Defensive armament for night bombers: was it worth it?

My 0.02 on this one

Retaining the armament and men to man it was more than worth it, IMHO. Firstly, it give more pairs of eyes to look for nightfighters and then call for evasive action. Secondly, the gunfire might not be accurate but it might at least put the NF pilot off his aim and cause him to miss. Finally, as has already being noted, the presence of armament must surely have been good for morale. It gave the bombers a chance to shoot back, even if this fire wasn't fully effective. I think these points would outweigh the potential benefit in weight saving realised by removing defensive armament.

Thanks for the replies, gents

Was it then a mistake that Brittish heavies were not equipped with belly turrets? It would've make approach for Schraege Musik kill a dangerous thing for German NF...

tomo pauk said:

Thanks for the replies, gents

Was it then a mistake that Brittish heavies were not equipped with belly turrets? It would've make approach for Schraege Musik kill a dangerous thing for German NF...

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Absolutely, a ventral gun position would have saved many an RAF heavy. I can never understand why no attempt was made to provide ventral armament, it would have bee extremely useful, and could have been remotely controlled like the chin mounts on the B-17G and Blenheim/Bolingbroke, to save weight and space.

One little thing to remember about looking "up" at night into the sky, so as to be at an advantage in an attack on a bomber.

Even in the darkest nights without a moon, there is still the phenomena of sky glow. When you're up in the clear sky three or four miles up, the sky isnt exactly perfectly black, and you can usually see dark black objects silhouetted against the off black "sky glow".

It doest work from an observer from the ground. But if your only hundreds of feet below and slightly behind to an object as big as a Lanc or Halifax, then its quite possible you will get a visual track on your target.

If there are high altitude clouds above the bomber, then the pitch black underbelly of the bombers are contrasted against the extremely dim, but noticeable white of the clouds.

So its an advantage to attack from the bottom.

BombTaxi said:

...I can never understand why no attempt was made to provide ventral armament, it would have been extremely useful, and could have been remotely controlled like the chin mounts on the B-17G and Blenheim/Bolingbroke, to save weight and space.

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The remote turret used on the first 100 or so B17-E's were pretty much useless, even inducing vertigo with some gunners.

I'm guessing most Sperry ball turrets were taken up by B17 and B24 production.

The type of remote sighted turret used on B29's might have worked, but once again, B29 production would have claimed most examples I would think. Besides, Avro was probably loath to interrupt Lanc production to incorporate the design change that would have been required for the fuselage.

I'm not entirely convinced a bottom turret would have made much of a difference anyhoo. The rear turret has a pretty good field of fire, and should have been capable of hitting any aircraft trying to sneak up from behind. More important, was SPOTTING the NF. I've read several articles that described gunners getting ready for night work. Typically, they would put on blindfolds up to a half hour before departure, be led aboard the aircraft, and would not remove them until entering NF territory. This was an attempt to get their eye's pupils to open as wide as possible. Of course, there could be NO light anywhere in their area, not even for a split second, or all this preparation would be lost in a moment at the pupils would contract. Makes me wonder why they didn't use the type of eyedrops I got on my last visit to the optometrist.

Model, I wasn't talking about using an American turret - the technology was already available domestically and had been used on the Blenheim IV and Bolingbroke. I take your point about production being interrupted, but fuselage alterations were done to accommodate H2S and different dorsal turrets, so I don't see why it couldn't have been done for a remote controlled ventral mount. While the early chin turrets on B-17s might have been pretty useless, they were being used against smaller, maneuvering targets. A nightfighter making a Schrage Musik attack actually had to formate with the bomber - so should have been a pretty easy target once visually acquired. With all respect, I think trying to compare American daylight experience to British night experience is something of a futile exercise, the conclusions drawn from one side are usually invalid on the other...

BombTaxi said:

....With all respect, I think trying to compare American daylight experience to British night experience is something of a futile exercise, the conclusions drawn from one side are usually invalid on the other...

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Good points!

I think that I would prefer to have it manned.

Having a spotter in a lower ventral position would be valuable even if he is unarmed. It is difficult to shoot down an aircraft at night using WWII technology if he is taking evasive action. So the key is to spot the night fighter before he spots you.

There is no space available for a ventral turret on the Lancaster or Halifax. There was a ventral hatch with a mg position on the Lancaster though. Later on, H2S was installed there. Increased armament with marginal effectiveness or a system to make the bomber itself more effective. Some magnesium flash bombs dropped out of the ventral hatch would be nice though, blinding an engaging nightfighter more than long enough to escape.

The other turrets weren't entirely useless, they provided other sets of eyes to watch for nightfighters. Removing the guns and having low drag fairings would have helped though.



A proposed cleaned up Lancaster with better streamlining and revised armament. Speed got up to around 350mph which would be fairly competitive with the majority of German nightfighters.

Didn't the Lanc gunners also use flash grenades that were tossed towards the night fighters? I remember reading where the flash is brilliant enough to induce temporary night blindness allowing the bomber to maneuver around and out of the way.

The Lancaster, and Wellington did have belly gun initially but they were deleted so there was definitely room.

while searching for more on the subject I foind this old thread on this very forum;

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/weapons-systems-tech/lancaster-ventral-turret-5502.html

timshatz said:

Believe it or not, that happens a lot in daytime. There were a few of American fighter groups in the Pacific (probably happened in Europe too) that took the tracers out of their ammo so the enemy was not alerted to the fact they were being shot at. My understanding is the number of kills went up.

As the old adage say, "75% of the pilots shot down never saw the guy who got them". Killing the tracers from your ammo gives you more chance to do it.

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yes without a doubt, in the NF war more often than not the Germans would not use tracers either! The greatest defences a plane has at night during WW2 are speed and a good rear warning radar! The toughest part is the hunt, if a NF gets into a Bomber Command stream then it can do some damage! The claims for single operations amongst German pilots can get quite large 5-6 kills on a mission for example!

The bombers could put up some defensive fire and it could be effective! There best hope is spotting and then avoiding the NF as it is manouvering to attack!

My knowledge is limited but thats my opinion, I think its a decent idea to have defensive armament, but their quiete ineffective! I see their role more as a spotter!

freebird said:

Did they have passive radar detectors that could give direction of LW attack?

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BC implemented some detectors (forgot the name of it...) which was just under the tail gunner but soon enough the NJ found a way to track them.
They got a device (Was it Naxos ?) which was homing to them.
BC took a long time to realize this but when they did these systems were deleted immediately.

There was a fantastic book about it unfortunately in french and long time ago on that specific electronic war.
But if you read the amazing series from Martin Middlebrook (Berlin Raids, Hamburg, etc) you can get a lot of infos about tactics on both sides. Poignant series.

4 x 303 were not punchy enough and at the end some Lancaster were fitted with a twin 50. I guess many nightfighters if not directly hurt might have just been blinded
by the light of the MGs firing. Tracers were a big part of the load. Disoriented at night.. another way to crash.

The most effective defensive armament for bombers are escort fighters. But unfortunately for the crews of Bomber Command, Butcher Harris was more than willing to sacrifice them in his quasi-religious crusade to prove that his bombers could bring Germany to its knees by themselves.

The RAF bombers could have been equipped with belly turrets and heavier caliber armament, but that would necessarily mean a reduction in bomb load- something Harris would not countenance. He could have also have protected his bombers from the nachtjaegers with a heavy escort of Mosquito nightfighters and intruders, but that would have meant fewer bomber variants...

Sorry for the rant, but I feel that Harris was more deserving of the Ritterkreuz than any of the nachtjaegers.

JL

Hi Butters,
I agree with you. Escort is the best. In daylight.
With the technology of that time I don't think escort in the Steam was as effective as disruption over the german airfields.
Also use of AI was prohibited above occupied europe for a certain time and many intruders were flying FB VI.
As for Harris, yes it was a crusade and I can understand your feelings but I'm pretty sure most of Germany would have hang him instead of giving him the Ritterkreuz ! Harris created a very deadly weapon at a huge cost.

Butters said:

The most effective defensive armament for bombers are escort fighters. But unfortunately for the crews of Bomber Command, Butcher Harris was more than willing to sacrifice them in his quasi-religious crusade to prove that his bombers could bring Germany to its knees by themselves.

The RAF bombers could have been equipped with belly turrets and heavier caliber armament, but that would necessarily mean a reduction in bomb load- something Harris would not countenance. He could have also have protected his bombers from the nachtjaegers with a heavy escort of Mosquito nightfighters and intruders, but that would have meant fewer bomber variants...

Sorry for the rant, but I feel that Harris was more deserving of the Ritterkreuz than any of the nachtjaegers.

JL

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On the escorts:

For day bombers, yes.

For night bombers, not really.

Escorting in night conditions is problematic at best and positively dangerous at worst.

Apart from the obvious risk of collision along the bomber stream (a maneuvering, high speed Mosquito is much more likely to hit something than a bomber moving in the same direction and same speed as its compatriots), the night fighter "escort" has a far more difficult job keeping opposing fighters away from the bomber stream. The nachtjadger were lone hunters, who operated in a completely different way from their daylight brethren.

I'll remind you that the FIRST operational Mosquito was a night fighter, as was the first operational Mosquito squadron. Of the 6,700 or so Mosquitos built during the war, 1,482 of them were night fighters (as well as another 180 conversions). Not bad when you consider that Mosquito production was split between night fighter, bomber, fighter bomber and photo reconnaissance variants. FB MK VIs also acted as night fighters, night intruders and night bombers.

Better than escorts were night intruder and night hunter missions, hunting down the nachtjadgers in their own territory before they could get to the bomber streams and harassing them in landing patterns and on their own airfields. Add to that the pathfinding and misdirection missions using Window, and the Mosquito made more than a fair contribution as an "escort" for the night bombers.

As for heavier armament, it was unnecessary. Night fighter engagements were usually conducted at ranges under a few hundred meters, where the .303 was still ample. A few more night fighters may have been downed with a heavier defensive armament, but it may not have been worth the time and effort to redesign the bombers and fit the new turrets.

I'd doubt that heavier defensive armament would have protected night bombers any better. Just because a gun is more destructive, does not mean the bomber is better defended. Better tactics, a faster aircraft, higher altitude, miss direction, killing the night fighter all protect the bomber, not replacing .303s with .50s or 20mms

Surely the crucial survival factor was length of time spent over enemy territory. Defensive armament actually contributed to Bomber Command's loss rates because the heavy turrets and extra crew just slowed down the bombers.

Not sure why the prewar belief that a bomber's defensive guns would be an effective protection against fighters persisted for so long. Bombers will always be cannon fodder for fighters, but at least a fast bomber can get out of the killing zone more quickly.

Fleets of high speed unarmed aircraft (such as Mosquitoes) would have fared far better (or rather less horribly) than the lumbering heavies. And thousands of gunners could have been saved for other duties.

Has anyone got info on Bomber Command's scare-gun experiment? Can't remember where I read about it: sten guns loaded with tracer were carried and anyone with a spare hand was supposed to stick them through portholes and empty them in the direction of attacking nightfighters. The author said the idea wasn't a success.

An interesting bomber project was the Hawker P1005. This was similar to the Mosquito in being a fast unarmed bomber, but was larger , being powered by two Napier Sabres and carrying a 6,000lb internal load (50% more than the Mossie). DH did not invent the Mosquito as a private venture, 'flying in the face of official intransigence' as the legend has it, there were a raft of similar projects, all officially sanctioned.

The Hawker P.1005 was ended when the prototype and the engineering drawings were destroyed in a bombing raid, but I wonder how bomber command might have faired had it flown and gone on to service?

Butters said:

The most effective defensive armament for bombers are escort fighters. But unfortunately for the crews of Bomber Command, Butcher Harris was more than willing to sacrifice them in his quasi-religious crusade to prove that his bombers could bring Germany to its knees by themselves.

The RAF bombers could have been equipped with belly turrets and heavier caliber armament, but that would necessarily mean a reduction in bomb load- something Harris would not countenance. He could have also have protected his bombers from the nachtjaegers with a heavy escort of Mosquito nightfighters and intruders, but that would have meant fewer bomber variants...

Sorry for the rant, but I feel that Harris was more deserving of the Ritterkreuz than any of the nachtjaegers.

JL

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Hi Butters

I am not a great fan of Harris wither, but for different reasons. His strength was that he took a force that was almost moribund at the end of 1941, and had the strength of will to make it grow into one of the most powerful intrstruments of war in the pre-nuclear age. Only the RAF had the technology and the expertise to level entire cities....the US 8th air force could not do this until much later in the war.

Harris' greatest triumphs were the 1000 bomber raids, and the destruction of Hamburg a year later. Speer said after the war that two or three raids like Hamburg would have brought Germany to its knees. If you study the effects of this attack (done at a time before the first reaqlly big attacks by the Americans), I dont think Speer waqs exaggerating. The city's industrial potential was totally wrecked for months afterward, and thousands were left homless as a result of the firestorm that developed (a technique quite beyond the USAAF at that time).

Moreover the twchnology available at that time would have allowed a very high percentage of bombs to be drooped on targtet, provided the target selection stayed within the 250 mile limit set by OBOE. If Harris had done that RAF losses would have remained tolerable, and the effects of the campaign would have been much greater, much earlier.

But this is where Harris lost the plot. Intoxicated with his success over Hamaburg, he took up the cry "On to Berlin!!!!" And this proved to be the death of Bomber Command. It was beyond the range of OBOE, beyond the range of effective escort, and a very difficult target for H2S to interrogate (because of the lake systems around the city). It was one of the most heavily defended targets in Germany both in terms of Flak and Fighters. And the percentage of bombs hitting the target was low. A huge mistake to attack this city, but one Harris, like his wwi predecessor (Haig) stubbornly refused to accept.

But you are wrong to suggest that the Bombers were not provided with escprt, or that they could be escorted in the same way as daylight attacks. The bombers did not form into defensive boxes, they attacked in a long continous stream, this was because the risk of collision was too high otherwise. There were various ways that escorts of the streams worked, and generally they were very effective, as the losses to the German Night Fighter Groups attests to.

Another furphy is that the British deliberately reeduced the defensive armament of their bombers to increase bombloads. Not true (or at least not mostly true). The main reason had to do with economy and costs. The fact s are that at the very end of the war some of the heavies were equipped with 50 cals, and this didnt make much difference to their loss rates (as far as I know). The quadruple 303 turrets werre plenty heavy enough to hurt an attacking NF, but they seldom got to be used because of German technologies, like SN-2 and Naxos.

parsifal said:

Speer said after the war that two or three raids like Hamburg would have brought Germany to its knees.

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Although Germany seemed quite good at fighting on her knees. Numerous Hamburgs later those nachtjägers were still bleeding the RAF dry.