F4F Wildcat

[ww2instc]

Hi everybody

I'm new to this forum, and this is on of my first posts.
I hope somebody can help me with some questions I have.
I'm not familiar at alle with the Wildcat, USN and USAAF in general, that's why I'm reaching out to you guys.

- Regarding the F4F Wildcat, what were it's primary objectives? Escorting bombers and carry out attacking missions? And I assume they were always in a group and normally never alone on a mission?
- How did the Pilot Uniform looked like in the Pacific Theatre? (Because I've heared some pilots flew in shorts and tshirt?)

Thank you so much in advance for helping me out!

 

[tomo pauk]

...
- Regarding the F4F Wildcat, what were it's primary objectives? Escorting bombers and carry out attacking missions? And I assume they were always in a group and normally never alone on a mission?
...
Thank you so much in advance for helping me out!

Cheers, welcome to the lot
The primary job of F4F was fleet defense.
Carrying out attacking missions was a job of bombers, mostly of the dive bombers like SBD. Another job of the F4F was indeed escort of own bomber that took off from carriers (even though that job included escorting the bombers that took off from land bases).

There was host of secondary objectives that arose later in ww2, like anti-sub patrol, recon, indeed bombing (although the bomb load was not that big, even when compared with other bombed-up fighters).

 

[Csch605]

Hi everybody

I'm new to this forum, and this is on of my first posts.
I hope somebody can help me with some questions I have.
I'm not familiar at alle with the Wildcat, USN and USAAF in general, that's why I'm reaching out to you guys.

- Regarding the F4F Wildcat, what were it's primary objectives? Escorting bombers and carry out attacking missions? And I assume they were always in a group and normally never alone on a mission?
- How did the Pilot Uniform looked like in the Pacific Theatre? (Because I've heared some pilots flew in shorts and tshirt?)

Thank you so much in advance for helping me out!

The limited bomb load as of 1941 was just 2 - 100lb bombs. That was just enough for an F4F to sink the Japanese destroyer Kisaragi. Alll hands on the Japanese destroyer died.. A huge event for the Marine Corp.
Henry T. Elrod - Wikipedia

 

[P-39 Expert]

Hi everybody

I'm new to this forum, and this is on of my first posts.
I hope somebody can help me with some questions I have.
I'm not familiar at alle with the Wildcat, USN and USAAF in general, that's why I'm reaching out to you guys.

- Regarding the F4F Wildcat, what were it's primary objectives? Escorting bombers and carry out attacking missions? And I assume they were always in a group and normally never alone on a mission?
- How did the Pilot Uniform looked like in the Pacific Theatre? (Because I've heared some pilots flew in shorts and tshirt?)

Thank you so much in advance for helping me out!

The Navy pilots had more standard attire, but Army (AAF) pilots in New Guinea did (at times) wear hacked off shorts and a t-shirt.