Best Fighter Pilot in WW II?? (Continued) (1 Viewer)

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Erich Hartmann, with 352 kills, was the best fighter pilot of WW2 (no Japanese or Allied fighter pilot scored as many kills as Hartmann). In my opinion, Richard Bong was the best fighter ace America had because he scored 40 kills in the Pacific theater in a P-38 Lightning alone (Bong later lost his life in a crash of a production P-38 the same day as the A-bomb raid on Hiroshima by the B-29 Enola Gay).
 
Hans Joachim Marseille.

Flew like the devil and killed like the devil himself.

Like most pilots are, he was bold, daring, crazy and reckless. He would release himself to attack numerically superior enemy formations, hesitation apparently was an unknown notion in Marseille´s profile.

I heard a veteran saying Hartmann was the follow up of the early gone Marseille.

The allies, in their fashion, have tried to minimize Hans as well.
Quality is quality here and there.

Kittyhawks, Hurricanes and Spitfires, all together, died when meeting Hans in the air.

Hans was one of the very few pilots of WWII who turned his fighter virtually into another extension of his body.

From some records of (IIRC) Royal Australian Air Force units I recall being cited, Marseille was such an absolute master of the air, there were cases units believing they were being attacked by superior forces


Marseille required a minimum of rounds (7,5 mm or 20 mm?) to shoot down a fighter. Did he aim for the cockpit to do the kill?
 
In my opinion, Richard Bong was the best fighter ace America had because he scored 40 kills in the Pacific theater in a P-38 Lightning alone (Bong later lost his life in a crash of a production P-38 the same day as the A-bomb raid on Hiroshima by the B-29 Enola Gay).
WOW......:JUST WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

EDIT: Added 3 more exclamation points
 
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I don't think the decision as to who was the best fighter pilot is as easy as just looking at their number of claims.
The quality of their opposition has to be a factored in too.

It seems like anyone who opposed the Soviets in the air came up with some impressive tallies, look at the Finns ace's scores, even the Japanese pilots during the Nomonhan incident.

Richard Bong was killed flying a P-80a on Aug. 6th 1945.
 
Imho, this is not as easy as looking at total victories a pilots attains. Many allied pilots were rotated home after a comparatively short tour. If for example, you spend 5 years in combat and survive and get 3 times as many victories as a guy who spent 1 year are you a better pilot?
Additionally, there is quality of oposition and oportunity that are going to factor into it.
Also there is what kind of guy were they i.e.
how much did they go out of there way for there men and in some cases even to be civalrus to the enemy. This may sound like a non sequitur at first but good guys may not run up the same score as the average all other things being equal. Witness Maguire, who by all accounts I've read really took care of his men and died comming to the rescue of one.If he hadn't died that day and had finished out the war what would his score have benn. I don't think 50 or 60 is outlandish. Or Franz Stigler who gave up at least 2 to easy kills I'm aware of just because he didn't feel right shooting down an already shot up plane full of men strugling to get home.
It would be a pretty complex formula to factor all these things in but, again imho, they need to be factored in.
 
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Erich Hartmann, with 352 kills, was the best fighter pilot of WW2 (no Japanese or Allied fighter pilot scored as many kills as Hartmann). In my opinion, Richard Bong was the best fighter ace America had because he scored 40 kills in the Pacific theater in a P-38 Lightning alone (Bong later lost his life in a crash of a production P-38 the same day as the A-bomb raid on Hiroshima by the B-29 Enola Gay).

Negative Ghost Rider, the pattern is full.

Richard Bong was killed while performing an acceptance flight in a P-80.
 
By what criteria does "best" get determined? Chuck Yeager and Bob Hoover were great stick-and-rudder pilots, probably much better than many of the top-scoring aces.

Now that I have gotten older and studied WW2 aviation more, I tend to agree with you here. Best is very subjective. There are so many variables.
 
How about the best of each nation in each theatre? That should make the discussion a bit more interesting.
For the Soviets, I vote for Pokryskin.
 
How about the best of each nation in each theatre? That should make the discussion a bit more interesting.
For the Soviets, I vote for Pokryskin.

For the Soviets, I'd say that Pokryshkin was great in leadership and in internal "politics" (useful to promote new tactic methods within an inert and rigid system) and in PR. As for fighter pilot skills, I'd vote for Ivan Kozhedub.
 
Erich Hartmann stated Marseille was the best pilot while he was being interregated by the Soviets. In his biography he said they considered 3 soviet kills were equivalent to 1 western.
 
I chose not to enter this debate long ago because I felt that it was a question that had only 1 objective criteria and ten reduced to many subjective opinion.

After choosing Hartmann as the Top killer of other pilots, my personal favorite was Heinz Baer for that distinction. His score total against the best Allied pilots in Africa and Europe, his leadership and his survival in the deadliest environment for German fighter pilots (ETO 1943-1945) speaks volumes - but 'the Best' ?? I dunno.
 
In all honesty, determining who the "best" was needs to have all the factors included.
Factors such as time period, theater, type they flew, types of their opponent and so on.
For example, IJN ace Lt. Nichizawa was perhaps Japan's greatest ace NOT for his tally, but for the fact that he was still flying the A6M by 1944 and scoring victories against superior types.
 
Whoever you choose as the best, one thing that is certain is that that they were extraordinarily lucky, in many respects you make your own luck but in many cases you just cant. As the Battle of Britain started there was a German coastal raid which was not a great success apart from it hit a hotel. The hotel had a dozen trainee pilots in it. Who is to say they could not have been aces but never had the chance. The same for Pilot Officer Montague Hulton-Harrop killed in the battle of Barking Creek on 6 Sept 1939 by his own side. Who was the top scoring pilot who never took a bullet in his machine or was shot down or wrecked the plane on landing, because it is just luck that makes those three survivable. The greatest F1 racer (Schumacher) and the greatest IoM motorcycle road racer (Hailwood) were injured or killed in accidents off track that could have happened at any time.
 
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