Dive-bomber crew skills (1 Viewer)

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EwenS said:
Turning to the RN and the FAA, everyone here seems absolutely fascinated with the Skua. It equipped only 4 front line squadrons. Having entered front line service in late 1938, the last squadron gave them up in May 1941.
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Maybe all of them should have been de-navalized and sent to Malaya or Burma in advance of the Vengeance arrival.
 
I read of a case where a USMC pilot was trained as an SBD pilot and served in combat. The he transitioned into F6F. On one mission he was providing air cover for an amphibious invasion and spotted a Japanese artillery piece well positioned to hit the beaches. He flew back to his base and jumped into an SBD, flew it back to the invasion site, and dive bombed the Japanese artillery into scrap.

I guess it is obvious that for high precision strikes dive bombers usually are better than fighters carrying bombs. But how often is that kind of precision required? Obviously ship attack is one case where it does, but the Battle of the Bismarck Sea shows how you do not have to use dive bombing to sink ships.
 
I'll offer some comments (insight??) on the subjects raised here.
Frequently the term "dive bombing" is used without definition. In the US Navy and Marine Corps, it was about 70 degreees. In the Luftwaffe it could be 90. Only based on a few US observations (including the wife of an Enterprise SBD pilot at Pearl Harbor!) the Japanese seemed to use less than 70.

So:
What has been assumed to be Dive Bombing often was "high angle" bombing however defined. In any case, less than 60-70 degrees. It was a concern with fighter aircraft, which had no bomb. displacing gear (aka Trapeze) to clear the prop arc. But 9th AF and other AAF organizations did fly steep air-ground missions. I knew some who preferred the 47 to the 51, having flown both in that role.

Long ago I knew a Canadian who'd flown SE-5s in the Great War. The subject of dive bombing arose, and the best way to hit a bridge. He said the best run-in heading was angled across the length of the span, optimizing chances for a hit by range and deflection.

I concurred, of course
but
I said that in the Vietnam flail frequently US tactical aircrews dived perpendicular to the bridge, which of course presented a really wide target and a REAL skinny one.

My SE-5 friend looked puzzled. "Why in the world did they dive that way?"

I explained Rules of Engagement and the DC concern for people at both ends of the bridge, who might be Chinese. Or Russians. Or something.

He was too gentlemanly to say "You Yanks were screwed up" but I could tell what he was thinking.
 
"Dive-bombing" could use better definition but I think we here can agree that once you're past 70° or so you are in fact both diving and bombing.
 
My father was flew both SBD's and SB2C's in WWII (after Midway, he was finishing his carrier Qualifying at that time) he had almost 100 hours of light plane flying before entering the Navy in early 1942. He had almost an additional 200 hours of training before flying his 1st combat missions. He flew Vindicators in early bombing training, then SBD-2's. He told of speaking with USAAC A-24 Pilots in late 1942 and he said most of them had less than 200 total hours in the air, and that they were not trained for anything steeper than "Glide Bombing" I don't know what angle that would be, I assume about 45 degrees. He said he wished them luck as he knew it would expose them to AA fire for a longer period of time. He never told me what angles he would use during a shipping attack, he just said "vertical"
Now granted this was in the mid 1970's that we spoke about it, so 30+ years later, and he had been flying A-1's and A-4's for another 2 decades after that, so I have no idea how good his memory of the events was, he has been gone for over 10 years now, so no opportunity to ask him. But I think you needed dive bombers to hit fast moving and maneuvering warships. The battle of the Bismark sea is not the same thing as most of the ships being attacked were slow moving transports, or escorts that were at least partially tied to the transports.
I don't think the A-20's or B-25 straffers would have had the same effect on a fleet composed of fast BB's, CA's, CL's, and thier escorts. Not even considering if they had CV's to fly a CAP.
Nothing against the A-20's and B-25's, they did a fantastic job vs Destroyers and Transports.

Just my 2 cent's, other opinions may vary.
 
When the SBD's were used in an attempt to intercept Kates at Coral Sea, I wonder how well the rear gunners were trained for that role. I would think not very well. There has got to be a world of difference between defending the airplane against attack while straight and level and trying to do it during fighter maneuvers. I cannot imagine what those gunners had to endure if the SBD's were acting as fighters or how much success they would have had at getting an enemy fighter off their tail during a real dogfight.

From what I recall both the SBD's and Vindicators the USMC launched from Midway used glide bombing attacks on the IJN and it did not go well for them. As near as I can figure, whether 70 deg or 90 degrees the dive bombers were all but invulnerable once in their dive against anything but a very lucky hit. Fighters could not stay behind them and AAA could neither have good chance of hitting them nor adjusting the shell burst altitude fast enough to improve their chances. I have to guess that glide bombing would be very vulnerable to both fighters and flak.

The best book I've read by a dive bomber pilot was a guy who flew SB2C at the time of the PI invasion. His flight was known to be really hot stuff and they were ordered to attack a IJN destroyer that was running around Manila Bay making a nusinice of itself. The SB2C does not have a good reputation but they walked 1000 lb bombs from the foredeck right down its length as it was in sharp turn. Their Hellcat escort got a radio call as the Helldivers pitched over, asking exactly where the destroyer was. The F6F flight leader replied, "In 30 seconds I'll tell you where it used to be." and he was exactly right.

On the other hand, while attacking Taiwan the flight of Helldivers encountered a Betty bomber. The leader ordered an attack. You'd have thought that with two 20MM the Betty Type 1 Lighter would have been gone in nothing flat but it survived firing passes from all four SB2C without exploding right away.
 
My father pretty much said the same thing about the opposing fighters not being able to stay with the SBD's in a dive, they would overshoot, the closest he came to being shot down by a fighter was on one of his 1st missions vs the Vichy French, they were intercepted by Hawk 75's and he did not see them until they were firing. But the were soon rescued by the escorts. As for the AA defense he said his early missions vs the IJN it was not bad, but in 1944 they seemed to figure out that the dive bombers would have to fly thru 4-5000' and they set up a barrage of the heavier AA at that altitude, and you had to fly thru it, he said you usually took some hits. Then at lower altitude the lighter 25mm would actually aim at your plane. It was then that you started mild maneuvers to try and throw off thier aim, but not take you off target. I can't imagine doing it. He had more guts and luck than I do! He once described diving on a IJN Light Cruiser in one of the battles around the Philippians Islands. He said it looked like the 4th of July and thier mission was to take out the escorts to give the TB's a better shot at the BB's. He was in a SB2C by that time. It was a SBD in the torch landings.
 
Not related to any above post directly, but I think this video has some pertinence, considering that there is a bit of comment on the attitudes of Stuka pilots towards the attack approach.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VewRPZ0-RFs
ETA: Also, some of the footage shows 80+° dive-angles from the Germans. These guys clearly knew their craft.

Didn't hurt that they had some automatic pullout. I'd be blind coming out of that.
 
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The Skua was designed and built expressly to disable and/or sink IJN carriers while it's ability to act as a CAP fighter was a secondary function. However on it's short stint as a CAP fighter it probably shot down more Axis aircraft than the far more numerous Dauntless. Unlike the Dauntless, all FAA DBs had folding wings. AFAIK the Skua was only used once as a DB against moving targets at sea, against RMI heavy cruisers and I suspect that they missed, on that occasion, because their 500lb SAP bombs had to be dropped high to have a reasonable chance of deck penetration.

The Swordfish flew hundreds of sorties as a carrier and land based DB, often carrying a bomb load in excess of 1700lbs, even off a carrier! 10 of the Swordfish that attacked Taranto carried bombs and aux fuel tanks. The high water mark for the Swordfish as a DB was probably on 3 April 1941 when two partial squadrons (14 sorties IIRC), carrying 6 x 250lb bombs each, attacked and sank 2 RMI destroyers, Nazario Sauro and Daniele Manin, in the Red Sea and damaged two others, which were later sunk by RN destroyers.

The Albacore flew hundreds of sorties as a DB while flying from North Africa bases, in support of the 8th Army. These sorties were mainly at night with the targets illuminated by flares and each Albacore typically carried numerous ~ 30lb flares and 1000 or 1500lbs of bombs and in some cases internal or external aux fuel tanks.

The Swordfish, Albacore and Barracuda benefitted from the ability to use a DB attack profile whilst conducting TB attacks.

Brown (Wings of the Navy) had this to say about the Skua as a DB:

 
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Another Enterprise pilot, Dusty Kleiss of Scouting Six, also went 2 for 2 on 4 June.
I was fortunate to know Dick for about 25 years. He was a New Deal Democrat and one of very few war lovers I've known, versus combat lovers. He said "I thought it was a great war and I wanted to stay out there until the end." He intended to be the finest dive bomber pilot in the Pacific Fleet, and likely was!
 
I had to look up Dusty Kleiss, from Wikipedia: "Kleiss was the only pilot to score three direct hits with a dive bomber plane during the Battle of Midway. For his participation in the battle, Kleiss received the Navy Cross in November 1942."

First among equals.
 
Interesting thing was that when Halsey sent the strike force after the fleeing (and nearly empty) IJN carriers they included bomb laden Hellcats attacking the enemy carriers.
 
In regards to pilots and training, a clear example would be the USN's SBD versus the USAAF's A-24.

Same aircraft, two different approaches to a target: As we know, the USN would have the SBD slightly overfly the target and heel over into a 70° dive to target.
With the Army, they would have the A-24 descend into a shallow dive to target, which produced poor results.

Had the Army put their pride aside for a moment and had the Navy teach their pilots to use the Dauntless as it was designed, the Banshee would have been a huge asset when it was really needed, instead of being labeled a failure.
 

A difficulty you didn't mention is that of identifying targets. While it's true that land targets do not move, they're also much smaller than ships in most cases and don't stand out against ground features like ships do against water. Given the terrain where the A-24 was mostly used, USAAF dive-bomber pilots would have had difficulties even compared to LW Stuka pilots in identifying the right target and nailing it.

Not saying you're wrong, just thinking that there's some nuance here.
 
Look at the USAAF record in the Pacific, particularly with the 91st BS.
They did score kills against the IJN, but their execution of attack differed from USN doctrine to the point that they were not fully utilizing the Dauntless' strengths.

As for aim points, a late friend of mine was a pilot of an SBD, attached to VS-6 (USS Enterprise) and saw action in the PTO, including Midway, and he said that they selected features that were easy to focus on.
For example, he and other Dauntless drivers would aim at the Hinomaru (flag) or elevators on IJN carriers, or superstructure of battleships or cruisers.

The idea with the battlewagons or cruisers, was to decapitate the command and control, not sink it. Once.it was dead in the water, it could be picked off piecemeal.
 
GrauGeist said:
Look at the USAAF record in the Pacific, particularly with the 91st BS.
They did score kills against the IJN, but their execution of attack differed from USN doctrine to the point that they were not fully utilizing the Dauntless' strengths.
Click to expand...

I'll have to read up more on the 91st. Do you have any links convenient to read?


Right, and that with a wake drawing a line to the ship. My point, if you'll pardon the pun, is that the A-24 pilots didn't have such easy markers working through the NEI or New Guinea on ground targets, which I think goes a ways to explaining why the AAF pilots had more difficulties hitting targets.

It does not, admittedly, explain the higher loss rates, but it may help explain why USAAF brass weren't sold on dive-bombing technique?

GrauGeist said:
The idea with the battlewagons or cruisers, was to decapitate the command and control, not sink it. Once.it was dead in the water, it could be picked off piecemeal.
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I think everyone knew that dive-bombers weren't great against BBs, though they could hurt -- and kill -- CAs. That factor surely played a part in the Solomons, when Mikawa turned around after Savo Island after utterly defeating the Allied cruisers; he only turned around for fear of Allied airpower finding him the next day.

But battleships, DBs were about killing AA crews and destroying upperworks. The whole "letting water in, not air" thing made DBs only irritations to battleships, generally.
 
Thumpalumpacus said:
I'll have to read up more on the 91st. Do you have any links convenient to read?
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Sadly, my books are still in storage, however, Pacific Wrecks online has an overview of the FEAF's 27th BG/91st BS complete with references.

Of the references, I have Edmonds' "They Fought With What They Had" ('91 ed.) and I would like to get a copy of "The Harvest OF The Grim Reapers..." when I get a chance.

Pacific Wrecks - 27th Bombardment Group (27th BG)

I will say that for the A-24's shortcomings, the A-36 certainly redeemed the Army's idea and execution of vertical ground attack.
 
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