Flying Tigers (AVG) and no P-40

[Nikademus]

1. You are saying F4F v Zero engagements were all over Guadalcanal, Nickademus seems to focus just on the combats between the two types in carrier battles. It was both. And there was a good deal of variety in the Guadalcanal engagements as well, Joe

We have discussed this component before. I was not focusing just on carrier combats. I stated that in all of 1942, there were 4 x one day carrier clashes (in terms of actual exchange of strikes) followed by one sustained campaign that occured over one single base....with the F4F's fighting primarily defensively...over their own base vs. an opponent that had to fly with limited numbers a distance greater than England to Berlin. (I am also aware of the late-campaign development of Buin and Buna as emergency fields/small fields but the main component remained Base Air Force at Rabaul.)

I 'do' tend to focus on 42 as this was the pivitol year for the A6M as a front line fighter as well as the climax of both the carrier engagements and the result of the struggle for Guadalcanal. Missions with F4F's did occur into 1943 but by this point the conflict was decided and the IJNAF had suffered a level of attrition that signifigantly impacted it's efficiency. I understand you disagree on how big an impact this was in 43 but there we've agreed to disagree.

Had the Japanese the opportunity in 42 to fight an additional campaign without the impediments stacked against them as listed in both Lundstrom and Richard Frank's account of Guadalcanal, they might well have scored better in the vaunted kill ratio....but more importantly, they might have won the campaign itself which is what ultimately counts.

 

[davparlr]

As far as Navy fighters are concerned, I have a book, " The Great Book of WW2 Airplanes" which has drawings of the profiles of the Spitfire, P51, P38, F4F, F6F, F8F, F4U, ME109, and FW190. The Grumman fighters all appear to have a pronounced slope from the bottom of the windshield to the end of the engine cowling. The F4U has a longer nose because of the fuel tank but it too has a rather pronounced slope from the windshield to the cowl and to add to that, after the early F4U1, the pilot's seat was raised 18 inches and the F4U pilot sat so high that I have read that on the ground, one F4U pilot could see the knees of another sitting next to him. The P51 and Spitfire appear to have very little slope, the ME109 none and the FW190 is hopeless because the windshield allowed the pilot only about 6 vertical inches of perspex to look dead ahead. Once again Lundstrom said that, in comparison to the USN fighters, the others had not enough visibility dead ahead for full deflection shooting. He apparently has studied all this and I doubt he would say something that is blatantly inaccurate for it would put in question his whole book"s credibility. That is good enough for me.

Using a bit of hocus pocus and guesstimations, and some hand measuring from internet drawings, I calculated some downward viewing angle of various WWII aircraft. There was some problem establishing the design eye position. The only available source on this was photographs.

P-51B 2 degrees
Spitfire IX 3.4
Tempest II 3.4
Spitfire 21 4.0
P-51D 4.6
Ta-152H 4.6
F4U-1 4.6
P-51H 5.1
Fw-190A 5.1
F4F 5.7
F4U-4 6.6
F6F 7.4


As has been noted in previous postings, Naval aircraft have better over the nose vision than most land base aircraft. However, this appears to be a requirement for carrier landings more than for deflection shooting. Outside the Navy, deflection shooting seems to be a non-issue. A look at the last ETO fighters, the Spitfire 21, Tempest II, P-51H, and the Ta-152H, all show between 3.4 to 5.1 degrees of over the nose vision. These aircraft must have included all the lessons learned during the very intense air-to-air European combat. My opinion, based on nothing particularly solid, is that deflection shooting was a rather spray and pray happening and the probability of success was not worth the aero impact of a high design eye. As has been said, this at least seems to apply to Europe with better armored aircraft. In the Pacific, maybe deflection success would be higher against the notoriously poorly armored Japanese aircraft.

Note: accuracy of my measurements is shaky in that design eye position, aircraft centerline, and drawing precision are of concern, but the overall trend is certainly accurate.

Those ETO aircraft that were mentioned are VERY successful and deadly aircraft.

 

[tyrodtom]

According to a book I have " The Complete Book Of Fighters" the F4U-1A had the cockpit raised 7 in ( 18 cm), not 18 inches, when the bubble canopy was fitted.

 

[davparlr]

To add fuel to the fire Page 467, Lundstrom, "The First Team"
"The pilots of the USN and Marines were virtually the only fighter pilots trained from the beginning to utilize and regularly succeed in deflection shooting. With the partial exception of the IJN, no other air forces during WW2 taught their pilots how to make full deflection shots. For the USAAF, the RAF, the LW, the Red Air Force, and all the rest, stern and head on approaches with their minimal deflection angles comprised the primary attacks. Only a tiny minority of their pilots realized the potential of deflection shooting and taught themselves the techniques, usually after extensive combat experience."

Did Lundstrom have the data telling how many more high deflection kills verses engagements were made by the Navy/Marines compared to all the lesser trained pilots in the world.

Very early in this thread, I made the statement that "it was no wonder that the AVG was effective because a lot of the pilots were USN trained" or something like that. That statement stirred up a whirlwind of discussion. It seems that my remark got the hair up on the back of advocates for all the other air forces and that is one of the beauties of this forum. With respect to all, I have enjoyed the many well thought out observations.

A study on comparison of Navy/Marine pilot kill rates per hour flying vs. other pilots would be more convincing.

One of the collateral benefits of this discussion is that I have been led to go back and reread Lundstrom and "The First Team." One of the facts that jumps out at me is the fortitude, bravery and downright guts it took in early 1942 for those naval aviators to take off from carriers to seek out the enemy. Knowledge about weather conditions was scanty. Navigation over water, sometimes in instrument conditions must have been harrowing. There was not much intelligence either about the enemy and it's equipment. One of the first pilots to sight an A6M thought it was a VB because of the canopy. The Wildcats in some squadrons did not match in performance. They were very short ranged, the fuel gauges almost useless, the self sealing tanks sometimes caused fuel line stoppages. There were no survival kits and the pilots raided the galleys for knives and meat cleavers. Sometimes pilot armor was iron under the seats applied on board. Some of the planes had IFF and homing devices, some did not and sometimes the homing devices did not work and the radios were faulty. What a gift to us that one of the pilots who played a major role in that early goings has a son on this forum who shares with us. His father is mentioned often in Lundstrom with numerous photos and he was an accomplished deflection shooter.

This is a great post! I am glad you presented very clearly the dangers facing those Navy and Marine pilots every day and the bravery they had. I shudder at the thoughts of having to do that. All were heros. I would only add that there were many similar heroes in the air war, just a couple that need mentioning is the bomber crews in England early in the war having to fly into fighter swarms and antiaircraft fire and with low probability of return. Coming home, going to bed and knowing you would have to do it all again tomorrow. And, the little known war in Alaska, where AAF pilots had to fly great distances over water so cold life would be sucked out in a few seconds, and in weather that was unimaginable to any other theaters of war. P-40 pilots had to worry about losing that one engine, P-38 pilots had to worry if that bullet hit caused a fuel leak, and all had to worry about getting lost, visibility and wind on landing, or running into an incredible weather front, in addition, of course, to the enemy. In this case God was not the copilot, death was.

Amazing courage, all.

Another interesting point, at least to me, relates to the many debates we have held about the efficacy of the M2 50 cal and how many were needed. In the prelude to the Battle of the Coral Sea a raid was mounted on the Japanese invasion of Tulagi. The F4F3s in the escort engaged some float planes and then strafed some naval vessels. Those F4F3s mounted 4-50 cals with 420 rounds for each gun. Two F4Fs strafed a Japanese DD, damaged her severely, killed and wounded many of her crew and put her out of action. So much for the debate about whether the 50 cal was lethal enough and whether the F4F4 with six guns and only 240 rounds per gun was a good idea.

I agree with all of this.

 

[Glider]

Just an observation but the debate over angle of view over the nose and the impact this has on deflection shooting could be misleading. Nost deflection shooting would happen when the target is being approached from ahead or from the side. As the target crosses in front of the fighter it will of course start firing. The angle over the nose has no bearing on this type of combat as the attacking aircraft will have to keep the target in sight at all times but its coming from the side. The angle of view over the nose will only become important if the fighter has to chase the target and allow for deflection or trajectory and the target is below the eye line over the nose. Even in these cases with the short effective range this wasn't normally a problem unless it was a fighter vs fighter combat and both were in a turning combat.

Re Lundstroms comments
The pilots of the USN and Marines were virtually the only fighter pilots trained from the beginning to utilize and regularly succeed in deflection shooting. With the partial exception of the IJN, no other air forces during WW2 taught their pilots how to make full deflection shots. For the USAAF, the RAF, the LW, the Red Air Force, and all the rest, stern and head on approaches with their minimal deflection angles comprised the primary attacks. Only a tiny minority of their pilots realized the potential of deflection shooting and taught themselves the techniques, usually after extensive combat experience
This is both accurate but misleading. It is certainly true that pre war RAF pilots had fixed fighter attack tactics called unimaginatively Type 1 Attack, type 2 attack and so on. However these were dropped very quickly once combat had been joined over the UK as they were fundamentally flawed for a whole variety of reasons and by the BOB at an estimate about 50-60% of the squadrons had dropped them. One thing the RAF were very poor at was imposing changes from above in particular in the field of tactics and harmonisation or all the squadrons would have changed.
The RAF and FAA quickly learned the lessons and poured a lot of effort into training their pilots in this dark art. Its worth remembering that it was the British who developed that sophisticated sights that came into use in the second half of the war specifically to improve deflection shooting to a new level, not the USA. These advances were quickly taken up by the USN and the USAAF

 

[renrich]

tyrodtom, you are correct. I had said eighteen inches from memory but after research the seat was raised eight inches, not the cockpit. The cockpit in the Corsair was commodius, partially because the chief test pilot was six foot four inches tall. Glider, in a snap shot where the attacker's nose is pointing at the spot in space where the defender will be when the bullets get there, visibility over the nose is not as important but that is an extremely rare situation and the amount of rounds put on the target would be small. In order to pull and hold lead so that more rounds can be put on target the attacker must be in a turn with the tightness of the turn decreasing as the angle to the target decreases. The tighter the turn the steeper the bank and the more important the visibility over the nose.

 

[R Leonard]

Davparlr -

If we can back up a little, I'm curious as to how you arrived at your figures for "fighter slots" and your statement regarding the limitation of USN fighter operations to carrier operations. My counting is a little different. You wrote:

At the start of the war, the Navy had seven front line carriers, on each of these approx. 30 aircraft were fighters (in reality it would be less early on) so that makes 210 fighter pilot slots available.

In December 1941 there were nine CV type VF squadrons - VF-2, VF-3, VF-5, VF-6, VF-8, VF-41, VF-42, VF-71, and VF-72. The average fleet carrier fighter squadron up until the middle of May 1942 had 18 aircraft and billets for approx 23 pilots. This would let us arrive at a number of 'fighter slots" slightly less than your 210 count while serving serving in two more squadrons.

Between mid May and the beginning of June 1942, with the change from the F4F-3 to the folding winged F4F-4, VF squadrons increased in size from 18 to between 27 to 29 depending on aircraft availability. Fighter pilot billets increased accordingly to an average of around 35, although one usually sees a couple of those left unfilled in each squadron. Within months, shipboard fighter complements were to rise to 36 aircraft and at least 42 pilots.

I'm unsure as to how you draw your conclusions on the number of "fighter slots" available or required to be filled. If you are basing your count on 1 VF squadron per carrier deck, then that is not how navy squadron organization works. Just because one's ship gets sunk or damaged does not mean the VF squadron evaporates. Of those original nine CV type VF squadrons at the start of the war three survived to the end of the war in one incarnation or another, others were disestablished as time went on.

- Lexington Air Group VF-2 went through a couple of reorganizations, but was finally disestablished on 1 July 1942. A later VF-2 established on 1 June 1943 had no direct lineage.
- Saratoga Air Group VF-3 survived, but only after some identity shifting wing VF-6, being so redesignated on 15 July 1943.
- Yorktown Air Group VF-5 was disestablished on 7 January 1943. The subsequent squadron numbered VF-5 had no direct lineage with the VF-5 at the start of the war. VF-5 never served aboard USS Yorktown (CV-5) during the time that ship was in combat. A later VF-5 had no direct lineage with the VF-5 at the start of the war.
- Enterprise Air Group VF-6 survived but was redesignated as VF-3 on 15 July 1943; see VF-3
- Hornet Air Group VF-8 was disestablished on 28 August 1942, mostly, and probably a good idea, because of the operational losses incurred at Midway. The subsequent squadron numbered
- Ranger Air Group VF-41 was redesignated VF-4 on 4 August 1943 and so carried on through the war
- Ranger Air Group VF-42 was disestablished on 22 June 1942 and from the records, for a couple of weeks was to reform in CVG-11. The VF squadron in CVG-11 designation changed to VF-11 in July. VF-42's combat cruises were aboard USS Yorktown (CV-5) vice VF-5.
- Wasp Air Group VF-71 operated land based in SoPac for a while after the loss of USS Wasp (CV-7) and then came back stateside to be disestablished on 7 January 1943
- Wasp Air Group VF-72 operated off USS Hornet after the loss of Wasp and after the loss of Hornet the remainder of its SoPac time was spent operating both from ashore and aboard USS Nassau. VF-72 returned stateside to be disestablished on 29 March 1943.

Is should also be noted that the change of VF-41 to VF-4, VF-42 to VF-11 and the disestablishments of VF-71 and VF-72 had as much to do with the change from named air groups to numbered air groups than anything else. The parent air group for VF-71 snd VF-72 (WAG) no longer existed. VF-41 was becoming VF-4 and increasing in size, there was no plan to put VF-42 back on Ranger or in CVG-4, not to mention that squadron had just completed what was essentially a 6-month combat deployment which included the almost all the major actions in the Pacific up to that point.

What also seems to be missing from your count are squadrons established and reforming during the period. Just because a carrier has not yet started work-ups does not mean it does not have squadrons assigned and already working up. Using official aircraft location reports and looking at which squadrons remained in service and which were subsequently established, redesignated, and, yes for a couple, disestablished, and their normal complements, up through 1943, a monthly count of your USN "fighter slots" looks more like:

Feb-42 = 207
Mar-42 = 212
Apr-42 = 220
May-42 = 253
Jun-42 = 412
Jul-42 = 432
Aug-42 = 465
Sep-42 = 530
Oct-42 = 565
Nov-42 = 591
Dec-42 = 642
Jan-43 = 792
Feb-43 = 792
Mar-43 = 1006
Apr-43 = 1072
May-43 = 1145
Jun-43 = 1283
Jul-43 = 1430
Aug-43 = 1535
Sep-43 = 1789
Oct-43 = 1885
Nov-43 = 2308
Dec-43 = 2425

A considerable difference from your calculations, and probably a little on the conservative side, but is based on actual squadrons and does not take into account billets for fighter pilots assigned to CASU, advanced training units, fleet air units, or other flying duties requiring fighter experience/rating.

Regards,

Rich

 

[R Leonard]

Davparlr -

Still on the "fighter slots" issue, it would appear from your writing that you seem to want to confine USN fighters to carrier duty. Obviously from the count in my previous you were not considering a very large number land based, fighter equipped units, mostly those working up for deployment, but, also more than just a few actually in combat theaters. You wrote:

Since the Navy could only accommodate fighter pilots on carriers, their build up could be much slower, probably allowing more training and flying experience before being committed to battle as you have stated. At the end of 1942, the Navy had roughly 1700 fighter aircraft built but only 115 fighter slots available.

Not sure that is an accurate description of what was going on, especially in light of the above. Further, in the South Pacific Theater, where the vast majority of USN fighter aircraft were seeing action were doing so, from the end of 1942 up through the introduction of the Essex class carriers into Pacific action, say, from 17 December 1942 to 16 November 1943, a quick look at aircraft location reports shows (and then taking into account what was actually happening in the theater that, on the average there were twice as many USN fighter equipped squadrons operating from land bases as from carriers, the average for carrier based squadrons per report being 2 and land based being 4:

Report Date - Carrier-based vs Land-based fighter equipped USN squadrons, SoPac Theater:
(Note that in the few instances were a squadron was split into land based and carrier based detachments in a report, the detachment with the largest complement of aircraft prevailed; e.g., on 1 Jan 43 VF-10 had 24 F4Fs aboard Enterprise and 12 ashore at Espiritu Santo, the squadron is counted as carrier based. On the other hand, when in the 28 Apr 43 report the same VF-10 shows 24 F4Fs ashore at Guadalcanal, 11 F4Fs aboard Enterprise, and 1 F4U ashore at Espiritu Santo, then the squadron is counted as land based)

17 Dec 42 - 4 carrier-based; 1 land-based
6 Jan 43 - 6 carrier-based; 0 land-based
10 Jan 43 - 6 carrier-based; 0 land-based
28 Jan 43 - 6 carrier-based; 0 land-based
17 Feb 43 - 6 carrier-based; 0 land-based
24 Feb 43 - 2 carrier-based; 4 land-based
4 Mar 43 - 3 carrier-based; 6 land-based
11 Mar 43 - 5 carrier-based; 4 land-based
24 Mar 43 - 1 carrier-based; 8 land-based
4 Apr 43 - 1 carrier-based; 8 land-based
21 Apr 43 - 0 carrier-based; 9 land-based
28 Apr 43 - 1 carrier-based; 8 land-based
5 May 43 - 2 carrier-based; 5 land-based
12 May 43 - 0 carrier-based; 6 land-based
20 May 43 - 0 carrier-based; 6 land-based
31 May 43 - 0 carrier-based; 6 land-based
8 Jun 43 - 2 carrier-based; 4 land-based
15 Jun 43 - 1 carrier-based; 5 land-based
21 Jun 43 - 1 carrier-based; 5 land-based
28 Jun 43 - 3 carrier-based; 3 land-based
6 Jul 43 - 2 carrier-based; 4 land-based
14 Jul 43 - 2 carrier-based; 4 land-based
21 Jul 43 - 1 carrier-based; 5 land-based
28 Jul 43 - 0 carrier-based; 6 land-based
3 Aug 43 - 1 carrier-based; 7 land-based
9 Aug 43 - 1 carrier-based; 7 land-based
17 Aug 43 - 0 carrier-based; 7 land-based
24 Aug 43 - 2 carrier-based; 1 land-based
7 Sep 43 - 0 carrier-based; 2 land-based
14 Sep 43 - 0 carrier-based; 4 land-based
21 Sep 43 - 0 carrier-based; 4 land-based
28 Sep 43 - 0 carrier-based; 4 land-based
12 Oct 43 - 0 carrier-based; 4 land-based
19 Oct 43 - 0 carrier-based; 4 land-based
26 Oct 43 - 0 carrier-based; 5 land-based
2 Nov 43 - 1 carrier-based; 5 land-based
9 Nov 43 - 5 carrier-based; 4 land-based
16 Nov 43 - 5 carrier-based; 4 land-based
Average report - 2 carrier-based; 4 land-based

Based on the squadron locations, the number of "fighter slots", that is, the squadron complements for fighter pilots can also be roughly determined:

Report Date - Carrier based vs Land based Fighter Pilot Billets – SoPac Theater
17 Dec 42 - 117 Carrier based billets; 42 Land based billets
6 Jan 43 - 159 Carrier based billets; 0 Land based billets
10 Jan 43 - 159 Carrier based billets; 0 Land based billets
28 Jan 43 - 159 Carrier based billets; 0 Land based billets
17 Feb 43 - 159 Carrier based billets; 0 Land based billets
24 Feb 43 - 67 Carrier based billets; 117 Land based billets
4 Mar 43 - 109 Carrier based billets; 75 Land based billets
11 Mar 43 - 159 Carrier based billets; 96 Land based billets
24 Mar 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 213 Land based billets
4 Apr 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 213 Land based billets
21 Apr 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 255 Land based billets
28 Apr 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 213 Land based billets
5 May 43 - 90 Carrier based billets; 105 Land based billets
12 May 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 189 Land based billets
20 May 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 189 Land based billets
31 May 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 189 Land based billets
8 Jun 43 - 67 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
15 Jun 43 - 25 Carrier based billets; 176 Land based billets
21 Jun 43 - 25 Carrier based billets; 176 Land based billets
28 Jun 43 - 75 Carrier based billets; 126 Land based billets
6 Jul 43 - 50 Carrier based billets; 151 Land based billets
14 Jul 43 - 50 Carrier based billets; 151 Land based billets
21 Jul 43 - 25 Carrier based billets; 176 Land based billets
28 Jul 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 214 Land based billets
3 Aug 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 263 Land based billets
9 Aug 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 261 Land based billets
17 Aug 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 261 Land based billets
24 Aug 43 - 67 Carrier based billets; 42 Land based billets
7 Sep 43 - 42 Carrier based billets; 42 Land based billets
14 Sep 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
21 Sep 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
28 Sep 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
12 Oct 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
19 Oct 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 134 Land based billets
26 Oct 43 - 0 Carrier based billets; 176 Land based billets
2 Nov 43 - 25 Carrier based billets; 176 Land based billets
9 Nov 43 - 186 Carrier based billets; 127 Land based billets
16 Nov 43 - 186 Carrier based billets; 127 Land based billets
Average report - 58 Carrier based billets; 141 Land based billets

While admittedly billets here are calculated using the squadron type (CV type VF, CVL type VF, CVE type VGF or VC type) and standard aircraft complement plus a fudge factor depending on squadron type, to account for spare pilots to arrive at a total complement, these are probably pretty close to squadron pilot complement authorized levels. If anything, they may be a tad low. Having counted noses a few times in the past, they look pretty close to me. And, surely and most certainly, there were times, probably most of time once operating in theater, when a squadron's roster was nowhere near completely filled, but that happens in all units and has nothing to do with actual authorized billets.

Anyway, as can be seen, land based USN fighter billets, as with squadron assignments as shown above, generally out number carrier based billets during this period in the USNs primary operating theater. The places where one could generalize fighter equipped carrier based squadrons, and, hence, their number of fighter pilot billets, as exceeding land based squadrons only appear in the first eight weeks of the period, before the USN land based units really ramped up in theater; in the 24 August 43 report, during a unit transition period with units leaving the theater and others arriving but not yet operational; and, finally, at the end when the Essex class carriers and some of their Independence class consorts arrive on the scene for a brief operational period.

On a weekly average, operating squadrons in just the SoPac Theater, the total of calculated fighter billets is about 73% higher than your calculated 115 for the entire navy; and there are only but two reports (24 August and 7 September 1943) from which the data would lead to the conclusion that there were less than 115 fighter billets in theater.


Regards,

Rich

 

[Glider]

Glider, in a snap shot where the attacker's nose is pointing at the spot in space where the defender will be when the bullets get there, visibility over the nose is not as important but that is an extremely rare situation and the amount of rounds put on the target would be small. In order to pull and hold lead so that more rounds can be put on target the attacker must be in a turn with the tightness of the turn decreasing as the angle to the target decreases. The tighter the turn the steeper the bank and the more important the visibility over the nose.

We agree that in a tight turn then the angle over the nose becomes important, but as we both know tight turning combats were the exception, not the rule. Also deflection shots were normally not snap shots, a snap shot is something quite different. Most deflection shots were deliberate and with sufficient distance to take the shot without worrying about the angle over the nose.

If I can add to my previous posting its worth remembering that the RAF started combat in Sept 1939, the USN in December 1941. By the time that the US started combat operations the RAF had dropped its pre war training and pre war attack tactics.

 

[renrich]

Glider, with respect, I don't believe that you understand what is involved in a full deflection gunnery run as practised in training and in combat by the USN. I had hoped to avoid this because of my poor typing skills but I am going to quote from "80 Knots to Mach 2" by Richard Linnekin(since I am sure that you are tired of hearing from Lundstrom) who spent 45 years as a pilot. His first gunnery training was in 1946 and he was flying a F6F. These evolutions are exactly as described in Lundstrom. The tight turns have nothing to do with tight turning combat.

Here goes: " There were four classic runs or approaches, in which we were obliged to become proficient: low sides, flat sides, high sides and overheads. Why all this attention to flying "canned" maneuvers against a towed sleeve, when it is generally accepted that over 90% of all aerial kills were accomplished from directly behind the victim? With the victor firing at close range and the victim unaware that he was under attack until the bullets started coming? There are a couple of reasons."

"First, the runs were tactically valid, especially against horizontal bombers that carried self protection swiveling and turret guns. An attacking fighter presents a difficult target to defending gunners if he properly executes a firing run. He minimizes his exposure to enemy fire while retaining a high kill probability against the enemy." (If Lundstrom is correct and high deflection shooting was not practiced by the RAF, a lot more LW bombers would have been killed and a lot less RAF pilots would have been killed in 1940)

"Second, the runs we practiced were an excellent tool for teaching pilots to shoot accurately at moving targets. In particular, the end game 90 degree deflection shots featured high angle rates and range rates, the most difficult problems to solve in any kind of gunnery. If one could shoot accurately out of our array of firing runs, one should be able to shoot accurately in the more benign tactical scenarios that can also occur in combat." (He goes on to say that the top scorers like O Hare and McCambell were excellent shots and often used small amounts of ammo for each kill which allowed them to get multiple kills on one flight.)

"With the exception of the overhead run, all runs in plan view had essentially the same shape, a kind of asymmetrical "S" To shorten this, I am now trying to paraphrase. The high side is the attacker is above the defender, flat side is level with defender, low side is below the defender. Obviously the high side is preferable because of performance issues The goal is to commence firing when the angle to the target line of flight is 90 degrees and the range selected by the USN was about 1000 feet. Ideally, in a high side run, the attacker begins the run at about 5000 feet above the target and off to one side. If the run is from the right side of the target, the attacker is well in front and banks into a left turn(toward the target) until he has reversed so that he is almost traveling parallel but on the opposite course of the target and still ahead . At the right moment he begins to reverse again with the goal of arriving at the firing point.

Linnekin: " The only thing that matters is that however you approach the target, try to be instantaneously approaching the target in a 90 degree or beam aspect when you start to shoot-"instantaneously" because this is a dynamic situation. You can't stay there; you just pass through. That is what makes it tough. You have to pass through this magic point in space wherein you are approaching exactly sideways to the target-90 degrees- at a range of roughly a thousand feet, while holding the appropriate lead, which is initially 80 or 90 mils."

Now the point about visibilty over the nose. The attacker is turning, rolling back to his right letting his pipper drift back in order to achieve the proper lead, about 80 mils. Linnekin: " Now you are going to apply increasing back stick pressure to keep the lead where you want it. YOUR BANK ANGLE IS INCREASING TOWARD 90 DEGREES. Yor speed is increasing. It is imperative that that this be smooth, ball-in -the-center, coordinated flight."

The reason I put the caps is to demonstrate that when the firing point is reached the attacker is in a turn, almost in a 90 degree bank and pointing well in front of the target. That is when the visibility over the nose is critical. As soon as firing is commenced the range begins to decrease and so does the lead angle but it "takes increasing g-forces to hold the lead angle because of decreasing range and increasing angular rates."

I am played out but hope this helps some.

 

[R Leonard]

maybe this will help?

View attachment Fix Gun Combat Tactics 2 - Gunnery Approaches.pdf

 

[R Leonard]

Or this, and maybe read it first, though there is a page missing.

View attachment Fix Gun Combat Tactics 1 - How to get hits w illuminated sight.pdf

 

[Glider]

First I must thank you for the effort that went into the typing. I agree with almost everything that you say and that the documents support that. Commenting on the previous posting I think we all agree that deflection shooting isn't snap shooting.
Alos nothing in the documents implies that at the point of shooting the target is out of sight of the pilot. Indeed all the doucuments comment on the amount of lead that you should give the target and this is normally in the view of the gun sight and by definition within the view of the pilot as they can see all the gun sight.
The only area I can see where the angle over the nose helps is in a turning dogfight as the 'lead' would be much greater. Also I can also see that having a better view could assist in the approach but I have never read of any fighter pilot who had a major problem with this in any fighter. The bank and angle of the fighter isn't an issue, what matters is if you can see the target.

I certainly do and have agreed that had the RAF modified their tactics before the BOB had begun the results would have been improved but a good number of the squadrons had changed, a point often forgotten. Its worth remembering that by Dec 1941 all the RAF squadrons and training had changed. What would be interesting is if the USN were further advanced on this in Sept 1939 or did they learn the lessons of the RAF and apply them in the two years grace that the USA had.

 

[davparlr]

Davparlr -

If we can back up a little, I'm curious as to how you arrived at your figures for "fighter slots" and your statement regarding the limitation of USN fighter operations to carrier operations. My counting is a little different. You wrote:
At the start of the war, the Navy had seven front line carriers, on each of these approx. 30 aircraft were fighters (in reality it would be less early on) so that makes 210 fighter pilot slots available.
In December 1941 there were nine CV type VF squadrons - VF-2, VF-3, VF-5, VF-6, VF-8, VF-41, VF-42, VF-71, and VF-72. The average fleet carrier fighter squadron up until the middle of May 1942 had 18 aircraft and billets for approx 23 pilots. This would let us arrive at a number of 'fighter slots" slightly less than your 210 count while serving serving in two more squadrons.

Between mid May and the beginning of June 1942, with the change from the F4F-3 to the folding winged F4F-4, VF squadrons increased in size from 18 to between 27 to 29 depending on aircraft availability. Fighter pilot billets increased accordingly to an average of around 35, although one usually sees a couple of those left unfilled in each squadron. Within months, shipboard fighter complements were to rise to 36 aircraft and at least 42 pilots.

I'm unsure as to how you draw your conclusions on the number of "fighter slots" available or required to be filled. If you are basing your count on 1 VF squadron per carrier deck, then that is not how navy squadron organization works. Just because one's ship gets sunk or damaged does not mean the VF squadron evaporates. Of those original nine CV type VF squadrons at the start of the war three survived to the end of the war in one incarnation or another, others were disestablished as time went on.

I now realize that my post was not as clear as it should have been. My conclusion on "fighter slots" was base on the number of fighter aircraft that were "shooters" where a shooter is an aircraft or pilot combat ready and is deployed in such a manner as combat is probable. I considered all commissioned carriers as having shooter fighter aircraft, they are mobile and can be deployed anywhere. This would also apply to all forward airfields such as Guadalcanal. Fighter squadrons based in Hawaii, for example, even if combat ready, would not be considered shooters. I do understand that lost carriers did not mean that the pilots or aircraft assigned to that carrier are lost, and that many pilots recover on other aircraft carriers or land based airfields, say, Midway. It does mean that there is a reduction in shooter billets. The number of aircraft now able to engage the enemy is reduced. While the aircraft and aircrews may have been recovered from the Lex at Coral Sea, they were not available for combat at Midway unless they were predispositioned at Midway. I will admit I am ignorant of land base naval forces. My assumption was that all land based assets were Marines. So, by the December 17, 1942, I would accept that there were 159 Navy shooter billets, like you show.

What also seems to be missing from your count are squadrons established and reforming during the period. Just because a carrier has not yet started work-ups does not mean it does not have squadrons assigned and already working up. Using official aircraft location reports and looking at which squadrons remained in service and which were subsequently established, redesignated, and, yes for a couple, disestablished, and their normal complements, up through 1943, a monthly count of your USN "fighter slots" looks more like:

Dec-42 = 642

Dec-43 = 2425

This can't be. You and I just showed that in December, 1942, there were only 159 shooter billets, not 642. In my opinion, fighter pilots were either a shooter or in training/practicing to be a shooter. Most of the 642 must have been the latter as there was very limited shooter assets available, and a lot of training/practicing was going on.

Also, in Dec, '43, there were 10 carriers operational; three of these were Lexington class. If all 10 carriers had 40 fighter pilots that would be 400 shooter slots. You show four land based squadron which would, if each land base squadron is equal to a CV squadron, bring that to 560 shooter slots available. That's a long way from 2425.

A considerable difference from your calculations, and probably a little on the conservative side, but is based on actual squadrons and does not take into account billets for fighter pilots assigned to CASU, advanced training units, fleet air units, or other flying duties requiring fighter experience/rating.

Remember that my hypothesis was that the Navy had a small quantity of shooter slots available through 1943, allowing them more time for training and practice before being committed to combat whereas the Army shooting slots were opening up much faster requiring often filling slots with pilots right out of flight training school and diluting Army experience. The typical Navy pilot being assigned to a carrier would have more time in the air and training under the belt than the typical Army pilot arriving at his combat squadron. At the Philippines 100 pilots were coming with the P-40s being delivered, all were right out of pilot training. I would be willing to bet that there were no right-out-of-pilot-training Navy pilots manning the fighters at the Coral Sea or Midway. I suspect this level of experience advantage for the average Navy fighter pilot would exist for entire war.

Still on the "fighter slots" issue, it would appear from your writing that you seem to want to confine USN fighters to carrier duty. Obviously from the count in my previous you were not considering a very large number land based, fighter equipped units, mostly those working up for deployment, but, also more than just a few actually in combat theaters. You wrote:

This post is confusing to me. When you show 0 carrier based, does that mean the all the carrier aircraft are assigned land-based even when actually on the carrier?

On a weekly average, operating squadrons in just the SoPac Theater, the total of calculated fighter billets is about 73% higher than your calculated 115 for the entire navy; and there are only but two reports (24 August and 7 September 1943) from which the data would lead to the conclusion that there were less than 115 fighter billets in theater.

Okay, but I still think that only allows a small number of shooters available relative to the Army requirements.

 

[renrich]

Many thanks, Rich. Glider, you are welcome. It is not so much the actual typing but since I am "a hunt and peck" typer who has to look at the keyboard, trying to duplicate what is in a book is onerous. Having said that, here is more from "The First Team".

"Aside from lack of knowledge of the proper ways to make deflection shots, tangible reasons existed why other air forces had trouble emulating the USN. The most important was visibility over the nose of the attacking fighter. When executing overhead and side runs from a full deflection angle (60 to 90 degrees), the attacker had to place his point of aim well ahead of the target, the distance depending on the target's speed. To shoot accurately and obviate risk of collision, the pilot had to see ideally both the target and where his tracers were going; thus both the target and the aiming point had to appear in his gunsight. This required excellent visibility over the nose of the attacker's aircraft. Otherwise when allotting sufficient lead for full deflection, the pilot would lose sight of his target when it disappeared under the nose of his own plane.

"Among it's other qualities, the Wildcat with its radial engine under a sloping cowling and cockpit installed high over a mid wing fuselage had the necessary visibility over the nose. a down angle of 6.5 degrees required for full deflection shooting. This quality of good vision forward and below evolved also in connection with carrier landings.Thus, naval fighter pilots came to expect that attribute as necessary for good shooting and good carrier landings. land based fighters often sacrifised good visibility for streamlining. Their pilots sat so low and so far back in the aircraft that visiblity over the nose was very poor, making deflection shooting extremely difficult even if the pilots knew how to do it."

Now, another point which may (or may not), demonstrate something about gunnery training of USN pilots, especially early war. Was browsing through "Table 1, Consolidated Summary of Navy and Marine Carrier and Land Based Air Operations and Results for Entire War By Model of Aircraft Employed" and learned something interesting and startling, (at least to me).
Navy SBDs flew only a total of 6048 action sorties from carriers in WW2.
There were 43 losses to E/A (enemy aircraft).
In turn those SBDs were credited with shooting down 31 bombers and 75 fighters. I assume all those figures come from the PTO.
To begin with, because of Lundstrom's exhaustive research, I assume that the credits are inaccurate on the high side.
Never the less, the SBD looks as if were a fairly lethal aircraft in air to air combat.
Probably, the fighter credits largely belong to the rear gunner but the bomber credits should almost all belong to the pilot with his twin 50s.
Early in the war, many of the USN pilots who flew VTs and VBs had received fighter training also and their gunnery skills must have stuck with them. Early in the war, SBDs were used in the CAP role because of the shortage of fighters and those SBD pilots were pretty aggressive.

Navy and Marine piloted SBDs flew a total of around 46000 land based action sorties in WW2, the vast majority by Marines, had 36 losses to E/A and were credited with 32 enemy fighters shot down.

 

[Glider]

OK the white flag of truce (not surrender) is going up over here. If only because if the angle over the nose as so critical the Corsair wouldn't have been nearly as good as it was.
However with that parting shot I now withdraw.

 

[drgondog]

Glider - one of the reasons the Corsair (Spit, Mustang, Jug, etc - pick one) was so successful is that its performance gave it an edge in most tactical situations and high deflection gunnery was the exception rather than the rule. Remember also that when the 51H was designed it had significantly better forward visibility over the cowl by dropping the engine axis and giving the H more 'droop' - for just this reason as well as slightly better taxi visibility.

Every good fighter pilot that I talked to about this specific subject recall that they had to pull through the opponent's flight trajectory when shooting at 70-90 degrees deflection - and often fired as the prey was lost to sight 'under the cowl'

 

[renrich]

Glider, truce works for me(not surrender) and Bill's explanation makes a lot of sense. However Richard Linnekin, author of the book I quoted from earlier said that he became a good gunner finally when flying those high deflection runs in a Corsair. He said the Corsair seemed to him to have better contol modulation than the F6F and the F8F and he could fly a smoother pattern in it. At a glance the Corsair does not appear to have good visibility over the nose and we know it does not at high AOA as in a carrier landing but maybe it is different in a gunnery run. The pilot does sit really high in a Corsair cockpit.

 

[Glider]

Thank you one and all, always willing to learn, says he in a serious sulk

 

[renrich]

This has been a nice discussion and I have enjoyed trying to contribute. As mentioned, it has led me to go back and study some of my books again and it is a joy to reread Lundstom and reflect on how fortunate us Americans were to have the dedicated men of the USN to bring us back from the debacle of Pearl Harbor in only about six months to the resounding victory of Midway. Lundstrom's books are so well researched to the point where he actually matches up the different pilots, where possible, as to the names of the US Navy and IJN and who shot down who. His books are not easy to digest because they are so detailed but if one sticks to them they are unparalleled, IMO, for accuracy and thoroughness.

Going back to the Navy and Marine statistics, I was shocked at the number of landbased action sorties that were flown by the Marines in SBDs. I have always pictured the SBD as a Navy carrier based VB that was a work horse in the PTO but the SB2C, the Beast, flew more than three times as many action sorties from carriers as the SBD did with 18,808 sorties. But 40, 872 action sorties by Marines from landbases in SBDs makes me wonder, where and when? Can anyone explain that?