Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
It began life/ was designed and built as a high-speed unarmed bomber, but was found to handle so well, be so manoeuvrable and so fast that it was soon adapted to fulfill any number of other roles. During it's operational career the Mossie served as a bomber (you could even say 'heavy' bomber - late Mosquitoes could carry heavier loads than a B-17, but with 1/5 the crew at almost twice the speed and the same range), PR bird (the best available to the allies 'til jets turned up), fighter, fighter-bomber, night-fighter, intruder, heavy strike/ anti-shipping fighter (Fb XVIII 'Tsetse'), target-tug, trainer, glider-tug, VIP transport, BOAC airliner (flying the very dangerous runs to Sweden to pick up loads which included escaped airmen and political prisoners etc.), and I'm sure I've missed a few as well. Christ, it was even cleared for carrier operations(!), and a special squadron of 'Highball' Mosquitoes was preparing to ship to the Far East for carrier operations against the IJN when Germany surrendered and it was deemed unnecessary, now that the British Atlantic and Mediterranean Fleets were free to take part in the Pacific campaign. What's more, it excelled in all of these roles, whereas the Ju 88 never really did make the grade as a day fighter...
In short, I challenge you to think up a role which the Ju 88 took up, but the Mosquito did/ could not.
Huckebein said:Heh - it was just luck in any case; neither plane was meant to carry out so many tasks, it just turned out that they could. It's therefore no fault of the designers if one of them does this better than the other - the designers' success is measured by whether it performed it's intended role well or not. Both of them did, both of them were good at other stuff too, the Mossie was better at other stuff. That's just the luck of the draw...
jj1982 said:I have already given my reasons as to why i feel the Ju88 was such a good plane.... I feel that you are saying that the wooden bomber is better cos it is more versitle...however if it wasnt then it wouldnt have met its spec...The Junkers were built and used for thier intended role. And were good at it.