Hellcat vs Spitfire - which would you take?

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ah, i never realized your dad was an instructor...that changes things dramatically. i knew a couple guys who were in the same boat....had to jump through some hoops to get from being a trainer to the eto.
 

ok now i have to ask as i dont really know....how many planes and pilots did we lose in the PTO between pearl and midway? and how many did the IJN lose? i am going to venture a guess and say the japanese could not field as many airmen as the US could.....we had enough resources to let airmen do so many missions and go home. the germans and japanese didnt have this kind of resource to draw from.
 
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Think about 200 downed for 76 losses in F4F. Which country replaces losses fastest. Which country (except for relatives of pilots lost) loses critical resource the most and placed in the worst tactical situation for the 'next' battle, and the 'next', and the 'next'.

Parsifal is addressing the fact that FM's and F4F's weren't ideal but they could at that stage of the war continue to be formidable if not overpowering against IJN - without F6F.
 
Yes. Another top ace for the 355th, Gordy Graham, had exactly the same path. When he came to the group my father was 354FS CO and wearing the hat of Deputy Group CO to replave Kinnard - Vice Stewart, as well as Dragon at the gate giving check rides to bomber pilots transitioning to 2SF. Gordy later made three stars.

Gordy labored under another handicap, namely having the nickname "Ace" when he came to the Group.. loaded with real 'aces'...but he flew every position in the squadron including Blue 4 at ass end and earned the respect of the Squadron. He became a 'real ace' (air) in a little over four months when there weren't a lot of opportunites until late November through Mid January.
 
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Not sure if this helps, but it gives a broad overview of the training regimes for each nation.

At Phil Sea the losses were very one sided. Gotta bear in mind that this was a significant moment in the war. Japanese strikes were badly co-ordinated, and with orders to ignore the American fighters. they US victory was asmuch about excellent fighter control and dense flak defences as it was about the unquestionable high quality fighter control and the good quality aircraft.

More US aircraft than 35 were lost due to non-combat reasons than combat reasons. In the riposte when the US CAGs struck back, many aircraft....from memory about 114 were ditched because they tried to hit the Carriers at long range and then got lost in the fading light. Which just underlines the point that even though it was the zenith of Hellcat success, they still could not get the better of the "other causes" reasons for lost aircraft. Attrition still remained the main reason for US losses. Not sure about the japanese on this occasion, I just dont have the data for their non-combat losses. It had tobe high, because some estimates put the losses to the japanese to the dfending cap at just over 100. These have to be estimates, we just dont know how effective each element of the defenses were.

By the time the US hit the 1st Mobile Fleet, there were just 35 Japanese fighters left, to fight well over 200. These guys were the last of the last of the Japanese experienced fliers. They fought like tigers, and were very effective in their zeroes. They limited the damage to the now completely disorganized, and vulnerable Japannese fleet, to just one carrier. The Japanese should have lost everything by rights, but their fliers performed so well, and fought the US so effectively that they managed to get most of their ships out of Dodge

The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia: Aircraft Pilots
 

I haven't found the cost of F6F production, but I did run across an interesting figure; Castle Bromwich (the factory built for Spitfire II production) cost over 4 million pounds or about $20 million US, however taking into account relative costs ( a KGV class battleship cost 7 million pounds) it seems likely that Castle Bromwich, if built in the USA would have equalled an Essex class carrier in cost.
 

In relation to the salient question that was put to you "could the F4fs do as well?" not individually, but collectively yes. By mid 1944, the key limit on American force projection was not aircraft numbers, or pilots, or pilot experience. by the time of Phil sea, the Americans were in plentiful supply of all three. The biggest constraint holding them back was carrier numbers. If the USN had access to a further 4 carriers at that time, a not unreasonable assumption given the earlier discussions, but equipped with F4Fs rather than F6Fs, instead of fielding 956 a/c for the battle, they would have been fielding about 1250 a/c for the battle. Instead of (roughly) 500 Hellcats in the CAP force, there would have at least 750 fighters to call in. To understand what the Japanese were up against, you have to understand the details of their attack. They had counted on significant intervention by Kakutas LBA assets to weaken the American defences preemptively. This never happened, lthough Kakuta lied that he was attacking and inflicting damage on 5th fleet.

So, we can pretty much disregard Kakutas efforts. What then were the compositions of the 4 main raids of 1st mobile fleet? How do they compare to the expected opposition, or the projected opposition that would be put up by a CAP consisting of at least 750 Wildcats.

Here are the broad details of the 4 raids undertaken by Ozawa

A/c attacjhed to the various 1st mob fleet :476

at least 20 search aircraft lost to "other causes....did not return"


"The first Japanese strike (Raid I), consisting 16 Zero fighters, 45 Zero fighter-bombers, and 8 Jills, was launched at 0830 by Carrier Division 3. These were detected by American radar at 1000 at a distance of over 150 miles (280 km). Mitscher promptly recalled the fighters over Guam and, at 1019, gave the order to launch all available fighters from his carriers. All carrier groups turned into the wind and commenced launching at 1023, with the Japanese 75 miles (140 km) away. The Japanese strike paused to regroup at about this time, giving the Americans time to stack their fighters at a suitable altitude for interception and to fly off all bombers on their flight decks. Raid I was intercepted by over 30 fighters and lost 42 aircraft to the Hellcats and the American antiaircraft fire (estimated losses to AA are 14), at a cost to the Americans of a single fighter and a bomb hit on South Dakota that killed 27 men but did negligible structural damage.

Strike - 69 a/c
Escort 16 zeroes
CAP 30 Hellcats
Losses to a/c 28
losses to AA 14
Total Japanese losses :42
Returned: 27 a/c

The second Japanese strike (Raid II) was the largest of the day. It was launched from Carrier Division 1 and Carrier Division 2 at 0856 and was composed of 53 Judys, 27 Jills, and 48 Zeros. Raid II made the mistake of flying over the Japanese van group and lost two aircraft to friendly fire from the nervous gunners. Another eight were damaged and forced to return to their carriers. Raid II was detected by American radar at 1107 at a distance of 115 miles (210 km) was intercepted at 60 miles (110 km) by the Hellcats, which shot down about 70 Japanese aircraft. The surviving Japanese wasted much of their firepower on unsuccessful attacks on picket destroyer Stockham, then attacked Lee's battle line. One Jill struck Indiana at the waterline, but its torpedo failed to explode. A small group of Judys broke through to Montgomery's task group and scored some very near misses on Wasp and Bunker Hill. The Japanese lost a total of 97 aircraft from Raid II.

Strike - 128 a/c
Escort 48 zeroes
CAP (Unknown) Hellcats
Losses to a/c 70
losses to AA 27 9estiated)
Friendly fire: 10 (8 damaged)
Total Japanese losses :97
Returned: 31



Raid III was launched at 1000 from Carrier Division 2 and consisted of 15 Zero fighters, 25 Zero fighter-bombers, and 7 Jills. This group was diverted too far north by a garbled report from the third reconnaissance group. Most returned to their carriers, but about 20 received a corrected sighting report and turned south, avoiding Lee's battle line and attack Clark's task group. They were detected 99 miles (180 km) out and intercepted at 1300 at a distance of 50 miles (90 km) by 40 Hellcats. Seven Japanese aircraft were lost.


At this point there was a brief lull in the battle, during which Mitscher sent out a search mission. It failed to find the Japanese fleet.

Strike - 47 a/c
Escort 15 zeroes
CAP 40 Hellcats
Losses to a/c 7
losses to AA 0
Friendly fire: 0
Total Japanese losses :7
Returned: 40



Raid IV was launched at 1100 from Carrier Division 1 and Carrier Division 2. It consisted of 30 Zero fighters, 9 Judys, 27 Vals, 10 Zero fighter-bombers, and 6 Jills. These were also mislead by the garbled sighting report from the third reconnaissance group and found no targets at first. One group headed for Rota. On the way, they ran across Montgomery's task group but were unable to score any hits. A somewhat larger group headed for Guam. These aircraft had already jettisoned their ordnance in preparation for landing when they were intercepted by 27 Hellcats from Cowpens, Essex, and Hornet. Many of the Japanese planes had lowered their landing gear and were sitting ducks. The Hellcats destroyed 30 out of the 49 aircraft, and the remaining 19 landed in such a damaged state that they were judged beyond repair. A total of 73 aircraft out of the 82 in Raid IV were destroyed or damaged beyond repair".

Strike - 82 a/c
Escort 30 zeroes
CAP 27 Hellcats
Losses to a/c 30
losses to AA 24(????)
Friendly fire: 0
Crashed: 19
Total Japanese losses :73
Returned: 9

According to these accounts, by the Japanese, they had about 75 fighters aircraft available for CAP operations when the Americans. 31 aircraft had been held back during the day as defending CAP, so out of the 107+31 survivors, 75 were fighters ready and available for CAP operations that afternoon. There were 116 Zero fighters, so despite all that effort by the USN, very successful I will say, they had managed to destroy about 50-60 fighters during the offensive phase of the operations. fighter losses were approaching that number at Santa Cruz with around 38 F4fs, poorly controlled, in the box seat.

It should be very clear that the Japanese airstrikes did not stand a chance, regardless of whether there were F6Fs, or F4fs waiting for them. Id even suggest that Buffaloes could have done the job
 

Not much point in looking at FY '41 spending while talking about having three additional carriers and their airgroups at the end of 1942. What's wrong with at least two-three additional carriers and airgroups by, say, March 1942?

Funding for the Yorktown Class (Yorktown and Enterprise (CV6 7)) was in FY '34, with Hornet (CV8 ) being added in FY '39; the latter was laid down 25/9/39 and commissioned 20/10/41. It was these, along with Saratoga, Lexington Wasp that fought in some or all of the main battles in 1942 through to early 1943.

In order to have two-three extra carriers in 1942 (and pretending that the "black shoe" BB Navy conceded that the "brown shoe" CV boys deserved to have more carriers, and gracefully sacrifice two South Dakota class BBs) the spending would have to be made in FY '39 at the latest, not FY '41 to guarantee that the carriers would be operational and reasonably well trained and efficient in time to make an impact at either the Coral Sea or Midway, plus the Campaign in and around the Solomons.

For the same carriers to be available by the end of 1942 funding would have to been made in FY '40 - the Essex Class carriers, which were funded in FY '41, via the supplementary programs of May and July 1940 were not launched and or fully trained until May 1943 - Essex (CV9) was commissioned 31/12/42 but was still on a shake down cruise, with Hellcats, in March 1943. Same goes for increased numbers of F4Fs, SBDs, TBMs etc which would have had to have been ordered during FY 41 to have had any effect on the Pacific war.

As it was the Hellcat was not funded until FY '42 (contract January 7 1942 - FY '42 started June 1941), well after all of the major ships with which the USN fought the war had been ordered and funded, including the Essex class carriers. Ships ordered in FY 42 - two carriers CV20 21, Light cruisers CL101 102, sixty destroyers and 23 submarines. Thus, to argue that funding the F6F somehow adversely affected the availability of carriers and aircraft during the important battles and campaigns to mid-1943 is drawing an extremely long bow. Info from Conway's pages 88-89 Aircraft Carrier Photo Index: USS ESSEX (CV-9)
 
Not much point in looking at FY '41 spending while talking about having three additional carriers and their airgroups at the end of 1942. What's wrong with at least two-three additional carriers and airgroups by, say, March 1942?
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not 100% sure what your getting at here, so apologies if I am misunderstanding you. But FY '41 was from June 1940 to June 1941. like FY42, it was brought forward to April 1940, with the bill that voted the funding for it approved 20April 1940. This became known as the 11% expansion plan, and construction began in June 1940. It included just one additional carrier, USS essex, a new design that even though it was built in record time, had some delays as changes were made to it during construction. Essex was commissioned December 1942, but would take many months before it was fully operational.

The USN could have had two Hornets instead of the one Essex, and still had $19 million left over for air groups (or anything really). Because the hornets were a well known design, my opinion is that they would have been able to comission probably2-3 months earlier,, and be ready for operations maybe 4-5 months earlier.

As indicated above FY42 was from June 1941, but like FY41 the construction approvals were brought forward to April '41. This contained 3 additional carriers, not sure when the funding was approve, but these ships were commissioned around 9 months after Essex. After that it gets a bit blurred, as the Americans added program after program, and ships were being completed in 1944-5 like hotcakes



Yeah okay happy with all of that, but the construction times for a peacetime economy are not the same as the construction times in wartime. Whether wartime helped or hindered can vary....for the japanese it blew their construction ties out of the water, for the US, well for propaganda, admittedly, but they reckoned they could build a liberty ship from start to finish in 10 days. in reality the construction times wer more like 6 months, but even that is very impressive.

In order to have two-three extra carriers in 1942 (and pretending that the "black shoe" BB Navy conceded that the "brown shoe" CV boys deserved to have more carriers,
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There was a bit of that, but that argument is so overblown. in fact the US Battleship admirals had been clamouring for additional carriers since at least the time of the fleet excercises in 1928. They may have under-estiated that carriers were more than just a support act for the BBs, but by 1939 the USN was advocating for about 20 carriers in the event of a British collapse, and (i think....0 about a total of 15 carriers in the event of a war against japan. The U&SN mucked about a bit getting new designs, and they mucked around some more with the socalled passenger liner conversions, but this still does not explain the inexplicable. With war clouds looming, and believing they needed at least 15 carriers, why in the first year of the war, did they complete a measely 1 CV, and lay down just one more. That is such a lapse of judgement, even on the asessments they had made themselves.


I'd have to say you are wrong on that. There was no need, or indeed likleihood of the FY'39 budget being affected. There was a similar unlikelihood of FY'40 being affected. The first wartime carrier was not laid down until FY'41 (in 1940, and this was for a very expensive new type. if the USN had stuck to the original plan and built 2 Yorktowns, they could have done it quicker, and cheaper. If they had made savings elswhere (and I think the most obvious is from the F6F program and its associated elements) for FY'41, thatwould have yielded maybe 2 more carriers. The f6F program would have come in FY42, and entered service about 9-10 months after it actually did. Hell, if people have so little faith in the F4F (which i dont share) the USN could even have tried its luck with the XF5F, its trial and tests were very promising as I understand it.....



Nope, Essex was commissioned December 1942, and undertook accelarated shakedown trial before transferring to the pacific Fleet in May as you say. Despite being labelled "accelarated" they were in fact slowed by the fact she was a lead ship of a new class. If Yorktowns had been built in her place, they can reasonably be argued as entering service probably around August 1942 (for the lead ship) thru to May'43 for the fourth ship, and shakedown times proabably half that of the Essex. this means that in December 1942, instead of just the Enterprise, the USN would probably have 3 x Enterprise/Hornets, and by May assuming no losses, 5 x Hornet/Enterprises 9possible 6....im unsure about the Saratoga)



Nope, again, being an off the shelf design there are no lead times to worry about like the hellcat. The additional F4fs could have been ordered in the accelarated FY42 with production beginning March '42 and squadron delivery probably around August. Finding the pilots at that time would be difficult, but solved by about Christmas.....with all the other losses suffered in the US carrier fleet, they had a surplus of carrier trained pilots by then.


R&D for what was to become the F6F began as far back as 1938. Development of the R2800 and the turbo-supercharged R2600 can at least partially be laid at the feet of the F6F. The development and additional wind tunnel test underrtaken under the F4U program can be attributed to the development of the F6F. The development of the XF5F a predecessor of the XF6F and linked to its development was begun in 1939, and carried on until just before December '41 (I think... I couldnt be bothered checking). The construction of factory number 3 dates back to the beginning of 1940 for the materials, with actual construction beginning in January 1941. The raising and training of manpower for this new factory began, I estimate from about June 1941. The factory iteself began F6F component manufactiacture from January 1942, some 6 months before its official commissioning date and well before the type itself had been accepted and contracts signed. Things were moving fast, but no way was the f6F R&D (including the factory stuff) funded all from FY42.
 
I can't answer those questions off the top of my head. Whatever those answers are, they had to be around a wash, just going off how the major battles went. My point was the Japanese weren't the only side to lose experienced pilots at that stage in the War. Let's give that factor a wash, too. We've been analyzing off just the Japanese losses of their experienced pilots and that makes that analysis lopsided. On the rest, sure. And a good case could be made we over-built, too, right down the line. But let's not just generalize from that. Did the Japanese just stop training their pilots? Were their training programs interrupted, in and way, shape, or form? I don't see any evidence they were. And neither does it make sense those programs would have been interrupted right in the middle of a War they started and even less sense that would have happened as early as 1942 when those 545 pilots would have been inducted.
 
Unless there's evidence their training programs were interrupted I don't see them at any disadvantage replacing losses with fresh pilots and aircraft.

drgondog said:
Parsifal is addressing the fact that FM's and F4F's weren't ideal but they could at that stage of the war continue to be formidable if not overpowering against IJN - without F6F.
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That's one thing he's saying, yes. To put the reason for the F6Fs in those terms we were less concerned with "formidable" and more concerned with "overpowering."
 
They couldn't find our carriers because we had our lights off. When we finally risked turning them on, it was a little late. Those losses had nothing to do with the competence of that aircraft and about 90% of those pilots were rescued. There were Japanese subs in that area, that's why that task force was "dark."

Back to my first question. When were those 545 inducted? You're well-read. When do you think?
 
I would have thought that standard operating procedure would have been for the fleet to be "dark" during War time.
It was a very courageous decision to "turn the lights on". Even with the lights on - it was difficult to get the aircraft down safely.
But respect is due to the guy who put his neck on the line to make that decision.
 

remember too that they had been fighting for some time now in china and other areas....so their resources were already being taxed. they had to occupy those areas and that takes manpower. they had a population but not enough to meet all their needs. plus their material resources had to be proiritized. yes they could have had the manpower and money but at the cost of something else....
 

Ive already given you an answer to your post. Your salient question was how would F4Fs do in a fight like Phil Sea. Answer: individually not better, as CAG, probabaly as good or better because there would be more of them in the scenario i outlined.

For the record. CarDiv 1 and 2 had about 6 months service time, the other CAGs had 3 months (for one group) and 2 months for the other. The Japanese had lost nearly all their Carrier pilots in the battles of 1942, then they were again decimated in the battles against the allies in 1943. They had begun rebuilding their pilot base for a third time beginning in January 1944.

However this figure of 6 months is misleadingly high. Because of the fuel crisis affecting the IJN, it was necessary to move the 1st Mobile Fleet from Singapore to Tawi Tawi. There was fuel available at Tawi Tawi (extremely high octane, which made their ships vulnerable, but at least they could move), but no airfield. Consequently for the time the fleet was based at Tawi Tawi, the CAGs had no opportunity to train.

Most sources say that CarDiv 1/2 had an average of about 120 hours ...that primary training AND combat time. There were a few experts with a lot more experience than that.....probably around 30-35 pilots. The other CAGs had on average less than 100 hours. Some accounts claim less than 50 hours....Im doubtful of that figure, but cant categorically rule it out either.

The Japanese since before the outbreak of the war had had their training programs restricted, severely, by the acute fuel shortages since at least July 1941. They never really recovered from that restriction. Later, they also suffered from a shortage of suitable advanced training aircraft, and also a lack of good instructors. They tried to address this by moving new recruits out too the front directly, to learn on the job. This was a disaster for them. Pilots need the hours, in a safe environment, to get familiar and confident. Germans did similar things to their aircrew, but were not as acutely affected as the japanese.

There is some variation in various accounts given on the amount of experience in the USN CAGs. Some do put it as low as 300 hours (and dont specify if that is combat experience and Basic, or just combat). Most sources however, give a much higher figure....between 300 and 400 Training time (about 250 in induction....but additional "top up" training as they were rotated back and forth). Many (more than half) were reported as having more than 500 hours combat (or perhaps hours in a front line squadron...most accounts dont differentiate). It would not be wrong or innaccurate, or misleading (like mentioning the number 409 and Hellcat in the same sentence, or claiming Hellcat losses were just 35, which they werent) to estimate USN airmen in the fleet CAGs as having around 700-1000 hours expereince by June 1944. They were extremely experienced flyers. Which is one reason why by that stage it took time to get into combat for new pilots.
 

I have some figures somewhere on this, but im not sure where....ill try and dig them out.

ive also recently read that to march 1943, the Japanese had lost 6200 aircraft since the outbreak of the war. Since before Coral Sea, Yammamoto had complained about the loses in expereienced pilots in a memo as i recall to the Naval Headquaters staff.....the japanese Admiralty.

The Allies lost around 1000 aircraft in the opening 3 months of the war, very very roughly. There were around 200 lost in malaya, 250 lost in the Phillipines, about 180 at PH, around 200 lost in Malaya, about 100 lost in Burma, and around 150 lost in NEI. Bits and pieces lost in Northern Australia and New uinea, and elsewhere. Pilot losses were significantly les than that.

There is no definitive number for the overall japanese losses, let alone for a given part of the war. However it was about 46000, of which at least 17000 were lost to "other causes". Because its impossible to give a complete picture, the USN Ra Ra boys and hellcat fan club members have a field day with this...saying their claimed victories are gospel. Doesnt perturb them that every other air force has had to revise down their war time claims universally. A really big share of Japanese losses were inflicted by the USN....around 15000 in fact, but a number of these were due to flak and a number due to F4fs and other types. At least 6000 of these losses (also absorbed by the Army, so the figures dont add up) were expended as Kamikazes, and about a similar number in conventional combats in 1945. Large numbers of aircraft were shot up on the ground, because of fuel shortages.

hellcats are credited with about 5500 air victories in the PTO, which might be about right, but the 19:1 propaganda so often pushed forward as to its superiority is a total crock. Hellcat losses need to include losses to all causes in order to compare apples to apples, and when you do that the ratio of wins to losses, drops to about 4 or 5:1. Stil very impressive, but not an uber fighter.
 
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the other issue isnt the number of carrier based planes and experienced pilots...but how many aircraft carriers did they have left for them to launch off of???? i know they lost several carriers at midway...how many did they lose at CS?? if you have really no chance to put those planes on carriers ( or an island ) ramping up your production and training is somewhat fruitless. you can punch out several thousand planes a month like germany did but to build a carrier is going to set you back years. those resources can be better shifted to something else.
 
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