Maneuverability vs Speed

[PAT303]

By 1943/44, Japan was introducing fighters that were on a par or exceeded U.S. fighters in performance and had it not been for their dire shortage of much needed materials as well as the increasing bombing of key manufacturing sites, would have caused the Allies considerable trouble.

If they were winning would they have had a dire shortage of much needed materials?.

 

[yulzari]

The difference between semi-auto and bolt action is rather obvious. There are some advantages to shooting bolt action, which is why most hunting rifles and sniper rifles still use this method. However, most weapons issued to 99.99% of soldiers are automatic or semi-automatic, and with very good reason. The enfield was not as effective as a Garand and was an order of magnitude less effective than any semi-automatic or automatic rifle with a detachable magazine. That is why every army in the world switched to the latter

Bolt actions are less effective than a reliable semi or automatic rifle But not in orders of magnitude. Slower to load and fire but pulling out an en-bloc clip or charger is faster than taking off a magazine, putting it back in your webbing until you can refill it, then pulling out a full one and putting it in the rifle. I would not think myself half armed were I issued and Rifle No4 instead of an L1A1. I would choose the L1A1 over the No4 of course but the No4 is not vastly poorer as an infantry long arm.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I'll reply to this on the other firearm thread

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

If they were winning would they have had a dire shortage of much needed materials?.

You could say the same for the Germans, but the Japanese had a more severe problem simply because they were living in a much smaller country in terms of land area, and their conquered territories could only be reached by sea. So once their navy was on it's back heels, certainly by 1944, their logistics problems were much more severe. In early 1944 the Germans could still bring in raw materials from France, Italy, Belgium, the Balkans, and could trade with Sweden and Switzerland etc. They could get most of what they needed like coal and iron. The Japanese didn't have a lot of iron to begin with, and for them all those things had to come by ship. Once the US torpedoes were working USN subs were a major, catastrophic problem for merchant shipping, and the US carrier fleets were prowling around the vicinity of the home islands, Japan was (obviously) cut off from supply.

But both countries had similar problems, just on a different scale.

And this is is of course why the Japanese war machine placed so much emphasis on their navy and on very long ranged aircraft.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I might point out that each nation had a different doctrine.

This

The French, who were leaders in aerial technology didn't have a jet, nor did the Italians produce a true jet during the war.

The Japanese based their requirements for a long range, light weight naval fighter, which resulted in the A6M, in the late 1930's, in an entirely different climate than those of Europe or the United States at the time.

Yes, this, exactly. The Japanese were on an island in a gigantic ocean. An ocean so big it's really hard to grasp. Their supply and logistics sources were only reachable by sea. The lands they intended to conquer were across significant distances of open ocean. So they planned accordingly. This is why they made aircraft which could fly raids from Formosa to northern Australia.

The Soviet Union, for a European power, was woefully behind the western European nations in regards to engines and airframe design. Several of their early engines were licensed designs and they had enlisted the help of an Italian engineer with airframe design.

I think you are not giving the Soviets enough credit here honestly, a lot of people copied a lot of Hispano Suiza tech and borrowed technology from all over (Swedish kit was pretty widely adopted too). Germany, England, the US and France all copied elements of what would become their aircraft from one another. The Soviets were less industrialized as an economy than Latinized Europe, but they certainly moved pretty quickly while absorbing the vast proportion of the German war machine's onslaught, which is not a trivial problem to overcome.

Their aircraft were quite innovative in the 30s and were not always behind the west. The I-15 / I-153 and I-16 looked primitive by WW2 but they were pretty advanced for the 1930s. The Pe-2 dive bomber was arguably one of the most effective of the war, certainly comparable to a Ju 88. The Yak series of fighters was well designed, production difficulties notwithstanding, and was developed into perhaps the ideal front line low altitude propeller driven fighter, and the La 5 series perhaps even more so.

By 1943/44, Japan was introducing fighters that were on a par or exceeded U.S. fighters in performance and had it not been for their dire shortage of much needed materials as well as the increasing bombing of key manufacturing sites, would have caused the Allies considerable trouble.

Agreed. That and the issues of getting raw materials to the island, once their navy was broken. The German armed forces were substantially broken after Stalingrad, but their industry was able to function a good bit longer in part because they had land (rail and road) access to most of their resources.

 

[GrauGeist]

In all fairness, the Soviets did have some good aircraft prior to 1943, particularly their twins, like the Tu-2, Ar-2, the afore-mentioned Pe-2 and even the SB.

However, their fighter program was hit or miss early on. Yes, the I-16 was good for it's time, but so was the P-26.

The core of the issue, I feel, is the Soviet's method of overseeing development. The vast majority of other governments would put out a request and manufacturers would work hard to land the contract but in Soviet Russia, you had aircraft (and engines) built by committee.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Well the French did that too. And came up with some good designs in spite of it, by the dawn of the war, if sadly too late for their cause.

I'd say the bigger problem for the Soviets was just the rule of Stalin and the NKVD / Cheka etc. I mean, Pe-2 was designed from a prison bureau for imprisoned aircraft designers! And it was not the only one...

This is a whole nother, bigger, meta issue, which also affected every nation to one degree or another. Beyond the scope of this thread for sure, and maybe difficult to discuss in some facets, but quite interesting and I think relevant. In my opinion, each major power in WW2 had to one extent or another, get past their own political ideology and lean into pragmatism, in order to solve the problems they needed to solve to win, or try to win the war. This affected everything from production to intelligence to strategy and tactics. And for sure, aircraft design and production specifically.

The Soviets had a major problem in that, to put it bluntly, their state was engaged in a program of mass-murder against it's own and subject populations while conducting the war, much as the Nazis also were, and perhaps to a greater extent than in any other WW2 power, anyone of any political, military, or economic significance was subject to imprisonment or murder by the Soviet State over fears of loyalty to the general secretary. That was maybe a bigger issue than design by committee, although that too could sometimes be a problem.

The Japanese also had a somewhat similar issue in that deviation from ultra-nationalist policies could result in assassination.

 

[GrauGeist]

Classic example of Soviet development (and relevant to the thread), was the La-5.

Uncle Joe was not happy with Lavochkin and the LaGG-3's lackluster performance.

Being relegated to a shack and a less than bright future, he managed to blend a Su-2's cowl/engine assembly to the airframe of a LaGG-3 which resulted in an excellent performer and aparently, made Uncle Joe happy once again.

I honestly cannot imagine how Semyon Lavichkin managed to stay cool and focused under that amount of pressure.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Yeah it blows my mind honestly. I've had some shitty, overbearing bosses but those kind of conditions are beyond comprehension.

I didn't realize that about the Su-2 that's pretty interesting. That was another design which actually seemed fairly promising, I never quite understood why they cancelled it.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

You could say the same for the Germans, but the Japanese had a more severe problem simply because they were living in a much smaller country in terms of land area, and their conquered territories could only be reached by sea. So once their navy was on it's back heels, certainly by 1944, their logistics problems were much more severe. In early 1944 the Germans could still bring in raw materials from France, Italy, Belgium, the Balkans, and could trade with Sweden and Switzerland etc. They could get most of what they needed like coal and iron. The Japanese didn't have a lot of iron to begin with, and for them all those things had to come by ship. Once the US torpedoes were working USN subs were a major, catastrophic problem for merchant shipping, and the US carrier fleets were prowling around the vicinity of the home islands, Japan was (obviously) cut off from supply.

But both countries had similar problems, just on a different scale.

And this is is of course why the Japanese war machine placed so much emphasis on their navy and on very long ranged aircraft.

Added to this, even the best fighters don't do much against submarines throttling the import of vital raw materials and resources. So to his question, there's more than one single aspect to winning any war. Odd that this should need to be pointed out.

 

[tomo pauk]

The core of the issue, I feel, is the Soviet's method of overseeing development. The vast majority of other governments would put out a request and manufacturers would work hard to land the contract but in Soviet Russia, you had aircraft (and engines) built by committee.

Not by committee, not by a long shot.

Classic example of Soviet development (and relevant to the thread), was the La-5.

Uncle Joe was not happy with Lavochkin and the LaGG-3's lackluster performance.

Being relegated to a shack and a less than bright future, he managed to blend a Su-2's cowl/engine assembly to the airframe of a LaGG-3 which resulted in an excellent performer and aparently, made Uncle Joe happy once again.

I honestly cannot imagine how Semyon Lavichkin managed to stay cool and focused under that amount of pressure.

Stalin was probably right on opinion that LaGG-3's performance was lackluster, and pilots agreed on that.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

LaGG-3 certainly had problems, although I'm not certain how much of the reputation was due to politics. Many of the problems with the LaGG-3 were actually due to the horrendous production issues the Soviets were experiencing. Probably Yak 1 was a better design, but both suffered from things like undercarriage not closing completely, pilots flying with the canopy open or off because they couldn't trust it to come off if they needed to bail out, all kinds of mechanical failures and so on.

By the time La 5 came along, the other two designers in the LaGG bureau (Gorbunov and Gudkov) were already out of favor To me that was the problem.

 

[tomo pauk]

LaGG-3 certainly had problems, although I'm not certain how much of the reputation was due to politics. Many of the problems with the LaGG-3 were actually due to the horrendous production issues the Soviets were experiencing. Probably Yak 1 was a better design, but both suffered from things like undercarriage not closing completely, pilots flying with the canopy open or off because they couldn't trust it to come off if they needed to bail out, all kinds of mechanical failures and so on.

From what I was able to get, LaGG-3 production/fit&finish was appalling during 1941. It was also a heavier aircraft than the Yak-1, that, coupled with mentioned issues meant Yak-1 was a better aircraft.
It took a lot of effort to make the LaGG-3 lighter, but that was in 1942, and image of it was already tainted.

By the time La 5 came along, the other two designers in the LaGG bureau (Gorbunov and Gudkov) were already out of favor To me that was the problem.

Gudkov's take on installing M-82 on LaGG-3 airframe was worse than Lavotchkin's. The former installation was prone to overheating, the later was not (Gudkov's mistake was to use small oil cooler, while Lavotchkin was using the oil cooler as-is from the Su-4) . So Lavotchkin's design was proceeded with.

(Mikoyan & Gurevitch sorta repeated the mistake with AM-38-powered MiG-3 prototypes, where the legacy liquid cooling system was not able to cool the more powerful engine)

 

[SplitRz]

.​

 

[PAT303]

You could say the same for the Germans, but the Japanese had a more severe problem simply because they were living in a much smaller country in terms of land area, and their conquered territories could only be reached by sea. So once their navy was on it's back heels, certainly by 1944, their logistics problems were much more severe. In early 1944 the Germans could still bring in raw materials from France, Italy, Belgium, the Balkans, and could trade with Sweden and Switzerland etc. They could get most of what they needed like coal and iron. The Japanese didn't have a lot of iron to begin with, and for them all those things had to come by ship. Once the US torpedoes were working USN subs were a major, catastrophic problem for merchant shipping, and the US carrier fleets were prowling around the vicinity of the home islands, Japan was (obviously) cut off from supply.

But both countries had similar problems, just on a different scale.

And this is is of course why the Japanese war machine placed so much emphasis on their navy and on very long ranged aircraft.

A nation as smart as your making Japan out to be would have realised and understood that, being an island dependant on ocean trade they should have fought within their abilities and placed a lot of value on ocean commerce but they didn't, look at Britain, there was no chance at all, zero of Sea lion succeeding because Britain knew control of the ocean was key, even in her darkest days Britain threw everything into protecting her trade routes, Japan never did, Japan won many battles and showed that they were a force to be respected but how many skilled pilots did they lose because of the high performance but poor protection offered by their planes?, a few weeks ago we had a thread showing them losing 20 to 50% of their attacking force on numerous occasions, that's not going to win you anything but defeat, history ultimately showed that.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

A nation as smart as your making Japan out to be would have realised and understood that, being an island dependant on ocean trade they should have fought within their abilities and placed a lot of value on ocean commerce but they didn't, look at Britain, there was no chance at all, zero of Sea lion succeeding because Britain knew control of the ocean was key, even in her darkest days Britain threw everything into protecting her trade routes, Japan never did, Japan won many battles and showed that they were a force to be respected but how many skilled pilots did they lose because of the high performance but poor protection offered by their planes?, a few weeks ago we had a thread showing them losing 20 to 50% of their attacking force on numerous occasions, that's not going to win you anything but defeat, history ultimately showed that.

You're confusing "smart enough to design a great fighter" with "smart enough to design a great strategy." Losing nations often have superlative designs, while winning nations, my own included, get by with middling designs but good grand strategy.

So, yes, a nation can build a great fighter aircraft and at the same time overlook the crucial point of the issue.

I mean, if they were really smart, they wouldn't have attacked America at all. But humans don't really work that way.

 

[JoblinTheGoblin]

Looks like my points are no longer being taken seriously. Oh well. I'm still largely unconvinced of Japan's technological prowess (Japan of any period really, but that's a topic for another time) but I won't argue much further. I'm almost out of gas to continue this discussion much further. What I will say is, American and European aircraft look cooler, for the most part.

Edit: Image removed.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Oh well. I'm still largely unconvinced of Japan's technological prowess (Japan of any period really, but that's a topic for another time) but I won't argue much further.

Type 93, best torpedo in the world at the time. Shokaku-class carrier, competitive with anything afloat at time of launch. Submarines that carry their own scout planes, who had them? Zero, good fighter with a glass jaw, but damned if it didn't do some hurt.

The Japanese problem was two-fold: 1) limited industrial base and 2) limited resources. Those problems will hamper even the smartest of folk. There's also the fact that their war in China distracted thinking and funding from R&D.

 

[JoblinTheGoblin]

Unsure of Japan's annual patent output during that time period (just one way of quantifying innovation in a country), but I guess I'll have to concede.

Still, those submarines you speak of were noisy (and other nations had explored the concept as well) and, as I said before, I still prefer other aircraft to the Zero. Who knows, maybe if I pick up a flight sim again with good AI or multiplayer I'll like it more. Or if I somehow see one in real life.

 

[PAT303]

You're confusing "smart enough to design a great fighter" with "smart enough to design a great strategy."

Smart enough to design a great fighter then smart enough to design a great strategy in which to continue it's development throughout the war like everyone else did.