Dive-bomber crew skills

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Thumpalumpacus

Lieutenant Colonel
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Feb 5, 2021
Tejas
So I was watching a series from Holland/Murray on the BoB tonight, and Jim made an offhand comment about dive-bombers "with Jericho Trumpets" and that got me to thinking about the best dive-bomber aircrews of WWII.

There's always discussion of Stuka vs Val vs Dauntless being the equipment, but there's very little discussion about aircrew skills, which perforce includes the FAA as well as the three nations alluded-to above.

I'd like to hear the opinions of the readership in this regard; which WWII combatant had the best dive-bomber crews? This varies with the time-period of the war and that's part of the discussion, I assume -- it is de rigeur for me.

In 1941, I think it's the Germans and the Imperial Japanese Navy. Their planes might be wonky, but with the results they put up (Crete, Battle of France, Operation C, Pearl Harbor), they're clearly the 1-2 in the world, though which order is arguable. The Brits got a good bag in dive-bombing a cruiser down in 1940, but I think they focused on torpedo stuff more? Us Americans had all the experience given by dropping bags of flour in peacetime exercises, so we ain't a part of the discussion right now.

By the end of 1942, I'd call the USN and the IJN about equal regarding DB crew quality and experience. I don't know how much the Germans were doing on the Eastern Front but I imagine those crews were pretty busy too. How good were the Brits at this point? It's an honest question, I just don't know. I know they were good, professional. But did they do much dive-bombing in this period?

By 1944, I think it's clearly both the Western Allies, mainly from accruing experience. The Axis were bleeding pilots at a breakneck rate, while the US and UK were able to make experience a legacy training program.

I'm just curious on y'all's thoughts, agree, disagree, or pointing out a rabbit-hole myself or others might not have considered.
 
Hey Thump, I would say that the Brits weren't even in the game. When WW2 broke out, the RAF didn't have any dedicated dive bombers. Instead, the RAF focused on high-angle bombing, a tactic that remained in use to increase the delivery accuracy of dumb bombs until well into the 1990s. Given the relatively short lifespan of true dive bombers as a dedicated type and mission, one could argue that the RAF had the right idea, at least for the long-haul.

The RAF had started some timid attempts to acquire a dive bomber as early as 1934-35 with Air Ministry Spec P.4/34 that led to the Hawker Henley, a type that never served in its intended role. In 1940, the "Stuka effect" accelerated RAF efforts to acquire a true dive bomber leading to the acquisition of a modest number of North American A-36s and a greater number of Vultee Vengeances. The latter, in particular, served very well in operations over Burma where their accurate delivery was much lauded by the soldiers who called them in for close-air support. However, even these types were removed from front-line service after a relatively short period as more powerful fighter aircraft were developed into more multi-role airframes that could, again, deliver bombs using a high-angle dive profile.

I think Germany was overly obsessed with dive bombing as a role. After all, they slapped a secondary dive-bombing role on any airframe that had multiple engines.
 
buffnut453 said:
I think Germany was overly obsessed with dive bombing as a role. After all, they slapped a secondary dive-bombing role on any airframe that had multiple engines.
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Was Britain any better in the late 1930s?

Spec P.12/36 that led to the Manchester and then the Lancaster initially included a dive bombing requirement. It was removed early on in time for the Halifax (ordered to the same Spec) to be redesigned but too late for the Manchester. Often wondered if that legacy was what gave the Lanc it great weight lifting capability.
 
As for Britain it needs broken down between the RAF & the FAA.

The origins of the Vultee Vengeance lie in a French requirement for 300 dive bombers to be delivered from Oct 1940 to Sept 1941 but nothing was signed before the French Armistice.

The early successes of the Stuka caused Britain (and Australia) to look again at the dive bomber in 1940. The result was a dispute between the Air Ministry who wanted nothing to do with the dive bomber concept (they reportedly refused to supply or train pilots for the role) and Beaverbrook and other Govt ministers who saw it as a way of supporting the army in the field, akin to how the Germans used the Stuka in 1939/40.

Britain ordered the first batch of Vengeance dive bombers on 3rd July 1940 with the prototype due to be delivered in Jan 1941 and production aircraft from March. Needless to say there were delays for a whole variety of reasons with first flight delayed until July 1941. It was April 1942 before the first aircraft arrived in Australia and Aug 1942 before the first arrived in India.

France & Britain also ordered the Brewster 340 Bermuda (SB2A Buccaneer) immediately before the French Armistice, with Britain taking over the contract and increasing the orders to 750. Ultimately this project was a total failure although about 206 arrived in Britain where they ended up in storage.

I'll return to the FAA part of the story later when I have more time.


Edit:- The RAF only received a single A-36A for trials. That arrived in Britain in March 1943.
 
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No dedicated dive-bombers, and they certainly weren't drinking Milch's Kool-Ade, but FAA pilots seemed pretty good at putting bombs on target to me. The pilot skill, which is the basis of my probing commentary, still seems pretty good. No one was up to Japanese standards in 1941, to be fair.

Let's put it another way -- how many hours on type did the pilots from the respective nations have? How well-trained were they? And were they able to convert experience to ability comparatively?

I know it's a bit of a blurry thing. American dive-bombers in 1944 were good but couldn't stop Ozawa's retreat at Phil Sea, Barracudas were effective at immobilizing but not putting down Tirpitz, and those pilot-cadres were trained by experienced combat vets, while Stukas put a real licking on the Crete evac and Vals reeled off hit after hit on the two poor cruisers, when neither Axis force had much experience attacking moving targets at sea.

I'm wondering why there's these discrepancies and if anyone has insight into that.
 
The main problem with the British is they only made 190 of the Skua's and they never made a MK II version and the last 50 were delivered as target tugs, a decision made before the war actually broke out.
This small sample of air craft is one reason that it didn't do more.
Some of the British crews did fairly well with it as a dive bomber but the crews were somewhat handicapped by lack of targets
Germans didn't put their ships in harms way very often.
British crews might have done better if they had better bombs.

I would say that the British crews were probably well skilled.
A lot is made of the Skua being a dual or even tri-purpose aircraft. The Dauntless was sort of dual purpose Scout/recon +dive bomber and perhaps tri purpose.
four .303 guns is not any greater burden than a pair of .50s
What the Dauntless had going for it was a more powerful engine even if only 10% on the early ones and both better bombs and wider selection.

Maybe the British Skua crews weren't as good. But with the limited actions due to the small force and the limited targets there may be no way to know.
 
A few things to consider when looking at the dive bombing skills of the various navies.

1. Inter war the role if the dive bomber for all three major carrier navies was to disable an enemy's carriers by tearing up their flight decks, and for the RN at least, to suppress the AA defences on supporting ships. For that bombs up to 500lb HE or SAP were more than adequate.
2. The USN moved to 1,000lb HE from 1937 to increase the effectiveness of near misses.
3. The objective of the torpedo bombers was to inflict sufficient damage to an enemy battlefleet so as to bring it within range of the guns of its own fleet.
4. The USN didn't have any AP bombs before 1942. The first was the 1,600lb AP and then the 1,000lb AP. While the SBD-5 produced from May 1943 was notionally capable of carrying the former weapon, it never did so from a carrier, if at all. So that restricted its use to the TBF and the SB2C. An Essex class only carried about 20 of those weapons. Supplies of the 1,600lb AP to the RN were made in small but increasing quantities from late 1943 allowing it to be used on suitably modified Barracudas from Operation Tungsten onwards.
5. When considering the great accuracy of the IJN Vals in the IO, it needs to be borne in mind that the only defences were the ships' own guns, with no CAP present to break up attacks.

Turning to the RN and the FAA, everyone here seems absolutely fascinated with the Skua. Not only was it produced in small numbers (190 in total, some of which went to secondary roles) but it equipped only 4 front line squadrons, only 3 of which took it into combat (the fourth on Illustrious saw them replaced by Fulmars before she went to the Med in 1940). Having entered front line service in late 1938, the last squadron gave them up in May 1941.gave

Everyone forgets that both the Swordfish and the Albacore had a dive bombing capability that was utilised until the mid-war period.

While the Skuas of 801 & 803 squadrons get a well deserved pat on the back for flying from their shore base at Hatston, across the North Sea to Bergen to sink KMS Konigsberg on 10th April 1940, Swordfish began flying bombing missions from Furious on 12th April. When and where the weather permitted these were flown as dive bombing missions. For example on 13th April during the Second Battle of Narvik, flew off 9 Swordfish each carrying 4x250lb + 8x20lb to attack the German destroyers. They attacked from under the cloudbase (about 1,500ft) in 60° dives, claiming several hits.

In late 1941 Albacores used their dive bombing capabilities on shipping strikes off Norway. During Operation Torch Albacores from Furious, Victorious & Formidable dive bombed La Senia airfield, a French fort and the site of a gun battery (That had moved by the time the bombs rained down. The Army were impressed by the accuracy).

Earlier in the Med Swordfish from Ark Royal, Eagle and Illustrious were used in the dive bombing role to strike airfields and other shore targets in Sardinia and the Aegean, not to mention during the Taranto strike. FAA squadrons based ashore on Malta and in Egypt practiced extensively for dive bombing operations at night operations using flares to illuminate their targets.

1943 saw the introduction of the Barracuda. It became famous for the series of dive bombing strikes on Tirpitz from April onwards. Due to her location in Kaa Fjord, the extensive smoke screens AA guns etc, she was an extremely difficult target to hit, with the Barracudas often bombing blind through the smoke. But hit she was. In one of the July raids a 1,600lb bomb penetrated all the way to her inner bottom - and then didn't explode! Implacable's Barracudas were dive bombing shipping off Norway in Oct / Nov 1944. Despite all the torpedo training effort put in by the Barracuda squadrons, the type only dropped torpedoes on one occasion while on operations.

In the IO the Barracuda was only used offensively as a dive bomber from early 1944 until replaced on the carriers by Avengers carriers In Oct 1944.
 
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I guess a question is: Did fighter pilots make better dive bomber pilots than dedicated dive bomber pilots? The USAAF did a LOT of dive bombing in WW2 but had only a few dedicated dive bombers. The fighter pilots could dive bomb but seemingly relatively few of the dive bomber pilots could fighter pilot.

At Coral Sea they SBD's were sent out to intercept Kates but encountered Zeros instead. Most just flew like dive bombers and only one got with it and flew like a fighter pilot. Guess what? They made him a fighter pilot after that.

The USAAF evaluated the Vultee XA-41, which was built along the same lines as the AD Skyraider and concluded that fighters carrying bombers were a better approach than dedicated dive bombers. Among other things, they could be used as fighters as well.

After Korea the USAF sort kinda figured out that dedicated attack aircraft were needed, and acquired the A-7D and A-10. They seem to have forgotten about dedicated attack aircraft now.
 
A lot of us are used to the idea of Dive Bombers being ship killing aircraft and some of them were, but not all.
A lot depends on the ship/s and some depends on the bombs.
Battleships are pretty much in a class of their own. You can blow the AA guns off and some of the fire control equipment but with 500-550lb bombs you are going to need an awful lot of hits to sink even a WW I left-over.
Carriers, except for some British ones, were very easy to damage and the damage could result in fires and 2ndary explosion. More often than pre-war planning?
Cruisers and smaller (and freighters) could sunk with 500-550lb bombs although it might take 3-4 hits. It might take 1 lucky one on a 10,000 ton cruiser.
The 4-6 250lbs than the British Biplanes used could certainly mess up the upper works and start fires. How deep they got to start letting in water (or how close the near miss had to be) is subject to question. But they may have been effective enough on anything except a battleship.
1000-1100lbs containing about 50% explosive are not going to get deep in a battleship either but the damage to the upper works is going to be pretty spectacular and near misses have a better chance of letting in water than near misses from 500-550lb bombs. 1000-1100lb bombs on cruisers and smaller have a bigger chance of being fatal even without being AP.

The Japanese only had 550lbs bombs for their dive bombers for most of the war and they did pretty well but they never really bombed any Battleships (?) except at Pearl Harbor and the most serious bomb damage was from the AP bombs dropped by the level bombers.
Germans did a lot damage dive bombing ships but they had a selection of bombs in both 250kg and 500kg sizes and few 1000kg bombs.

Taking out the battleships as targets because there were so few, but they heavily influenced some peoples thinking, both then and now it would seem that most countries could sink the majority of naval targets with their dive bombers of choice. Perhaps some countries could have done a bit better but the RN didn't have that many opportunities to dive bomb German ships after Norway. To dive bomb ships you need good weather (visibility) extending up to 8-12,000ft. You can't dive bomb from 3,000ft in a snow squall.
 
Discounting Japanese skills because the cruisers and Hermes had no air-cover doesn't change the fact that those dive-bombers attained a roughly 40% hit rate against the cruisers and even higher against the carrier and Vampire, all moving targets at sea. That's mighty impressive.
 
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SaparotRob said:
Wasn't that, in part, due to the range factor and lateness of the strike?
Click to expand...

Yes, but the percentage of hits was abysmal as well. The setting sun and reduced lighting probably affected that percentage, the range issues not so much. I think Wasp's SB2Cs went after the Japanese refueling group because of range issues, but all the others present went after the Japanese carriers.

The remainder, probably 62 or so dive bombers, scored five or six hits on the four fleeing Japanese carriers, helping to sink Hiyo alongside TBMs. They also hit Haruna twice. That is an awfully low percentage, even given a setting sun.

Myself, I suspect that the emphasis on landing-support had probably put a little rust on the USN DB pilots' ability to hit moving targets speeding at sea. But it wasn't a good showing.
 
I saw one of the two remaining Stuka dive bombers last month.

The Junkers Ju 87 Stuka is housed at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, and it's one of only two intact examples left in the world.

This particular aircraft is a Ju-87R-2 variant, and it's been part of the museum's collection since 1946. While the engine is displayed separately, the airframe itself remains a powerful symbol of WWII aviation and psychological warfare. The museum occasionally lowers it to the main floor for cleaning and conservation work, including a 3D scan project that helped preserve its structural details.
 
I have on my list of research topics to look at dive bombing accuracy over the course of the War.

For the USN, it seems in 1942 with Lundstrom's "First Team", one squadron of SBDs could disable and or sink one CV. In round numbers, in 1942, one carrier air group had the ability to sink one carrier. Then in 1944 during the Marianas, the ratio of USN CVs to IJN CVs was staggering in the US favor, the USN did not seem to have the same ratio for bombing. Whether it due to less trained pilots or better defense by the IJN, the ratio swung to the defender. At Midway, pilot training was everything. The Marine aviators flying SBDs from Midway didn't have the dive bombing experience of the Naval aviators and their score reflects this. Hornet's air group performance at Midway is an example of training and experience mattered more than aircraft type.

The Germans had very high hit rates with the Stuka in the Mediterranean, there was previous thread where a poster listed Stuka hits and kills in the Med, and argued the Luftwaffe was the highest scoring plane for plane of any air force against shipping.

This paper is an interesting Monte Carlo simulation of Midway. https://www.researchgate.net/public...he_Battle_of_Midway_A_Counterfactual_Analysis

The authors simulate a "good" Hornet air group and if Zuikaku had sailed with Kido Butai.

As for the best dive bomber crews, Richard Best is to my knowledge the only pilot during the war to score hits on two different carriers in one day. He has my vote for the Best.
 
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There are a number of factors to be teased out of your post.

Firstly from the time that CTF Pacific Fleet carried out its first strikes at the end of Aug 1943, it had virtually no opportunity to engage with fast manoeuvering ships on the open sea. The only occasion I can immediately think of was during Operation Hailstone in Feb 1944. And of the CAGs present at Philippine Sea 4 months later only 1 perhaps had the benefit of that experience.

Then there is the question of the experience of each individual air group. This is the period when it became policy to rotate carrier air groups off a carrier after 6-9 months. So of the 7 fleet carriers present at Philippine Sea (the CVL didn't carry dive bombers):-
TG58.1
Hornet CV-12 - joined TF58 on 20 March 1944 with CVG-2
Yorktown CV-10 - new air group CVG-1 from 29th May 1944
TG58.2
Bunker Hill - new air group CVG-8 joined March 1944
Wasp CV-18 - joined TF58 in early May 1944 with CVG-14
TG58.3
Enterprise - CAG-10 had been aboard since 15 Jan 1944
Lexington CV-16 - rejuvenated CVG-16 joined in March 1944 following her torpedoing in Dec 1943
TG58.4 (did not participate in the strike against the IJN on 20th June)
Essex - new air group CVG-15 from 19th May 1944.

So "rusty" or inexperienced in a combat environment with that kind of moving target?

On 20th June both navies were split into a number of groups spread over a considerable area of ocean with each group not always within sight of the others. There were 3 principal Japanese groups plus a tanker group.

It was 1542 before the first garbled sighting report was received by TF58 and 1557 before it was confirmed. Launch was between 1621 & 1636. The nearest Japanese group was then thought to be 275 miles distant. By launch time it was thought to be 300 miles. This was considered to be at the limit of what was possible. And to launch the carriers had to run to the east into the wind and away from the Japanese fleet. To save time & fuel normal form up procedures over the fleet were dispensed with, each air group forming up en route instead. So the aircrews had "range anxiety" before they left. After launch TF58 turned northwest at 23 knots to try to close the gap to the Japanese fleet as much as possible. The launch was of:-
85 x F6F (from 6 CV and 5 CVL)
54 x TBF (21 with torpedoes & rest with 4x500lb bombs from the 6 CV & 5 CVL)
51 x SB2C dive bombers
26 x SBD dive bombers

There were 14 aborts (types unknown). At the time of launch TF58 was expecting to launch a second strike the next morning, so some aircraft were being held back including the whole of the Princeton air group.

By the time they reached the Japanese fleet the sun was just touching the horizon (at take off it was thought that they might have 30 mins of daylight). Due to the range they were unable to form up for a co-ordinated attack. And they had to penetrate the IJN fighter CAP. The CO of VB-14 from Wasp made a deliberate decision to attack the tanker force, the first group encountered, with the objective of limiting the future mobility of the Japanese fleet according to one source I have. The whole action was over in about 20 mins.

Hiyo was hit by two bombs, but it was the effects of a single torpedo that finally stopped her. She succumbed to an internal explosion of unknown cause some time later (the IJN attributed that to a torpedo from a sub, but none was present).
Zuikaku was hit by a single 500lb bomb that started fires in her upper hangar and on the flight deck but avoided another 6 close near misses and a couple of torpedos.
Junyo was hit by one or two 500lb bombs but damage was "moderate"
Chiyoda was hit by a single bomb that caused only "moderate" damage
Ryuho was attacked by bomb laden TBFs and near missed but suffered no damage worth commenting on.
Zuiho & Chitose were undamaged
Haruna was hit by one and near missed by 3 bombs delivered by TBFs and then hit by another bomb.

Except as noted above it does not seem to be clear whether the hits achieved were from dive bombers or glide bombing TBFs. 20 aircraft were lost during the attack.

It should also be noted that, while not up to USN standards, IJN damage control was better than in 1942 and their ships were carrying many more 25mm AA mounts than in 1942.

Morison notes that at this point the USN had not recovered from the poor performance of the TBs in 1942, and lack of suitable targets subsequently, despite the TBD having been superceded by the TBF and the various issues with the Mk 13 torpedo having been cured. This trend was subsequently reversed as was seen in later actions.
 
Were the SBD squadron aircrews veteran or new?
 
SaparotRob said:
Were the SBD squadron aircrews veteran or new?
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The only CVGs still with the SBD were those on Enterprise (from Jan 1944), Essex (from 19 May) & Lexington.

CVG-16 on Lexington had been with the ship since her work up in early 1943. However they only started operations in Sept 1943. They then got a break from 9 Dec 1943 to 3 Mar 1944 when the Lexington went to Bremerton for repairs to her torpedo damage. How many of her aircrew were swapped out in that period I don't know. CVG-16 was replaced on the Lexington by CVG-19 in July 1944 with the SB2C so maybe not many replacements.

Most of the new squadrons reaching the fleet from 1943 had a few veterans from 1942 in leadership positions. The rest were coming straight out of the training system. So I'm not seeing any difference between them and the SB2C squadrons in that respect.
 
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