Maneuverability vs Speed

Greg Boeser said:

No. That was a conspiracy between the ammunition peddlers and corrupt bureaucrats of the military-industrial complex.

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Can't it be both things?

I think in most wars, certainly in WW2, the dirty little secret about infantry is most of the killing is actually done not so much by the infantry with whatever rifle, but by crew served weapons and armored vehicles. The reason the infantry have their rifles is mainly so nobody else can go into the space they occupy.

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

Can't it be both things?

I think in most wars, certainly in WW2, the dirty little secret about infantry is most of the killing is actually done not so much by the infantry with whatever rifle, but by crew served weapons and armored vehicles. The reason the infantry have their rifles is mainly so nobody else can go into the space they occupy.

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If by crew served weapons you are talking about heavy artillery, then yes.
You need boots on the ground to take or hold territory. Though much is made of the island of Pantelleria surrendering to aerial bombardment alone, they didn't surrender until the invasion fleet was steaming off their shore.

There is also the progression in ease of use which makes it easier to train your troops.

The Longbow and Crossbow were both deadly and could hit from greater ranges than the musket but
had the problem of carting enough bolts/arrows and the crossbow took time to reload. The longbow
was quick firing but the user had to have a lot of experience and built up strength to use it effectively.

The musket in comparison had a crap range but plenty of powder and rounds were easy to carry.
Reloading was a faff but large units could stagger their fire and anyone who got hit got hit hard.

So it goes from there on.

JoblinTheGoblin said:

I guess aircraft designs emphasising power, that would have larger engines, would weigh more, negatively impacting climb rate, but ultimately, wing area, considered to be an important factor in maneuverability due to wing loading, increases drag, which affects speed and energy retention (for energy fighting, which can involve diving), and this is why I am focusing largely on wing loading, and turn rates and roll rates (though I'm not sure if wing loading has much of a relationship with the latter). More powerful engines, accounting for other factors, would increase climb rate, from what I've read.

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yes but this is a gross oversimplification.

A6M2 wing area 241.5 sq ft / 22.44 sq meter (notable that the A6M3 had a smaller wing and the A6M5 smaller still)
Ki-43-IIb wing area 230 sq ft / 21.4 sq meter
Spitfire Mk Vb wing area 242.1 sq ft / 22.49 sq meter
P-51D Mustang wing area 235 sq ft / 21.8 sq meter
Ki-84 wing area 230 sq ft / 21 sq meter
Hawker Tempest wing area 302 sq ft / 28.1 sq meter
F4U Corsair wing area 314 sq ft / 29.17 sq meter

Wing area doesn't necessarily correlate to high drag, and it definitely doesn't have anything to do with roll rate necessarily. Wing shape, weight in the wing and size of ailerons can all affect roll, as can other factors. Roll rate is certainly important.

JoblinTheGoblin said:

I've always heard that the Flying Tigers achieved kill ratios in excess of 15:1 (the classic 20:1 number that gets touted around) against the IJAAF, using P-40Bs, with lower ratios apparently reliant on dubious criteria like Japanese kills against airmen on the ground. The Soviet Volunteer Group also seemed to have achieved favorable kill ratios at times—if I remember correctly, the details are hazier there—though the Soviets appeared to have underperformed in aerial battles over Khalkhin Gol. The RAF Hurricane also seemed to be comparable to the Zero, especially if the ~330mph estimate for the A6M2/3 is valid. There is the 12:1 kill ratio that the Zero apparently achieved in combat, but I am unsure about the actual details of this kill ratio, whether it be its source, date (China and/or the Pacific?), types of aircraft destroyed (including on the ground or in the air).

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All those "kill ratios" for AVG etc. are based on claims vs reported losses, and are basically just fantasy. There is always a great deal of overclaiming. AVG did quite well but most of their early opponents were Ki-27s and various bombers. By the time the Ki-43s were showing up, AVG had learned many lessons and was getting newer faster types of P-40s (and other planes).

Other Allied units did not fare so well. It's also worth noting that while in hindsight we can see clearly that the F2A as deployed in the Pacific was a flawed design, it was a new fighter aircraft at the time. It was introduced only one year earlier than the A6M.

These days a number of publications have come out which show us the actual losses on both sides, where the disparities and 'kill ratios' are far less dramatic. That is what I was summarizing in my post.

With all due respect I think your derogation of the Japanese aircraft and their fighting capability more broadly is a bit superficial.

Greg Boeser said:

If by crew served weapons you are talking about heavy artillery, then yes.

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Not just heavy artillery. Light mortars kill a lot of people too. Machine guns and today, other things like automatic grenade launchers and so on also kill.

Greg Boeser said:

You need boots on the ground to take or hold territory. Though much is made of the island of Pantelleria surrendering to aerial bombardment alone, they didn't surrender until the invasion fleet was steaming off their shore.

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Taking Pantelleria was still quite an accomplishment... but I certainly agree - taking and holding territory is the job of infantry and it is what they are meant to do.

WARSPITER said:

There is also the progression in ease of use which makes it easier to train your troops.

The Longbow and Crossbow were both deadly and could hit from greater ranges than the musket but
had the problem of carting enough bolts/arrows and the crossbow took time to reload. The longbow
was quick firing but the user had to have a lot of experience and built up strength to use it effectively.

The musket in comparison had a crap range but plenty of powder and rounds were easy to carry.
Reloading was a faff but large units could stagger their fire and anyone who got hit got hit hard.

So it goes from there on.

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Muskets and arquebus type firearms actually had pretty good range. With all of those weapons there was a difference between 'area shots' (what the British sometimes called clout shooting, for the way they trained to do it) and shooting at individual targets. Crossbows and firearms were better at the individual targets like people or horses, self bows, including British type longbows as well as recurves, were better for shooting into areas. The crossbow was really the dominant ranged weapon in Europe until the mid-15th century, but firearms were already important for siege warfare (which was a big part of war then) fairly early in the 14th.

The reputation of inaccuracy for firearms had more to do with the type of troops being used in wars in the 17th-18th Centuries.

Anyway, all of this is way off-topic, maybe it can veer into the other thread SR6 started.

special ed said:

I have seen newsreel footage of British soldiers, prone position, firing at German lines using left hand on bolt, arm curved over receiver, to allow rapid fire, keeping cheek weld.

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My former co-worker (many years ago) was a SS Panzer Grenadier and he took the time show me the drill with my Mauser at the range.

In the half-kneel position: right knee down, left knee up with the left elbow resting on that knee, he held the fore-stock firmly against his shoulder and with a fluid motion, fired and worked the bolt in a rapid but smooth motion while keeping his cheek against the stock.

He could fire and reload well within two seconds, accurately hitting preset targets down range and using the left knee/elbow as a pivot.

And he was doing this fourty years after the war.

Gary Cain said:

Which is still nowhere as fast as a Garand.

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Your Garand shooter better be not just fast but a good aim, I have no trouble hitting a hard hat at 300 meters firing as soon as the front sight is on, I'd have no issue taking an aimed shot at a man at 500 meters with confidence. Speed is nothing without control

You sir, are a good shot.

I had trouble hitting 300 meter targets, except maybe with the LMG.

Sometimes a good shot is really what is needed. But I think the issue for infantry a lot of times is holding territory or taking it, in which case you typically do need a lot of shots. That is why semi-automatic + larger magazine became typical for every army in the world.

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

For a fighter with glass jaw they lasted a long time

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Because they had nothing to replace it, would you take a Zero to war against a FW190A 109G Spit 9 Spit 14 high dash P47, Merlin Mustang Tempest Typhoon Corsair Hellcat in '43-44-45?, yeah neither would anyone else.

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

You sir, are a good shot.

I had trouble hitting 300 meter targets, except maybe with the LMG.

Sometimes a good shot is really what is needed. But I think the issue for infantry a lot of times is holding territory or taking it, in which case you typically do need a lot of shots. That is why semi-automatic + larger magazine became typical for every army in the world.

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Thanks mate, been doing it my whole life, I made the Australian team many years ago but pulled out, my then young family came first.

PAT303 said:

Because they had nothing to replace it, would you take a Zero to war against a FW190A 109G Spit 9 Spit 14 high dash P47, Merlin Mustang Tempest Typhoon Corsair Hellcat in '43-44-45?, yeah neither would anyone else.

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I was referring to the Japanese war machine. Army with air force, navy with air force.

Against a Bf 109G or Fw 190 or Spit 9 or Corsair, I'd say the J2M certainly had a fighting chance. Against a Typhoon I'd take an A6M5 no problem

PAT303 said:

Thanks mate, been doing it my whole life, I made the Australian team many years ago but pulled out, my then young family came first.

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Which makes sense. As you know, not too many people can shoot that well in most armies. Certainly not many in my unit, though we had a few rednecks who grew up hunting who maybe could.

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

I was referring to the Japanese war machine.

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It was flawed, look at Midway, once the officers were killed it was all over for them, the code of honour bushido and all that sounds romantic but your setting yourself up to fail.

PAT303 said:

It was flawed, look at Midway, once the officers were killed it was all over for them, the code of honour bushido and all that sounds romantic but your setting yourself up to fail.

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This is true. I have seen examples of this in my military career. The "Zero Defect" mentality. Raising expectations so high that failure is inevitible, and then because failure is not an option, covering up mistakes until something really bad happens. Usually somebody ends up dead, somebody gets scapegoated, and the underlying problem gets swept under the rug.

And yet they won several naval engagements after Midway. Their military, both army and navy, were still extremely formidable for at least a year after Midway. Not only did they take the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Indonesia, but they also conquered vast areas of China and muscled the British out of Burma and right up to the borders of India.

Think of the Japanese Navy as a machine for sinking ships. Warships and commercial vessels. Who else in the world could match them in 1942 or 1943?

Their submarines managed to infiltrate major Allied surface fleets and sink aircraft carriers and other high value targets.

Their destroyers, torpedo boats, and light cruisers all carried extremely lethal long lance torpedoes or equivalent. As did their carrier torpedo bombers and their land based bombers like the G3M and G4M, which made short work of the Prince of Wales and Repulse.

On top of this, they had their dive bombers. The D3A, say what you want about it, was a ship killing beast. Their performance against the Royal Navy at Ceylon was incredible. I forget the exact number of hits, but the number was astounding. Every time they engaged the US with these in 1942, they sunk ships with them.

Then you have their bigger surface ships. The heavy cruisers, battlecruisers and battleships were world class. Well armored, very well armed, and crewed by highly disciplined, extremely effective crews. They were trained for night combat and excelled at it. This was not just a few commerce raiders like the Germans had, but multiple large fleets built around their big surface sluggers.

And they had the super battleships, which nobody in the world could compare to. Ultimately these were held in reserve until it was too late, but that was often the fate of capital ships.

The US Navy rose to the occasion and contended with them, but that was very much in doubt in 1942. And we all know Midway could have gone either way, the decisive factor other than luck was the breaking of the Japanese code.

Note, quite a few US ships here



For the whole war- see here

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

yes but this is a gross oversimplification.

A6M2 wing area 241.5 sq ft / 22.44 sq meter (notable that the A6M3 had a smaller wing and the A6M5 smaller still)
Ki-43-IIb wing area 230 sq ft / 21.4 sq meter
Spitfire Mk Vb wing area 242.1 sq ft / 22.49 sq meter
P-51D Mustang wing area 235 sq ft / 21.8 sq meter
Ki-84 wing area 230 sq ft / 21 sq meter
Hawker Tempest wing area 302 sq ft / 28.1 sq meter
F4U Corsair wing area 314 sq ft / 29.17 sq meter

Wing area doesn't necessarily correlate to high drag, and it definitely doesn't have anything to do with roll rate necessarily. Wing shape, weight in the wing and size of ailerons can all affect roll, as can other factors. Roll rate is certainly important.

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I guess I have to agree, I hadn't considered wing shape, among the other aspects you mentioned. Even so, if Japanese doctrine favored power, more designs like the Ki-28 would have appeared in the Japanese arsenal early on.

Wild_Bill_Kelso said:

With all due respect I think your derogation of the Japanese aircraft and their fighting capability more broadly is a bit superficial.

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If Japanese aircraft like the A6M and Ki-100 were so great, I would expect to see more similarly slow but agile aircraft in the European theatre (and in Interwar Europe) achieving an exceptional amount of success. I would have expected to see the "best-trained" pilots in the world crush the Allied pilots decisively in battle, which they did at times, given their rather enormous amounts of flight hours, but they did not achieve this consistently. Even at Pearl Harbor, pilots lacking sleep were still able to shoot down Japanese aircraft, including one or more Zeroes, without losses, though nothing at the time could prevent Japanese success there. On the other hand, Japan was still having a difficulty entering the jet age, and the lower estimates for the performance of their German-influenced jet aircraft are terrible. This is relevant, because Japan's motives for stomaching an invasion of a country as large as China, for going to war with America, date as far back as the black ships in Edo bay in 1853, self-preservation. Yet, they lagged in key technologies such as radar, rocketry, jet engines, nuclear weapons, computing, and even night-vision, among others, all of which would become increasingly relevant in years to come, and could have both been a sign of Japan's technological prowess (which includes opportunities to gain prestige) and helped to some degree in their future self-preservation against the likes of the opportunistic Soviet Union and the United States, both of whom had interests in East Asia. They were already falling behind in propeller planes alone, with their 2000HP prototypes having inferior speeds and increasing disadvantages in other aspects, in comparison to other aircraft with engines of similar or higher power output.

Edit: A small part of the issues with Allied aircraft was perhaps the climate of the islands of the South Pacific, particularly for European, and European-influenced (Ki-61 on the Japanese side), aircraft, though I do not much information on this, nor its actual prominence.

JoblinTheGoblin said:

If Japanese aircraft like the A6M were so great, I would expect to see more similarly slow but agile aircraft in the European theatre achieving an exceptional amount of success. I would have expected to see the "best-trained" pilots in the world crush the Allied pilots decisively in battle, which they did at times, given their rather enormous amounts of flight hours, but they did not achieve this consistently. Even at Pearl Harbor, pilots lacking sleep were still able to shoot down Japanese aircraft, including one or more Zeroes, without losses, though nothing at the time could prevent Japanese success there. On the other hand, Japan was still having a difficulty entering the jet age, and the lower estimates for the performance of their German-influenced jet aircraft are terrible. This is relevant, because Japan's motives for stomaching an invasion of a country as large as China, for going to war with America, date as far back as the black ships in Edo bay in 1853, self-preservation. Yet, they lagged in key technologies such as radar, rocketry, jet engines, nuclear weapons, computing, and even night-vision, among others, all of which would become increasingly relevant in years to come, and could have both been a sign of Japan's technological prowess (which includes opportunities to gain prestige) and helped to some degree in their future self-preservation against the likes of the opportunistic Soviet Union and the United States, both of whom had interests in East Asia. They were already falling behind in propeller planes alone, with their 2000HP prototypes having inferior speeds and increasing disadvantages in other aspects, in comparison to other aircraft with engines of similar or higher power output.

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

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.

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.

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.

tomo pauk said:

Shinpachi - can you help, please?

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According to Mechanic of World Aircraft Vol.4, 331.8kt at altitude 6,585meters of J2M5 seems the fastest.