Best Bomber of ww2

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I read a story the other day that an RAF Catalina was patrolling the Atlantic and saw a U -Boat. It attacked and the the U-Boat fought, inflicting the Pilot with 72 injuries and completely trashed the plane. Despite this, he destroyed the U-boat and made it back to land where he recieved emergency medical attention. Oh, and he was awarded a Victoria Cross too.
 
You wouldn't like one of them pointing at you while anti-shipping. "Dat 'Tse-Tse' hat 57mm, BAH! Wie hat 105mm! Ja ja ja!" That's what they'd say...exactly like that.

And the Mosquito pilot would say "Oh, bollocks ginger they've got those huge 'effin guns on that blighter! Let's twaddle off to blighty and screw this mission"

And that's what happened on the 18th June 1944. Exactly like that...I have..the erm...reports.
 
And why would a P.108 be shooting at a U-Boat? Politics never was your thing, was it?
 
It would be too heavy and escort isn't going to stop AA fire. Possibly after the Armistice but really, they didn't do that much against the Germans.
 
Some U-Boats had very stiff AA, but what was dangerous to attacking planes was the 20mm, not the larger guns.

Even so, the idea of staying on the surface and fighting it out with an attacking plane was a failure and was abandon after some brief success against the earlier attack planes (such as the PBY) which were usually extremely slow.

Staying on the surface to duke it out with a B-24 or a Lancaster, let alone a Hellcat or other fighter type was foolisness. Even if they shot down 3 planes for every sub lost, the planes would have to be considered the victor. And it was clear they wern't going to do even that well.

=S=

Lunatic
 
But then the Mosquito would just blast them senseless with a 6pdr. Genius. 8)
 
The US Navy 'jeep carriers' typical used F4F fighters to strafe a U-Boat to kill of drive off the gun crews. Then a TBM would roll in and blast the submarine with rockets, bombs, depth charges, etc. The U-boats best bet was to dive. Sticking around on the surface was suicide.
 

and can i just point out, whilst i know little of RA tactics, it's unlikely they'd send groups of bombers with big guns and fighter escort on routine patroll, possible against specific targets, but if the SM.79 couldn't do it, what chance did the P.108 have??
 
For anti-U-Boat work, how about the Hellcat (or Wildcat) carrying two FIDO's?

This little baby, devloped by inferior American technolgy went from drawing board to operational use in just 16 months, sinking its first U-Boat in May 1943. 204 FIDO's were launched against enemy submarines, sinking 37 of them and damaging at least 18 more.

Note: usually 2 FIDO's were fired at a target u-boat.

=S=

Lunatic
 
Yes, that was what happened, fighters would strafe whilst calling-up support...
By the latter stages of the War, there was greater coordination with anti-sub aircraft, and the US did contribute some great additional technology, besides the additional aircraft....
If a patrolling aircraft stumbled onto a surfaced sub, it usually attacked ASAP before it could dive, which could happen despite Doenitz's order to stay-up and fight, but let's not under-estimate the firepower of the U-boats, they were deadly, and accurate!.....
- CC is quite right about the amount of damage the aircraft could absorb, and having to come right over to drop their ordinance, they copped-it at almost point-blank....Unfortunately, the bigger the aircraft, the bigger the crews usually, so losses were high, hence my bitch about aircraft armament being insufficent. Some of the U-boat crews were very well trained, and getting sprayed by .303's with all that heavy metal to duck behind helped, whilst incoming aircraft had to deal with a voracious amount of up-coming flak....Essentially it was the depth-charges or bombs that did any serious damage, but getting down there and accurately placing them against that sort of barrage was nothing short of heroic....
Things were helped by the introduction of FIDO and RP's, the latter more or less replacing 57mm cannon, and the 20mms were really a case of simply 'trading shots'...
- Being able to lob stuff at U-boats from more of a distance, plus the greater number of aircraft involved, was what really made the difference in the end......

Oh, and incidentally, Wellington bombers basically carried the same bomb-tare as B-17's.........
 

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Just out of curiosity, what sort of AA fire power are we talking about here?

The American submarines might carry a couple of 40mm as well as a couple of 20mm. While that isn't a bad load, it is completely inadequate to stop a determined attack. Where the U-boats any better armed?
 
From what I'm reading, twin 20mm's, quad 20mm's, a single 37mm [I think it's single] and the main deck gun, 88mm I think....
 

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