll i avsnittet Bevpning


 
Thanks for info.
Rather interesting. I learnt a bit info of that in one of Smith's book about dive-bombers and saw a picture of the device in one book from "Aircraft profile" serie (perhaps about Tunnan).
In its first mode I guess BT-2 was a bit inferior to TSA-2D. If input of altitude data was for BT-2 manual for TSA-2D it was automatic from radioaltimeter FuG-101 as far as remember.
But BT- had a strong advanteg over TSA-2D - it development was continued and as for TSA it ended with Germany's defeat.

I wonder the way it calculated. As I guess the devices calculated on the base of data of altitude and angle of dive slanting distance to the point of aim (to the target) and thus continuously calculated by ballistic of a choosed ordnance the distance of dropping and time to that point making corrections of change of height, speed, acceleration and angle of dive by data from accelerometer and stable gyro. But I'm not sure at all.


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

> The blitz on HMS Illustrious 70 years ago - timesofmalta.com



relying on a source like the BBC world history series is not a good basis for historical analysis. Its okay, but not great. I am relying on at least five written sources, chiely Norman Polmars 800 page book on Carrier Warfare in WWII. He devotes nearly 20 pages to this battle, giving and almost blow by blow account. Its at home at this minute, and i am not, but i can check later tonite to confirm details in the following response 


"


> The Luftwaffe returned after refueling rearming in Sicily to give the final blow. The fleet went to Illustrious' aid put up a heavy barrage. Fulmars from Illustrious fought to save the ship retired to Malta to refuel rearm to again return to the fight shoot down at least 5 Stukas. She was still 40 miles from Malta."



All true enough, but its the omissions that make this statement unreliable. Whereas the attacks at noon had involved only a portion of FKX (and these were the attacks I was referring to incidentally), the air attacks delivered in the afternoon (starting at around 3pm) were delivered by the full force of the Korps. at that time there were 248 a/c attached, plus there were approximately 50-100 RA aircraft involved in the attacks. To be fair, the Axis divided their concentrations into two, one part attacking the convoy and the other concentrating on finishing off the carrier. But then, this division of effort needs to be balanced up by the fact that the defenders also had to split their forces, some to protect the convoy, and some to protect the carrier (which by then had been detached).

In that second attack, Axis losses amounted to 10 A/C. 5 are indeed attributed to the 5 remaining Fulmars providing topcover, by now operating from Malta about 40 miles away. The carrier had suffered a fire in the hangar, that had destroyed 9 Swordfish and all the fighters that were not airborne. Only those that were airborne were able to divert to malta. 

Illustrious was just getting underway again. I am not sure of its speed, but it was still manouvering by engines alone. I ahave read reports that her speed in that second attack was about 10 knots. She still had the "Ship Not Under Command" ensign on her yardarm at the time of this attack, which says in spades she was barely underway and barely manouvering 

I am unsure if the words chosen in your quote are as careful as i am reading them (ie, am I reading too much into them), but a "barrage" is not directed fire, its the method used when you cannot aim properly. If the Brits were relying on "barrage" fire, they were in deep trouble at the time of that second attack 




> It seems the Illustrious was rather heavily defended and quite mobile during the second attack in which she was heavily defended by the AAA of other ships. The presence of so much AAA and fighters would have spoiled the aim of the bombers. Ju 88's were not capable of the vertical dive of a Ju 87 and at the time lacked the computing bombsight so much less accurate with only standard sights. The Luftwaffe had to learn to attack moving ships, it had trouble at Dunkique.



Ah agreed, however FKX flyers had been trained to ignore the effects of flak, had developed tactics that maximised their benefit against the known British weaknesses in their AA FC. FKX had been fighting the RN since April 1940, and knew their jobs. Against experienced verterans like that British AA was weak. by the time of the second attacks and the attacks over malta, the defences had been organised and were ready, and proved very effective, thatmuch I can agree with, but also by then, the numbers of aircraft involved in the attacks had greatly increased. Rememeber, the object of this little sub-debate is how the LW compared in terms of accuracy to aircraft not fitted with bombsights. I am saying they didnt make much difference to the accuracy issue. 



> _"HACS" the "High Angle Control System" had limitations as a AAA director but it was repeatedly modified so that around 1940 (from wiki)
> 
> Tachometric and radar additions:
> 
> "The RN moved quickly to add true tachometric target motion prediction and radar ranging to the HACS by mid 1941. The RN was the first navy to adopt dedicated FC AA radars. However the system, in common with all WW2 era mechanical AA fire control system still had severe limitations as even the highly advanced USN Mk 37 system in 1944 needed an average of 1,000 rounds of 5-inch ammunition fired per kill.[22] In 1940 the Gyro Rate Unit (GRU) was added to the HACS system, an analogue computer capable of directly calculating target speed and direction,[23] converting the HACS into a tachymetric system.[24][25] Also in 1940, radar ranging was added to the HACS.[26] The GRU and its associated computer, the Gyro Rate Unit Box (GRUB) no longer assumed straight and level flying on the part of the target. GRU/GRUB could generate target speed and position data at angular rates of up to 6 degrees per second, which was sufficient to track a 360 knot crossing target at a range of 2000 yards_"



Wiki is a source you need to be careful with, though in this case the information concerning technical specs seems okay to me. what is misleading, in the extreme, is the claim that the brits had solved their AA problems for their sghips by 1940, or even by mid 1941. I would recommend that you spend roughly AU$180 in a good reference like campbell, that looks at this in detail. Basically the true picture is this....Britain had indeed identified the shortcomings in its AA systems afloat by mid 1940, following the poor showings in Norway. New ships from the midddle of 1941 on were indeed incoprorating new FC and directors, and in some instances stabilized mounts. older ships also as they could enter refit were being updated to the new standards. but this took time, and even as late as 1944 RN ships were still having difficulty with their AA systems. But anyway, in the case of this battle, Illuistrious had not been updated or refitted since commissioning. Her AA systems, whilst very advanced (relative to other RN units) , did not take on board the newest ideas mentioned in the wiki article. It was basically a 1938 style AA suite, designed with all the inherent flaws in that system. It finished up working adequately, but not outstandingly. The same can be said for the two battleships. I have their refit dates at home, but they too were still using the late 1938ish style of AA FC and weapons fits. I will also need to check at home exactly what support was given to Illustrious whilst she was in Malta...not sure if the BBs stayed with her or not. 

To get some idea of the efficiency of the british system compared to the US mk37 system of late 1944, for the Us the estimated number of rounds per kill in 1944 from director controlled fire was about 500 to 1000. For the Brits in 1941, the estimated ammo expended from director controlled fire was about 10x that amount (german AA fire needed approximately 8250 rpk according to Westermann at this time) . That means Brit AA was about a tenth as effective as its US counterpart. They improved that gradually as the war progressed, but in 1941 they had a lot of problems.

One final observation, the article says (erroneously) that things were in hand by 1941....well even on the basis of that flawed article, the combattants would have been operating at a disadvantage. The battle was fought in January 1941, not mid 1941.


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## Siegfried (Nov 17, 2011)

parsifal said:


> [
> 
> Ah agreed, however FKX flyers had been trained to ignore the effects of flak, had developed tactics that maximised their benefit against the known British weaknesses in their AA FC. FKX had been fighting the RN since April 1940, and knew their jobs.
> 
> ...



The installation of Gyro Rate Unit Boxes, supposedly in 1940, would have improved HACS which previous to this required speed to be estimated and assumed constant height.

Ju 87 were very accurate dive bombers due to the vertical cabillity, Ju 88 were fairly accurate as dive bombers even due to the 45-60 degree capabillity with what amounts to little more than a gun sight with grid markings. However they *were* receiving AAA from the Illustrious, Nearby escorts and Fairy Fulmar fighters (where were the Bf 109s?) and the carrier was moving, she had steam going to her screws (enough for rudimentary stearing). Had the Ju 88's had the Stuvi 5B with BZA computer its likely they would have been more accurate. Even the Ju 87 was more accurate with this sight. 

To put it bluntly, Illustrious was a moving target protected by professional AAA from several ships and escorts. Much harder than hitting a bridge. The Ju 88's, which were the bulk of the attackers had not been equiped with computing bombsights.

Comparing AAA with FLAK rounds to kill given a false impression. The data from Westerman is for a period when Allied jamming had just had a victory and the Germans had not yet had time to counter. It compares older weaker FLAK 8.8cm 18/36/37 guns from 'dads army reserve units' with second rate directors rather than the larger more powerfull 10.5 and 12.8cm guns which achieved 3000 shots to a kill in the same period. The US and UK guns were larger and more pwerfull than the basic 8.8cm (not FLAK 41).

The US by 1943 was widely using proximity fuses at sea by then.


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

> The installation of Gyro Rate Unit Boxes, supposedly in 41, would have improved HACS which previous to this required speed to be estimated and assumed constant height.



But it didnt happen in 1941, for the most part it didnt happen in '42 either. It was fitted mostly after April 43 for the most part as a generalization 





> Ju 87 were very accurate dive bombers due to the vertical cabillity, Ju 88 were fairly accurate as dive bombers even due to the 45-60 degree capabillity with what amounts to little more than a gun sight with grid markings. However they *were* receiving AAA from the Illustrious, Nearby escorts and Fairy Fulmar fighters (where were the Bf 109s?) and the carrier was moving, she had steam going to her screws (enough for rudimentary stearing). Had the Ju 88's had the Stuvi 5B with BZA computer its likely they would have been more accurate. Even the Ju 87 was more accurate with this sight.





Whats your source that they were receiving fire from the escort? They were receiving some fire, thats for sure, but not much and not very effective. I have a copy of the Fleet commanders Report (Cunningham) which you are welcome to have a look at, and he definately does NOT say that. In fact, relevantly he says, in his report to his bosses "*The dive bombing attacks by German aircraft were most efficiently performed and came as an unpleasant surprise. The results of our A.A. fire were disappointing[/*U]. he then goes on to give quite detailed accounts and explantions as to where ships were, what was happening and why the Carrier could not be supported as she should have been. It does pay to do a little research before making claims like that I am afraid 



> _To put it bluntly, Illustrious was a moving target protected by professional AAA from several ships and escorts. Much harder than hitting a bridge. The Ju 88's, which were the bulk of the attackers had not been equiped with computing bombsights._


To put it even more bluntly, she was a moving target, moving slowly, in a slow predictable path, and a target much bigger than a bridge, in near perfect conditions (we do not know the conditions of the P-47 attack). The Ju88s were not the bulk of the attackers, incidentally, more than half the attackers were Ju87s in fact. The AA crews were professional, but the equipment they were using not so good.

So, if you think that computing bombsights would make a difference to bombing accuracy, why is it that this attack on the RN is considered the most accurate, and most efficient ever achieved by the LW on a moving seaborn target, except for PQ17???? Your failing to answer that 




> Comparing AAA with FLAK rounds to kill given a false impression. The data from Westerman is for a period when Allied jamming had just had a victory and the Germans had not yet had time to counter. It compares older weaker FLAK 8.8cm 18/36/37 guns from 'dads army reserve units' with second rate directors rather than the larger more powerfull 10.5 and 12.8cm guns which achieved 3000 shots to a kill in the same period. The US and UK guns were larger and more pwerfull than the basic 8.8cm (not FLAK 41).


Westermannn does NOT make that comparison or at least, he does not make that comparison on its own or in isolation. he compares overall, he compares specific weapons, he makes the point that in 1941 and 42 the Germans were using fully trained professional flak crews and that their weapons were the best in the world at that time. I dont know if you have even read Wstermann, but he most certainly does NOT say what you are claiming. 

I agree that TPK is not such a good measure, but it does provide a surrogate measure of flak effectiveness. It gives us an indication as to how accurate the AA was, but the real measure is how effective the guns were in throwing the attackers off aim. 



> The US by 1943 was widely using proximity fuses at sea by then.




which has been reckoned to about double AA efficiency. thats not the only thig at work here....the increase in AA efficiency was due to a whole suite of changes that in total added up to a greatly incresed efficiency level. Putting that increased effieiciency level down to one or two factors is the misleading statement, not using a surrogate measure to gauge accuracy.


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## parsifal (Nov 17, 2011)

The RN forces involved in the battle were disposed as follows. this information is based on the dispatches made by Cunningham and handed to the AQdmiralty 31 March 1941.

Convoy " Excess," consisting of ESSEX for Malta, and CLAN GUMMING, CLAN MACDONALD and EMPIRE SONG for Piraeus, having sailed the previous evening.

Force "A", consisting of WARSPITE, VALIANT, ILLUSTRIOUS, JERVIS, NUBIAN, MOHAWK, DAINTY, GREYHOUND, GALLANT and GRIFFIN, sailed at 0500.6th Jan

On 10th jan the fleet undertook the following movements and actions:

At 0430, when in position 35° 56' N., 13° 20' E., course was altered to 290° to rendezvous with Convoy " Excess " At 0741 a report was received "from BON A VENTURE,
who was in position 36° 29' N., 12° 10' E., that she had sighted two enemy destroyers
bearing 010°, 3 miles, and at 0756 the Rear-Admiral Commanding, 3rd Cruiser Squadron*
reported that SOUTHAMPTON, BONAVENTURE, JAGUAR and HEREWARD were engaging.

The gun flashes at the commencement of this action were seen from WARSPITE, and
Force A continued westward to close the scene of the action, passing close to the southward of Convoy " Excess " at 0800. By this time,. BONAVENTURE and HEREWARD were in sight against Pantellaria, still firing heavily at close range into the crippled and burning Italian. SOUTHAMPTON and JAGUAR were rejoining the convoy.

At 0810 one enemy destroyer blew up, having been torpedoed by HEREWARD, the second having escaped to the north-west at high speed. The destroyer sunk is believed to have
been the VEGA. 

In the meantime a rendezvous had been, made with Convoy " Excess " in position 36°
28' N., 12° n' E. A fighter patrol of 6 and an air search in sector 280°-310° was flown
off at' 0815, and the mean line of advance altered to 140° at 0820 in the wake of the
convoy.

At 0834 when in position 36° 27' N. 12° n' E , GALLANT was torpedoed or mined, her bows being blown off. She was taken in tow by MOHAWK, and BONAVENTURE and GRIFFIN were detached to stand by her, HEREWARD and JAGUAR joining the fleet screen. GLOUCESTER and SOUTHAMPTON were also detached to stand by GALLANT at 1000, the fleet remaining close to the convoy for the remainder of the forenoon

One of the A/Sf patrol aircraft sighted a Spica class destroyer about 5 miles from Pantellaria and attacked with A/S bombs, reporting a near miss. Two enemy aircraft unsuccessfully attacked BONAVENTURE with torpedoes. 

27. The movements of "Malta convoys were as follows: —
M.W.5 arrived Malta at 0800.
M.E.6 escorted by PEONY, SALVIA and,
HYACINTH, sailed at 0700.
M.E.sfc escorted by DIAMOND, sailed at 1130 to join Convoy " Excess ".
JANUS left Malta at 1200 and joined the fleet screen, and CALCUTTA joined M.E.6.

In the meantime the fleet had been located by enemy aircraft at 0930 and reported
at 1015, and at 1127 a shadower was shot down over Linosa Island by Fulmars. At 1223, two SM.79s dropped two torpedoes which missed astern of VALIANT. These aircraft were
engaged in good time by the close range weapons of the battlefleet, without effect.
29. At 1235 large formations of aircraft were sighted approaching from the north. These
•were identified as JU.Sy and 88 aircraft with German markings A very heavy, determined and skilful dve bombing attack developed on the fleet, 
directed on ILLUSTRIOUS, and the Convoy .....

Anyone with any experience at sea will identify what was happening. All through the morning, the fleet was presented with multiple threats that had the effect of distracting and dispersing the Task Force. Most of the ships of the Task Force were completely out of position at the time of the attack. The two battleships had been tasked, as their primary mission, the defence of the convoy, but in any event came under attack themselves. They were not in a good position to provide defensive cover to the carrier. The carrier was well equipped with AA weaponary, but that weaponary has known deficiencies in its targetting and fire control mechanisms. one ships AA versus 45 aircraft is not a heavy AA defence. Maybe 50 ships could be so considered, but not one ship. The defensive CAP was completely out of position at the time of the attack, hence the low number of kills. as Cunningham notes elsewhere in his repoprt, the perfoiarmance of the AA was disappointing. 

Despite what the Luftwaffe ra ra squad here would have you believe, this was not a case of the very best of the RN concentrating all its efforts to defeat a detrermined and formidable opponent. its a case of a force distracted from its main purpose by multiple threats and events, caught off guard, but somehow managing to survive. The carrier was not manouvering at speed, it was travelling at a leisuerly 17 knots and steaming straight to either launch or recover aircraft a big part of that recipe for survival was the relative innaccuracy of the bombers, despite their obvious skill. they just could not hit the carrier with enough force to kill her, not because she was hurting them, or causing them much grief by her return fire, but simply because they could not hit her. Some of this was because she was moving, some of this was because she was firing AA, but mostly its because the bombers were simply too innaccurate to hit her....and that tells volumes about comparing aircraft with a bombsight being any or significantly, more accurate than aircraft without a bombsight. 

What these guys are trying to feed you is , to put it bluntly, a load of bull


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## Siegfried (Nov 18, 2011)

gorizont said:


> In its first mode I guess BT-2 was a bit inferior to TSA-2D. If input of altitude data was for BT-2 manual for TSA-2D it was automatic from radioaltimeter FuG-101 as far as remember.



TSA-2D could use barometric altitude or optionally FuG 101a radar altimeter. When the pullup light flashed the barometric chamber was locked off (sealed) and the accelerometer took over tracking of altitude. Obviously if one was using barometric altititude one needed to enter an offset for topgraphical altitude of the target, however it could not be jamed or interfered with and was quite accurate anyway.

There was a less refined TSA-2A but the Luftwaffe wanted to go to the TSA-2D straight away.


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## Siegfried (Nov 18, 2011)

parsifal said:


> So, if you think that computing bombsights would make a difference to bombing accuracy, why is it that this attack on the RN is considered the most accurate, and most efficient ever achieved by the LW on a moving seaborn target, except for PQ17???? Your failing to answer that




1 the most succesfull portion of the attack was the *first* attack when the bulk of the attacking bombers were Ju 87.

2 Ju 87 do not need computing bombsights as their vertical dive capabillity means little to no compution is required for accuracy.

3 Ju 88's would benefit from a computing bombsight due to their preference for a 45 degree dive (60 max). The Ju 88's were the bulk of the second and 3rd attacks. Ju 88's are very accurate at this angle nevetheless. However its clear that the German attackers were under *heavy* fire. They lost 10 aircraft; that's heavy fire assuming this is not allied over claiming and that it marries up with Luftwaffe losses. (claims are usually inflated 50% to 100% both sides.

So on the second attack when a higher proportion of the attackers were Ju 88s and the RN defences better organised one would expect poorer results. Something has to explain the decline in efficiency.

4 76 bombers can not all attack at once and saturate, they would collide.

5 The 40mm PomPom had less range than the 20mm FLAK vierling used on German ships, however there were two versions, one with higher velocity, that would have been on Ark Royal, still inferior to the 20mm but with a large and deadly round, big maganzines, long sustained fire and good director, it was effective to 1.5km.

4.5 inch guns are not the primary defence. Kamikazee were stopped 20% by 5 inch, 40% by 40mm boffors and 40% by 20mm Oerlikon.

Illustrious was also moving at 25 knots when Stukas achieved a 9% direct hit rate and then latter 17 knots and she was defended. I can't see that this can be compared to a bridge.

The reason she was not sunk is because 250kg bombs are inadaquet and 500kg also. One needs 1000kg bombs (which needs a Ju 88 or late model Ju 87) or one needs torpedoes.

Had she been attacked by FW 190F with 1000kg bombs and a TSA-2D the results for Illustrrious would have been worse: the fast moving fighter bombers hard to hit, their toss bombing sights providing some standoff capabillity and range.


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## parsifal (Nov 18, 2011)

Part I



> the most succesfull portion of the attack was the *first* attack when the bulk of the attacking bombers were Ju 87.



I agree, and i also concede that Illustrious was attacked in the successive attacks by far less numberes in mass from 3pm, though overall the numbers appear greater. What complicates the issue greatly is that in the follow up strikes, the LW were not just going after the Illustrious, they were going after most of the ships in the convoy and the escort as well, which is why Southampton was lost. What is baffling about the first strike is that the majority of hits were obtained by Ju88s, 5 out of the 7 hits/near misses were 1000lb bombs, which could only come from the Ju88s 



> Ju 87 do not need computing bombsights as their vertical dive capabillity means little to no compution is required for accuracy.



I know, and thats one of the points being made. The steeper the angle, the more accurate the attack. However the flaw here is that in the first attack, undertaken by 25 Ju87s and 17 Ju88s, 5 of the 6 hits were made by the Ju88s, with 1000 pounders



> 3 Ju 88's would benefit from a computing bombsight due to their preference for a 45 degree dive (60 max)


. 

And yet history shows us that, in the main despite the introduction of all these U-beaut gizmos, they never succeeded in achiving quite the accuracy level that they did on that day, when you say they were not fitted with advanced bomb sights. what they did have was a weak defence, exceptionally good weather, a very good attack plan, and air crews that were exceptional at their job. oh, and a lot of help from their allies. 

There are a number of conclusions that may logically explain this. On the British side, they perhaps were never caught in such a complacent and disadavataged defensive position, For the germans, it might be that falling aircrew standards had something to do with it. There are other possibilities, but one thing we can say for sure is that the bombing aids you put so much faith in could not compensate for these other disadvantages. This has to mean that as an element of the battle they simply were not that great an advantage. the very thing you are attempting to "prove" is in fact disproven by events. The Germans, with one or two very lucky exceptions never got close to this level of efficiency ever again. 





> The Ju 88's were the bulk of the second and 3rd attacks. Ju 88's are very accurate at this angle nevetheless. However its clear that the German attackers were under *heavy* fire. They lost 10 aircraft; that's heavy fire assuming this is not allied over claiming and that it marries up with Luftwaffe losses. (claims are usually inflated 50% to 100% both sides.



Firstly, lets have a closer look at the second attack. I freely admit my recollections about numbers were completely off the mark, but this is about getting the facts right, rather than making up a convenient story or relying on dodgy source material 

No Ju88s were not in the majority in the attacks after 3pm, they werent even present according to Cunningham. FKX at this time consisted of 50 He111s, 80 Ju87s, 70 Ju88s and 26 Me110s (remember your comment about "where were the me109s.....there werent any). The source for this is Polmar. In the subsequent attacks after 3pm, Cunningham again gives good details on the way the attacks and fleet movements developed. Relevantly he advises on the escort provided to the carrier....remember, even at this stage the carrier was NOT the focus of british concerns....getting the convoy to Malta was still the prime objective, and this was reflected in Cunnighams dispositions: 

"_ILLUSTRIOUS reported that she was " badly hit " and making for Malta; but it was not until 1530 that she was got under control and steering steadily for Malta at 17 knots. In the meantime she was turning circles while the battlefleet was manoeuvred to maintain supporting distance from her. HASTY and JAGUAR were detached to screen her_".

If you read this carefully, this means the Carrier was provided with the two Battledhips and two destroyers as a screen. I can assure you that is not a heavy AA screen, as Cunningham advises in his report. I dont know where you get the notion that the second attack was met by "heavy AA" but according to contemporary British accounts this was not the case. Cunnighams report is backed up by Polmars account of the battle as well accounts 

Cunninghams official report goes on to give further details of the 2nd attack on Illustrious: 

"_Between' 1600 and 1700, a second attack, developed on ILLUSTRIOUS and the battlefleet, by about 20 JU87 aircraft. ILLUSTRIOUS's Fulmars, who had been refuelled at Malta, were, able to intervene and shot down 6 or 7 JU.87S,damaging others. The attack on the battlefleet was mostly concentrated on VALIANT who had one killed and two wounded from splinters_".

to be fair, I should say that some reports say this second attack saw another 1000 lb bomb hit the carrier. if so, the attackers were indeed Ju88s, but then thjis seems unlikely to me. The bomb penetrated the hanger deck and then exploded. One would have expected an AP fuse, in which case the bomb would have penetrated both levels of armour and sunk the ship. It didnt, which means either the bomb was SAP and/or it was lighter than 1000lbs 

I could not find a reference as to how many a/c were shot down by AA fire in Cunninghams report, but according to Polmar a total of 6 Axis aircraft were lost to all causes (flak and fighters). I thnk Cunnigham made an eror here by attributing all the German losses to the fighters. I think his number is the total lost as well. If assume conservatively that the Fulmars shot down 3 a/c, that means the flak on this occasion shoy down 3. thats more effective than the midday effort (by one a/c) , but its still not a heavy loss rate on the LW. And still, claiming the 
flak over Illustrious was "heavy" is not supported by any reputable facts. Its a fantasy. 

Again, it would be wrong to assume all effort was devoted to defending the Illustrious. once again the Stukas split up and attacked all the heavy ships, suppressing all the defensive fire over the carrier, as stated in Cunninghams report, and backed up by both Polmar and Barnett. 

Now, lets have a look at the third attack to see if your claims do any better there....

The next attack of any description by the LW did not occur until the 11th, and did not even target the Carrier. the target was Cruiser Squadron 3, which had left the damaged Gallant outside Malta, and was heading north to cover the Convoy. According to Cunningham: "_At 1500, C.S 3,* who had left GALLANT off Malta reported that SOUTHAMPTON and GLOUCESTER had been attacked in position 34° 54' N., 18° 24' E. by 12 JU87 dive bombers who achieved a surprise attack down sun, and both ships had been hit SOUTHAMPTON was making good a course of 105° at 22 knots. At 1605, C.S.3 reported that SOUTHAMPTON was stopped in position 34° 54' N., 18° 24' E" _

SOUTHAMPTON was eventually scuttled, no evidence of either heavy flak or any Ju88 presence there either.....

Cunninghams report for Sunday 12 January provides the folowing important entry 

Sunday, I2th January, 1941. 44. The Commander-in-Chief's position at 0001 was 35° 05' N., 20° 40' ^E., and at
0800 all forces, including Force X, made a rendezvous in position 34° 40' N. 23° 10' E.

The Commander-in-Chief m WARSPITE, with VALIANT, GLOUCESTER, JERVIS, JANUS, GREYHOUND, DIAMOND
VOYAGER, HERO and DEFENDER, proceeded to Alexandria. Vice-Admiral, Light Forces, 7'th Cruiser Squadron, YORK, MOHAWK, GRIFFIN and Force X then all proceeded to Suda Bay to refuel. The entire fleet, less the Ilustrious cleared out before any 3rd attack on the carrier developed.......mmmm

At no stage in Illustrious's advance to malta can her flak protection be described as heavy


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## parsifal (Nov 18, 2011)

Part II If your third attack claim relates to things that happened whilst Illustrious was being repared in Malta, thats a different story, we would have to look at the amount of flak being provided around the harbour whilst the ship was being made ready for sea. Whilst the level of flak could be described as heavy here, the ship was stationary, here and protected by less than 10 fighters...against escorted raids with 70 bombers r more I did find these bits in Polmar.... "_The bombers from Fligerkorps X were escorted by Messerschitt, Fiat Macchi fighters. The RAF managed to send up 4 Hurricanes, 3 Fulmars 2 Gladiators. These were instructed to stay out of the harbour area pick off stragglers. The attack comprised of 2 seperate attacks - the first by Ju 88's (shallow dive bombers) the second by Ju 87 (Stuka's). This force amounted to 70 bombers all concentrating on sinking Illustrious.
The harbour guns opened up to a deafening noise described as 'hell let loose'. The ships in harbour including Illustrious fired their guns also.

Despite the bravery of the German airmen only one bomb hit Illustrious this being on the quarterdeck caused little damage.

Despite the RAF pilots being told not to enter the harbour area a Fulmar chased a Stuka right through the barrage. After the bomber released his bombs he swept off down the harbour so low to the water he had to climb to get over the 15' breakwater. The Fulmar eventually shot it down. This returned to Hal Far where the pilot remarked - 'Don't think much of Malta's bloody barrage'. The plane however was so badly damaged it didn't fly again apparently.

During this attack the merchantman Essex which was lying at the other end of the creek was hit by a heavy bomb in the engine room with the loss of 38 men. Luckily the bulkheads contained the explosion. She was loaded with 4,000 tons of ammunition torpedoes.

On the 19th January came the last bombing raid which raised up clouds of dust to 1,000 feet. This probably screened the ship was accurate bombing._

For the moment i will leave off on that issue, but as far as any attacks "third" attacks on the Illustrious between 10 and 12 January, there were none". 

If you wanted to include the raids within the harbour as well as those made at sea on the 10th and 11th, you get a total of 8 hits for 200 sorties, or a 4% success rate overall. Not bad, but again brings the p-47 incidents reported by Davebender sharply into perspective. Remember these were the best days for the Luftwaffe. 

[


> I]So on the second attack when a higher proportion of the attackers were Ju 88s and the RN defences better organised one would expect poorer results. Something has to explain the decline in efficiency.[/I]



As indicated above, it is unlikely ther were no Ju88s present in the second attack, or if there were, a maximum of 12. For the third attack (the ones in the harbour the numbers of Ju87s and Ju88s were about equal by the look of it, though if you have better source material, please do provide those sources. Flak for the two attacks against the Illustrious carried out at sea was always light. The engagement of 45 Ju87 sorties and 17 Ju88 sorties for the two strikes achieved a total of 5 bomb hits for the Ju88s and 2 bomb hits by Ju87s. Thats a hit to sortie rate of about 2% for the Ju87s and about 30% for the Ju88s. So much for the Ju88s being less accurate.....

There wasnt a decline in efficiency, there were far less numbers of aircraft involved in the second attacks. In the third attack on the cruisers, there was total surprise which tends to skew the statistics. In the attacks carried out in the harbour, there was a lot more flak, but the target was stationary, and still very large 



> 76 bombers can not all attack at once and saturate, they would collide.



Huh???? whats this got to do with anything??? Oh, I get it, your claiming that the 70 bombers attacking the carrier in harbour could not attack all at once. no they couldnt, thats true, but the attacksd by 45 aircraft on the 10th was allover in 6 minutes. thats near enough to simulataneous in my book For the record more than 76 aircraft can attack a single target, but as this has absolutely nothing to do with what we are talking about,i'll let this one slide



> The 40mm PomPom had less range than the 20mm FLAK vierling used on German ships, however there were two versions, one with higher velocity, that would have been on Ark Royal, still inferior to the 20mm but with a large and deadly round, big maganzines, long sustained fire and good director, it was effective to 1.5km.



According to Campbell, the Ark Royal was equipped with the 2pdrr QF Mark VIII. it had a max horizontal range of 6200m and a max vertical range of 3960m. the 20mm Flak vierling may be just about any gun of that calibre. I will stick with those guns used by the KM. There were two principal types used afloat by the germans, the 2cm Flak 38, and the older 2cm Flak 30. The flak 38 was the more common, and had a max horizontal range of 5250m and a max ceiling of 3900m. How is that superior to the pom pom???? However there is a big difference between max and effective ranges. Because the KM guns used open sights the effective range for most 20mm guns in the KM was about 1000m

The PomPom was similalry restrained, at least in 1941. its big drawbacks were the weight of the mountings and the relatively low MV of the gun, not so much the range. Typically its effective range was perhaps slightly more than the 20mm guns, but certainly no more than about 12-1500m 




> 4.5 inch guns are not the primary defence. Kamikazee were stopped 20% by 5 inch, 40% by 40mm boffors and 40% by 20mm Oerlikon


.

Not really relevant to this discussion but would love to know the source for this. suffice it to say I dont agree with the proportions. 



> Illustrious was also moving at 25 knots when Stukas achieved a 9% direct hit rate and then latter 17 knots and she was defended. I can't see that this can be compared to a bridge.




She was recovering aircraft, which required her to steam at a set speed and course. Made her speed advantage far less important. Moreover, the illustrious was as big as a football field in terms of deck area, wheras a bridge might be one or two car lengths long, and one or two car lengths wide (a bigger bridge would have been hit by medium or heavy bombers). The target size more than compensates the fact that the carrier was moving (in a dead straight line). During the attack in harbour, which you insist on bringing into the discussion, the Carrier was far better protected by flak, rather less well protected by aircraft, and stationary. Being underway is an advantage, but apparently not as great an advantage as you are claiming, particulalry agsint divebombing 




> The reason she was not sunk is because 250kg bombs are inadaquet and 500kg also. One needs 1000kg bombs (which needs a Ju 88 or late model Ju 87) or one needs torpedoes


.

Err wrong again. According to Polmar, there were 6 hits and one near miss (which actually passed through the pom pom platform. Of the actual hits that were made, one was a 500lb bomb with a contact fuse, the rest were all 1000 lb bombs, which had to be carried by the Ju88s as you say.

I dont know where you get the notion that a 1000kg (ie 2200lb) bomb was needed to to sink the Illustrious. The ship was armoured to withstand 6" gunfire, and bombs of up to 500lbs weight. She could not withstand 1000lb (400kg or above bombs, and this is borne out by the damage she sustained. 

The 500lber destroyed both forward pom pom crews (reducing AA defences incidentally. Of the 1000 lbers one hit and wrecked the after lift, and started a massive fire in the hangar). shrapnel from this bomb wrecked three of the 4.5 inch guns and temporarily knocked out the remainder for several hours. 

Another 1000lber penetrated the upper armoured deck but because it had an SAP fuse then exploded in the hangar. it did not penetrate the lower armoured deck simply because of the fuse it was carrying. One bomb penetrated both armoured decks, and would have sunk her but failed to explode. Not sure about the damage caused by the other bombs, but i can assure you 1000lbers can easily sink the Illustrious. 

[


> I]Had she been attacked by FW 190F with 1000kg bombs and a TSA-2D the results for Illustrrious would have been worse: the fast moving fighter bombers hard to hit, their toss bombing sights providing some standoff capabillity and range[/I].



Funny thing about that, the illustrious class faced worse attacks by the kamikazes which failed to have any appreciable effect. We will never know if these wonder weapons you talk about would have made any difference. Personally i doubt it.


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## parsifal (Nov 18, 2011)

Perhaps its useful to compare the german effort against the illustrious to the RAF efforts at brest, from around about the same time. There were two raids in July 1941 that are perhaps comparable. On the night of 1/2 July 1941 52 Wellingtons attacked the Prinz Eugen whilst she lay moored in brest along with 5 Destroyers and the two battleships. Brest was at least as heavily defended by flak as Malta IMO. Two aircraft were lost to that flak, but scored a hit on the ship.

Within the month, the RAF was back, this time in daylight and using the new Halifax bombers. 93 aircraft participated in the attack. Again there were two losses to flak, but this time there were 5 hits on the Scharnhorst.

So wheras it took 200 German bomber misions to achieve 8 hits on the Illustrious, it took the RAF 140 missions to hit German warships 6 times. For the germans they achieved a hit to sorties rate of 0.25%, whilst the brits achieved a hit to mission ratio of just under 0.2. . The P-47 raids was somewhere between 0.1 and 0.2%, which is not that unfavourable compared to those achieved by the germans or the RAF true bombers...

i dont see anything wrong or outrageous with the performance of the P-47s to be honest. if I was to hazard a gues as to why they were a fraction less accurate, it might be because of weather, the difficulty of the target or even the speed of the aircraft. It might be the lack of bombsghts also for that matter, though the difference in accuracy arent enough to worry about.


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## jim (Nov 18, 2011)

Hajo Hermann ,in his book' EAGLE s WINGS' , describes some of these mediterennean naval attacks. He reports how british battleships held course even with Ju 88s in their dives and only sharply changing direction as bombs were released. And it was a succesful tactic.. Nomatter the reason , the failure to sink Illustius ,Formidable, and cripple ( very dificult to sink battleships just with bombs) the Battleships Valiant , Warspite and Queen Elizabeth was a MAJOR FAILURE of the luftwaffe with no excuses.. It was a tactical defeat with great effects in the entire campaign.


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## davebender (Nov 18, 2011)

A moored ship isn't moving so it's comparable to attacking a large bridge.

Do we have historical accounts of Allied light bombers attacking moored ships? Attacks by RAF Bomber Command heavy bombers belong in a seperate discussion.


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## Siegfried (Nov 18, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Perhaps its useful to compare the german effort against the illustrious to the RAF efforts at brest,



I can't see it as particularly usefull within the context as you are comparing medium altitude level bomber attacks using level bombing sights and large strings of bombs against dry docked ships with dive bomber attacks against ships at speed and out to sea fully defended and at the ready. Brest was in fact regarded as difficult to defend, it was too open to the sea and so gave limited opportunites to mount a defense and had limited FLAK which is one reason the Germans moved their ships from the area. It was a level bomber attack against a dry docked ships using armour piercing bombs dropped from sufficient height to penetrate rather than semi-armour piercing bombs dropped from low level against a manouvering ship. Halifaxes and Wellingtons would have been nearly relatively ineffective against manouvering ships. The height of these attacks also precludes use of smaller more effective light FLAK. HMS Illustrious's danger, given her proximity to port, was limited so long as she remained mobile; it takes torpedos to sink a ship of that size, 250kg SC250 can generally disable it unless they get hits on the waterline or underneath the ship (by delay fuse), which toss bombing sights would in fact do but dive bombers generally don't. Of course while Gneisau was hit by a string of bombs Scharnhorst escaped hits.

By attacking the side of the ship from a shallow, high speed, dive (eg as was done by against HMS Fiji) the bomb can either acheive a direct hit on the waterline, the superstructure or hit ahead of the waterline in which case a time dealy fuse (5 seconds is good) ensures the bomb sinks to about 10 meters under the ship and detonates, likely breaking a destroyer or merchanman in half or severely damaging a larger ship.

In fact a special series of highly connical bomb topedoes was developed to maximise the tunnelling effect: the so called BT series (BT 250, BT400, BT1000) which tunneled through the water and detonated by magnetic influence and or pressure.


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## parsifal (Nov 19, 2011)

Part I 



> ......you are comparing medium altitude level bomber attacks using level bombing sights and large strings of bombs against dry docked ships with dive bomber attacks against ships at speed and out to sea fully defended and at the ready. Brest was in fact regarded as difficult to defend, it was too open to the sea and so gave limited opportunites to mount a defense and had limited FLAK which is one reason the Germans moved their ships from the area.



You forgot to mention that according to your estimations German flak was not as good as Allied flak and was manned by untrained personnel. These are all assertions I completely disagree with in the context of 1941, and am supported by Westermann to that extent. Also Scharnhorst and the 5 destroyers were not in drydock, they had just returned that very day from shakedown exercises just outside port. They were not ready for major operations, according to German standards, but they were operational. After major refits, the germans liked to work up their crews for about 3 months or so before committing them to operation. Of course this does not accord to your theories of German trainng levls I know.

However as level bombers, one part of which were operating at night, one would expect the British losses to be lower than the losses to divebombers. I see that you are still perservering with the notion that Illustrious was heavily defended at sea despite all the witness accounts and reports that I have presented to you that says completely the opposite for Illustrious whilst she was at sea. Some people never listen, and never learn do they. You also make the claim that the ships were in drydock, when most of them werent. Im not sure about Gneisenau, but she had not suffered any significant damage to that point, so there is no reason for her to be in drydock. Prinz Eugen had been placed in refit when she first arrived at Brest in early June, but as far as I know that did not require drydock. She had last been in drydock just before departing on the ill fated Rheinabung mission, less than a month before. She was a brand new ship, fully worked up and ready for action. As I understand it a full flak regiment was in attendance at the port, and my understanding is that about 30 fighters were available sas well (I am less sure about that, but neither is it significant).

In any event, Illustrious oin her arrival at malta WAS put into dry dock, but because she was in a combat zone, her AA guns remained manned and functional for the entire stay at malta. The Germans operated to the same procedures, so their shipboard and port defences can be expected to have been contributing to the defence during these raids. 

If you were in any way correct in these asserions, one could reasonably expect the RAF bomber losses to be lower. These were level bombers, operating at about 14000 ft, some of them at night. The flak defences according to you were of lower quality more difficult to deploy and the ship borne defences unable to fire. If those assertions were correct it should be the case that British losses should be lower. they werent. In the raid on the night of 1/2 July those 52 Wellingtons lost 2 bombers to flak....a loss rate of 4%. In the raid by FKX against Illustrious at 1230 10 jan 41, the Germans lost 2 a/c to flak, a loss rate very nearly the same. In the raid between 1600 and 1700 on that same day, a force of 20 Ju87s suffered a loss to flak of 3 a/c, or about 15%. This was against two battleships, a damaged carrier and two destroyers. In the raid over Malta 12 Jan 41, the germans committed 70 bombers to the attack and lost 4-5 to flak....a loss rate of about 7.5%. The British raid on the scharnhorst at her La Pallice Berth was carried out by 93 Halifax bombers. 6 were shot down by flak. thats a loss rate of about 6.5%. Thats a rmarkably similar loss rate to that suffered by the germans in their lower level raids against the ilustrious.

I would suggest to you that your information about what happened at brest is wrong, as is your assumptions about what happened at Brest. Flak at Brest was always described by the RAF crews tasked to attack it as heavy. 




> It was a level bomber attack against a dry docked ships using armour piercing bombs dropped from sufficient height to penetrate rather than semi-armour piercing bombs dropped from low level against a manouvering ship. Halifaxes and Wellingtons would have been nearly relatively ineffective against manouvering ships


. 

There is no argument that level bomber oprating against manouvering ships are less effective, however it is another one of those post war myths that they were totally inneffective. In March of 1941, for exaample, the British Coastal Command sank something like 50000 tons of Axis Shipping on the Atlantic Seaboard, out of Malta, Wellingtons were sinking large amount of shipping using conventional bombing techniques. Whilst these merchantmen and warships were moving more slowly than the illustrious, they were also more free to manouvre. This made the task of hitting almost as hard as hitting the carrier in my opinion. But they did it regulalry. 

What was inneffective was high altitude level bombing aaginst a moving target, as Germany, Britain and Italy all found out at the beginning of the war. High level generally means dropping bombs from higher than 10000 ft. The stukas attacking dropped their bombs on Illustrious from about 5000 feet, if level bombers had operated at a similar height,, the bombs would have reached terminal velocity well before impact, and there would be a reasonable chance of hits from that altitude as well. 

Despite this, the bomb hits achieved by Divebombers in Malta Harbour (1 hit in 70) against a stationary target does not compare well with the RAF effort against similar target, operating at a higher altitude using a known less accurate method of attack. Losses were similar, suggesting a similar amount of flak. So why were the British more accurate in their bombing??? The difference expressed as a percentage of the total bombs dropped is not that great, suggesting the statisitcal sample is not significant enough, but at this stage I cannot explain the anomaly


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## parsifal (Nov 19, 2011)

Part II



> The height of these attacks also precludes use of smaller more effective light FLAK. HMS Illustrious's danger, given her proximity to port, was limited so long as she remained mobile; it takes torpedos to sink a ship of that size, 250kg SC250 can generally disable it unless they get hits on the waterline or underneath the ship (by delay fuse), which toss bombing sights would in fact do but dive bombers generally don't. Of course while Gneisau was hit by a string of bombs Scharnhorst escaped hits



Illustrious' armouring scheme was designed to withstand up to 500 lb hits, so in theory the best the Ju87s could hope for was to disable her. However, this was the argument that underpinned the Bismarcks deployment....she was immune to the 18in torpedoes carried by Swordfish, and could resist the 14in shells of the KGVs. This was because the armour protection scheme was designed to withstand that ordinance or below. Even the 16 in shells of the Nelson were very hard pressed to penetrate her. She still was forced to either sink, or scuttle. The 18 in tops could not penetrate her main belt, but still disabled her. The shellfire from the KGV, even the cruisers firing at her, disabled her main guns within 30 mins of the final enagements commencing. There is no such thing as an immune defensive system. 

Moreover (but conversely), the majority of hits on the Illustrious were 1000 lbers. These should have sunk her, but by sheer good luck did not. 

You can argue all you like about the advantage of toss bomb sites, but what we really need is hard evidence of that advantage. The facts are, there is none. Germans never achieved as good a result as they did on the 10 Jan 1941. It was the zenith of their bombing efficiency against a Brit carrier. 


Arguing that Divebombers cannot sink ships by lobbing bombs on top of them is simply wrong. Suggest you have a look at the battles of Midway, Coral Sea amd Eastern Solomons to observe the effects of 500lb bombs on carriers. And arguing the Jap carriers were not as well protected is really a furphy too. Shokaku and the Akagi class were both as well or better protectefd in terms of armour protection as the illustrious. What was lacking was the intelligent design and the good damage control. Once through the japanese armoured deck, those ships were vulnerable, and because theu were not well managed in terms of damage control, they were even more vulnerable. illustrious's torpedo protection was never tested, but it was extensive. Because she was designed to a closed hanger, armoured box principal, I simly disagreee that she was vulnerable to the attack from the side, We wil never know, but there is no reason to suppose that her side protection would operate any worse.

I would point out that Ark Royal was sunk by a single torpedo, and very poor counterflooding. There was a design fault in the Ark Royal that contributed to her loss (can dig it out if you are interested, but this had been rectified in the illustrious class. I d not see a 250 kg bomb having any greater chance of sinking her than a horizontal attack. Just remember as well, the vertical protection was designed to withstand totpedoes up to 18in which from memory have an explosive warhead of about 550-600lbs. One should be careful to say "never " about this sort of thing, but then one should be equally careful to say "a sure kill". Too many variables 


One minor point of correction. Gneisenau was not targetted or damaged in the attack late July. It was the Scharnhorst that was hit. She was hit by 5 1000lbers, in a near straight line, suggesting she was hit by a single stick of bombs dropped by one aircraft



> By attacking the side of the ship from a shallow, high speed, dive (eg as was done by against HMS Fiji) the bomb can either acheive a direct hit on the waterline, the superstructure or hit ahead of the waterline in which case a time dealy fuse (5 seconds is good) ensures the bomb sinks to about 10 meters under the ship and detonates, likely breaking a destroyer or merchanman in half or severely damaging a larger ship.



The loss of fiji occurred at the same time as Gloucester, a near sister sunk by conventional attacks. Four months previously, another half sister, the HMS Southampton had also bee sonk by conventional "vertical" bombing. There is no evidence here that confirms a horizontal attack was any more deadly to this class of ships than conventional attack methods. Moreover, such attacks carried with them a real problem. In order to be carried out the aircraft had to get close, extremely close, and the pnly reason the 109 that attacked Fiji could do that was because Fiji at the time of her attack was extremely low in ammunition and did not think that a fighter was a particular threat. The RN after that certainly changed its attitude after that....So for this method to work, the attacks had to be delivered at ranges of about 500yds or less, compared to 2000 yards for a torpedo, or about the same for a divebomber. That means that most of the time these attacks are going to end in failure. 




> In fact a special series of highly connical bomb topedoes was developed to maximise the tunnelling effect: the so called BT series (BT 250, BT400, BT1000) which tunneled through the water and detonated by magnetic influence and or pressure


.

Genuinely very intersting, but not relevant, and no evidence of use i expect.


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## Siegfried (Nov 19, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Part I
> 
> 1 What is baffling about the first strike is that the majority of hits were obtained by Ju88s, 5 out of the 7 hits/near misses were 1000lb bombs, which could only come from the Ju88s
> 
> ...



1 It was possible for Ju 88's to carry 4 x SC500 bombs, I assume the Ju 88A5 that was likely used could do this as the Ju 88A4 was not yet available, this allows a slight spreading of the bombs to increase hit rate.

2/3 The very degradation in bombing accuracy you claim, which I would argue, was likely caused by the kind of gizmos you somewhat dismiss on the other side; improved fire control on ships emanating from better computers, more and better sensors such a radars, rate gyros, stablised plaforms etc. Aircraft too needed to use more advanced systems to improve their accuracy, especially at range. By the time the Luftwaffe had these the air-power situation had turned against the Luftwaffe.

1942 should have seen a large number of Me 210 or Me 410 aircraft taken into service. An aircraft capable of delivering a pair of 500kg Armour piercing bombs in a dive brake supported dive attack and with a level speed of 368 or 386 mph repectively: at low altitudes probably as fast or faster than a Mosquito, Spitfire V or even Spitfire IX.

The Me 210/410 was designed by Professor Woldamer Vogt but Willy Messerschmitt personally intervened in the design process to shorten the tail and remove the slats to hopefully improve the performance, the two features which lead to nearly a 1 year delay to the program and a massive disruption of German manufacturing.

Had it been available in quantity and on time the Me 210/410 could have made a substantial difference. As it was it was late and abreviated in production leaving the Luftwaffe with far more vulnerable types.

4 NAVWEAPS gives the following
for the C/38 guns:

Muzzle Velocity
HEI:* 2,740 fps (835 mps) 
API:* 2,625 fps (800 mps)

Elevation
With 0.300 lbs. (0.134 kg) HE Shell
Range @ 45 degrees
5,360 yards (4,900 m)
AA Ceiling @ 85 degrees
12,140 feet (3,700 m)

Wiki give and effective range of 2200 meters.

For the 2 pounder using its High Velocity ammunition:


Muzzle Velocity
LV:* 1,920 fps (585 mps)* 
HV:* 2,300 fps (701 mps) 
Others - N/A

Shell Type and Weight
Range
With LV shells 2.0 lbs. (0.91 kg)
3,800 yards (3,475 m)
With HV shells 1.81 lbs. (0.82 kg)
5,000 yards (4,572 m)
AA Ceiling with HV shells
13,300 ft. (3,960 m)
Note:* The British considered the 2-pdr HV to have a maximum effective range of 1,700 yards (1,550 m).


As you can see the 20mm C38 exceeds the pom pom in range by 8% but has less AA ceiling by 7.5% .

The C38 mount did have reflector sights available (early in the war) and leading computing (latter) it was also available on gyro stabilized mounts.

File:Bundesarchiv Bild 101II-MN-0945-08, Schulboot "Drache", Doppelflak.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Accuracy of the TSA 2D in the very early evaluation test was about 84m in a 30 degree approach from a range of 3000m (3.5km slant). This is good as it requires little pilot judgment apart from entering in head and tail winds. Obviously the less the better. Latter accuracy seems to have grown to about 45m at that range. This is a substantial standoff outside of the range of much AAA.

TSA 2D accuracy evaluation.


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## parsifal (Nov 20, 2011)

> 1 It was possible for Ju 88's to carry 4 x SC500 bombs, I assume the Ju 88A5 that was likely used could do this as the Ju 88A4 was not yet available, this allows a slight spreading of the bombs to increase hit rate.



Thats true, but the normal warload in these situations was a single 1100 lb (sc500) bomb. The the A-5 could carry up to 2 x SC500 internally and another 3-4000 lbs externally, however range and performance were very badly affected if they did that. The raid on the illustrious was unescorted so the germans would be looking to maximise performance of their strike aircraft to offset that disadvantage. The most likley offensive loadouts for the Ju88s attacking would have been a single sc500. Second most likley might have been either 2 x sc500, or 1 x sc500 and 4 x sc250.

Somewhere in the vault i have details on the attack from an FKX perspective. i will look a boiut and see what the offensive arrangements were....



> 2/3 The very degradation in bombing accuracy you claim, which I would argue, was likely caused by the kind of gizmos you somewhat dismiss on the other side; improved fire control on ships emanating from better computers, more and better sensors such a radars, rate gyros, stablised plaforms etc. Aircraft too needed to use more advanced systems to improve their accuracy, especially at range. By the time the Luftwaffe had these the air-power situation had turned against the Luftwaffe.



Of course, technology makes a difference, but it does not occupy the critical position for bombing accuracy you guys are tryiing to claim, at least in a WWII context. Crew training and the weapons platform were impp9ortant, there were massive improvements in blind bombing aids. for ground defences the advnaces in computing, stabilized gunb platforms, ammunition, radar etc all added up to a major improvement in efficiency. All true, I have no argument with that. However, that is not what was being arguyed here. what was argued was that VISUAL aids were improved AND this made a big difference to bombing accuracy. I can agree that there wwere big advances in visual aids technology, and that this made some difference on bombing accuracy. However where I draw the line is that visual aids made a big difference. there is no evidence to support that especially in the field of study that I do know a thing or two about. 

What was THE critical factor in accuracy was the crew training....how well your people knew how to do their jobs. My opinion is that the method of delivery (Divebombing, level bombing, skip bombing, trpedo bombing, makes a bit of difference, but not much. The training of ther crews makes a huge difference, whilst the gizmos make only a small difference. 

You are singing the praises of the "toss bombing sights" yet the allies, in both the ETO and the PTO by the end of '42 and early '43 were usiing similar methods with their skip bombing terchniques. At Bismarck sea, approximately 200 attack aircraftover a two day perios, flying around 400 sorties sunk 22 Japanese merchant ships and from memory about 6 destroyers. They didnt have the benefit of specialist bombsights, what they did have was six months of training behind them 




> 1942 should have seen a large number of Me 210 or Me 410 aircraft taken into service. An aircraft capable of delivering a pair of 500kg Armour piercing bombs in a dive brake supported dive attack and with a level speed of 368 or 386 mph repectively: at low altitudes probably as fast or faster than a Mosquito, Spitfire V or even Spitfire IX.
> 
> The Me 210/410 was designed by Professor Woldamer Vogt but Willy Messerschmitt personally intervened in the design process to shorten the tail and remove the slats to hopefully improve the performance, the two features which lead to nearly a 1 year delay to the program and a massive disruption of German manufacturing.
> 
> Had it been available in quantity and on time the Me 210/410 could have made a substantial difference. As it was it was late and abreviated in production leaving the Luftwaffe with far more vulnerable types.



This is entering into the realm of luftwaffe ra ra land. Its a case of coulda, shoulda but didnt. WWII is a story of lost opportunities for both sides. It would not have been 1942, incidentally, it would have been 1943, before a decent force of these aircraft could have been put together and trained for the purpose. Time enough for the RN and the RAF to develop effective countermeasures. Moreover these aircraft would not have been able to deliver their ordinance at anywhere near those speeds. A mosquito BIV carrying a full 2000lb warload had a top speed of 340mph and a cruise speed just over 300mph. No reason to believe that the performance of an Me 410 would be any less degraded when carrying its bombload.

Moreover, level bombing at the deck level carries with it a massive risk. in order to do it, the aircradt has to get in close, which in 1943 was a deadly proposition for any LW aircraft getting close to a defended TF. Real;istically the LW might ghet 20-30 of these aircraft concentrated at any one tome. They would face swarms of SAefires or Hellcats by that stage, easily able to run them down, and backing them up a wall of AA fire, which instead of the two minutes enagegement time they had against conventional bombers (and then oply with their 40mm calibres) they would get about 3 mins with everthing down to the captains signal pistol firing at them. Deck level bombing is really only effective when the AA is light....better proposition is a Mosquito fitted with a Molins gun and/or rockets 







> 4 NAVWEAPS gives the following
> for the C/38 guns:
> 
> Muzzle Velocity
> ...



No, what I can see are difference between the ranges given by Campbell and Navweapons. Both are good sources, both give different ranges. The ranges I wuoted are the ranges for the Mk VIII fitted to Ark Royal and the figures for the 2cm Flak 38 are for the types used afloat. You may find the Pom Pom subtype is not correct, or you may find that the subtype for the flak38 given in the Navweapons are not for types taken to sea. The term Flakvierling can refer to basically any 20mm gun, and does not necessarily refer to types taken to sea.

As to effective ranges, I'd really like to see anybody hit anything over open sights at 2200 m, especially when the target is moving at 300 knots. Having fired 40mm Bofors at that range, I can assure you about all you are doing is trying to scare your target. Any gun fired over open sites, with no predictor assistance, is flat out hitting anything beyond around 1000m 



> The C38 mount did have reflector sights available (early in the war) and leading computing (latter) it was also available on gyro stabilized mounts.
> 
> File:Bundesarchiv Bild 101II-MN-0945-08, Schulboot "Drache", Doppelflak.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



As did the 40mm 2pdr. Which ships did either of these weapons go to sea in???????




> Accuracy of the TSA 2D in the very early evaluation test was about 84m in a 30 degree approach from a range of 3000m (3.5km slant). This is good as it requires little pilot judgment apart from entering in head and tail winds. Obviously the less the better. Latter accuracy seems to have grown to about 45m at that range. This is a substantial standoff outside of the range of much AAA.




Are you claiming the germans could lanch iron bombs at 3000 m (9000 ft) and hit a target with a +/- 45m error???. If so that is better than a modern day Bullpup missile. You will forgive me if I say, bar!!! humbug!!! to the claiml


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## tomo pauk (Nov 20, 2011)

The 2200m for 20mm AAA is not realistic; the ex-Yu guns of 20mm have had effective range of 1500m, and that's with analog computer (import from Italy, made by Officine Galileo). 
I myself was on the 30mm (Praga V3S), and if we were to score a 'hit' on the drogue traveling at 150m/s, we were to receive rewards. The drogue was flying at 500m in the closes point.


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## gorizont (Nov 20, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Are you claiming the germans could lanch iron bombs at 3000 m (9000 ft) and hit a target with a +/- 45m error???. If so that is better than a modern day Bullpup missile. You will forgive me if I say, bar!!! humbug!!! to the claiml


 
Parsifal, surely the data should be exemine additionally but I suppose you forgot that bombing was done form piston-engined aircraft approacing a target with less speed than a jet aircraft.

Anyway we should tale into account that the primer task for designing such sophisticated for WWII equimpent was not the inceasing the accuracy in comparison with for instance Ju-87 in steep dive.
a well trained (for several year) pilot of the Stuka may bomb it with no less rate of accuracy than in shallow dive with more modern sights on more speedy aircrafts. He was well trained to calculate mentally all the corrections (including drift and taking into account moving target's maneuver to some degree) and could produce it with a great skill. 
The primer tasks were to allow less trained staff to achive a comparible rate of accuracy and to hit a target in less risky way - to increase pilots chances to survive while have a considerable chance to hit a target.


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## Vincenzo (Nov 20, 2011)

the Ju-88 can't load SC 500 internally, and sure they don't fly with a 1 SC 500 externally but with 2 (1 left and 1 right wing)


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## parsifal (Nov 20, 2011)

gorizont said:


> Parsifal, surely the data should be exemine additionally but I suppose you forgot that bombing was done form piston-engined aircraft approacing a target with less speed than a jet aircraft.
> 
> Anyway we should tale into account that the primer task for designing such sophisticated for WWII equimpent was not the inceasing the accuracy in comparison with for instance Ju-87 in steep dive.
> a well trained (for several year) pilot of the Stuka may bomb it with no less rate of accuracy than in shallow dive with more modern sights on more speedy aircrafts. He was well trained to calculate mentally all the corrections (including drift and taking into account moving target's maneuver to some degree) and could produce it with a great skill.
> The primer tasks were to allow less trained staff to achive a comparible rate of accuracy and to hit a target in less risky way - to increase pilots chances to survive while have a considerable chance to hit a target.



My apologies but did not quite follow you here. I would say that visual and electronic aids in the longer term made a fundamental difference to bombing accuracy. today, using guided freefall bombs, if a strike does not achieve an 80% hit ratio they are having a very bad day. Thats why a squadron of todays aircraft can achieve what would have taken 4 or 500 aircraft in 1943. So, I am not arguing that in the longer view bombing aids dont make a difference. They do, and a big one. What is at issue here is whether visual aids make a difference in the context of wwII. More specifically, do those p-47s operating wothout sights with about 1-1.5% hit ratio fly with hopeless innaccuracy compared to other aircraft. I say no they dont. One of the most accurate strikes undertaken by the LW with bombers known for their accuracy ( the Ju88 and the Ju87) managed toi achieve accuracy rates of about 2, maybe 3%. Level bombers on the allied side achieved accuracy rates of around 2%. All this other stuff we have been discussing is whether the situations are comparable...... I think there is not that much difference in the situations that might affect accuracy, so here we are, with a range of accuracy varying from 1.5-3, maybe even 4% accuracy, and this was on one of the best days for the LW compared to what I bet is one of the worst for those p-47s. I am not singling the LW out for special treatment. What is the issue here is whether the gizmos made any significant difference. Perhaps, but I dont see any evidence to support that. Thats the very issue.


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## gorizont (Nov 20, 2011)

parsifal said:


> My apologies but did not quite follow you here. I would say that visual and electronic aids in the longer term made a fundamental difference to bombing accuracy. today, using guided freefall bombs, if a strike does not achieve an 80% hit ratio they are having a very bad day.


Maybe you will argue it but I suppose that it isn't worth mentioning modern smart weapon coupled with modern sensors taking into account any comparison with the era of piston - engined aircrafts of wwii.
It gives nothing to any useful conclusion. Just statistic without a way to turn it to anything useful.



parsifal said:


> So, I am not arguing that in the longer view bombing aids dont make a difference. They do, and a big one. What is at issue here is whether visual aids make a difference in the context of wwII. More specifically, do those p-47s operating wothout sights with about 1-1.5% hit ratio fly with hopeless innaccuracy compared to other aircraft. I say no they dont. One of the most accurate strikes undertaken by the LW with bombers known for their accuracy ( the Ju88 and the Ju87) managed toi achieve accuracy rates of about 2, maybe 3%. Level bombers on the allied side achieved accuracy rates of around 2%. All this other stuff we have been discussing is whether the situations are comparable......



you have considered that that the situations were comparable. I suppose that the situation of attack on a maneuring and moving target (its speed was about 45 km/h) differed to situation of an attack of a stationary target but as I see you prefer to treat them as same ones.
Second - you have taken into account the attack on Illustrioues, on the briges in Italy and Brest.
And have taken them as typical - and why? Why haven't you consider the attack japanese Val's on two british cruisers (Dorsetshire and Cornwall) as typical example of dive-bombers accuracy? According to your arguments all the rest of british ships from british task gave to Illustious no help so it is more than comparable example.




parsifal said:


> I think there is not that much difference in the situations that might affect accuracy, so here we are, with a range of accuracy varying from 1.5-3, maybe even 4% accuracy, and this was on one of the best days for the LW compared to what I bet is one of the worst for those p-47s. I am not singling the LW out for special treatment. What is the issue here is whether the gizmos made any significant difference. Perhaps, but I dont see any evidence to support that. Thats the very issue.



I suppose that Japanese dive-bombers crew and US Dauntless crew were the most trained crew in the world for attacking naval ships. Not German pilots. But I suppose we can find the examples of more accurate bombing of naval vessels by LW crew than the above mentioned.

I mean that you're making too profound conclusions if take into account how narrow is the base -just three isolated cases chosed arbitrary.


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## davebender (Nov 20, 2011)

Speaking of which....

Russia employed A-20s as a torpedo bomber and also for attacking targets on land. What bombsight did they use for this Lend-Lease aircraft?


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## Siegfried (Nov 20, 2011)

Toss bombing sights and computing slide bombing sights also allowed greater tactical freedom. They allowed use of aircraft such as fighters not usually capable of carrying as bomb sight which is important since specilised dive bombers were not survivable. The Luftwaffe was not only planning to aim bombs with the TSA-2D but 'rocket bombs' such as the BT 700 (Bord Torpedo weighing nominally 700kg but in reality 830kg). This large conical rocket propelled bomb gave a standoff range and also penetrated the water ahead of a ship and could tunnel several hundred meters before detonating via magnetic fuse beneath the ship. I believe backup fuses in the form of timed delay, hydrostatic and impact were also fitted. There were a range of BT "bord torpedos" the larger ones such as BT 1000 and BT 1400 may not have been propelled. Tested in lakes but didn't see service.

The Luftwaffe was also experimenting with rockets that discharged clusters of 15-30 SD 4 4kg shaped charge warheads. (some picks in Fleischers German air dropped Weapons) A bombsight could be given a supplimental cams to provide flight time data for the purpose of setting a time to blossom the cluster.

Some fast aircraft such as the Me 262 when flying at speed had the problem of the bombs slipstreaming and a pullup helped detach the bombs.


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## parsifal (Nov 20, 2011)

> Maybe you will argue it but I suppose that it isn't worth mentioning modern smart weapon coupled with modern sensors taking into account any comparison with the era of piston - engined aircrafts of wwii.
> It gives nothing to any useful conclusion. Just statistic without a way to turn it to anything useful.



The reason I mention postwar development of smart bomb weaponary is to give some context. There is no real comparability between the accuracy of modern aircraft and those that existing in 1939-45. But glancing at modern aircraft gives an idea of what was eventually achieved.

The point to make is that visual aids in wwii made not a great deal of differnce to bombing accuracy, relatively speaking. A far more important factor was the standard of crew training. 



> you have considered that that the situations were comparable


. 

No, I have considered situations that are not comparable. What is observed, however is that in each situation the bombing accuracy is relatively similar, and independant of things like moving targets, stationary targets, bombing method and the like. The other thing is that the best results in terms of accuracy occurred without Hi tech (for WWII) bombing aids. Conclusion: they are not relevant to the outcome, or not as relevant as other factors. it seems to me that the most important factor is crew proficiency. thats a theory at this point, but so far their is no evidence tyo refute the theory. There appears to be heaps of evidence to refute the theory that the gizmos being sung about in this thread made a big difference. we have yet to see any instances of that phenomenon. 




> I suppose that the situation of attack on a maneuring and moving target (its speed was about 45 km/h) differed to situation of an attack of a stationary target but as I see you prefer to treat them as same ones.



Absolutely not. The point i raise is that for a moving target, so far, for an aircraft supposedly at a disadvantage in terms of accuracy ( a ju88 using shallow dive techniques
achieved by far the most accurate result. Conversly, and perhaps as an anomaly the worst result occurred very soon in time thereafter on the same target, with heavier AA (but not that much so, based on losses), but this time stationary 



> Second - you have taken into account the attack on Illustrioues, on the briges in Italy and Brest.
> And have taken them as typical - and why?



No i didnt. Can you read english my friend. i was at pains to point out that for the german attacks at least, these represented the best instances for accuracy. thats hardly parading them as typical. What comes out, however, is that as a percentage of bombing accuracy there was only minor differences to the P-47 raids. 



> Why haven't you consider the attack japanese Val's on two british cruisers (Dorsetshire and Cornwall) as typical example of dive-bombers accuracy? According to your arguments all the rest of british ships from british task gave to Illustious no help so it is more than comparable example.



Didnt think of them, perhaps i should. But what is the point you are trying to make here. Youve just finished telling me that you want "typical" or average, and the Val attacks on the two RN cruisers are anything but that. They are generaly considered to be the mnost accurate D/B attacks achieved by any large force during the war.......some accounts say 80% of bombs hit their target. Not sure of that , but it was high. The result was exceptionally anomalous, and achieved with aircraft that AFAIK did not have any hi-tech visual bombing aids. Just exceptional crews. The same book that told me about the 80% hit ration in this raid also stated that just two years later the same class of aircraft had sunk to less than 10% accuracy rate. The only change is the accuracy (perhaps not, but surely the obvious known variable is crew quality). 




> I suppose that Japanese dive-bombers crew and US Dauntless crew were the most trained crew in the world for attacking naval ships. Not German pilots. But I suppose we can find the examples of more accurate bombing of naval vessels by LW crew than the above mentioned


.


None that im aware of. These were not untrained crews. they were the premier anti-shipping unit of the LW. In 1940, they sank over 700000 tons of allied shipping. I think the only better result for the LW may be against PQ17, possibly also the Schwarzes Meer in the black sea, though i doubt it. But go ahead, knock yourself out. If you can find bomb hit rates higer than 29% for a significant formation against moving ship (25kts plus, go ahead would be very happy to look at the issue. If you could find higher hit percentages using advanced bombsights I'd be even happier. 




> I mean that you're making too profound conclusions if take into account how narrow is the base -just three isolated cases chosed arbitrary


.

this is not a statistical analysis, I picked the best LW result that i know of against a moving target at sea, then the same target whilst it was in port a few days later (at the insistence of somebody else) then compared that to a level bombing raid by the allies against a moored target. The results I got suggest that crew training is far more important than bombing method, or bombsights. 

Its a bit rich to say that i have jumped to conclusions when you guys were all singing the praises of how important visual bomsights were (you included) without even a shred of supporting data. that is still occurring, and i see that we have now moved into the familiar Luftwaffe Ra Ra club where the claims will soon get ridiculous and bear no resemblance to reality. And you have the b*lz to say i have no statistical sample.....


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## Siegfried (Nov 20, 2011)

parsifal said:


> You are singing the praises of the "toss bombing sights" yet the allies, in both the ETO and the PTO by the end of '42 and early '43 were usiing similar methods with their skip bombing terchniques. At Bismarck sea, approximately 200 attack aircraftover a two day perios, flying around 400 sorties sunk 22 Japanese merchant ships and from memory about 6 destroyers. They didnt have the benefit of specialist bombsights, what they did have was six months of training behind them
> 
> Moreover, level bombing at the deck level carries with it a massive risk. in order to do it, the aircradt has to get in close, which in 1943 was a deadly proposition for any LW aircraft getting close to a defended TF. Real;istically the LW might ghet 20-30 of these aircraft concentrated at any one tome. They would face swarms of SAefires or Hellcats by that stage, easily able to run them down, and backing them up a wall of AA fire,
> 
> ...



I think Japanese FLAK had a poor reputation, there wasn't enough of it for one. At one point a lot of targets being sunk were effetively undefended barges. Again at this point non of the gyro predictors for their 25mm guns or radar ranging for light flak had made it onto Japanese ships. Had your Bismark sea force attacked a US quality Anti Aircraft Suite the results for the attackers would have been far worse.

FLAK vierling invariably refers to the same RB 20mm C38 gun. In fact the FLAK vierling (quad) mount was a naval weapon adopted for land use. AFAIKT the earlier lower cadence C30 guns were never fitted to the quad mount. Anyways the point is simply to say that the German C38 FLAK vierling could put out a sustained rate of fire of about 960 rpm (two guns loading while two gound fired) which is twice the rate of fire of the quad Pom Pom, it could do so with similar ballistic performance. It didn't need a remote director because it didn't have a smoke/flash isssue. Of course the shell was much smaller but then the mounts took up less space.

Using the TSA-2D, in tests, a FW 190 could achieve a 92m CEP from 3000m at 30 degree approach.
The chart i posted shows about a 45-50m CEP from 2000m from an Me 262, unknown approach (probably less).

This sort of accuracy will be deadly against shipping as even if the waterline isn't hit directly the super structure will and if the bomb is short it will simply tunnel beneath the ship and detonate.

Hellcats are no threat to a FW 190D-13 which were to be used in this role, Do 335, Me 262 or Ar 234. Seafires a little bit better.

The point is that Hellcats, Seafires, Sea Hornets, Tigercats and Corsairs would be dealing not with Ju 87, 88, 188, He 111 or FW 200 or some sluggish dive or torpedo bomber but with aircraft as fast or faster than they were and thus difficult to intercept and still able to aim accuratly and from considerable standoff distances of 2km to 3km perhaps more with certain kinds of weapon; certainly out of accurate light and medium FLAK range and a difficult target for heavy FLAK.


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## parsifal (Nov 20, 2011)

This stuff is hilarious for me. Please provide historical examples of this ever happening, anywhere. Please explain why, in the 60s, the USN would adopt a missile system not as capable as the one you are describing and far more expensive.

I bet I dont get an intelligible reply. It will be more woulda, coulda shoulda, but didnt, wont it


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## Siegfried (Nov 21, 2011)

parsifal said:


> This stuff is hilarious for me. Please provide historical examples of this ever happening, anywhere. Please explain why, in the 60s, the USN would adopt a missile system not as capable as the one you are describing and far more expensive.
> 
> I bet I dont get an intelligible reply. It will be more woulda, coulda shoulda, but didnt, wont it



Modern fighter bombers *ALL* still have variations of exactly the same kind of toss bombsight as the Luftwaffe's TSA-2D or USN AN/ASG-10. They now use digital computers to store ballistic data rather than cams, have accurate radio altimeters, can integrate doppler radar into the computer to get wind drift and more likely than not the inertial guidance system has that kind of information anyway. They can often radar range to the target and likely incorporate air temperature to get mach effects on the bomb but the principal is the same. When F-16's deliver close support to troops in Afghanistan they use this kind of bombsight to deliver a bomb since a standoff missile is not required.

Of course attacking from distances of around 2-3 km or even 4 is no longer acceptable or safe in the presence of modern SAM missiles that are found on even small destroyers or on the shoulders of individual soldiers.

And of course what USN adopted Walleye and the USAF adopted bullpup; the former was a TV guided system with a optical centroid lock on facillitiy while the latter was a standoff missile using MCLOS; the standoff range was considerably greater than a tossed bomb up to 12 miles. Bullpup was not considered a great success; this type of guidance needs a second opperator.


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## gorizont (Nov 21, 2011)

parsifal said:


> The point to make is that visual aids in wwii made not a great deal of differnce to bombing accuracy, relatively speaking. A far more important factor was the standard of crew training.



To some (and possible great) extent, yes. But - I should mention that implemantation of more modern bomb sights for level bombing allowed to increase accuracy for crew of the same rate of training IMHO. Maybe It is obvious only in test conditions and at battlefield it decresed by many factors but all the nations prefered the way of complicating equipment to way of training much more crew for long -terms training.



parsifal said:


> No, I have considered situations that are not comparable. What is observed, however is that in each situation the bombing accuracy is relatively similar, and independant of things like moving targets, stationary targets, bombing method and the like.



I prefered to consider that the same rate of accuracy in different conditions was achieved by different methods of bombing. In other case - for instance using fighter - bombers like P-47 against a navy force like the mentioned results could be different and the same rate of accuracy hadn't been achieved.



parsifal said:


> The other thing is that the best results in terms of accuracy occurred without Hi tech (for WWII) bombing aids. Conclusion: they are not relevant to the outcome, or not as relevant as other factors. it seems to me that the most important factor is crew proficiency. thats a theory at this point, but so far their is no evidence tyo refute the theory. There appears to be heaps of evidence to refute the theory that the gizmos being sung about in this thread made a big difference. we have yet to see any instances of that phenomenon.



I suppose that such an outcome was a result of impact by several factors not only the fact of more skilled crew at the start of war.
Among them (influence on accuracy of dive -bombers especially at sea and especially of Axis bombers) are 1) strengthening of fighter cover of targets, 2) growth of AA density, quantity and quality, 3) improved battle orders of ships formations, 4) improved skills of ships crew - usage of new tactics, methods of maneuring for avoiding dive-bombers attack.
The first factor coupled with implemantation of radar with its range of detection, tracking and capability of guidence for CAP gave a great credit to decreising air danger for Allied. Brits started to explore the last capability at 1941 and in this experiments took part US naval aviation officers (as observers but started to use the method since the Coral sea battle). Since 1943 and especially later it was a problem from time to time for Axis recon aircrafts to find out allied naval forces without been intercepted. 
It is very difficult to estimate mathematically a value of each of those factors in the whole picture but I suppose that from the beginnig of 1944 axis had almost no chance to achieve an effectiveness comparable to the early-war one using tradional methods of attacking if we take into account an advantage in quintaty achieved by Allied air forces. So it is a complex impact of many factors.
And the situation was so that a mere fact of attack by Axis could be counted as a success irrepective to its effectivness (in other words if any hit was scored or it was just near miss).



parsifal said:


> No i didnt. Can you read english my friend. i was at pains to point out that for the german attacks at least, these represented the best instances for accuracy. thats hardly parading them as typical. What comes out, however, is that as a percentage of bombing accuracy there was only minor differences to the P-47 raids.



And what is the best percentage of bombing accuracy of P-47 against such moving targets as naval vessels. I suppose the data is needed for correct comparison.




parsifal said:


> Didnt think of them, perhaps i should. But what is the point you are trying to make here. Youve just finished telling me that you want "typical" or average, and the Val attacks on the two RN cruisers are anything but that. They are generaly considered to be the mnost accurate D/B attacks achieved by any large force during the war.......some accounts say 80% of bombs hit their target.  Not sure of that , but it was high. The result was exceptionally anomalous, and achieved with aircraft that AFAIK did not have any hi-tech visual bombing aids. Just exceptional crews. The same book that told me about the 80% hit ration in this raid also stated that just two years later the same class of aircraft had sunk to less than 10% accuracy rate. The only change is the accuracy (perhaps not, but surely the obvious known variable is crew quality).



As I pointed above not the only factor in degradation of rate of accuracy but one of the most importent. But anyway - if Vals at the start of war achieved approximately about 50% of hits and the accuracy decreased to 10% in 1943 - Doesn't it seems to you that approximate rate of accuracy calculated on the base of that figures is higher than 4% pointed by you earlier?



parsifal said:


> None that im aware of. These were not untrained crews. they were the premier anti-shipping unit of the LW. In 1940, they sank over 700000 tons of allied shipping. I think the only better result for the LW may be against PQ17, possibly also the Schwarzes Meer in the black sea, though i doubt it. But go ahead, knock yourself out. If you can find bomb hit rates higer than 29% for a significant formation against moving ship (25kts plus, go ahead would be very happy to look at the issue. If you could find higher hit percentages using advanced bombsights I'd be even happier.



I just said that Vals crews were trained just for hitting ships and were very skillful on that part - more skillful than Germans crews. I didn't say that the germans were not trained.
And - I can add the example. 11-th january 1941. Attack on HMS Gloucester and Southampton by twelve Ju-87R. Result - at least three hits out of 12 dropped bombs so it means that the accuracy was of 25%. But everythere I found was mentioned that Gloucester had a hit by one bomb whith fuze hadn't worked and Southampton got at least two hits - so if there were for instance three hits the percentage raised to 33%.
By the way - we can see that the attack was undertaken a less numerious force to ships of less sizes than of Illustriuos, and if take into account your judgement that AA fire we shouldn't consider because of its ineffectivenes in first case in the same way we should consider that the conditions of attack for german pilots in the case of Gloucester and Southampton were worse but they made it with a higher degree of accuracy achieved. 
let me make things clear - I'm not trying to treat you as a person who thinks in the wrong way. But I suppose that you underestimates of value some factors in the case including just a pure luck.
I should add that during the second attack on Illustrious Stukas tried to hit it with heavy bombs (1000 kg). It significantly restrained Ju-87R's ability to maneuvre (not only avoiding but and for obtaining a right position for the launching the attack and to steer an aircraft in the proccess of final stage of dive before drop of a bomb. 

.



parsifal said:


> this is not a statistical analysis, I picked the best LW result that i know of against a moving target at sea, then the same target whilst it was in port a few days later (at the insistence of somebody else) then compared that to a level bombing raid by the allies against a moored target. The results I got suggest that crew training is far more important than bombing method, or bombsights.



I should concur with you statement but just partially. At the end of war such devices could provide Axis with great assistance because of new difficulties concerned with new Allies methods and new equipment. And the greatest degree of skills of German pilots could help with nothing at the end of war to achieve a single hit using a tactic of steep dive. They just would fail to approach because of allies countermeasures.
a speedy pass from low altitudes would give a chance but against moving well defended targets it demands to input all the corrections in rather short period of time while appraising the tactical situation.

As far as I know US Navy and Marine Corps which had many fighter-bombers since 1944 didn't significantly succeed in attacking japanese ships by Hellcats and Corsairs.


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## Siegfried (Nov 21, 2011)

This is a patent infringment brought by
SVENSKA AEROPLAN AKTIEBOLAGET (SAAB), Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
MERGENTHALER LINOTYPE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee.
SVENSKA AEROPLAN AKTIEBOLAGET (SAAB), Plaintiff-Cross Appellee,

It is interesting as it explains the rudiments of toss bombing. Im suprised the prior German and USN art wasn't brought up!

410 F.2d 979


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## parsifal (Nov 21, 2011)

Too many preconceptions to deal with, too many beliefs in false gods, so you will have to work it out for yourself. Just a few things that are of interst to me for you to consider 




> As I pointed above not the only factor in degradation of rate of accuracy but one of the most importent. But anyway - if Vals at the start of war achieved approximately about 50% of hits and the accuracy decreased to 10% in 1943 - Doesn't it seems to you that approximate rate of accuracy calculated on the base of that figures is higher than 4% pointed by you earlier?



Trouble is tey didnt get anywhere near that level of accuracy, on average at least. just to look at some of the more famous actions they participated in 

1. Sinking the Cornwall and Dosetshire: No CAP, little flak (1 a/c lost from 54 engaged), ships manouvre at high speed. Each ship was attacked by exactly 27 D/B. against the Cornwall, 8 hits (29.6%), Dosetshire was hit by 10 bombs (37%)

2. Sinking the Hermes: No CAP, no flak (essentially....there were no losses for the japanese) attacked by 85 Vals (67 were used to attack the carrier and DD Vampire , 18 to attack a convoy to the North consisting of sinking the RFA Athelstone ( 5,571 grt), her escort, the corvette Hollyhock, the oil tanker SS British Sergeant and the Norwegian ship SS Norviken of 2,924 GRT. There were no losses to AA but 4 Vals were shot down by 6+6 Fulmars which arrived late from Trincomallee. For practical purposesd this was an undefended force. The Japanese force of 67 a/c scored a total of 40 hits on the Hermes and Vampire (59.7%). Hits against the convoy are unknown, but had to be at least 25% (and almost certainly far higher) 

3) Coral Sea; Attacks against the USN 

a) against the Neosho Sims 36 Vals attacked, score 10 hits in total (27.% hit ratio) , no losses 
b) against the Yorktown and Lexington. against the Lexington, with light AA and badly placed CAP (heavy losses were sustained only after the attacks) scored 2 hits from 33 atackers. Yorktown was hit once from 12 attackers. The respective hit ratios of the Vals in these two attacks were 6% and 8%. 

4) Midway, Hiryus attacks on the Yorktown. There were only 6 fighters available at the time of this attack to intercept the 18 Vals escorted by 6 zeroes. I would describe the Yorktowns CAP protection as sligtly better than for illustrious, and her AA as moderate. 3 D/B were shot down by AA and about 4 by the fighters, however at least half these losses occurred after the D3As had released their bombs. The estimated aircraft over the target is therefore 14. These a/c achieved 3 hits with 250kg. these hits occurred before any other damage. The Hit to sortie ratio is therefore 16.6% of the bomber force


I just said that Vals crews were trained just for hitting ships and were very skillful on that part - more skillful than Germans crews. I didn't say that the germans were not trained.

I chose these early war episodes, because they were largely unchallenged and we get about as close to unadulterated accuracy figures as is possible. In the raids presented there were a total of 68 hits from 235 attacks. thats a hit to mission ratio just under 27%....about the same as the best day of the LW. 



> And - I can add the example. 11-th january 1941. Attack on HMS Gloucester and Southampton by twelve Ju-87R. Result - at least three hits out of 12 dropped bombs so it means that the accuracy was of 25%. But everythere I found was mentioned that Gloucester had a hit by one bomb whith fuze hadn't worked and Southampton got at least two hits - so if there were for instance three hits the percentage raised to 33%.



Gloucester was lost at the same time as Fiji, when both ships were dangeroulsy low on AA ammunition. This reduced the effect of their limited AA fire. Southampton fell victim to a surprise attack from out of the sunb....there was basically no AA for this attack 



> By the way - we can see that the attack was undertaken a less numerious force to ships of less sizes than of Illustriuos, and if take into account your judgement that AA fire we shouldn't consider because of its ineffectivenes in first case in the same way we should consider that the conditions of attack for german pilots in the case of Gloucester and Southampton were worse but they made it with a higher degree of accuracy achieved.



I never said that we shouldnt consider AA fire....you are very good at misquoting people I see. What i said was that the AA defences for Illustrious in that first attack were very weak relative to the force ranged against her. In the second attack they were stronger, but stil quite inadequate. Defences in the harbour were strong, but inneffective, judging by the losses. AA fire over brest was described as Heavy. Nowhere does that say we should disregard AA, completely the opposite in fact. 



> let me make things clear - I'm not trying to treat you as a person who thinks in the wrong way. But I suppose that you underestimates of value some factors in the case including just a pure luck.



Yes, you are trying to discredit me, which is fine, its called the smiling assassin. There is no such thing as luck, its just a superstitious argument when we cannot understand the probability involved. Given enough understanding of the variables, we dont need to describe anything as lucky. Of course we have to accept some situations as unexplainable, because we dont have all the information....so we call it luck



> I should add that during the second attack on Illustrious Stukas tried to hit it with heavy bombs (1000 kg). It significantly restrained Ju-87R's ability to maneuvre (not only avoiding but and for obtaining a right position for the launching the attack and to correct an aircraft in the proccess of final stage of dive before drop of a bomb


. 


ive never heard of the Ju87s that attacked the Illustrious as ever carrying SC500 bombs. They could do it, but not at the range the illustrious was from them. I think you will find this is mistaken, but if you have hard evidence , please produce it. 




> As far as I know US Navy and Marine Corps which had many fighter-bombers since 1944 didn't significantly succeed in attacking japanese ships by Hellcats and Corsairs.



Actually they were very successful, especially the corsairs against japanese shipping. They were judged even more successful in the ground support role, so thats how they were mostly used when carrying offensive ordinance. RN Corsairs were even more extensively used in this role, since in 1945 Seafires were just as effective in CAP role and less effective in FB role


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## parsifal (Nov 21, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> This is a patent infringment brought by
> SVENSKA AEROPLAN AKTIEBOLAGET (SAAB), Plaintiff-Appellant,
> v.
> MERGENTHALER LINOTYPE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee.
> ...



ill say it again, though you are not listening. What evidence of battle use do you have for any of these gizmos in WWII. What were the operational results. Not really interested in what they might have done, more intersted in what they actually did


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## gorizont (Nov 21, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Too many preconceptions to deal with, too many beliefs in false gods, so you will have to work it out for yourself. Just a few things that are of interst to me for you to consider
> ...
> I chose these early war episodes, because they were largely unchallenged and we get about as close to unadulterated accuracy figures as is possible. In the raids presented there were a total of 68 hits from 235 attacks. thats a hit to mission ratio just under 27%....about the same as the best day of the LW.



So how this percentage is comparable to percentage of hits achieved by Jugs attacking by bombs even non-movable targets?



parsifal said:


> Gloucester was lost at the same time as Fiji, when both ships were dangeroulsy low on AA ammunition. This reduced the effect of their limited AA fire. Southampton fell victim to a surprise attack from out of the sunb....there was basically no AA for this attack



11 January 1941 Gloucester operated with Southampton and one DD, and was hit with a single dud bomb so survived.



parsifal said:


> I never said that we shouldnt consider AA fire....you are very good at misquoting people I see. What i said was that the AA defences for Illustrious in that first attack were very weak relative to the force ranged against her. In the second attack they were stronger, but stil quite inadequate. Defences in the harbour were strong, but inneffective, judging by the losses. AA fire over brest was described as Heavy. Nowhere does that say we should disregard AA, completely the opposite in fact.



OK. I suppose that at Malta AA fire was as heavy as at Breast. At least they both could be described in such way by observers. 
Heavy flaks more often could disorder attackers and damaged aircraft than destroyed them.



parsifal said:


> Yes, you are trying to discredit me, which is fine, its called the smiling assassin. There is no such thing as luck, its just a superstitious argument when we cannot understand the probability involved. Given enough understanding of the variables, we dont need to describe anything as lucky. Of course we have to accept some situations as unexplainable, because we dont have all the information....so we call it luck



As you wish. I prefer in the case than an occurance of low probability had happened instead of expected occurance of high probability sometimes call it as "luck" - especially in the case of occurance with very, very mearged probability. Almost impossible outcome according to its probablity. 
I'm afraid you have never got a chance to find out and mathemetically consider all the factors influenced the result of all the impactsfor each thing. If yes - description of the fact that there must be a causal-effect relation gives you too little help to explain the occurance from the point of its causes and the ways how their effected.
I wonder if you can count all the factors with their definite ranks in the cases we are discussing. About me - I can't. But I can take them at some degree into account (that doesn't mean that I can count them mathematically).



parsifal said:


> ive never heard of the Ju87s that attacked the Illustrious as ever carrying SC500 bombs. They could do it, but not at the range the illustrious was from them. I think you will find this is mistaken, but if you have hard evidence , please produce it.



I should agree that here I've mistaked. Just taking 1000-lb for 1000-kg.



parsifal said:


> Actually they were very successful, especially the corsairs against japanese shipping. They were judged even more successful in the ground support role, so thats how they were mostly used when carrying offensive ordinance. RN Corsairs were even more extensively used in this role, since in 1945 Seafires were just as effective in CAP role and less effective in FB role



I said nothing contrary to the fact that F4U Corsairs were effective against stationary ground targets. I mentioned that I haven't heard about such their great success in attacking japanese ships that excelled effectivenes of other Navy and marine attack aircrafts of that time. I heard about several facts as VMF-115's Corsairs made mastheads attacks or Corsairs attacked with bombs Jamato and DD from its escort but I cannot see their superiority in effectiveness any other type of US Navy or Marine attack aircraft which attacked in the same manner.


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## parsifal (Nov 21, 2011)

> So how this percentage is comparable to percentage of hits achieved by Jugs attacking by bombs even non-movable targets?




Its much better, but neither are the two sets of data all that comparable. We are basically comparing the very best datasets for the Val, with the very worst (I'm betting) for the p-47. We have little or no information on the conditions or circumstances of the P-47 attack. We do know that the Vals, after the pilot quality was lost or degraded, suffered a downgrading in accuracy. I am willing to bet, that under normal circumstances, the Vals possessed a hit to mission ratio of around 2-3%. The problem though is that history doesnt record failures, or average, it only records exceptional....either exceptionally good (eg the attacks on the Hermes), or the exceptionally bad (like the attack by the P-47s).

Which is related to the other strand of this debate. Even though we can oggle at the theoretical capabilities of German bombsights, because there is no hard data or performance assessments, we cannot assertain their actual effectiveness. Thats why I keep asking for evidence of their peformance, and why their disciples keep trying to ignore me. They dont have any data, and if they are as cunning as i suspect they are, they know that combat data would show the actual performcance of these aids to be a lot less than the theory....a lot less.


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

I have been documenting all the air attacks on shipping along the Atlantic coast in 1941, in the "three Fighters" thread. I am basically translating the German "SeeKrieg" diary website and came across this little gem

_1.10.1941 English Channel the 3rd R flottille with R 38, R 33, R 35, R 36, R 165 and R 166 is near Dieppe by 8 Hurricanes. R 38, R 33 and R 165 are heavily damaged, the other boats slightly damaged (13 dead, 11 seriously injured). On R 38, the flottille commander Kptlt fall. Rossow, and the commander of the 2nd security division, K. z. S. are killed._ 

if you count the number of hits, that nine hits for 8 a/c. If you assume the heavily damaged ships were hit by bombs and the lightly damaged ships by cannon fire, thats still a hit/mission ratio of 37.5%.

Fighter bombers could, at times be deadly accurate.

Its all about crew proficiency.......


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## gorizont (Nov 22, 2011)

parsifal said:


> I have been documenting all the air attacks on shipping along the Atlantic coast in 1941, in the "three Fighters" thread. I am basically translating the German "SeeKrieg" diary website and came across this little gem
> 
> _1.10.1941 English Channel the 3rd R flottille with R 38, R 33, R 35, R 36, R 165 and R 166 is near Dieppe by 8 Hurricanes. R 38, R 33 and R 165 are heavily damaged, the other boats slightly damaged (13 dead, 11 seriously injured). On R 38, the flottille commander Kptlt fall. Rossow, and the commander of the 2nd security division, K. z. S. are killed._
> 
> ...



I should say that this exmaple concerns with the topic just slightly if doesn't concern at all. 
1) I don't see any notice about what weapons those boats were hit by. Serious damage could be inflicted to such small crafts by even gunnery for example. I suppose the Hurricanes were armed with cannons.
So to make a 37,5% accuracy achieved by a mix of weaponry is not the same for example as estimations of accuracy achieved by Stukas on Illustrious taking into account in this examples they used only bombs. 

2) We discussed bombing with figther - bombers comparing with dive bombers and factor of novel equipment in achieving higher level of accuracy.
I have no doubt that fighter -bombers could produce hits on targets with gunnery and rockets not worse than any other type of attacking aircraft and moreover better than many others types of aircrafts. 
P-47's excelently hit such targets as trucks and locomotives - but usually did it with gunnery and rockets as far as I know. At that point there is nothing to compare with bombing accuracy.


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## gorizont (Nov 22, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Its much better, but neither are the two sets of data all that comparable. We are basically comparing the very best datasets for the Val, with the very worst (I'm betting) for the p-47. We have little or no information on the conditions or circumstances of the P-47 attack. We do know that the Vals, after the pilot quality was lost or degraded, suffered a downgrading in accuracy. I am willing to bet, that under normal circumstances, the Vals possessed a hit to mission ratio of around 2-3%. The problem though is that history doesnt record failures, or average, it only records exceptional....either exceptionally good (eg the attacks on the Hermes), or the exceptionally bad (like the attack by the P-47s).



I argree with many statments in your post, but should mention the procedure of aiming from dive - bombers to target.
Some estimations pilots made at the stage of approach a to target - in shallow dive, and then, chosed the point of entry into the steep dive 
1) In steep dive pilot let the airplane to drift watching the shift of reticle from target and thus taking into account a direction and speed of wind
2) next he observed the central mark of reictle on the center of target moving along the target to estimate course and speed of target (it is important for hitting ships)
3) estimating those factors a pilot steered the aircraft as so the central mark of the reticle was offset according to all the mentioned corrections plus corrections of selected height of dropping bomb angle of dive and aircrarts speed (those values every pilot was to learn by heart from the ballistic tables)
4) at the movent of achieving of selected altitude a pilot pushed the release button and then started to pull out the aicraft 
5) than he made an evasive manuever to avoid flak fire of interception by fighters.
6) he flyed to arranged point for gathering aircrafts and than took direction to return to base of carrier.
It is with use a simple reflector or optic tube sight.
It took several years to train a pilot to be capable to achieve regulalry an accuracy even of 20% in test conditions not to mention of 50% and higher.
I wonder how pilots of Jugs many of which learnt to bomb only in 1944 could compare with such trained pilots of the start of war if we take into acount that their crafts had no airbrakes and had less time to aim (account all the corrections). swallow dive technic let to attack at faster speed and in one continous pass and thus to increase chances to survive but I doubt that with usage of only simple reflector sight the lower altitude of dropping could compansate other factors dicreased accuracy. 
And to increse accuracy the devices which may help pilots made all the estimations needed to put corrections in more easy way were designed.



parsifal said:


> Which is related to the other strand of this debate. Even though we can oggle at the theoretical capabilities of German bombsights, because there is no hard data or performance assessments, we cannot assertain their actual effectiveness. Thats why I keep asking for evidence of their peformance, and why their disciples keep trying to ignore me. They dont have any data, and if they are as cunning as i suspect they are, they know that combat data would show the actual performcance of these aids to be a lot less than the theory....a lot less.



It's another side of the problem. We haven't got enough statistic data to evalute a capability of more modern sighting devices in WWII. It is true.
For example how we make a comparable evaluation of more modern japanese Type 3 with inclinometer and old Type 1 optical tube if the war conditions changed so greatly that Japanese aircrafts hardly had a slight chance to achieve a good position for dive-bombing and we have no statistic data of average time of trainig in 1944 for dive-bombers crew. Just notes that they were trained so poorly that it was more correct to say "under any reasonable standart'. And usage of even whose improved sights demanded to some dergree trained staff. 
Anyway it is obviuos that in that way after the war sights design has been developed and improved.


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

> I should say that this exmaple concerns with the topic just slightly if doesn't concern at all.
> 1) I don't see any notice about what weapons those boats were hit by. Serious damage could be inflicted to such small crafts by even gunnery for example. I suppose the Hurricanes were armed with cannons.
> So to make a 37,5% accuracy achieved by a mix of weaponry is not the same for example as estimations of accuracy achieved by Stukas on Illustrious taking into account in this examples they used only bombs.
> 
> ...


.


err no, you need to do some research before jumping to conclusions. I checked the following sources to try and get a little clearer picture 

Conways: Did not give any details of sinkings, except that three were lost off the french Coast in October 1941. Its a start

Janes 44-45 edition. Lists three R-16 class (of which these ships were aclass members) as being sunk by FC aircraft in October '42, outside of Dieppe. Right aircraft, right place, right ships, wrong year.

Lagervorttrage des oberbefehlshabers der kriegsmarine vor hitler 1939-45: My German is not good, but I believe this source says that 3 R Boats were bombed and sunk by RAF aircraft of Fighter command on the 2 October 1941. One day out, but three R boats fitting the description of these ships is not a bad match

JC Taylor, German Warships Of WWII, says that three minesweeper were sunk and four damaged on 1 October 1941 off the french coast. This source gives their details as displacing 115 tons, top speed 21 knots, as built with 2 x C38 20mm cannon, more added after the war broke out. I then found an image (attached, which shows them with four 20mm guns each. If so, for their size they packed a considerable punch. With seven of them operating they would have been able to call up an AA barrage of 28 20mm guns.

Next I tried to get some idea of the aircraft that allegedly attacked them. I could not get a specific subtype of Hurricane, but it was most likely a Hurricane II (given that bombs are likley to have been carried. The Hurricane II could have been armed with 8 or 12 303s, or 4 20mm. AFAIK there were no Hurri IIDs at his time. 

Given the characteristics of the target warships, I find it highly unlikely that the hurricanes were attacking them with guns alone. It is likley that the ships were strafed, but I just cannot see hurricanes being able to sink a 115ton steel warship with 20mm cannon alone. Possible but unlikley.

Do you still want to say this is not a bombing attack by fighters, and do you still believe it is not relevant.


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

> It took several years to train a pilot to be capable to achieve regulalry an accuracy even of 20% in test conditions not to mention of 50% and higher.



The elite pilots of the IJN when she went to war according to Dunnigan had an average training time of about 300 hours, and combat time of about 500 hours. That gives a total of about 800 hours for these pilots.

In 1943 the average pilot training hours in the USAAC was 350 hours, plus they had, on average about 150 hours combat time on average. It took the pilots about 18 months, roughly to chalk up both the training hours and the flight time....so, if the P-47s were 2/5 as good as the Val pilots it would have taken them about 18 months to get there

Trouble is, the model is flawed. Nobody achieved 50% accuracy rates against defended targets over an extended period. Elite crews, operating against no or lightly defended targets, might get 25-30% hit to mission ratios. Against reasonably defended targets, the average might be 1-8%. 

Against land targets the ability to pin down accuracy rates is notoriously hard. bergstrom gives some idea of accuracy against tanks in his book about Kursk. claims by both Soviets and German air forces against tanks are wildly overoptimistic. I have one account where a force of over 50 HS129s attacked a full Soviet tank Brigade, and claimed to destroy over 70 tanks. However in relaity, it has been shown that in post war research, just 8 tanks were knockewd out. Thats are 3 days of continous attacks by about 45-60 aircraft. LW were said to be flying about 3 or 4 sorties per day during Kursk, lets be conservative and say 3. Over threee days they had to have flown 450-500 sorties against this Soviet Brigade....to destroy 8 tanks. They did a lot of good those LW pilots, but kill a lot of tanks they did not.... 




> I wonder how pilots of Jugs many of which learnt to bomb only in 1944 could compare with such trained pilots of the start of war if we take into acount that their crafts had no airbrakes and had less time to aim (account all the corrections). swallow dive technic let to attack at faster speed and in one continous pass and thus to increase chances to survive but I doubt that with usage of only simple reflector sight the lower altitude of dropping could compansate other factors dicreased accuracy.




As a generalization, there were relatively few American pilots trained in 1944 that saw combat in 1944. More than 50% of the personnel trained by the USAAC never left the strategic reserves, which were mostly deployed in the US. Most pilots deplyed to front line combat in 1944 had over 500 hours training time by then, and often around 300 hours combat flight time. most of the Jug pilots were dedicated fighter bomber jockeys, so they would have spent a lot of time practicising those skills. They wouold have been close in termsof proficiency at this job. You wil always get your freaky types like Rudel, but as a force, the accuracy of the Jug force would be similar to the LW jocks of 39-40 IMO 





> And to increse accuracy the devices which may help pilots made all the estimations needed to put corrections in more easy way were designed.




No not really, ther is no evidence to support that claim. Produce some evidence of that, from either side, and we will look at it. Dont try to slip in an odd unsubstatiated claim here or there, it will just get shot down



> It's another side of the problem. We haven't got enough statistic data to evalute a capability of more modern sighting devices in WWII. It is true.



I a general way we do...according to aother the LW intriduced hi -tech sights after 1941, yet even whilst they still retained hi quality crews, there is no evidence to support any measurable increase in accuracy. perhaps ther is, but my repeated requests to produce it has met with stonwallled silence. all we get are the propaganda pieces about hi-tech German weaponary, but no details of actual performance, even for the stuff that was deployed. 




> For example how we make a comparable evaluation of more modern japanese Type 3 with inclinometer and old Type 1 optical tube if the war conditions changed so greatly that Japanese aircrafts hardly had a slight chance to achieve a good position for dive-bombing and we have no statistic data of average time of trainig in 1944 for dive-bombers crew. Just notes that they were trained so poorly that it was more correct to say "under any reasonable standart'. And usage of even whose improved sights demanded to some dergree trained staff.




I goota hand it to you, at least you are having a go....specifically when were these sights you metion introduced, and where were they first used. Which units were using them. We can analyse them against aircraft with the older sighting equipment, even in conditions that were tough and get a comparison, perhaps. I'll amake a bet with you, ther wont be any appreciable difference 



> Anyway it is obviuos that in that way after the war sights design has been developed and improved.



Yes, but in the context of a thirty year time frame. in the context of the war, for visual sights, low to moderate improvements at best, and hardly worth the effort. ]


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## gjs238 (Nov 22, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> They allowed use of aircraft such as fighters not usually capable of carrying as bomb sight which is important since specilised dive bombers were not survivable.



Would the US A-36 not be considered survivable?


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## riacrato (Nov 22, 2011)

Wasn't the A-36 conceived to keep production rate of Mustang airframes up? Anyways it was a fighter airframe adapted to dive-bomber use with good success. My impression is that it's basically a fighter bomber with airbrakes. It has relatively poor top speed for its period which doesn't surprise me given the added weight and drag. So yeah, definetly vulnerable against e.g. a FW 190 A-5.


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## gorizont (Nov 22, 2011)

parsifal said:


> .
> 
> 
> err no, you need to do some research before jumping to conclusions. I checked the following sources to try and get a little clearer picture
> ...



In this attack no R-boat was damaged up to sinking. all of them were only damaged and there is no evidance how seriously.
So there is no clue for considering a single direct bomb hit.
In the report was mentioned for exmple R-33/
Look at it: "1939 The R-boat R33 is commissioned, 1939 The R-boat R33 becomes operational with the 3. Räumbootsflottille., *19 July 1943* The R-boat R33 is sunk after being attacked by Russian aircraft, off Jalta. Position 44° 30N 34° 10E."
Another mentioned above R-35: "2 October 1943 The R-boat R35 is sunk after being attacked by Allied aircraft, off Feodosia. Position 45° 02N 35° 24E."
*27 August 1944* The _R-boat R38_ is sunk after being hit by a mine, it in the Aegean, West of Paros. Position 37° 05N 25° 08E.
You can find it at R-boat 1937-43 Type

So the only source of considering the rate of damage is pure impression of the pilots which might be just exagerated.
All the mentioned R-boats according to the link were sunk in 1943 and 1944.


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## Edgar Brooks (Nov 22, 2011)

Hurricanes were incapable of carrying bombs until, at the earliest, November 1941, probably even later, since trials went on into May, 1942.


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## davebender (Nov 22, 2011)

Since it had no bomb sight I think the A-36 was a dive bomber in name only, to trick Congress into funding an additional fighter aircraft type. Rather like calling the F-18E a modified F-18D rather then admitting it to be an entirely new aircraft model.


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## Sagittario64 (Nov 22, 2011)

i always wondered why there was a dive bomber variant of the p-51. i didnt know that the a-36 didnt have bomb sights. so youre saying that the a-36 was simply a p-51 with bomb racks(i dont know if it had swing racks like the stukas and vals), which was nothing more different than the later fighter-bomber versions of the p-51? I know the IAR 80 was another fighter with a dive-bomber variant, with purpose made bomb racks over the centerline for swinging the bombs out of the propellers way. but i dont know if it (IAR 81 i believe is the original name of the IAR 80 dive-bomber) had bomb-sights.


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## Edgar Brooks (Nov 22, 2011)

davebender said:


> Since it had no bomb sight I think the A-36 was a dive bomber in name only, l.


Not really, it had dive brakes (the only Mark to have them,) but they caused problems, and some, reportedly, were wired shut.


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## riacrato (Nov 22, 2011)

davebender said:


> Since it had no bomb sight I think the A-36 was a dive bomber in name only, to trick Congress into funding an additional fighter aircraft type. Rather like calling the F-18E a modified F-18D rather then admitting it to be an entirely new aircraft model.


 
I may be wrong but iirc many other dive bombers like the Dauntless didn't have anything but standard reflector sights either.


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## riacrato (Nov 22, 2011)

Sagittario64 said:


> i always wondered why there was a dive bomber variant of the p-51. i didnt know that the a-36 didnt have bomb sights. so youre saying that the a-36 was simply a p-51 with bomb racks(i dont know if it had swing racks like the stukas and vals), which was nothing more different than the later fighter-bomber versions of the p-51? I know the IAR 80 was another fighter with a dive-bomber variant, with purpose made bomb racks over the centerline for swinging the bombs out of the propellers way. but i dont know if it (IAR 81 i believe is the original name of the IAR 80 dive-bomber) had bomb-sights.


IIRC it carried the whole load under its wings so there was no need for swing racks (and a limitation to 500lbs-bombs).


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## Sagittario64 (Nov 22, 2011)

Interesting. thanks riacrato


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## tomo pauk (Nov 22, 2011)

riacrato said:


> Wasn't the A-36 conceived to keep production rate of Mustang airframes up? Anyways it was a fighter airframe adapted to dive-bomber use with good success. My impression is that it's basically a fighter bomber with airbrakes. *It has relatively poor top speed for its period which doesn't surprise me given the added weight and drag.* So yeah, definetly vulnerable against e.g. a FW 190 A-5.



Could you add some numbers to back up the claim?


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

I think I got this one wrong. Might go and brush up on my German I think. Great resesource for the Raum Boats incidentally


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## tomo pauk (Nov 22, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> Hurricanes were incapable of carrying bombs until, at the earliest, November 1941, probably even later, since trials went on into May, 1942.



Interesting.
When were the Spits and Typhoons allowed to carry bombs?


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## davebender (Nov 22, 2011)

That doesn't help much without a bomb sight.


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## riacrato (Nov 22, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> Could you add some numbers to back up the claim?


According to this site top speed is about 580 km/h at ~6100m.
The Plane That Saved The Mustang: The North American A-36 Apache


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## tomo pauk (Nov 22, 2011)

According to the 'Vee's for victory', it was able to fly 360+ mph, from sea level to 14000 ft ( >576 km/h up until 4340m) - the engine was tuned for low level work. So from deck to 3500m it was faster than a contemporary Fw-190.


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## Vincenzo (Nov 22, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> According to the 'Vee's for victory', it was able to fly 360+ mph, from sea level to 14000 ft ( >576 km/h up until 4340m) - the engine was tuned for low level work. So from deck to 3500m it was faster than a contemporary Fw-190.



were estimed 345 mph at S.L. and 366 at F.T.H., http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/mustang/a-36-na-5338.pdf


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## barney (Nov 22, 2011)

A-36 gunsight - anybody know what this is?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3e/A-36A_in_India_1945.JPG


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## tomo pauk (Nov 22, 2011)

Thanks for the table, Vicenzo.
The 345 mph at sea level is with MIL rating (1325 HP), 1500 HP was available there with WER (up to 5400 ft), hence the 366 mph at S.L. as stated in the book.


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## Vincenzo (Nov 22, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> Thanks for the table, Vicenzo.
> The 345 mph at sea level is with MIL rating (1325 HP), 1500 HP was available there with WER (up to 5400 ft), hence the 366 mph at S.L. as stated in the book.



after years on forums and see many primary sources (digital version off course) i've ever doubt on books
21 mph to up i think i bit too many


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

An A-36 fully bombed up, is not going to be able to reach 360 mph or 345 mph for that matter. I would expect those figures to be as a "clean" configuration.

However, any bomber or fighter bomber able to travel raster than about 310 mph is going to be a very hard target for an FW 190 to catch. Mosquito B IVs fully loaded and armed had a top speed of around 340 mph. They were basically uninterceptable at that speed. An Fw 190 at that speed I expect is going have the throttles wide open, fuel consumption right up, and far less endurance as a result. In most cases they will lack the legs to keep up or catch up.

If the raid is first detected at a range of say 50 miles, the FW 190 and the target for the bombers is say 150 miles from take off. The A-36 travelling at 340mph will reach target in less than half an hour. If the range to intercept is 50 miles, and the FW 190 wants to intercept before the attack gets under way, he has to do that in less than half an hour. He will need to be travelling at least 390 mph in order tyo intercept by my calculations, which he cannot do. He might catch the A-36 on the return leg, but by then the A-36 has the throttles wide open too and the speed difference might be 20mph or less. Lets assume the A-36 is 20 miles from the Fw190 by the time he starts to head for home, and the rate of closure is now 20mph. It will take the A-36 less than half an hour to get home, but it would take the FW 190 an hour to catch him....in other words he cannot do it. 

Of course there are endless variations to this, but the basic maths makes it a difficult prospect to intercept, whern there is only a 40 or 50 mph in speed difference.


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

We've been told of P-47s having undertaken bombing raids with les than 2% accuracy for an attack on a bridge, which I now believe is the attack undertaken by a P-47 unit in connection to the Monte Cassino Battle in March 1944. What about the other end of th4e scale??? We have looked at the P-47s at their worst, what about at their best? 

Looking at the performace of the XiX tactical Command, I came acoss this report in relation to the falaise battle 

_That morning 37 P-47 pilots of the 36th Group found 800 to 1,000 enemy vehicles of all types milling about in the pocket west of Argentan. They could see American and British forces racing to choke off the gap. They went to work. Within an hour the Thunderbolts had blown up or burned out between 400 and 500 enemy vehicles. The fighter-bombers kept at it until they ran out of bombs and ammunition. One pilot, with empty gun chambers and bomb shackles, dropped his belly tank on 12 trucks and left them all in flames. _


Obviously a proportion of these kills were done with guns, but the bombs must also have had an effect


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## parsifal (Nov 22, 2011)

This is an excerpt from the following:

http://www.aero-web.org/history/wwii/d-day/17.htm


I make no claims as to the accuracy of these figures but it at least appears that the p-47s undertook some very critical work and were extremely good at what they did

_Even allowing for some exaggeration and duplicate claims, the sortie claims of the Ninth AF and 2 TAF during the Normandy fighting is most impressive. __Fighter-bomber sortie claims in Normandy 
. 2 TAF/ 9 AF/Total 
Sorties flown 9,896/2,891/12,787 
Claims for motor transport destroyed 3,340/2,520/ 5,860 
Claims for armor destroyed 257/ 134/ 391 
Total claims 3,597/2,654/ 6,251 
Claims per sortie 0.36/ 0.92/ 0.49 
No stronger endorsement of the air support in Normandy canbe found than Omar N. Bradley's letter to AAF Commanding General "Hap" Arnold at the end of September 1944. "I cannot say too much for the very close cooperation we have had between Air and Ground," Bradley wrote. "In my opinion, our close cooperation is better than the Germans ever had in their best days." _


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## riacrato (Nov 23, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> According to the 'Vee's for victory', it was able to fly 360+ mph, from sea level to 14000 ft ( >576 km/h up until 4340m) - the engine was tuned for low level work. So from deck to 3500m it was faster than a contemporary Fw-190.


 
When used as dive bombers they approached at 4300m though.


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## tomo pauk (Nov 23, 2011)

My point was that A-36 was way faster than any dive bomber fielded; it was faster than many fighters in 1942/43. While it's true that in bombed-up state the speed was down, it rook the interceptors being at just the right spot, if they were to score kills. If not, A-36s will bomb the targets and retreat.
With USAAC employing A-24s ( variant of the Douglas SBD Dauntless), for example, in such tasks, the defending fighters would've had far easier time to catch them.

Hi, Vicenzo



> after years on forums and see many primary sources (digital version off course) i've ever doubt on books
> 21 mph to up i think i bit too many



The table from Mike's site declares the figures as 'guaranteed/estimated' - the serial produced planes will achieve at least as good performance as stated there (we could expect better, then). In other words, the table is not a result of USAAC tests.


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## Vincenzo (Nov 23, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> My point was that A-36 was way faster than any dive bomber fielded; it was faster than many fighters in 1942/43. While it's true that in bombed-up state the speed was down, it rook the interceptors being at just the right spot, if they were to score kills. If not, A-36s will bomb the targets and retreat.
> With USAAC employing A-24s ( variant of the Douglas SBD Dauntless), for example, in such tasks, the defending fighters would've had far easier time to catch them.
> 
> Hi, Vicenzo
> ...



wait, the first collumn are estiamted the 2nd guaranteed, and it's possible that stime are optimistic (it's not so uncommon), the guarantees speed are 328 and 350 mph and this are for clean plane, estimated with bomb racks (w/o bombs) are 337 and 356 mph, with 500 lbs bombs are 305 and 332 mph. sure it's fast at low, like the P-51 with Allison.


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## davebender (Nov 23, 2011)

A 1945 photograph of an A-36. Apparently it has been field modified since it rolled out of the factory during 1942.


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## tyrodtom (Nov 23, 2011)

Are you still going by the three picture you posted of A-36 cockpit ?

The 3 pictures were of the same aircraft, and with so many switches, instruments, levers, control collumn grip, and other things was missing from that cockpit, as well as a gunsight, how could you base you knowledge of what any operational A-36 had from those pictures ?


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## gorizont (Nov 23, 2011)

parsifal said:


> This is an excerpt from the following:
> 
> D Day: The Legacy of Air Power at Normandy
> 
> ...


 
There is a more informative link about it - HyperWar: The US Army Air Forces in WWII: D-Day 1944
But I suspect here an example of an ordinary overclaiming.
All the mentioned air forces had about 2400 fighters and fighter-bombers plus 700 medium and heavy bombers in support. 
So every aircraft according to the claims destroyed about 2 mororboats and one out of ten destroyed an armor (what armor? a tank or?). 
Please look at your own post in the topic there you shows how not effective were Luftwaffe against armor of Soviet Union. And now do you belive that in the case of US and Britain pilots the matter is so different?
Hm... 
Germans at D-Day had at Normandy the only 21st Panzer division. It had about 140 tanks and self-propelled guns. I wonder how Allies managed to find out about 400 "armors" from less than 200 (I don't see claims for german armors from other US and British forces - I guess if count them Germans had got not less than 1000 tanks in Normandy  )

And it's not easy to coprehend what "a motor boat" means.
R-boat? or something about a two-meters long pleasure boat?

Anyway should we believe that no less every one pilot of Allies airforce destroyed about two boats in the campaign?

Second - I suppose that claims have a little concern in any aspect with bombing accuracy.
We have no statistic even with claims - what percentage of claims put down to dropped bombs.


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## tyrodtom (Nov 23, 2011)

I think when they say motor transport they mean vehicles, trucks, cars, not water transportation. Armor would be tanks of all sizes, assualt guns, probably half tracks too. If a pilot sees a turret, a big gun, or tracks, to him it's a tank.


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## davebender (Nov 23, 2011)

> Lt. Col. Leighton I. Davis was nearing the end of his second tour of duty at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, in April, 1943, when he received orders to command a fighter-bomber group composed of North American A-36s that was about to deploy overseas. He flew to Alabama in advance to meet his new boss and to look over the A-36--the ground attack version of the P-51 Mustang. "I was amazed to see that they still had ring and bead sights in the middle of the damn thing," exclaimed Leighton when he recalled the event in later years. (3) It was the same sight used in the P-12s that he had flown in 1936. Nothing new had been added to assist the pilot in his main mission: gunnery and dive bombing.



I believe firsthand testimony.


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## parsifal (Nov 23, 2011)

Not necessarily. Aircraft "looked over" were likley not intended for overseas service. They could well have been attached to the Training Command


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## gorizont (Nov 23, 2011)

tyrodtom said:


> I think when they say motor transport they mean vehicles, trucks, cars, not water transportation.


I suppose they meant in fact vessels calling them motor-boat. Because as far as I know "boat" means only a marine vessel (usually small) and nothing else.



tyrodtom said:


> Armor would be tanks of all sizes, assualt guns, probably half tracks too. If a pilot sees a turret, a big gun, or tracks, to him it's a tank.


 
"Armour" means armoured truck or tank and I suppose the pilots claimed exactly such targets. It is another matter what they indeed took as "armour".


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## tyrodtom (Nov 24, 2011)

Nowhere in that release does it say anything about boats, ships, vessels or any sort of water transport. 

In the english language motor transport is just another way of saying motor powered wheeled vehicles.


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## Edgar Brooks (Nov 24, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Not necessarily. Aircraft "looked over" were likley not intended for overseas service. They could well have been attached to the Training Command


Hardly likely, since units deployed overseas would normally take their aircraft with them, and would need to become entirely comfortable before embarking, plus the Americans would not have been stupid enough to train their personnel in obsolete equipment, then send them abroad to use a sight they'd never seen.


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## parsifal (Nov 24, 2011)

fair enough, but then, how likley do you think it that the yanks would fit old fashioned bead sights to a modern aircraft like the A-36. That seems just as foolish dont you think?


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## tyrodtom (Nov 24, 2011)

What is so drop dead awful about a ring and post sight , you can still set up a lead angle, or drift angle for dive bombing, using the ring. It has it's advantages, bulbs don't burn out, or fuzes blow. Might not be the best under low light conditions, also easy for the ground grew to knock out of adjustment when working around the plane, not inflight adjustable either. 

A lot of early WW2 aircraft Used the ring and bead, some had both the ring and bead outside, and a reflector inside the cockpit.


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## Edgar Brooks (Nov 24, 2011)

parsifal said:


> fair enough, but then, how likley do you think it that the yanks would fit old fashioned bead sights to a modern aircraft like the A-36. That seems just as foolish dont you think?


Not really, since the early sights were not always reliable, so it was quite common to see that the sight was hinged, so that it could be swung aside, in the event of a failure, and the pilot could revert to the R&B sight.


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## gorizont (Nov 25, 2011)

tyrodtom said:


> Nowhere in that release does it say anything about boats, ships, vessels or any sort of water transport.
> 
> In the english language motor transport is just another way of saying motor powered wheeled vehicles.



OK, I suppiose it's a result of my misunderstanding.
Anyway 21st Panzer division had hardly got more than 2000 "motor transports". 

Other german divisions could hardly have more than 1900 "motor transports" and no one knows how many operational.
Look at battle order:
The following units were deployed in a static defensive mode in the areas of the actual landings:

716th Infantry Division (Static) consisted mainly of those 'unfit for active duty' and released prisoners.
352nd Infantry Division, a well-trained unit containing combat veterans.
91st Air Landing Division (Luftlande – air transported), a regular infantry division, trained, and equipped to be transported by air.
709th Infantry Division (Static). Like the 716th, this division comprised a number of "Ost" units who were provided with German leadership to manage them.

Other divisions occupied the areas around the landing zones, including:

243rd Infantry Division (Static) (Generalleutnant Heinz Hellmich), comprising the 920th Infantry Regiment (two battalions), 921st Infantry Regiment, and 922nd Infantry Regiment. This coastal defense division protected the western coast of the Cotentin Peninsula.
711th Infantry Division (Static) (Generalleutnant Josef Reichert), comprising the 731st Infantry Regiment, and 744th Infantry Regiment. This division defended the western part of the Pays de Caux.
30th Mobile Brigade (Oberstleutnant Freiherr von und zu Aufsess), comprising three bicycle battalions.

As far as I know a static infantry division had no more than 200 trucks and cars. 352nd Infantry Division should have slightly more than 800 motor vehicles. 91st Air Landing Division hardly had more than 300 ones.

So Allies pilots claimed of at least in one and a half times more motor vehicals destroyed than Germans actually had at disposal (operational and non-operational).

I have taken amount of vehicles at the german divisions as maximum.
Look at figures in http://www.lonesentry.com/articles/germanhorse/index.html


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## parsifal (Nov 25, 2011)

> Other german divisions could hardly have more than 1900 "motor transports" and no one knows how many operational.
> Look at battle order:
> The following units were deployed in a static defensive mode in the areas of the actual landings:
> 
> ...




Bear in mind that the MV figures you are posting are for vehicles organic to the divisions. Far greater numbers were controlled at Corps and Army Level.

For example, the 185 divisions committed to barbarossa, had, on the 22 June 1941 248000 vehicles under the command of those formations. However the overall 831400 vehicles in totat were committed to the operation. For the heer, the vast majority of trucks were attached to the higher HQs and were providing rear area lodictic support between the supplyheads and the HQs. Army level trucks would transport supply from the railhead to Army HQ, whilst Corps MV parks would provide logicitcs from Army HQ to the Divisional supply dumps. Russia proved heavily destructive to the German vehicle park. Being rather lightweight, the trucks attached to the higher HQs found the Soviet roads very roug going, which drove up breakdowns and loss rates greatly. In the west,1939-41 the heaviest attrition for German trucks occurred in the frontline echelons, which had resulted in a rather modest attrition rate for the german vehicle park. In North Africa from the middle of 1942 onwards, the RAF discovered the weak link in German military machine, its tail. And the RAFs medium and FB doerces went to work on the Panzer Armee Afrikas suply chain. This strategy was repearted in both Italy (less successfully) and France (far more successfully) as the medium steadily forced back the effective rail supply heads from the front, increasing the reliance on trucks for supply of the frontline forces

The Germans and the italians lost about 80000 vehicles in North Africa....a mnassive percentage of their overall truck production. Dont know how many trucks were destroyed in the Normandy campaign, but it had to be a lot since the germans in Normandy suffered chronic supply shortages of just about everything imaginable. ive read that the Germans could only manage to get about 20000 filers to the shattered field formations up till the end of September0. Replacements (ersatz) Bns were available, but they could not reach the front because there was no safe path and no transport to get them there.


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## gorizont (Nov 25, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Bear in mind that the MV figures you are posting are for vehicles organic to the divisions. Far greater numbers were controlled at Corps and Army Level.
> 
> For example, the 185 divisions committed to barbarossa, had, on the 22 June 1941 248000 vehicles under the command of those formations. However the overall 831400 vehicles in totat were committed to the operation. For the heer, the vast majority of trucks were attached to the higher HQs and were providing rear area lodictic support between the supplyheads and the HQs. Army level trucks would transport supply from the railhead to Army HQ, whilst Corps MV parks would provide logicitcs from Army HQ to the Divisional supply dumps. Russia proved heavily destructive to the German vehicle park. Being rather lightweight, the trucks attached to the higher HQs found the Soviet roads very roug going, which drove up breakdowns and loss rates greatly. In the west,1939-41 the heaviest attrition for German trucks occurred in the frontline echelons, which had resulted in a rather modest attrition rate for the german vehicle park. In North Africa from the middle of 1942 onwards, the RAF discovered the weak link in German military machine, its tail. And the RAFs medium and FB doerces went to work on the Panzer Armee Afrikas suply chain. This strategy was repearted in both Italy (less successfully) and France (far more successfully) as the medium steadily forced back the effective rail supply heads from the front, increasing the reliance on trucks for supply of the frontline forces
> 
> The Germans and the italians lost about 80000 vehicles in North Africa....a mnassive percentage of their overall truck production. Dont know how many trucks were destroyed in the Normandy campaign, but it had to be a lot since the germans in Normandy suffered chronic supply shortages of just about everything imaginable. ive read that the Germans could only manage to get about 20000 filers to the shattered field formations up till the end of September0. Replacements (ersatz) Bns were available, but they could not reach the front because there was no safe path and no transport to get them there.


 
I've beard in mind all your arguments and cannot agree with them in respect of situation with German transport in Normandy and Allied claims.
1) Normandy June 1944 was not a Russian front or North Africa. In North Africa there was a mobile war without a front line. Station defence was only at population places (towns, oasises).
German units were well supplied with transport.
In Normandy they had mostly station divisions to defend in a non-mobile way. So they hadn't got transport in the same proportion as at North Africa or in 1941 in Russia.
2) All the claims are for the first day of invasion or no more than the first stage. Look at an amount of sorties - overall about 12500. For 2400 aircrafts and 700 bombers in support it is for no more than two days - and more possible for one (about a three sorties for each aircraft).
Taking into account that aircrafts made their flights from England it become clear that coudn't invade deep into german-occupied territory. So it is more probable they had chances to hit only transport attached to the listed units.
maybe anybody here knews German statistic about their losses in the first days of the invasion?
3) It is just pure claims without been checked out with german data - am I right? 
For me usage of such data for calculation of effeciency is a dubious method.
4) moreover it is evident that such data couldn't afford to estimate effeciency of bombing for P-47 and their accuracy (with bombs).


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## parsifal (Nov 25, 2011)

Hi Gz

You posted in reply before I could correct an error....The figures i should have posted was that as at June 1941 there were 208 divs in the german Army, and a toal of 831400 vehicles. 550000 vehicles supported the offensive into Russia, the remainder were kept in the west or supported Rommels drive in Africa.


Just very roughly, there were approximately 140 divs attached to the eastern Front at the beginning of the campaign, and about 70 divs retained in the the occupied territories. 550000/140 is roughly 3982 vehicles per div, whilst the ratio for vehicles per div for those on occupation duties was slightly higher at 4000. Allowing for the inherent inaccuracy that goes with figures like this, the vehicles attached to occupation forces were at about the same rate as those in the East. 

Not exactly sure what happened after June 1941, through to June 1944. The German vehicle park took a very bad hit, and overall losses reduced the numbers (I will try and dig out by how much). I agree that priority might be given to the east, because that was a mobile war,. however that should not be overplayed. In the West the german rail supply system was being heavily worked over, such that the rail net was down to about 19 or 20% of minimum requirements in France by June 1944. A lot of supply was being shipped out directly from Germany to the front lines. Thats a lot of truck. So, whilst I cannot yet give you precise figures on truck availability in the west, you are incorrect to make the assumptions you are (basically)/

When the allies did break out,they were unable to rely on the french railnet for many weeks/months after capture. The allies brought in plenty of trains to replace the shaky and unreliable french engines and rolling stock that had been left behind, but the rail network....lines, bridges, marshalling yards and the like had been so comprehensively wrecked (much more by allied and resistance efforts than by german demoilition) that it would take basically till 1945 to repair it. It was a major constraint on allied operations. To an extent the allies managed to address this with a major trucking effort called the red ball express,....imagine how much harder it must have been for the germans, who had a fraction of the truck pool of the allies....


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## parsifal (Nov 25, 2011)

I managed to dig out one source on the motor transport situation for the Germans Referenced

Madej V, German War Economy - The Motorization Myth Allentown Publishing 1984

Agrees with the vehicle availability figures as at june 1941, Doesnt give a figure for total truck numbers in the west during the normandy campaign, but does say that lift capacity for the support echelons had dropped to below 1000 tons per day , and that the average supply distance by June 1944 for the forces in Normandy had increased to over 500 km, mostly because of the Allied Interdiction campaign. Somewhat offset by stockpiles that had been made prior to the campaign. However the average daily trip distance for german trucks, according to Madej was 150 Kms per day. Distance to supply heads 500 km. Thruput capacity of the supply echelon, about 1000 tons per day per div. Average load carrying capacity per truck might be about 2.5 tons tare (made low by the return trip to depot empty). To move that 1000 tons per day, you are going to need around 1500 trucks, just in the rear echelons, then there are the vehicles needed to get from the forward epoits to the front lines.....maybe 200-800 vehicles attached directly to the Div (say an average of 500 vehicles). On average, therefore, in June 1944, in the normandy front, you are looking at an average of about 2000 vehicles per Div. There are of course the Horse drawn elements, but these generally did not undertake the kind of long haul heavy lift supply efforts we are talking about. The majority of Horse drawn transport was used to get additional ammunition to the Artillery regiments and heavy weapons groups. 

Saying that Normandy was a static battle is untrue, except for those Divs located within fortresses like Cherbourg. The Static did rely on stockpiled supply, but the units in the lines could not. and this was the majority of formations engaged in the battle. A better example of a static battle might be the Somme or Verdun, where front lines might change by a few yards every day. This was not the case in Normandy....front lines were constantly changing, Divisions were constantly moving about.....it cannot be viewed as a static battle from a logistics POV 

At 1000 tons per day, in conditions of heavy engagement such as normandy, ammunition expenditure alone for a german infantry Div can be as high as 500 tons per hour, however according to Dunnigan on average you might expect a minimum of 1500 tons per day, plus about 500 tons per day for other consummables. I expect water and fodder for the horse drawn transport could be obtained locally (amounting to about 140 tons per day of that 500 tons ancillary items) . However its no wonder that the germans were on a more less constant restricted ammunition regimethroughout the campaign....they didnt have the supply capability to heavily engage their divisions all the time. The campaign had to have been a nightmare for them


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## parsifal (Nov 25, 2011)

having the bulk of a division attached to the logistics echelons is not a uniquely German issue. Most people quote that in 1944 a british Infantry Div had 18000 men attached and about 2000 vehicles. Kinda right, but then not really. in reality if the logistic tail of the division is included, it had an average of 55000 men and well over 6000 vehicles attached.

The germans were never that lavish, but it was nothing for their tails to double the size of th division to around 20-25000 men. Thats for the normandy campaign. There were 70 US Divs ready for the normandy campign with about 2.5m men directly attached to the divisional structure, or about 35000 men per div. US logistics tended to emphasize Corps control, so the trucks and manpower attached to the Corps offset the apparent manpower diference compared to the Brits.


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## gorizont (Nov 25, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Hi Gz
> Not exactly sure what happened after June 1941, through to June 1944. The German vehicle park took a very bad hit, and overall losses reduced the numbers (I will try and dig out by how much). I agree that priority might be given to the east, because that was a mobile war,. however that should not be overplayed. In the West the german rail supply system was being heavily worked over, such that the rail net was down to about 19 or 20% of minimum requirements in France by June 1944. A lot of supply was being shipped out directly from Germany to the front lines. Thats a lot of truck. So, whilst I cannot yet give you precise figures on truck availability in the west, you are incorrect to make the assumptions you are (basically)/
> 
> When the allies did break out,they were unable to rely on the french railnet for many weeks/months after capture. The allies brought in plenty of trains to replace the shaky and unreliable french engines and rolling stock that had been left behind, but the rail network....lines, bridges, marshalling yards and the like had been so comprehensively wrecked (much more by allied and resistance efforts than by german demoilition) that it would take basically till 1945 to repair it. It was a major constraint on allied operations. To an extent the allies managed to address this with a major trucking effort called the red ball express,....imagine how much harder it must have been for the germans, who had a fraction of the truck pool of the allies....


 
Hi Parcifal
I will try to find out figures.
Now I can refer to "D-day deception: Operation Fortitude and the Normandy invasion" by Mary Barbier, p/191 - "Shortage of vehicles forced the germans to rely on french rail system which forced delays in transporting reinforcements to Normandy."


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## gorizont (Nov 25, 2011)

parsifal said:


> I managed to dig out one source on the motor transport situation for the Germans Referenced
> 
> Madej V, German War Economy - The Motorization Myth Allentown Publishing 1984
> 
> ...


 
I found figures which showed that at Normandy german troops supllied from 15 to 35% of ammunition spent previous period. So...


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## parsifal (Nov 25, 2011)

I am not going to challenge that, sounds very reasonable. But, likley that the 15-35% was concentrated along thise sectors that were static as you say. So, a few Divs....the ones fortified, wont need near as much transport, the ones undertaking the mobile battle, are likley to need a large supply network to support them.


This gets down to how badly the the german supply train was monstered by the allies. By accounts from both sides, it appears very badly, and at the forefront of that are those poor old P-47s that we have been discussing. they have their bad days, they have their good days, but overall, essential to allied victory IMO


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## fastmongrel (Nov 26, 2011)

Nice info Parsifal but you do realise how unfashionable you are thinking about logistics. Everyone on the internet knows that armies (particulary German ones) magically supplied themselves using Fairy Dust and magic carpets. 

Do you have the figures for how much fuel the allied supply lines were using when the logistics tail stretched all the way across France. Getting a gallon of fuel and a round of ammunition to a Sherman tank on the Belgian border must have taken a frightening amount of juice.


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## Siegfried (Nov 26, 2011)

gorizont said:


> Hi Parcifal
> I will try to find out figures.
> Now I can refer to "D-day deception: Operation Fortitude and the Normandy invasion" by Mary Barbier, p/191 - "Shortage of vehicles forced the germans to rely on french rail system which forced delays in transporting reinforcements to Normandy."



That's more or less correct. A German division relied upon about 6000 horses. Sweddish Military Historian Nikolas Zetterling has carefully analysed the Normandy action. Basically he has determined that the German CER (Combat Efficiency Ratio) was about twice that of the allied one. He also notes that the Germans couldn't even supply enough amunition to their troops and artillery; transport was by rail followed by horse or truck if available to the front. Air power did not knock out many tanks at all. It was well known that a typhoon with rockets was too inaccurate to hit a tank. Rockets have dispersion and falloff. Even if there were trucks its I would think fuel would be an issue.


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## parsifal (Nov 26, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> That's more or less correct. A German division relied upon about 6000 horses. Sweddish Military Historian Nikolas Zetterling has carefully analysed the Normandy action. Basically he has determined that the German CER (Combat Efficiency Ratio) was about twice that of the allied one. He also notes that the Germans couldn't even supply enough amunition to their troops and artillery; transport was by rail followed by horse or truck if available to the front. Air power did not knock out many tanks at all. It was well known that a typhoon with rockets was too inaccurate to hit a tank. Rockets have dispersion and falloff. Even if there were trucks its I would think fuel would be an issue.




Others have determinewd that the German CER was down to about 1.31 by this stage. But these figures (about 2, down to 1.31) are all highly misleading, because they dont incorporate all the factors that determine on field performance....like the force multiplier effect of airpower, the logistic shortages suffered by the germans, the effects of NGs, to name but a few. they are simply thoeretical comparisons of how a given force of men, devoid of any force multipliers, or external influences, could perform relative to an opposing group of men. This was not the case in normandy, it was anything but a 'level playing field" , which is why the heer, despite its inherent advantages (being entrenched, superiority in numbers, being attacked by amphibious forces, by an army lacking combat experience) to th4e 24 July, still managed to lose the battle and suffer over 100k more casualties than the Allies. 

Man for man, because of these outside combat multipliers, the allies were several orders of magnitude superior than the Wehrmacht in Normandy.


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## parsifal (Nov 26, 2011)

fastmongrel said:


> Nice info Parsifal but you do realise how unfashionable you are thinking about logistics. Everyone on the internet knows that armies (particulary German ones) magically supplied themselves using Fairy Dust and magic carpets.
> 
> Do you have the figures for how much fuel the allied supply lines were using when the logistics tail stretched all the way across France. Getting a gallon of fuel and a round of ammunition to a Sherman tank on the Belgian border must have taken a frightening amount of juice.




I think I do, but at home (330 km away at this moment)

yes, we are witnessing classic revisionist history at the moment....a uniquely internet forum phenomena, where people can and do say anything, and a few others will believe them. Unlike the traditional forms of research where you produce a paer and then have the findings reviewed by your peers,,,,now it is anything goes. The volume of information has exploded, the quality has imploded......

Some good images of tanks that appear to have been disabled by airpower and other causes

Axis History Forum • View topic - The battle of Mont Ormel and Das Reich's counterattack


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## Siegfried (Nov 30, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Others have determinewd that the German CER was down to about 1.31 by this stage. But these figures (about 2, down to 1.31) are all highly misleading, because they dont incorporate all the factors that determine on field performance....like the force multiplier effect of airpower, the logistic shortages suffered by the germans, the effects of NGs, to name but a few. they are simply thoeretical comparisons of how a given force of men, devoid of any force multipliers, or external influences, could perform relative to an opposing group of men. This was not the case in normandy, it was anything but a 'level playing field" , which is why the heer, despite its inherent advantages (being entrenched, superiority in numbers, being attacked by amphibious forces, by an army lacking combat experience) to th4e 24 July, still managed to lose the battle and suffer over 100k more casualties than the Allies.
> 
> Man for man, because of these outside combat multipliers, the allies were several orders of magnitude superior than the Wehrmacht in Normandy.




The Heer wasn't entrenched, it wasn't even there in numbers by the start of the campaign. The German army was inferior in numbers to the allied forces not superior as you stated. 

As Zetterlings research showed the CER was around 2 not 1.3 because the German numbers were simply much lower than claimed. Your casuality figure claims don't make sense in terms of the CER.


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## Siegfried (Nov 30, 2011)

parsifal said:


> I think I do, but at home (330 km away at this moment)
> 
> yes, we are witnessing classic revisionist history at the moment
> SNIP
> ...



Revisionist history? There is nothing wrong with "Revisionism" the word means "to look again" and is about correcting the mistakes, removing deliberate obfusifications and biases of times past and to incorporate new information.

Allied air power was NOT effective at destroying tanks in anyway weather using bombs or rockets. In fac many kill claims were really multiple claims on the same tanks that had already been disabled by At guns, or generally simply run out of fuel.

http://www.wlu.ca/lcmsds/cmh/back issues/CMH/volume 3/issue 1/C... 
Air Force and Army OR researchers 
prepared four Joint Reports in the fall and 
winter of 1944-45.65 Again there was no 
disagreement about the evidence. For example 
in Joint Report No.3 titled "Rocket Firing 
Typhoons in Close Support of Military 
Operations" it was found that 350 rockets, 
involving 44 sorties, would have to be fired at 
a small gun position to obtain a fifty percent 
chance of a hit. If Typhoons were to be 
employed in a close support role they were 
best used to reduce enemy morale and raise 
the morale of allied infantry. Both doctrine 
and the manner of planning operations needed 
to be revised to take account of this. 

Montgomery'S Scientists: Operational Research in Northwest Europe: Operational Research in Northwest Europe" contains a thorough analysis. I believe they found only 2-3% of tanks had been knocked out by rockets. Considering the 2000 aircraft lost by the allies this is not a good deal.


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## parsifal (Nov 30, 2011)

Chris Lawrence, who is a member of the Dupuy Institute (and served as a US Army staff officer during the war in Bosnia in the 1990s) has analysed several models used to measure CERs, including those devised by Colonel Dupuy, Zetterlings model, that undertaken by the US military (with input from himself) , and several other models. The acepted term incidentally is Combat Effectiveness Values (CEVs), not Combat Effectiveness Ratios. CERs are a purely Zetterling invention. Nearly all other researchers, without exception, use the CEV terminology and adopt the same standards as Dupuy. 

Whereas most of the models use a relative values, where values of less than 1.0 represent an axis advantage and values above 1.0 represent an Allied advantage, Zetterlings model is somewhat different in that it expresses its findings as a ratio, in favour of the germans. This mathemeatical model has been shown by others to naturally skew the results in favour of the Germans, and is not helped by Zetterlings failure to provide working details of how he arrived at his ratio. 

Zetterling (also a member of the Dupuy institute) has subsequently tried to explain his position in his book in the following terms:

"_In effect I can be said to have used the same methodology as shown in Numbers Predictions and War, page 99. I have used the overall casualties for the campaign and assumed an average allied theatre numerical superiority of 3-1. The choice of 1.4 rather then 1.3 to account for the advantage of defence was based on east front data. It must of course be remembered that the result I show is the "Score Effectiveness", which means that the "CEV" is the square root, which would suggest a German CEV superiority of about 1.5_."

Lawrence and others have pointed out the numerous errors in the assumptions made by Zetterling, chief and most obvious amongst them being his assumptioons on ratios at the front. Whilst the allies overall enjoyed combat numbers many times in their favour, the combat ratios at the front were seldom that high, moreover his defence adjustment for Normandy (which were based on east front studies) are hotly challenged by many other, more qualified scholars in this subject. 

Lawrence now works as a consultant in this field, and contributed to what many regard as the most accurate model in this field, still used by the US Army in its battalion sized evaluations of battle modelling. The original QJM (Quantified Judgement Model) was tested to 149 primarily division-level engagements for 1 to 5 days in length. While the model had a set of scaling factors that allowed it to be used in periods of less than a day for much smaller engagements...it had not been designedfor such. Furthermore, the model had been revised all through its life, and was revised again in the early 1990s to created the TNDM (Tactical Numerical Deterministic Model). Most analysts agree this refined modelling tool is by far the most accurate measure of CEVs for any engagement in the modern era. Whilst its application to WWII engagements has a rather limited dataset, it is still streets ahead of anything anyone else has ever done, including Zetterling. 

Applying the TNDM to Normandy one comes up with typical CEVs of between 1.2 to 1.5, thats 1.2:1 to 1.5:1 in favour of the allies. AFAIK that does not include FPF multipliers like airpower and NGS. It does however take into account issues like defensive or attacking stance, terrain, supply state and the like. The accuracy of the TNDM is that when applied to the Normandy situation, it accounts for the casualty rates to within +/-5%. Thats why German casualties exceeded allied casualties during the campaign....if the campaign is expanded to its traditionally accepted end (to the end of August), german casualties were several orders of magnitude higher than allied. 

The Dupuy Institute has in recent years produced a report on this very issue, using a range of models, including some of the material contained in Zetterlings analysis

In part this report draws the following conlcusions: 

(The institute is the only think tank to have a) published attempt to measure German combat effectiveness done by Trevor N. Dupuy, which is in Appendix H of Hitler's Last Gamble (Trevor N. Dupuy, David L. Bongard, Richard C. Anderson). In that effort he analyzed 11 Ardennes battles using the TNDM. In those 11 battles, all from 16 Dec 44 - 11 Jan 45, the German CEV is higher in 7 of the cases. The average German CEV comes out to 1.03. The average US CEV comes out to 1.01. The fact that both averages exceed one is due to the use of simple averages (i.e. the inverse of a CEV of 1.48 is .68, which if average with 1.48, does not equal one).

In these 11 cases, it does appear like there was rough parity in perfmormance.

The Ardennes, however, was fought with mostly elite formations with no-one dug in 9initially), and the germans on the attack . In Normandy there was not as great a concentration of elite formations, and many units of the german Army were heavily dug in (such as at Cherbourg), plus the allies were coming out of an amphibious assault, a situation where the germans had intially a significant numbers and positional advantage) 

Historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event. Though the word "revisionism" is sometimes used in a negative way, constant revision of history is part of the normal scholarly process of writing history. However in most cases for WWII, it is the process of replacing well established, well researched historical facts and replacing them with historical fantasy and propaganda. that is what is happening here i am afraid.


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 1, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> Allied air power was NOT effective at destroying tanks in anyway weather using bombs or rockets. In fac many kill claims were really multiple claims on the same tanks that had already been disabled by At guns, or generally simply run out of fuel.
> 
> [ For example in Joint Report No.3 titled "Rocket Firing Typhoons in Close Support of Military Operations" it was found that 350 rockets, involving 44 sorties, would have to be fired at a small gun position to obtain a fifty percent chance of a hit. If Typhoons were to be employed in a close support role they were best used to reduce enemy morale and raise the morale of allied infantry. Both doctrine and the manner of planning operations needed to be revised to take account of this.


There's something awry with the mathematics above; if 350 rockets achieve a 50% chance of a hit, it means that 175 rockets will hit the "small gun position," roughly equivalent to being hit by 175 25-pounder shells, and it would be one hek of a position that could withstand that.
An assessment of 83 Group's effort from 7-8-44, involving 35 missions equalling 295 sorties, which should have used 2360 rockets, caused the following damage:- Tanks 84 flamers, 35 smokers, 21 damaged; Met 54 flamers, 19 smokers, 39 damaged.
The report points out that "Great care was taken in assessing the claims, but with the number of sorties flown and the frequency speed of the attacks, some duplication is inevitable." (Probably why the tank total exceeds the number reported as being present.) 
It also says that "The following conclusions may be drawn from the report: (i) The R/P weapon is the ideal armament for dealing with tanks. This is especially so if they are in the open. (ii) The chances of finding tanks are much greater when they are moving."
The pilots reported that "The first attacks caused confusion among the tank crews, who scrambled for cover and gave the impression that they had abandoned their tanks regardless of whether they were blocking the roads or not."
It's generally forgotten that a tank is completely disabled even if hit by only one rocket, which blows off a track, and not many crews are going to attempt a repair while being threatened by other aircraft.
It rather begs the question, if rockets were completely ineffectual, why did the RAF use them for 18 months, and the US Army continually call the Typhoons in to assist?


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## Vincenzo (Dec 1, 2011)

Edgar i thinked, i had read that, that with 350 rockets they got 50% (0,5) probability of a (one) hit not that they take 175 hit, but maybe i'm in wrong


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 1, 2011)

Vincenzo said:


> Edgar i thinked, i had read that, that with 350 rockets they got 50% (0,5) probability of a (one) hit not that they take 175 hit, but maybe i'm in wrong


I'm not sure how you can have .5 of a hit, and, if 349 rockets had missed, out of 350, there would have been some serious lapses in training.
This is a photo of a Mk.III tank, hit by four rockets (four were fired at it by a Hurricane, in the desert); I trust that the report of the damage is still legible.





As an aside 1556 Typhoons were lost, to all causes including accidents, 649 before D-day, and 53 after VE-day, so maybe the authorities thought that 854 were a price worth paying, during the charge across Europe, to rid us of Nazism.
I'd also like to add that Typhoons were tasked with shutting down radar sites, before D-day; with each one out of action for an average 3 months, it made a huge contribution to the success of D-day.


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## fastmongrel (Dec 1, 2011)

Edgar that tank must have been hit by the 25 pound AP warhead but iirc the Typhoons in Europe fired the 60 pound HE warhead and relied on blast effect not penetration.


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## tomo pauk (Dec 1, 2011)

This is what Tony Williams says in his book 'Rapid fire':
-Under test conditions, Hurricane IID was achieving a hit rate of 25% by it's cannons, while RPs were achieving less than 5% - all for tank-sized target. Under combat conditions, RP's accuracy dropped to 0,5%.

But, while Hurri IID was something akin to flying 6pdr, Typhoon was akin to small flying MLRS/Katyusha, but far more accurate. And after it dispensed it's rockets, it's cannons were far too good asset not to be used to attack ground positions and vehicles.


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 1, 2011)

fastmongrel said:


> Edgar that tank must have been hit by the 25 pound AP warhead but iirc the Typhoons in Europe fired the 60 pound HE warhead and relied on blast effect not penetration.


The make-up of the rockets is irrelevant; this thread concerns gunsights, and four hits from four rockets is not 25%. For the Avranches strikes, the vehicles hit, at a rate of .5%, even allowing for 100% duplication, would have required 25,200 rockets, yet they used 2,560. Once they'd come up with the adjustable sight, to allow for drop, and used Beamont's method of having the sight reflecting straight off the windshield, accuracy improved over what had been achieved in the desert.


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## Siegfried (Dec 2, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> The make-up of the rockets is irrelevant; this thread concerns gunsights, and four hits from four rockets is not 25%. For the Avranches strikes, the vehicles hit, at a rate of .5%, even allowing for 100% duplication, would have required 25,200 rockets, yet they used 2,560. Once they'd come up with the adjustable sight, to allow for drop, and used Beamont's method of having the sight reflecting straight off the windshield, accuracy improved over what had been achieved in the desert.



This 0.5% hit rate is for the Normandy period AFAIKT.

British opperational research post Normandy itself determined that very few tanks were knocked out by airpower: less than 5%. This research involved injspecting the tanks themselves. Where a tanks showed multipile hits it was usually the case of a tank that had already been disabled by AT guns, brocken down or run out of fuel. Less than 5% of panzers were destroyed by airpower. Most of those hits were on already dead tanks. If a tank got caught in the open the best solution was to just ignore the attack and batton down the hatch. The guns were accurate but could do not harm while the rockets were powerfull enough but lacked any accuracy.

Given the amount of tank warefare the Germans were involved in and the extreme need for AT weapons it is interesting to note that they never used their experience to introduce air fired AT rockets despite extensive experimentation.

The one system that did see minimal service was the Panzerblitz II a derivative of the R4M "Orkan" (Hurricane)





The combination of folding fins and spin stabalisation did, apparently, significantly reduce dispersion on these missiles as compared to conventional missiles.

Allied 5 inch rockets seem to have been effective anti ship weapons, not anti tank weapons.

Back to the light bomber bomb sight issue.

The TSA-2D continiously computing 'toss bombing sight' was meant to aim not only bombs but rocket projectiles in the form of the BT 700 rocket propelled bomb and this indeed is how rockets were aimed by some jet age fighter bombers.

A proper rocket sight would take into account the aircrafts altitude, speed, angle of incidence and therefore estimate range to provide a superelevation to the gunsight or it would use the pullup/toss method.

Such sights were absolutely necccesary to maintain accuracy as standoff distances had to increase.

FW 200 were deadly accurate at sinking ships: the method was to overfly the ship and release 3 bombs. Given the beam of a ship is likely to be 20m, the effect of the raised deck and super structure likely to broaden the target to 40m and given that the 5 second fusing of the bombs ensured that hits over 30 m ahead the waterline would simply tunnel beneath the water to detonate beneath the ship and break its back a string of 3 bombs was unlikely to miss.

However more effective defenses require higher speeds, higher altitudes and greater standoff distances. That is why more sophisticated bomb sight are required.


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 2, 2011)

When, exactly, was the Fw 200 listed as a light bomber?


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## Siegfried (Dec 2, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Chris Lawrence, who is a member of the Dupuy Institute (and served as a US Army staff officer during the war in Bosnia in the 1990s) has analysed several models used to measure CERs, including those devised by Colonel Dupuy, Zetterlings model, that undertaken by the US military (with input from himself) , and several other models. The acepted term incidentally is Combat Effectiveness Values (CEVs), not Combat Effectiveness Ratios. CERs are a purely Zetterling invention. Nearly all other researchers, without exception, use the CEV terminology and adopt the same standards as Dupuy.



I suppose when one looks for a dozen points of view one can always find one that supports ones own POV.

In fact Chris Lawrence, whose authority you appeal to has stated or rather conceded the following:

*1. The Germans and the US were roughly equivilent in combat effectiveness, with the US being within 20 to 30 percent of the Germans (possibly lower). This appears to have been especially true in Italy.
2. The Germans and the UK were within the same order of magnitude of combat effectiveness, with the UK perhaps being somewhat inferior (by 20 to 50 percent).....*



parsifal said:


> Whereas most of the models use a relative values, where values of less than 1.0 represent an axis advantage and values above 1.0 represent an Allied advantage, Zetterlings model is somewhat different in that it expresses its findings as a ratio, in favour of the germans. This mathemeatical model has been shown by others to naturally skew the results in favour of the Germans, and is not helped by Zetterlings failure to provide working details of how he arrived at his ratio. He does provide details, not to the actuarial level though.



This is all subjective style without substance. What you are saying is that saying that the Germans had a CER of 2:1 over the Allies is unfair. It should be expressed as 1:0.5 or some manner more comfortable to private ryan. A number is a number and had the Germans peformed as poorly they also would have looed poorly by the same rules.



parsifal said:


> Zetterling (also a member of the Dupuy institute) has subsequently tried to explain his position in his book in the following terms:
> 
> "_In effect I can be said to have used the same methodology as shown in Numbers Predictions and War, page 99. I have used the overall casualties for the campaign and assumed an average allied theatre numerical superiority of 3-1. The choice of 1.4 rather then 1.3 to account for the advantage of defence was based on east front data. It must of course be remembered that the result I show is the "Score Effectiveness", which means that the "CEV" is the square root, which would suggest a German CEV superiority of about 1.5_."



Yes indeed the CEV is the square root of the CER which makes it smaller than the CER and more acceptable to you?



parsifal said:


> Lawrence and others have pointed out the numerous errors in the assumptions made by Zetterling, chief and most obvious amongst them being his assumptions on ratios at the front. Whilst the allies overall enjoyed combat numbers many times in their favour, the combat ratios at the front were seldom that high, moreover his defence adjustment for Normandy (which were based on east front studies) are hotly challenged by many other, more qualified scholars in this subject.



No, Lawrence actually agreed with Zetterling on his use of these figures: see link below.

Some of your interpretations of the dupoy institute blog you are quoting from are as "non linear" as this preceding statement.



parsifal said:


> Man for man, because of these outside combat multipliers, the allies were *several orders of magnitude *superior than the Wehrmacht in Normandy.



German combat figures - The Dupuy Institute Forum



parsifal said:


> Applying the TNDM to Normandy one comes up with typical CEVs of between 1.2 to 1.5, thats 1.2:1 to 1.5:1 in favour of the allies.
> 
> AFAIK that does not include FPF multipliers like airpower and NGS.



In fact he comes up with the ratio is favour of the Germans though someone grudgingly.

Indeed it doesn't include airpower. 20000 allied aircraft against 300 German ones.

The Germans were still outnumbered, they still inflicted casualties at a 50% greater level than they suffered, irrespective of whether they were on the offense or defense and they did so while they lacked any air power against overwhelming allied air-power and they lacked transport and lacked ammunition and hadn't even begun to reinforce Normandy. That particular TNDM is looking shaky and incomplete.



parsifal said:


> Historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event. Though the word "revisionism" is sometimes used in a negative way, constant revision of history is part of the normal scholarly process of writing history. However in most cases for WWII, it is the process of replacing well established, well researched historical facts and replacing them with historical fantasy and propaganda. that is what is happening here i am afraid.



Denile isn't just a river in Egypt I'm afraid.


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 2, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> Indeed it doesn't include airpower. 20000 allied aircraft against 300 German ones.


Do you pluck your figures from thin air? The RAF had 5,252 aircraft, for the attack on Normandy, and the Americans had 5294, which I cannot make add up to 20,000.


> The Germans were still outnumbered, they still inflicted casualties at a 50% greater level than they suffered, irrespective of whether they were on the offense or defense


Figures, please, and an indication of what "casualties" means, and includes (dead, wounded, etc.,) and no doubling up as you did with the Allied air power.


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## parsifal (Dec 2, 2011)

The Germans during the Normandy campaign did not inflict 50% more casualties than they suffered in Normandy. they suffered a total of 288000 casualties to the 25 August, compared to 235000 on the allied side. these are conservative figures. Other sources put the committment and losses as follows:
Allied troops 
1,452,000 (by 25 July)
2,052,299 (by 21 August, in northern France alone) Including service personnel)
German 
380,000 (by 23 July) (combat) troops approx1,000,000 (total) 
1,400,000 (25 August under the command of OB West)


Other sources on casualties 
So unless you are comparing comparing combat troops of the german army to total troops of the Allies, there is no way that the Allies outnumbered the germans in combat. Just to give some context to this rather farcical discussion, a British Infantry Division had 55000 men attached, and just 4200 combat Infantry attached. Against a German Infantry Division, with a combat echelon of 12000 men, about approximately 6500 combat personnell, the British division in the frontline was actually outnumbered. 

Losses (prior to Falaise) (other sources) 

Allies
226,386 casualties
Germans

209,000- 450000, generally quoted as 386000 casualties. Thats prior to Falaise

At Falaise, you can add another 18000 deaths to the germans losses and at least 45000 captured in the pocket alone. Allied losses amounted to less than 15000 in this phase of the battle. Generally the Normandy campaign is acknowledged as ending at the conclusion of the Falise Pocket. If we did continue the "narmandy Campoaign to the advance to the Germans fontier (about the end of Septemeber, the losses of the germans army skyrocket. Name your preference 

Adding all that up the allies are said to have suffered, all up somewhere in the order of 225000 casualties during the campaign. German casualties amounted to somewhere between 285-512000 casualties, depending on who you believe. The generally accepted figure to the end of Falaise is 445000. thats a loss ratio of nearly 2:1 against the germans

I agree with Edgar, except he is quoting aircraft numbers, and I am quoting casualties. I dont know where you are getting your claims on losses, but it certainly has nothing to do with reality. They look dremed up, trumped up and grosly innaccurate to me 

As for all the discussion about CERs and CEVs, just rememeber the starting point, which is agreed by Lawrence. Thee figures are all over tyhe place. this means they are an unreliable measure, which is why I brought in the numerous discussions that professionals have had about them. You can choose to rely on them if you want, and themn seek to parade that as proff to your cockamamy casualty figurees. i hope they get dismissed as the revisionist propaganda that they are , because Germans casualties from Normandy on were never less than Allied casualties.

And just to put all this into perspective, your claim is that allied losses were at least 2x greater than German losses during the campaign. How?????????


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 3, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> Indeed it doesn't include airpower. 20000 allied aircraft against 300 German ones..


Just to bring this up-to-date, on 31-5-44, Luftwaffe strength stood at 4929, and I refuse to believe that 4629 of those were on the Eastern Front.


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## MacArther (Dec 4, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> Just to bring this up-to-date, on 31-5-44, Luftwaffe strength stood at 4929, and I refuse to believe that 4629 of those were on the Eastern Front.



Yes, there were more on the Western front....In Germany...or blown up....or unserviceable.


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 5, 2011)

MacArther said:


> Yes, there were more on the Western front....In Germany...or blown up....or unserviceable.


The report specifically says "serviceable." There were also 4573 10-1-45, after Bodenplatte, and even 3331 9-4-45.


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## cimmex (Dec 5, 2011)

Fact is, during the D-day the Luftwaffe flew only two sorties against the beeches.
Regards
cimmex


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 5, 2011)

cimmex said:


> Fact is, during the D-day the Luftwaffe flew only two sorties against the beeches.


Which just proves that they were caught completely on the hop; check the days following, and you'll find more activity, remembering that the hierarchy were still forlornly waiting for the main blow to arrive at Calais, two Lancaster Squadrons having fooled them into believing that a second invasion force was heading that way.


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## cimmex (Dec 5, 2011)

Only some lines from “Bergström”
_Thus, while almost two Allied aircraft were lost for every German aircraft loss, these losses should be compared with each side's numerical strength. During this period, the Allied air forces performed 99,000 sorties over France (Clark, p. 98 ), while the Luftwaffe only flew 13,315 sorties over France (Prien, "JG 1/11", p. 1051). Thus, the Allied loss rate was only around 1 % while the German loss rate was almost
5 %._
cimmex


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## cimmex (Dec 5, 2011)

Some more:
_Out of a total of 13,000 Allied aircraft on 6 June 1944, less than 10 % were lost over France between 6 and 30 June 1944. Out of 1,300 Luftwaffe aircraft in France (the peak number, reached on 10 June), around 50 % were lost between 6 and 30 June 1944._
cimmex


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## Edgar Brooks (Dec 5, 2011)

Having read neither "Bergstrom," "Clark," or "Prien," I can't comment, but thank you for confirming that there were a heck of a lot more than 300 Luftwaffe a/c available to combat the Allies, which is what our friend, in Australia has been trying to claim.
Any chance we can get back to bombsights, now?


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## parsifal (Dec 5, 2011)

Im from Aus and im certainly not claiming that....oh you mean the other guy......


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## Siegfried (Dec 6, 2011)

parsifal said:


> Other sources
> SNIP
> And just to put all this into perspective, your claim is that allied losses were at least 2x greater than German losses during the campaign. How?????????



You have a great many sources but no cites.

In terms of the CER.

The Germans, being outnumbered (which is now evident from Zetterlings detailed analysis of unit strength, one of his biggest if not biggest contributiuons to the debate) inflicted a higher percentage of casulaties on the allies in proportion to their numbers than the allies did in reverse.

That's what both the CER and CVR do, they factor in the reality that having a superior number of combat troops over an opponent confers a big positive non linear advantage that is roughly a 'square' factor. Other factors incorporated are the advantages of defense over offense.

The Germans, with harsh and bitter experience from the Franco-Prussian war, WW1 and WW2 were extremely effective, organised and well lead fighters. In fact their experience goes back to one of the greatest Military analysists and strategists of all time von Clausiwitz who coined the phrase 'the fog of war' and developed the concept of skirmishing to a high level after he went to work for the Tsar as a way of fighting Napoleon after yet another French invasion.


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## Siegfried (Dec 6, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> Just to bring this up-to-date, on 31-5-44, Luftwaffe strength stood at 4929, and I refuse to believe that 4629 of those were on the Eastern Front.



There are many assertions posing as facts.

The Luftwaffe managed just over 300 sorties on the first day compared to about 14000 allied ones. The Germans had bet on the d-day landings being 2 weeks latter and so most aircraft were in the east or in Germany as part of defense of the Reich as were most troops, had they bet on an earlier date things might have turned out different. Estimates of Luftwaffe aircraft available on d-day itself go to as low as 80 aircraft.

Either way you can count on the Luftwaffe being outnumbered at least 10:1 and likely 20:1. My claim for 20,000 allied aircraft is likely correct when one considers that besides the approximitly 11500 allied aircraft commited to Normandy other US airforces and RAF Commands and carrier based forces flew sorties over the rest of the France and other parts of occupied Europe that had to be dealth with by the same Luftwaffe Gruppen.

One of the key, if not the key weapon for driving back of the allied invasion was supposed to be an 'light bomb' sight, the TSA-2D. It was supposed to toss bomb allied ships and landing aircraft from high speed fighters ranging from Me 262, Me 163 rocket propelled aircraft and fast piston aircraft. Apart from the use of normal bombs with duel impact and time delay fuzes a series of rocket boosted bombs such as the BT 700 (BT = bord torpedo's) was to be also aimed by this sight. These highly connical weapons would pierce the water at a shallow angle due to their speed and tunnel several hundred meters. Impact, hydrostatic and time fuses were fitted but the primary idea was to detonate by magnetic influence fuze below the ship to break its back. This gave both a good standoff range and a very broad hit area.

Exactly why this sight did not make it to service by this time is a somewhat puzzling, it was likely a manufacturing resource issue as an earlier version, the TSA-2A was passed over.

They were seeing some service with KG-51's Me 262A2a in 1945.

The Germans were also experimenting with rockets of equivalent dimension to the large allied rockets: howerver they dispersed either 15 or 30 4g SHL4 hollow charge cluster munitions. There are illustrations in Wolfgang Fleischers "German Air Dropped Weapons". The time setting for the optimal time to bloom the cluster would require or at least benefit greatly from a computing sight.


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## tyrodtom (Dec 6, 2011)

A bomb sight for a Me-163 ???


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## parsifal (Dec 6, 2011)

> You have a great many sources but no cites.




Which is a little better than a great many opinions and no sources




> In terms of the CER.
> 
> The Germans, being outnumbered (which is now evident from Zetterlings detailed analysis of unit strength, one of his biggest if not biggest contributiuons to the debate) inflicted a higher percentage of casulaties on the allies in proportion to their numbers than the allies did in reverse.
> 
> That's what both the CER and CVR do, they factor in the reality that having a superior number of combat troops over an opponent confers a big positive non linear advantage that is roughly a 'square' factor. Other factors incorporated are the advantages of defense over offense.



I dont know about Zetterlings numbers analysis, but there are many sources that give ratio of forces and casualties suffered. One source is the Portsmouth Historical Institute, but there are many others. Whilst it should be acknowledged that accurate figures for losses and numbers are imprecise at best, even taking into account Zetterlings work, its a very big stretch to argue that the Allies outnumbered the Axis in terms of frontline strengths during the campaign. For example, the Portsmouth Institute says that on the first day the allies managed to put ashore 10000 men, and suffered 9000 casualties (not all of them permanent, or fatal ....the estimated permanent casualties were about 5500, of which about 2500 were suffered at Omaha). This source puts German permanent casualties at an estimated 13000 men. The combat strength of the Allied forces on that first day reached an estimated maximum of 39000 men, they were faced by a total of just under 100000 German troops (say a frontline strength of about 55-60000 men). Saying that German formations in the West, prior to engagement is not supported by facts. The Germans on the Eastern Front had formations that were running at about 40% authorised strength, but on the western front, prior to Normandy, the germans were using this front to rebuild their formations. Most formations in France were at 90-100% TOE strength on the first day of the campaign. As the battle progressed, the rifle strengths of German formations took a nosedive, mostly because of the interdiction campaign whereas allied formations could be rested and rebuilt. But thats a function of the campain, and a terstament to the effectiveness of Allied all arms warfare, not to the superiority of the germans on the battlefield. 

Moreover, it took some time for the Allies to overtake the germans in terms of frontline and total strengths. According to the US online History website, "By nightfall on June 6, more than 9,000 Allied soldiers were dead or wounded, but more than 100,000 had made it ashore and secured French coastal villages. Within weeks, supplies were being unloaded at Utah and Omaha beachheads at the rate of more than 20,000 tons per day. By June 11, more than 326,000 troops, 55,000 vehicles, and 105,000 tons of supplies had been landed on the beaches. By June 30, the Allies had established a firm foothold in Normandy. Allied forces crossed the River Seine on August 19.

Moreover it was not until the third week of the campaign that the Germans were overtaken in terms of numbers. by June 11, the estimated frontline strength had reched about 400000 men. 39000 men were lost outright when Cherbourg fell. Panzer lehr lost 2000 men in a single day. There were never anything like those casualty rates suffered by the Allied forces in any part of the campaign 

Your position here moreover, seems to have shifted. You started out by saying that Allied casualty rates were twice that of german rates. Clearly the data that we do have does not support that. The Germans appear to have suffered around 425000 casulaties through to the end of Falaise, compared to somewhere in the order of 209-235000 Allied casualties. You have not responded to, or refuted those numbers, though you are sticking to the line that Germans were killing twice as many allies as the allies were inflicting on the Germans. I cant see how that can be sustained when a maximum of 1.4 million allied soldiers were deployed to the theatre in the time frasme, and less than a fourth of those were frontline combat troops, yet they managed to inflict casualties of around 425000. I cannot see how it can then be claimed that allied loss rates were twice that of the germans, or that they outnumbered the Germans in terms of frontline boots on the ground. 



> The Germans, with harsh and bitter experience from the Franco-Prussian war, WW1 and WW2 were extremely effective, organised and well lead fighters. In fact their experience goes back to one of the greatest Military analysists and strategists of all time von Clausiwitz who coined the phrase 'the fog of war' and developed the concept of skirmishing to a high level after he went to work for the Tsar as a way of fighting Napoleon after yet another French invasion.




The germans had a fine military tradition and a solid basis from which to build their army, these are valid issues to consider. So too did the British Army. The other allies like the americans and canada, had less in terms of military traditions, but they were excellently trained, led and equipped, and were imbued with a fighting spirit at least equal to that of the germans. There is no evidence to support the notion that the younger nations that participated in the fighting were in any way handicapped by that. 

Working against the Germans was their very limited equipment levels, the large number of caualties their army had suffered by 1944, the supply shortages they were suffering, the fact that a significant proportion of their formations werent even German in nationality (with motivation issues that went with that). other formations like certain SS formations were excellent in motivation, but poorly officered. Other formations had virtually no transport, and the list goes on and on. 





[/QUOTE]


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## parsifal (Dec 6, 2011)

> You have a great many sources but no cites.




Which is a little better than a great many opinions and no sources




> In terms of the CER.
> 
> The Germans, being outnumbered (which is now evident from Zetterlings detailed analysis of unit strength, one of his biggest if not biggest contributiuons to the debate) inflicted a higher percentage of casulaties on the allies in proportion to their numbers than the allies did in reverse.
> 
> That's what both the CER and CVR do, they factor in the reality that having a superior number of combat troops over an opponent confers a big positive non linear advantage that is roughly a 'square' factor. Other factors incorporated are the advantages of defense over offense.



I dont know about Zetterlings numbers analysis, but there are many sources that give ratio of forces and casualties suffered. One source is the Portsmouth Historical Institute, another is the American Historical Association, but there are many others, more substantial than those, including many in print. Whilst it should be acknowledged that accurate figures for losses and numbers are imprecise at best, even taking into account Zetterlings work, its a very big stretch to argue that the Allies outnumbered the Axis in terms of frontline strengths during the campaign. For example, the Portsmouth Institute says that on the first day the allies managed to put ashore 100000 men, and suffered 9000 casualties (not all of them permanent, or fatal ....the estimated permanent casualties were about 5500, of which about 2500 were suffered at Omaha). This source puts German/Axis permanent casualties at an estimated 13000 men. The combat strength of the Allied forces on that first day reached an estimated maximum of 39000 men, they were faced by a total of just under 100000 German troops (say a frontline strength of about 55-60000 men). Saying that German formations in the West were understrength , prior to engagement is not supported by facts. The Germans on the Eastern Front had formations that were running at about 40% authorised strength, but on the western front, prior to Normandy, the germans were using this front to rebuild their formations. Most formations in France were at 90-100% TOE strength on the first day of the campaign. As the battle progressed, the rifle strengths of German formations took a nosedive, mostly because of the interdiction campaign whereas allied formations could be rested and rebuilt. But thats a function of the campain, and a terstament to the effectiveness of Allied all arms warfare, not to the superiority of the germans on the battlefield. 

Moreover, it took some time for the Allies to overtake the germans in terms of frontline and total strengths. According to the US online History website, "By nightfall on June 6, more than 9,000 Allied soldiers were dead or wounded, but more than 105,000 had made it ashore and secured French coastal villages. Within weeks, supplies were being unloaded at Utah and Omaha beachheads at the rate of more than 20,000 tons per day. By June 11, more than 326,000 troops, 55,000 vehicles, and 105,000 tons of supplies had been landed on the beaches. By June 30, the Allies had established a firm foothold in Normandy. Allied forces crossed the River Seine on August 19.

Moreover it was not until the third week of the campaign that the Germans were overtaken in terms of numbers. by June 11, the estimated frontline strength had reched about 400000 men. 39000 men were lost outright when Cherbourg fell. Panzer Lehr lost 2000 men in a single day. There were never anything like those casualty rates suffered by the Allied forces in any part of the campaign 

Your position here moreover, seems to have shifted. You started out by saying (or at least implying) that Allied casualty rates were twice that of german rates. Clearly the data that we do have does not support that. The Germans appear to have suffered around 425000 casulaties through to the end of Falaise, compared to somewhere in the order of 209-235000 Allied casualties. You have not responded to, or refuted those numbers, though you are sticking to the line that Germans were killing twice as many allies as the allies were inflicting on the Germans. I cant see how that can be sustained when a maximum of 1.4 million allied soldiers were deployed to the theatre in the time frasme, and less than a fourth of those were frontline combat troops, yet they managed to inflict casualties of around 425000. I cannot see how it can then be claimed that allied loss rates were twice that of the germans, or that they outnumbered the Germans in terms of frontline boots on the ground. 



> The Germans, with harsh and bitter experience from the Franco-Prussian war, WW1 and WW2 were extremely effective, organised and well lead fighters. In fact their experience goes back to one of the greatest Military analysists and strategists of all time von Clausiwitz who coined the phrase 'the fog of war' and developed the concept of skirmishing to a high level after he went to work for the Tsar as a way of fighting Napoleon after yet another French invasion.




The germans had a fine military tradition and a solid basis from which to build their army, these are valid issues to consider. So too did the British Army. The other allies like the americans and canada, had less in terms of military traditions, but they were excellently trained, led and equipped, and were imbued with a fighting spirit at least equal to that of the germans. There is no evidence to support the notion that the younger nations that participated in the fighting were in any way handicapped by that. 

Working against the Germans was their very limited equipment levels, the large number of caualties their army had suffered by 1944, the supply shortages they were suffering, the fact that a significant proportion of their formations werent even German in nationality (with motivation issues that went with that). other formations like certain SS formations were excellent in motivation, but poorly officered. Other formations had virtually no transport, and the list goes on and on.


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## tyrodtom (Dec 6, 2011)

We're talking land warfare on a air power forum ?

I would think that of course the Germans inflicted more causulties, they were fighting from prepared defensive positions, with preperpared fallback positions. A defense almost always inflicts more hurt on a attacking force. They're in bunkers, dugouts, with prepared, cleared fields of fire. If a defense can't inflict more death on the attackers than they receive, by a gross amount, they are going to fail.


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## parsifal (Dec 6, 2011)

tyrodtom said:


> We're talking land warfare on a air power forum ?
> 
> I would think that of course the Germans inflicted more causulties, they were fighting from prepared defensive positions, with preperpared fallback positions. A defense almost always inflicts more hurt on a attacking force. They're in bunkers, dugouts, with prepared, cleared fields of fire. If a defense can't inflict more death on the attackers than they receive, by a gross amount, they are going to fail.



First off, yes, often happens around here that we talk land operations on air forums.

In relation to losses , yes one would expect the defender to take less casualties than an attacker, however firstly, the assertion being made is that the germans inflicted twice as many casualties on the Allies regardless of whether they were attacking or defending. secondly, whilst full details on losses are lacking, the information that is available suggests german losses were about twice as bad overall during the campaign as was suffred by the allies. There is some variance in the numbers, because of incomplete records, but Allied losses were about 209-235000, compared to 288-450000 for the germans, depending on your cutoff point and who you believe. The generally and most widely accepted loss rates for the Germans to a point just after Falaise is 425000 casualties. The Germans certainly were not inflicting casualties at a rate of 2 for every one. It was more like 1:2 against them, down to about 1:1.4 against them. this is disputed by Siegfried, but he does not have any numbers or sources as yet


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## parsifal (Dec 7, 2011)

According to Antony Beevor (D-Day The Battle For Normandy(first Published 2009 Penguin Books) 592 pages, at page 263, he states " _by 30 June , the British Army had suffered 24668 casualties since the invasion began, while the Americans had lost 34,034men. German losses for the same period were 80,783_".....

Overall German to Allied casualties were running at 1.38:1. At this same stage there were 346000 +/- 10000 Allied troops deployed into Normandy, compared to approximately 400000 German troops.

These exchange rates occurred just after the fall of Cherbourg, that had seen the loss of 39000 Germans in one swoop. however it also was at the height of the Bocage fighting, incorporated the hard fighting at the times of the landings and saw some of the heavy fighting around Caen. These were battles where the german defensive capabilities were significantly enhanced by the terrain, and the effects of air support diminished by those same terrain factors. 

As I have been saying from the beginning, all this talk of CEVs, CERs and other combat ratios are very unreliable, and should not be used to draw any firm conclusions about the fighting capabilities of the respective armies. They are essentially a predictive tool that can be used when other sources are not available. In this case, there are some records on strengths and losses, that clearly show the Germans as the inferior force in this battle (not in terms of numbers, in terms of combat effectiveness). The Germans outnumbered the Allies at this time (or at worst were only marginally inferrior in numbers), yet had suffered close to 40% greater casualties, and were losing the positional battle to boot. They were on the strategic defensive, and were in terrain that greatly favoured the defence. As tyrodtom points one would expect the allies, as the attackers, to be suffering more heavily as the attackers, but they werent. 

My opinion is that it was not that the individual allied soldier was better than the individual German. Its just that the Allies enjoyed so many advantages that acted as combat multipliers for them that it was virtually impossible for them not to achieve combat superiority in most situations

I am also not saying that the germans were not effective. their methods of defence were first class, but this could not offset the inherent advantages enjoyed by the Allies. As Beevor also notes "_On the eastern Front the Germans had learnt from Soviet bombardments to minimise losses in defence. They applied these lessons to good effect in Normandy. Their front line was no more than a light screenof machine gun positions and delay squads. Several hundred yard further back a rather more substantial line was prepred. behind that was usually a third line that contained a counterattack force, ready to counterattack immediately. 

The germans knew well that the best moment to catch the allies off guard was just after they had taken a position. More casualties were commonly inflicted on the allies at this moment than during the actual assault (by the allies). The allies were often slow to dig in, and would often resort to using German trenches. These were often booby trapped, and always preregistered by German artillery.......(the allies) found the Germans to were very adept at camourflage_." Beevor also gives praise to the German abilities at entrenching which he considered to be superior to that of the allies. Most of these advantages can be put down to their experiences in Russia.


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## Siegfried (Dec 7, 2011)

Above some of the BT weapons which ranged from BT200 to BT1400 (number = approx warhead weight in kg)
They got to the point of testing in lakes.



tyrodtom said:


> A bomb sight for a Me-163 ???








Meant to target the allied invasion fleet. Above is an inverted Me 163 wind tunnel model fitted with these weapons. 

I suppose the concept could certainly sink battleships and cruisers outside of gun range.


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## tyrodtom (Dec 7, 2011)

With the known extremely short endurance of the Me-163, are you sure this could even hit targets well within normal gun range?

It's evident, and even more evident now, the Germans needed a department to look at projects so time and resources wouldn't be wasted on " stupid" ideas.

The Allies did have such a agency, but some slipped by them too. Look up the Panjandrum Wheel.


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## Siegfried (Dec 7, 2011)

I don't see an anti-shipping Me 163 as stupid at all especially if it was the longer ranged Me 263 version. The Me 263, BT 700 weapon and TSA-2D bombsight were all independantly developed weapons so the expense was only in integrating them. The range is given in "Luftwaffe Secret Projects: Ground attack and special purpose aircraft" as a radious of around 45 knautical miles or so (don't have book with me). 

Once airborn they would be beyond interception. The weakiness is of course the range, it can protect only a narrow section of coast. These interceptors and their pilots would need to do double duty intercepting bombers or reconaisance aircraft using either these aircraft; otherwise they'd just be wasting time waiting for an invasion fleet on their stretch. 

The strength of the weapon was its extremely potent weaponry the warhead is equal to a truely massive torpedo, its detonation in an area that can not be easily protecred, the expected high accuracy and pk and the difficulty in intercepting.

Ofcourse the Luftwaffe didn't atually decide to produce it; however they did investigate it.


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## tyrodtom (Dec 7, 2011)

The proposed Me-263 would have had a endurance of 12 minutes of power. That's where they get that 45 mile radius, 12 minutes at their speed would equal about 90 miles.

So you got to plan a mission down to the minute or it won't make it back to land, it's got to pick it's target with enough care so that once it goes low to skip bomb it has to have enough fuel to regain altitude to glide to it's landing field, where it will be helpless until towed to cover.

Sounds like another brillant brainstorm to deplete the Luftwaffe of it's pilots even faster.


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## Njaco (Dec 7, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> I don't see an anti-shipping Me 163 as stupid at all especially if it was the longer ranged Me 263 version. The Me 263, BT 700 weapon and TSA-2D bombsight were all independantly developed weapons so the expense was only in integrating them. The range is given in "Luftwaffe Secret Projects: Ground attack and special purpose aircraft" as a radious of around 45 knautical miles or so (don't have book with me).
> 
> Once airborn they would be beyond interception. The weakiness is of course the range, it can protect only a narrow section of coast. These interceptors and their pilots would need to do double duty intercepting bombers or reconaisance aircraft using either these aircraft; otherwise they'd just be wasting time waiting for an invasion fleet on their stretch.
> 
> ...



Sooooo......aren't we really talking about the Bachem "Nader"?


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## standish (Oct 13, 2012)

Siegfried wrote in #49:
"I can't see it as particularly usefull within the context as you are comparing medium altitude level bomber attacks using level bombing sights and large strings of bombs against dry docked ships with dive bomber attacks against ships at speed and out to sea fully defended and at the ready. Brest was in fact regarded as difficult to defend, it was too open to the sea and so gave limited opportunites to mount a defense and had limited FLAK which is one reason the Germans moved their ships from the area. It was a level bomber attack against a dry docked ships using armour piercing bombs dropped from sufficient height to penetrate rather than semi-armour piercing bombs dropped from low level against a manouvering ship. Halifaxes and Wellingtons would have been nearly relatively ineffective against manouvering ships. The height of these attacks also precludes use of smaller more effective light FLAK.'"
--
My uncle Standish was the Australian pilot of 1 of the 2 Wellingtons shot down at Brest 1 July 1941, as Siegfried was discussing. His CO wrote to my grandmother that the flight was low and steady, which suggests Standish was lining up (a flak ship?) for a precise hit. Just a bit of personal info...
cheers.


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