Best Dogfighter Poll Revisited...

Best Dogfighter Between 15,000 - 35,000 feet......

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plan_D said:
If that's the case, what happened to all those bombers falling mysteriously out of the sky?
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Not that many were lost to fighters once the P-51's were on the scene in force were they? In fact, the Luftwaffe' got their asses handed to them on a platter.
 
plan_D said:
Not many were lost? What World War 2 are you looking into?
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Not that many heavies were lost to enemy fighters after about July 1944, and by Oct. 1944 the Luftwaffe' was practically non-existant.
 
the Luftwaffe was quite a viable force till it moved from Reich defence to the Ost front in January 45. The Nachtjagd was nver quelled actually by the RAF, it swas due to the confinement of the Reich and lack of fuels
 
The Luftwaffe' pretty much hid from the USAAF after summer 1944. Only on a few occassions did they try to attack in force. Bomber losses to fighters dropped to minimal levels as compared to the 1943 and early 1944 levels.

Germany still actually had plenty of fuel production for aircraft useage. They just could not get it from production to the aircraft that needed it - becuase of Allied air interdiction.

=S=

Lunatic
 
the order by "Fatty" was to attack at all costs or suffer the consquences in 44, including keeping the drop tank in place. the Sturmgruppen first mission was 7-7-44 so no the Luftwaffe was not absent from the skies in the least bit. for the amount of German a/c-pilots in the skies of 44 they dealt out more death than all the Reich defence of late 43 and early 44. Because of the success's of the SturmFw units in the July-august 44 moths all Fw and Bf 109 gruppen were to change their tactics to angriff über hinten. And becaue they did attack like this and tried to linger for another Gefechtsverband they were caught by P-51's and beaten up
 

Late summer of 1944 was the last gasp of the Luftwaffe'. By the end of October they were beaten. Bomber losses, especially to fighters, fell considerably after that point.
 
Really =S=

better do some more research friend

27 SEptember 1944 30 B-24's lost by the 445th bg group alone.

6 October 1944 94th bg lost 4 over Berlin, the 385th lost 11 plus, the entire "B" group shattered by SturmFW's

7 October 1944 the 94th again is shattered by losing 8 plus to SturmFw's.

21 November 44 one US bg loses 10 B-17's to JG 301 and JG 1 Fw's

26 November 44 my cousin KIA, JG 301 nearly destroys the 491st bg with the destruction of 16 bombers and clobbering the 445th with 5 confirmed destroyed ? damaged.

September 11, 44 as a back up the 100th bg is assaulted by JG 4 and is crapped on with losses of some 11 B-17's and the 92nd bg loses 8 to IV.Sturm/JG 3 Fw's.

granted I am picking select incidences but these are terrible losses by individual bomb groups not just huge bomber armadas with bg's losing 1-2 bombers apiece. the point I am trying to make is that the Luftwaffe during the summer-fall months of 44 was a more effective force in bringing down bombers than it was in the spring with fewere a/c and pilots.

November 2, 44 is another gut ripping incident with some 35 US bombers shot down by 2 gruppen of SturmFw's.

Note in practically no cases have I listed any other Luftwaffe defence units, except for one, and these muyst be given credit where credit is due upon their defence even in dealing with horrendous numbers of P-51's.

Only after 14th of janusary 45 was the effectiveness of the Luftwaffe delinquished and that as I have repeated in other threads, when the Defnce of the Reich was left wide open and only 4-5 Reich defence units were left to defend Germany/ the others sent to the Ost front.
 
Those are some impressive totals, but you also have to remember that the 8th was putting up some where around 1000 heavies for each mission. 30 bombers out of 1000 is a far cry from the 30 out of 300 that was so common during late '43.
 
Keep in mind that there were about 10 guys per bomber though. That's 300 men! Some became POWs, but I have seen statistics that show about 60% of them made it out alive to become POWs. I don't know how accurate that is, I have not actually done the research myself nor seen a source. I just heard it from someone else. Either way, that's 300 guys that have to be replaced.
 
umm... about the bomber loss, many of the bombers are not loss ONLY 2 fighters, since they fly in formations they are vulnarable to FLAK consontrasion like wut u sad in berlin(which has the most flak in the whole third reich), and stuff, and the pilots are green pilots so they keep shoting the bombers utill they were shot down
 
again I am trying to point out that the Luftwaffe was not under the covers during the summer to winter of 44/45. I have other tallies if interested. Remember gents I have interviewed both sides the last 20 years and the listings of US bombers "killed" I have the documentation and mission reports to back all of this up as I was planning to put all of this online. My listings indicate no interference from Flak as those were under a different loss category with the US bg's.

the major difference and I do know this, is that the P-51 escorts were overwhelming. Just as friend and ace Oskar Bösch has said " We had ver sensiteve listening devices in Germany on the western border in the summer-fall of 44 and we could determine by "hearing" just how many US bombers were in the air as well as the lighter friends. It was then radioed/called into our Gruppen HQ. Every mission in the fall of 44 was doomed as a suicide but we did what we were ordered to do."
 
See, so the Mustangs were not a definate saviour. German aircraft always got through. You think too clean cut, RG. If it was so simple for the Mustang to dive, bounce, climb and re-adjust it'd be invincible.
Say we have Spitfire Mk. XIV and Spitfire Mk. VI (High Alt) flying high cover. The Mustangs aren't going to be able to stop the attack. Why? Because both groups of Spitfire aren't going to follow.
 

I never said they would be 100% effective. Any time the two combatants are roughly competitive, some are going to get through. Escort is by definition more difficult than interception, so you need more escorts than the number of interceptors to be stopped. The point is that the P-51 was the better escort/patrol plane than the Spitfire.

As for your follow argument - you are assuming there are more Spitfires than P-51's? If so then of course some are likely to get through!

For the Spitfire vs. the P-51, you failed to suggest their counter tactic. It is rather simple. The Spitfire XIV was able to fight more effectively at 35,000 feet than the P-51. By climbing to such altitude they could harry the P-51's and drive them off, and then dive into the bombers. Timing would be critical and difficult to manage given the very short endurance, but it could be done - sometimes it would work out, sometimes it wouldn't. The issue then becomes the fact that the Spitfire lacks the firepower to take down B-17s reliably in a single pass - but that's another issue.

So what it comes down to is the Spitfires need to get above the P-51's, the P-51's need to prevent them from doing so. Either result could be achieved depending on circumstance, but all things considered the P-51 is probably more likely to succeed if available in sufficient numbers (ie: something more than 1:1 which would be expected as P-51's were easier to build than Spitfires).

===================

Erich-

Sure the Luftwaffe' was able to mount a few sorties where they had some measure of success. But compared to the overall numbers of bombers flying on those days, they were tiny. Looking at single bomber formations that the luftwaffe' upon which concetrated its attacks and trying to use that as a reference is totally playing with numbers, you have to look at the total number of heavies in the air that day. And what you've failed to list is the losses suffered by the Luftwaffe' to achieve those relatively few kills.

=S=

Lunatic
 
If I just started going on and on about a clean cut situation of the Spitfire being at 35,000 feet then I'd be...well...you! Love nor war is as clean cut as you think.
 
evangilder said:
You of ALL people should not be accusing others playing with numbers.
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Oh? Please be specific. Sometimes my numbers may be wrong, but I don't "play with them" to give a false impression of what I know to be the truth.
 
plan_D said:
If I just started going on and on about a clean cut situation of the Spitfire being at 35,000 feet then I'd be...well...you! Love nor war is as clean cut as you think.
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Of course it's not. But in the context of this discussion we are looking at a basically unrealistic type of situation right?
 
You might be, but I'm not. If it was an unrealistic situation they'd know one another was there and they'd both be going to exact same speed at the exact same altitude.
 
So now you are claiming that Erich is giving a false impression? You better go back and READ his post, thoroughly. He does the research and has been talking to the guys that fought the battles. You have a tendency to rely on charts and graphs to come to a determination that one airplane is better than another by specifications. Things on paper are not always the whole truth, you as an engineer should know that.
 
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