Best Air Force 1943-1945

I can accept views about parity between the AAF and RAF in 1943; but beginning in 1944, the AAF was the best. There cant be much argument about it.

I think there can be much argument. In 1944 the USAAF's main heavy bomber carries the same bomb load a similar distance as the RAF's primary light bomber. The USAAF was not unique in having an aircraft for every niche role - mine degaussing Wellingtons anyone? Once again, best doesn't equal biggest and I stand by my evaluation. Given that you're not likely to budge I think we should leave it there.

There also seems to be a slight misalignment in juxtapositions here. If we are talking the end of 1944, I would tend to agree that the US air force was ascendant, both in quality and quantity.

However at the beginning of 1944, that is far from proven. If you rewind just a couple of months earlier, to Schcweinfurt, the US was typically sending bomber formations over Germany of 2-300 aircraft. In comparison the RAF was sending bomber formations of 700-1000 aircraft. In terms of tonnages dropped, the RAF outstripped the Americans until well into 1944.

Again, in terms of such items as Night fighters and electronics, the US was lagging at the beginning of 1944, but by the end, I think they were probably ahead. The juxtaposition needs to be carefully selected when making these sorts of comparisons

Parsifal, good points. In Feb 1944, the 8th AF was putting up 600 - 700 heavy bombers, per mission. And month by month, the totals kept increasing. And this doesn't count the 15th AF and Pacific based units which would significantly jack up those totals.

As for night fighters, by going on what Erich has written, the AAF was behind all the way to the end. As for night bombing; the B29 gave the edge to the AAF (in 1945) by virtue of it's better performance and capability to carry more navaids than the Lanc.

I can agree with all of that, with regard to NFs, one ought not discount the P-61....it was a fantastic aircraft in my view, and by June '44 my opinion is that the AI carried by US aircraft was at least as advanced as any other air force. The AAF was progressing and expanding at a breathtaking pace that no-one could hope to match

buffnut453 said:

For the record, I believe the RAF had the edge in 1943, the RAF and USAAF were broadly equal in 1944 and it was only in 1945 that the USAAF truly became the dominant air force in the world.

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The RAF had a decided edge in heavy bombers, medium/intruder capability with the mosquito, day and night fighter squadrons with their own equipment through mid 1943 in England. The RNAF had several carriers in the Atlantic and several in the Med for naval air assets. Offhand I am unclear on RNAF assets anywhere else such as CBI/PTO.

From an Airpower standpoint, the USAAF and USN/USMC were collectively deployed everywhere in early 1943 except for USSR.
The RAF was incapable of carrying and sustaining either tactical or strategic campaigns against the Japanese

From an Airpower standpoint the USAAF exceeded RAF for strategic bombing capabilities - using 'all in' numbers across the globe by mid 1943, including bases from every continent except Asia ('context' USSR), Tactical Air, Naval Air, Air Transport Command. The Commonwealth was shoulder to shoulder in smaller numbers in the PTO but the RAF and RNAF were virtually non existant in the PTO/CBI.

If you count Manufacturing and Distribution of the US as an integral part of airpower (and I do), and you count the volumes of aircraft and spares and aviation gasoline as an integral part of Airpower (and I do) and you mention the numbers of US aircraft distributed to USSR, Britain, Commonwealth (and I do) and the distribution of aviation and diesel fuel to the Allies (and I do)and the flight crew training facilities, aircraft, instructors provided to Allies (and I do) - as an integral part of Airpower -

Then the the US achieved parity in early 1943 and ascended in first half and clearly the most powerful by the of 1943.

Quality is impossible to measure comparatively between USAAF/USN/USMC and RAF/RNAF by mid 1943 although the RAF had a clear edge in combat hour experience in total and specifically in ETO/MTO... after that timeframe IMO the US exceeded then far outstripped the RAF and Commonwealth in aggragate quality and effectiveness based on numbers of pilots and crews entering operations with high quality training and multiplying that by the numbers of crews in combat ops.

So, from an Airpower capability as measured by a.) quality and variety of aircraft suited to tactical and strategic combat role (daylight strategic bombing B-17, B-24), Light-medium daylight bombing and attack (A-20, B-25, B-26) , Long Range anti sub (B-24, PBY and USN Carriers), tactical air/close support (P-40, A36, P-47, P-38, F4U), long range escort fighters (ie F4U/P-38), Naval Air (SBD, F4F, F4U, TBF), Air Transport Command (C-47, C-46, C-54), b.) Deployment, c.) Theatres fully engaged, d.) tactical/strategic pressure applied to Axis, d.) inventory of new advanced aircraft (B-29, P-51B, F6F, P-61, A-26, SB2C) being produced and staging for deployment, e.) Huge Inventory of high quality aircrews staging for deployment to all theatres, f.) manufacturing facilities producing not only for US needs but also for Allies (P-39, P-40, P-47. B-24, PBY, F4F, C-47, B-25, A-20, etc) - by mid 1943.

I have to agree with Bill here. Just the fact that by that time the US could project its air power anywhere alone sets it above.

Bill, the RNAF is the FAA (Fleet Air Arm).

Dragondog is correct by 44 the USAAF was the dominant airpower but disagree with his assumption of training being better in the USAAFand think that is a holdover from 1940's propaganda films .One item comes to mind is the commonwealth instructed on the inverted flat spin but the USAAF didn't ( trying to find ref). Commonwealth navigators were trained to a higher standard and most guys that served in both Commowealth and USAAF systems universially agree that instrument flying was of a higher standard in the Commonwealth.

In the ETO US pilots were receiving slightly more hours in training before being sent to the front. 2/3 of the US air force never left the continental US, as opposed to about half the RAF never leaving the british isles. It was theoretically possible for the US to have better trained pilots, but hard to say about the actual front line formations.

drgondog said:

From an Airpower standpoint, the USAAF and USN/USMC were collectively deployed everywhere in early 1943 except for USSR.

The RAF was incapable of carrying and sustaining either tactical or strategic campaigns against the Japanese

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The RAF had operated in the USSR, both fighters and bombers. Your comment about the RAF not sustaining tactical or strategic campaigns against the Japanese is sheer nonsense. The 'I' in CBI stood for India where the RAF had both fighter and bomber assets of all classes and sustained the campaign from the withdrawal out of Burma in 1942 until the reconquest in 1944. In 1944-45, the RN carriers were undertaking extensive operations in the Pacific, including some of the last raids against Japanese targets during the war. The inventory of new aircraft on the RAF side included the Tempest, the Meteor (again, where would the US have been without British jet engine technology?), the Vampire, the Canberra in the stocks etc. The B-17 was not a good strategic bomber - too small a payload for the effort. The Beaufighter and Mosquito were at least as good, if not better, than any near-equivalents in the US inventory. And once again you keep going back to manufacturing when the question was about the best air force. The air force didn't make a single aircraft - the US industrial complex did.

For the Pacific, you would also have to add the RAAF and the RNZAF, both of wich retained strong links to the RAF, despite some later war afiliations to the US. They remained more "british" than "US" in terms of their thinking, training, and equipment. The RAAF remained the dominant land based air force in the South Pacific zone until well into 1943. USAAF was dominant in the SWPac and Central Pac. Dont know about the North pacific, since this could arguably include western Canada.

Saying that the RAF (and its dominion subsidiaries) was a force without global projection capabilities (or even limited capabilities) is a nonsense. Saying that the USAAF in late 1943 dominated this area in late '43 is also highly debateable. it depends on the criteria that you want to make that assumption by. Saying that the USAAF was dominant by the latter half of 1944 I can entirely agree with. By then, it was a true statement.

buffnut453 said:

The RAF had operated in the USSR, both fighters and bombers.

Total force deployment in squadrons from Jan 1943 through Jan 1944? Operating where and in what capacity?

Your comment about the RAF not sustaining tactical or strategic campaigns against the Japanese is sheer nonsense.

Total force deployment in squadrons from Jan 1943 through Jan 1944? Operating where and in what capacity?

The 'I' in CBI stood for India where the RAF had both fighter and bomber assets of all classes and sustained the campaign from the withdrawal out of Burma in 1942 until the reconquest in 1944. In 1944-45, the RN carriers were undertaking extensive operations in the Pacific, including some of the last raids against Japanese targets during the war.

Total force deployment in squadrons from Jan 1943 through Jan 1944? Operating where and in what capacity? All classes bombing which strategic Japanese targets escorted by what? How many carriers, what class and attacking what? In comparison with US assets in theatre?

The inventory of new aircraft on the RAF side included the Tempest, the Meteor (again, where would the US have been without British jet engine technology?), the Vampire, the Canberra in the stocks etc.

Agreed Brit contribution to technology. Meteor contributed to what tactically or strategically? Canberra??????? are you talking about what the USAF purchased as B-57 in the 50's??


The B-17 was not a good strategic bomber - too small a payload for the effort.

And the German Petro chemical industry fell to early daylight raids by RAF?? while Harris was focused on night area bombing of German cities?? How did the RAF tonnage capacity contribute to destruction of German aircraft industry to the ball bearing industry, etc, etc


The Beaufighter and Mosquito were at least as good, if not better, than any near-equivalents in the US inventory. And once again you keep going back to manufacturing when the question was about the best air force. The air force didn't make a single aircraft - the US industrial complex did.

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The question I posed was about AIRPOWER and the footprint of the US across all theatres, which was not materialized out of thin air...

OK - I have to throw in a few comments here....

Fist off the Commonwealth training program (and we'll talk Canada) by necessity had to have an expanded instrument training program based on location and weather conditions or I don't think you could have rapidly graduated any primary student without having them building flight time unless they flew purposely in the soup. With that said the expanded nature of this training can only benefit so far as IMC flying in that day was limited and basically crude. The biggest in this scenario was introducing instrument flying at an earlier part of the allied training curriculum which might and I repeat might have gotten some pilots more proficient in this type of flying earlier in their career, and this was stated by some US pilots who did learn to fly in Canada. In the end however what was introduced early in flight training was generally learned and made proficient by learning the skill "in country," or by "do or die."


I don't know where some of these numbers mentioned on this thread are coming from but I'd like to see sources. To say for example that there were 5,000 trained aircrew coming out of Canada by Dec 41 might be an accurate statement, but I'd like to know how many of them were combat ready as many of those who got their wings had to spend some time in an OTU before they saw combat. While comparing what the commonwealth was doing at the same period one should look to the south as there were hundreds of schools in the US pumping out hordes of fresh pilots, who were in various levels of proficiency. In my old home in Southern California you had Polaris Academy (mention on this site in many older threads) were assisting the commonwealth within their own ranks.

War Eagle Field - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I can tell you that there are "dozens" of auxiliary fields peppered through out this area of Southern California that still can be seen today and supported this training effort.

Bottom line I'd like to see sources on some of these numeric claims and would also see where some of these fresh recruits were within their training when they hit the European Continent. Additionally I'd like to see data that supported the IMC proficiency of the typical combat pilot being introduced to IMC flying earlier in their career rather than later.

With regard to the comments about how effective the B-17 was and the impact of the offensive on oil installations, I think it a a bit of a stretch to say the B-17 was inneffective as a bomber. Perhaps what this is alluding to though are comments made by Speer to the effect that the British bombs, by reason of them generally being bigger in explosive capability, caused more lasting damage than the generally lighter weight bombs carried by the US heavies

With regard to the Oil offensive, it is true that this was the eventual focus of the 8th AF from the beginning of 1944. However from a point just after the US commencement of this offensive, BC also diverted an increasing, and effective proportion of its efforts to this goal. There were many BC raids on oil installtions, in fact oil was identified as one of the targets to be attacked fro the very beginning of the war, however it was not until the early part of 1944 that concerted efforts were made to target that complex. After the failure of the battle of berlin, and after the diversion to the Normandy invasion, BC tended to concentrate on transport and communications, in the latter part of 1944, which was at least as effective in dislocating the german war effort as the offensive on oil. Because the US made it the focus of their 1944 campaign (until June) they are generally given all the credit, however this is just as innaccurate as saying the b-17 was not an effective bomber. The truth lies somewhere in between....For the record, the last big raid on the petrochemical complex was by the RAF, in late April 1945, when 107 lancasters attacked a plant in Norway.

USAAF can rightly claim taking the lions share of destroying the Luftwaffe day fighter force, however, BCs efforts at neutralising German industry are not generally adequately acknowledged. This arises not because the campaign was inneffective (many will disagree, i know), but because the USSBS on which most post war histories of the subject are based, gives only scant attention to the issue. According to a short summary given in the survey, the efforts of BC accounted for about 17% of german industrial potential in 1944. Other studies have put the RAFs efforts as high as 46%. Others say that less than 1% of productive effort was lost to bombing. What is clear, is that the germans were forced to divert over 85% of their artillery production to flak defence, and divert over 1 million men to aerial defence. If one accepts that it was a lack of manpower, more than anything, that led to the demise of the third Reich, and that the critical moments for the regime occurred on the eastern front sometime before the commencement of the US offensive, then the contribution of the RAF to this moment becomes readily apparent. As Speer said after the wqar, BC in its efforts opened a second front, long before there actually was a second front. The efforts of BC in contributing to that defeat start to move into focus.....add to that the heavier casulties suffered by the german civilian population, and the case becaomes much stronger as to the importance of the contribution made by BC in achieving victory.

According to wiki, incidentally, the RAF continued to drop higher tonnages of bombs over germany than the USAAF until the very end, despite being outnumbered by the Americans by that stage. I make no claim as to the veracity of that statistic. I have stated previously that tonnages dropped by the RAF greatly exceeeded the USAAC on amonth by month basis until at least the spring of 1944....thereafter the case become a lot less believable

FLYBOYJ said:

OK - I have to throw in a few comments here....

Fist off the Commonwealth training program (and we'll talk Canada) by necessity had to have an expanded instrument training program based on location and weather conditions or I don't think you could have rapidly graduated any primary student without having them building flight time unless they flew purposely in the soup. With that said the expanded nature of this training can only benefit so far as IMC flying in that day was limited and basically crude. The biggest in this scenario was introducing instrument flying at an earlier part of the allied training curriculum which might and I repeat might have gotten some pilots more proficient in this type of flying earlier in their career, and this was stated by some US pilots who did learn to fly in Canada. In the end however what was introduced early in flight training was generally learned and made proficient by learning the skill "in country," or by "do or die."


I don't know where some of these numbers mentioned on this thread are coming from but I'd like to see sources. To say for example that there were 5,000 trained aircrew coming out of Canada by Dec 41 might be an accurate statement, but I'd like to know how many of them were combat ready as many of those who got their wings had to spend some time in an OTU before they saw combat. While comparing what the commonwealth was doing at the same period one should look to the south as there were hundreds of schools in the US pumping out hordes of fresh pilots, who were in various levels of proficiency. In my old home in Southern California you had Polaris Academy (mention on this site in many older threads) were assisting the commonwealth within their own ranks.

War Eagle Field - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I can tell you that there are "dozens" of auxiliary fields peppered through out this area of Southern California that still can be seen today and supported this training effort.

Bottom line I'd like to see sources on some of these numeric claims and would also see where some of these fresh recruits were within their training when they hit the European Continent. Additionally I'd like to see data that supported the IMC proficiency of the typical combat pilot being introduced to IMC flying earlier in their career rather than later.

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I've been reading alot about the subject of military training in Canada one of my main source was called "Immigrants of War" and the sunject is about the 9000+ US citizens that joined the RCAF it consists mainly of interviews with the US guys ,I don't own the book but I have gotten it several times from the library, here is a fairly good piece on the book with interviews , I believe the Blakesee interview in the following link might help explain my position on the IMC training as he was very upset with the quality and grounded some guys when he went to 4th FG
http://immigrantsofwar.blogspot.com/

pbfoot said:

I've been reading alot about the subject of military training in Canada one of my main source was called "Immigrants of War" and the sunject is about the 9000+ US citizens that joined the RCAF it consists mainly of interviews with the US guys ,I don't own the book but I have gotten it several times from the library, here is a fairly good piece on the book with interviews , I believe the Blakesee interview in the following link might help explain my position on the IMC training as he was very upset with the quality and grounded some guys when he went to 4th FG
IMMIGRANTS OF WAR -

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Blakesee complained lack of training with regards to some pilots coming into his command and he wanted to expand in country training, especially flying IMC, this has been well documented in many books. Brass at a higher level sometimes over ruled him (Jablonski, Target Germany 1971). Like the training in Canada, the environment dictated what you trained and flew in. There definitely needed to be some in-country training that provided IMC flight training but that didn't mean that green pilots arriving in country were "poorly" trained or incompetent - they just lacked "specific" training that was needed for the theater. It's obvious that pilots going to the Pacific didn't have the same problem and you heard little of poorly trained "green" pilots reaching the Pacific.

Blakesee was a premier combat leader and probably a perfectionist and I wonder how many of those he "grounded" would have done fine in the groups - or at the same time would have run into a granite cloud the first time they were sent over the channel. That's why I'd like to see numbers to support all of this (if available).

drgondog said:

The question I posed was about AIRPOWER and the footprint of the US across all theatres, which was not materialized out of thin air...

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To answer the question about units in the Burma/India theatre (ORBAT as of 1 Jul 44 - source "Burma Air War" by Chris Shores):

221 Gp, Imphal
7 sqns of Hurricanes
3 sqns of Sptfires
1 sqn of Vengeances

224 Gp, Chittagong
2 sqns of Spitfires
4 sqns of Hurricanes
1 sqn of Vengeances
1 sqn of Beaufighters

231 Gp, Calcutta
3 sqns of Liberators
1 sqn of Wellingtons
1 sqn of Warwicks (ASR role)

222 Gp, Colombo
2 sqns Spitfires
3 sqns Beaufighters
1 sqn Liberators
1 sqn Thunderbolts
1 sqn Sunderlands
3 sqns Catalinas

225 Gp, Bangalore
2 sqns Beaufighters
2 sqns Liberators
1 sqn Hurricanes
1 sqn Wellingtons
3 sqns Catalinas

229 Gp
1 sqn of Hudsons/Dakotas


Troop Carrier Command
4 sqns of Dakotas

PR Group, Comilla
1 sqn Spitfires
1 sqn Mosquitos



By 12 Dec, the ORBAT had grown to the following:

221 Gp, Imphal
6 sqns of Hurricanes
4 sqns of Spitfires
3 sqns of Thunderbolts
1 sqn of Mosquitos

224 Gp, Cox's Bazaar
4 sqns of Thunderbolts
3 sqns of Beaufighters
3 sqns of Hurricanes
2 sqns of Spitfires

231 Gp
6 sqns of Liberators

PR Force
1 sqn Spitfires
1 sqn Mosquitos

293 Wg
1 sqn of Beaufighters
1 sqn of Spitfires

222 Gp, Colombo
2 sqns of Spitfires
3 sqns of Beaufighters
2 sqns of Liberators
3 sqns of Catalinas
1 sqn of Sunderlands

225 Gp, Bangalore
1 sqn of Hurricanes
2 sqns of Liberators
2 sqns of Catalinas

Additional Units Working Up for Operations
2 sqns of Thunderbolts
4 sqns of Mosquitos
2 sqns of Hurricanes
1 sqn each of Liberators, Wellingtons, Dakotas and Spitfires

Combat Cargo Task Force
4 sqns of Dakotas

As I keep banging on, I accept the USAAF was bigger but the RAF was just as widely dispersed, and if you take the Commonwealth air forces into account (which I haven't until now but is not an unreasonable thing to do), were operating pretty much everywhere the USAAF was operating and at a pretty large scale and in pretty much all the roles the USAAF had at that time.

Buffnut - you may keep banging on. The point I was making was about Airpower deployed globally by the US versus any other nation. You are free to add the Commonwealth if you choose, but please consider subtracting the pilots trained, aircraft supplied or aviation gasoline provided by the US (to derive the 'effective Commonwealth strength) - Ditto USSR

1.) the Commonwealth is not the RAF, but if it was it probably still doesn't total up the the combined assets of USAAF/USN/USMC - and definitely could not if you include assets in US, Canal Zone, Brazil, Greenland, etc

The USAAF alone had constituted as full Air Forces the following:
1. 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th AF - Continental US
2. 5th, 7th. 11th and 13th AF - PTO including northern, southwest and central Pacific.
3. 6th AF -Canal Zone and South America
5. 10th AF - India/Burma
6. 14th AF - China
7. 9th, 12F - Afica/Italy (not counting 15th until Jan, 1943)
8. 8th AF - England
9. Anti Submarine Command

The USAAF alone had 1.9 Million Officers and Enlisted men active Dec 1942. I would have to dig but the assets of the USN and USMC in PTO by Jan 1943 was far larger in early 1943 than Commonwealth and growing exponentially.

Source - The Official Guide to the Army Air Forces, published May 1944.

I'm not denying your statement but I am disagreeing that the USAAF training was the be all end all that much of this thread is stating. What I am am trying to state although maybe poorly is that the training was probably very comparable. One point I have neglected to make was the number of trained pilots that came north to become part of the pointy end that because of age or ability were streamed into instructing much to their chagrin . IMO the quality of the aircrew that went overseas in late 40-41 from canada was probably not great but were needed to fill aircraft I'm going to suggest the same was taking place in 42 for the USAAF and as time went on quality for both increased