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These are the service ceiling numbers I have, but it doesn't say if these are loaded or unloaded altitudes.
Mitsubishi G3M "Nell" - 33,730'
Mitsubishi G4M "Betty" - ~30,000'
Mitsubishi Ki-21 "Sally" - 32,800'
Nakajima Ki-49 "Helen" - 26,772'
Kawasaki Ki-48 "Lily" - 33,135'
My favorite is the Corsair. Unfortunately for the purpose of this discussion, the Corsair had no weaknesses! Ha. I guess I would have to say range. It also could do a 4 G inverted negative dive! hahaha.
RCAF or RAF he wouldn't be to bright to take that big pay cutI would refer you to THE THREADBARE BUZZARD, by Thomas M. Tomlinson. He was from Montana but went to Canada and enlisted in the RAF. .
First off, I must confess that I LOVE the P-40B/C. But trying to be objective. I think the success the AVG had compared to other, later, P-40 outfits were: tactics, the aforementioned early warning, and the foe, the AVG was not fighting Zeros.
I think that's correct Mike, but of course with a higher ceiling and better climb rate the P-40B/C was able to resort to the succcessful Boom and Zoom tactics Channault promoted. Reading Bartsch, I definitely got the impression the USAAF pilots knew about and wanted to Boom and Zoom but just weren't able to control the circumstances of the engagement, typically surrendering altitude superiority to the Zero. They were very frustrated with the E's inability to climb to intercept altitude, let alone gain altitude superiority. My impression is that the B is fundamentally a better airplane weapon system than the E.
Not true. I worked with guys who flew the P-38 in combat, it was just something to be aware of on earlier models if you did go into a dive.P-38 Lightning: Everybody was scared to dive in it once the compressibility phenomenon reared its ugly head.