Germany's Doomed Plan: Operation Bodenplatte and the Battle of Y-29. Thoughts?

[tbfighterpilot]

What do people think about Germany's Operation Bodenplatte (bottom plate), and the aerial battle of Y-29? Could it have been a success? Here are some videos from the History Channel's show Dogfights:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=booCDyCFxFg

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyJUXttD2oQ

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjnYo7qECzg

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LryvsoDEl7w

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ss1TWvRhDGI

 

[vikingBerserker]

Dang it, I missed this show. Thanks for posting!

 

[mhuxt]

No, I don't think it could have been a success. A "Grosser Schlag" to reverse the defeats of early 1944 might have worked if the 262 had been ready to take up the slack immediately thereafter, in March or so, but that's all woulda coulda shoulda. By April '44 (give or take a month or two?) the Third Reich was already dead, it just hadn't fallen down yet.

 

[tomo pauk]

Instead of attacking the airports by sun rise, they attacked around 10 o'clock. Expecting that Allie pilots AAA crews would've been still in bed by that time was wishful thinking. While the attack might've been a pretty unpleasant deal for Allies, the outcome of war was decided some 2 years ago.

 

[gjs238]

Just seems that the greater the effort Germany expended in the West meant more of the East that would be occupied by the Soviets.
Regardless, it was just delaying the inevitable.

 

[tyrodtom]

There was a lot of low time pilots in the Bodenplatte attack, a predawn takeoff would had added extra hazards, and low level navigation in the dark is difficult even for experienced pilots.

I don't know how much distance there was between the fields they took off from and the points they attacked, but 10 am does seem a little late. Maybe there was some early morning fog that delayed takeoffs.

 

[pbfoot]

It was New Years day and if half of the Allied crews were not hungover , I`ll paint your house. They were young guys away from home surounded by Congnac. Champagne etc .
here is link to a story about a Xmas party
A Biggin Hill Christmas > Vintage Wings of Canada

 

[gjs238]

Vat 69?

 

[pbfoot]

delete

 

[pbfoot]

Vat 69?

Its gotta be in there , I'm aware of one Sqn that had over 50cs of champagne which worked out to about 2.5 bottles for everyone including groundcrew

 

[Milosh]

Sun rise for Brussels is 8:45AM.

At 8:25AM, 16 Me109s of I./JG27 took off. Take off times for most units taken part in Bodenplatte can be found in the Bodenplatte book by Manrho and Putz.

Many of the units flew with navigation lights on for part of the flight to the target.

Sun rise times can be found @ Sunrise and Sunset for Belgium – Brussels – January 1992

 

[tomo pauk]

The same book claims that time of attack was set at 9:20. It also states that many (most?) of the losses inflicted by Allied fighters occurred after 9:30, mostly around the bases they were defending.

Another fail of the planning was that quite a few of front-line crossing routes chosen were just above the areas of bitter ground battles, where Allies have had decent amount of AAA assets. And by 9:30 the AAA guarding Allied airfields was ready to harm the attackers.

Another thing that was going against LW fighter units was that many of young pilots were having hardly any experience of ground strafing, not to mention strafing of a target defended by AAA. Hence they've inflicted less damage, while experiencing greater losses.

 

[davebender]

It's my understanding the operation was originally supposed to compliment the Ardennes Offensive. Take out U.S. and British CAS aircraft so they couldn't attack the Heer in Belgium. That has some military logic.

Launching Bodenplatte during January 1945 was simply throwing aircraft away as the Ardennes Offensive was already over. IMO they should have launched a massive attack on a daylight bomber formation instead.

 

[Siegfried]

Germany had to defeat the Allies at the Normandy beach head. It was certainly possible in certain circumstances: for instance IF the Germans had of moved their troops and aircraft there at least 2 weeks earlier then what happened at Omaha might have lead to failure for the alliers there and at other landing sites. Had they widely introduced the rewirable reflector for the enigma machine; UKWD, (Unkehr Walze D) in 1943 then allied cypher penetration of enigma would have collapsed and with it a huge allied advantage. UKWD was only used in small numbers from 1943 and hence made no difference; in fact it sometimes made things worse as opperators asked "Do you have UKWD" which provided a crib for a break in.

What strikes me is the lag in introduction of the Me 109G-10, Me 109K-4 and FW 190D-9 and D-12 was so late. These aircraft need to be moved forward some 6-9 months so that they are seeing service at the begining of 1944 (january) in serious numbers instead of the end. It is at this time that the P-51B is seeing its first service. The Me 109G-14AM and probably also the Me 109G-14ASM also need to be moved forward 9 months and the 1.42 ata rating also needs to be released earlier. This at least gives the Luftwaffe pilots aircraft that keeps more of them alive. At the very minimum the very basic mods that could be done to the Me 109 to keep its speed up need to be introduced in the manufacturing line:
cleaned up gun bulges, retractable tail wheel, ERLA haube, galland hood and higher precision manufacturing. The latter alone can easily add 12km/h. In total there is over 12 perhaps 20 mph there. This was all understood.

I'm also inclined to assert that had a lightweight ejection seat similar to that used on the He 162 been introduced on 109s, 190s and 262s in early 1944 that so many more pilots would have survived it would have kept the skill level of the Luftwaffe up dramatically.

The Me 262 could have been ready. Though seeing service trials in mid 1944 it wasn't untill late 1944 with the introducion of the Jumo 004B4 with hollow blades that the production engine became reasonably reliabe. An aspect of reliabillity that could have been much earlier was better fuel control, the so called beschleunigungs ventile (accelerator valve) that would have helped to keep the engines temperaturs stable and controlled. This poor fuel control was a problem with allied engines as well. In general the engineers involved regretted that not enough attention had been paid early on in introducing proper control; there was not leap in technology required, just an application of existing art. Measure or estimate the airflow rate accuratly and add fuel proportionatly such that the engine neither falmes out from fuel starvation nor burns through due to over supply.

 

[pbfoot]

I'm also inclined to assert that had a lightweight ejection seat similar to that used on the He 162 been introduced on 109s, 190s and 262s in early 1944 that so many more pilots would have survived it would have kept the skill level of the Luftwaffe up dramatically.

Not really lots more guys in the hispital with back problems, and to eject from 109 you are going to loose your legs from mid thigh down . So alls you achieve is a lot of LW pilots bumming around

 

[Readie]

and to eject from 109 you are going to loose your legs from mid thigh down

How come? Is it because of the size of the cockpit?
John

 

[Siegfried]

Not really lots more guys in the hispital with back problems, and to eject from 109 you are going to loose your legs from mid thigh down . So alls you achieve is a lot of LW pilots bumming around

Feldwebel Alfred Staffa ejected ejected no less than 3 times from He 219 in night combat, unhurt each time.
2005
2005

I see no reason why a pilot should loose his knees ejecting from a 109, it would be engineered appropriatly with foot straps to pull in the knees or foot rests to position accordingly.

German ejection seas did not use a blind, but used an arm rest to relieve the torso of weight and compose correct spinal alignment.

Some post was soviet seats had a bad reputation for causing spinal injury, they opperated at nearly 25g.

 

[pbfoot]

Hmmm obviously never seen an ejector seat nor a 109 , so when ejecting from 109 it would have to be a capsule taking with the instrument panel (that where the legs cease to hang onto body) probably adding a minimum of 600lbs to an already over stretched airframe . Gotta love them rockets or 20mm shells blowing straight down into fuel tank to get seat out . And as for Staffa good for him I haven't met anyone that ejected from aircraft that hasn't been alittle bacnged up but I forgot we are dealing with a better class of human

 

[pbfoot]

How come? Is it because of the size of the cockpit?
John

instrument panel and all the structure under wind screen realizing your legs are tucked under it . So as you ejected your legs would catch under all that , would be the same in a Spit or Hurri and probably every single seater of WW2 vintage its a fools errand

 

[Erich]

the op was ill-conceived from the very start chatted with several LW pilots that flew on this ill fated day, would of been better to send bombed up equipped LW night fighters to attack the bases as they probably would of been more familiar with the AF and the surrounding landscape since they were involved in ground attack from the very onset of the bulge battles. some of the NJG Ju 88 crews never flew in this area since some were from NJG 100 serving on the Ost front.
as to ejection seats none of the single seaters were equipped like the 109/Fw 190 variants it was protocol to zoom upward at 1000 ft if lying low level, pop the canopy and then turn the craft upside down and drop out this again told to me from over 20 LW pilots during 44/45. many of you have seen the US Mustang cine films that proves this very procedure