Most Overrated aircraft of WWII.....?

[Stig1207]

What are your sources for those numbers

The Soviet figures are apparently from:
'Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the Twentieth Century' by Krivosheev.

I don't know of any break down of losses by type or cause, but it seems that of the 46000 operational losses, an estimated 20000 were due to aerial combat.

 

[GrauGeist]

Schweik, perhaps bring a credible source for your claims to the table instead of a website...

Sourcing that .ORG site is like using wiki, FFS.

 

[parsifal]

before we can quote losses and sources< we at least need to agree on when a loss is a loss >

both sides have their loss tallies shrouded

Soviet losses are generally hidden behind their version of political correctness. Even sources like Krivosheev suffer from this affliction

German losses are incomplete for a start, and because of the way damaged aircraft were tallied and processed could often be hidden from view. aircraft were assesses according to damage. Aircraft damage above what the frontline formations could repair generally meant pulling the airframe out of theatre, back to Germany where it was either scrapped or repaired, but not as an airframe attached to the eastern front. Neither was it a loss recorded for the EF.

As Ive said previously, determining losses for the EF with any accuracy is pretty much a lost cause

 

[Stig1207]

As Ive said previously, determining losses for the EF with any accuracy is pretty much a lost cause

We can pretty much agree on this; which makes the conclusions being drawn by various posters based on this 'data' all the more remarkable

 

[Kryten]

That were the losses in the air to air encounter 109 vs Spit the losses of Spit versus others aircraft are not include. The battle was win for many reasons and the quality of Spit V probabily not count, the would win the battle also using only Kittyhawk, with more losses but ever win

If you bother to research the air battles over Malta you will find "encounters" between 109's and Spitfires were rarely isolated , but were part of massed air battles, the RAF had bombers, dive bombers and fighters to deal with, the 109's job was to keep the Spitfires from shooting down said bombers and dive bombers, you cannot isolate one type, you can only look at the relative numbers involved (the RAF fought massively outnumbered on most days) the losses and the result of the battle!

Plainly and obviously 109's will shoot down more Spitfires than they lose if they are only fighting Spitfires, whilst the numerically fewer Spitfires are having to deal with superior numbers of bombers and fighters and the priority is the bombers!
So your statistic in it's isolation shows nothing of realistic value!

 

[Schweik]

Plainly and obviously 109's will shoot down more Spitfires than they lose if they are only fighting Spitfires

Really!?

 

[Milosh]

Really!?

Yes as the Spit had Italian and German bombers and fighters to contend with.

 

[Kryten]

Really!?

It's not rocket science,
The attacking forces consisted of bombers, dive bombers and their escorting fighters, the Spitfires had to deal with all of these with the priority being the bombers.

The 109's had just the Spits and the odd Hurricane which they had to keep away from the bombers, so it's ridiculous to isolate one type and try to make a comparison, if you want to draw any conclusion of the relative performances you have to take into consideration the losses of all types, and the number involved!

as an example at 18:00 on July 11th an incoming raid consisted of 10 -Ju88's, 16- Macchis and 24- Bf109, this was opposes by 24 Spitfires drawn from 3 different Sqdns (8 from each).

This was the third raid of the day, each time the defending Spits were outnumbered more than 2 to 1 and often much worse odds, so it's quite foolish to try and make like for like comparisons when it's plainly obvious the tactical situation dictates any engagement and it's outcome.

 

[Schweik]

It's not rocket science,

What I meant is that the statement "Plainly and obviously 109's will shoot down more Spitfires than they lose if they are only fighting Spitfires" implies that if you have 20 Spitfires and 20 Bf 109s in a fight, the Bf 109s are going to shoot down more Spitfires than they lose. That may not be what he meant to say but that is how it reads.

Which I don't think is generally true, though it depends on the sub-variants of both.

Even when there is a big mix of planes in the air, the effect that has on how the combat goes depends more on the capabilities of the aircraft in question and the strategy. If the aircraft is too slow or lacks performance to disengage, then tactical options are limited so they are more or less stuck with the odds - and suffer losses accordingly if the odds are against them. Hurricanes, MC 200, Cr 42, Me 110 and so on, suffered from this problem. Spitifires, Bf 109s, MC 202 / 205, and P-40s could all disengage if they needed to so if they had sufficient operational flexibility in terms of their orders / chain of command, they could tackle the fight in different ways.

If they were ordered to go after the bombers and ignore the fighters, or conversely as an escort, if they were forced to stick close to the bombers, then the fighter casualties go up. If they were given more of a free hand then the fighter casualties go down. In MAW II and III, there were cases where both Allied and German fighter squadrons were able to cause devastating damage against much larger enemy formations even when badly outnumbered (including Spits & P-40s), and cases of the opposite where they got creamed.

Generally in mid 1942 when the Spitfires first arrived in the Med the British tactics were still a little bit messed up, overly rigid and they weren't always using pairs / wingmen. But by the fall they had adopted the 'Finger Four' type formations same as the Germans and given their fighter squadron a freer hand, though this still depended on the squadron commander. I remember reading about one engagement with Spits flying escort where they were being attacked from above, behind and to the left by some Bf 109s. The squadron commander ordered "break right" instead of "break left" and the RAF fighters did as ordered, resulting in 4 of them immediately getting shot down. Clearly a disastrous error by the squadron leader. But there were not too many cases like that. Most of the Spitfire squadrons seemed to do pretty well.

The German fighter squadrons were given plenty of tactical flexibility, almost to a fault, and tended to cherry pick the easiest and safest targets, which often meant low flying fighters, and they would disengage by climbing or diving away any time the fight went against them.

Which is why I say, as for the alleged numbers quoted, I wouldn't get too excited about it - I suspect those numbers are way off. The Devil is in the details of how they are counting the losses on both sides, and for example are they using the same criteria for both Axis and Allied squadrons. I have still yet to see this famous original post (I wish somebody would link it) but I suspect there may be something fishy in how the losses are being added up. This can be a little tricky because the damage and losses are reported differently in Shores MAW.

• The RAF / Commonwealth losses are reported as "shot down" or "bailed out" or "damaged", but also "force landed" or "crash landed", results for crew (KiA, MiA, WiA, POW, "unknown" or "Failed to Return") and damage as "Cat I, Cat II", or (more rarely) "Cat III". It was quite common for P-40s in particular to return back to base as damaged "Cat II" but still manage to land normally. They will also specify the cause of the lost / damaged aircraft: to accident, enemy fighters, or Flak.
  
• The USAAF and Free French losses don't have as much detail, but they will indicate "shot down by 109", "lost to flak", "damaged" or "badly damaged", "crash landed / force landed" and where (i.e. crash landed on the base or in the battle area) and sometimes "Late arrival club" for pilots who made it back to base by whatever means a day or two after an incident.
  
• The German results while similar are based on percentage, so they will say "Damaged 10% or Damaged 90%", they will indicate "Force / Crash landed" or not, what happened to the pilot, and sometimes they use ambiguous terms like "blown up" which usually means shot down but can mean damaged on the ground by bombers / strafers, or "aircraft abandoned" which usually means bailed out but can also mean abandoned after a forced landing. They will also usually indicate what they think shot them down, such as Spitfires, P-40s, Hurricanes or enemy bombers - or Flak.
  
• Italian results are much more vague and usually are either just "Failed to Return", "Crash landed" or "Damaged" plus the condition of the pilot / crew.

Another issue is that sometimes there are losses with no corresponding claims. Sometimes you can find these claims in the other volume - Vol II and III overlap in some periods but seem to come from different sets of records. So for example on a particular day you might find records of 3 lost Bf 109s with no corresponding DAF claims, but you check the other Volume and find 4 or 5 matching claims on that day. If you cant find them then I would say they don't count.

So there are some questions you must answer if you are going to evaluate this stuff which are a little complex. When I did some totalling up of several days actions for the Bf 109 vs P-40 thread, for me the following issues came to mind:

• Do you count aircraft destroyed by Flak / AAA? I decided if I'm trying to match claims to losses such as between Spits and 109s, I don't count "Flak kills", but there are a few cases where one side attributed a loss to Flak when it was clearly an enemy aircraft that got them so there are some exceptions to this.
• How do you count crash landed aircraft? This is very tricky because as I mentioned previously, a single bullet hole in a radiator can force a plane down, but that same plane can be repaired in a few hours or less and right back into action. So there is definitely a difference, but it's clear at least when an aircraft had to 'force land' or 'crash land'. Rather than try to distinguish crash landed from shot down, I just list them separately, so for example on a certain day the RAF may have lost 3 Spitfires destroyed and 2 crash landed.
  
• How do you count losses that seem to be in another battle area or a different time? In the P-40 vs 109 thread, one guy argued a lot about one particular incident on March 24, 1943. USAAF 33rd FG P-40Ls escorting a B-25 raid had clashed with Bf 109G-2, G-4 and G-6s of at least two, possibly three different JG, claiming 10 & 5 damaged, and losing 1 P-40. The Germans claimed 7 P-40s (including two by Experten Hans Bar who the German report said shot down two P-40s that were giving his subordinates a lot of trouble) and lost 6 destroyed and 1 damaged 50%. The accompanying text described a long "running battle" from the site of the German airfield at Tebaga North in Southern Tunisia all the way back to the DAF airbase in North West Tunisia or Algeria (it wasn't clear where exactly). The issue was that 2 of the German losses were to 'unknown reasons' and they and one other loss were reported in North-East Tunisia. The ensuing argument was complicated but my general conclusion is, it's just a little bit too much of a mystery to delve deep into every single lost aircraft. It's possible there is a coincidental navigation error or engine malfunction for 3 of the 6 lost German fighters, but I doubt it. The bottom line though if you are trying to do this day by day, I think the criteria should be if there are losses which can be matched to the claims on the same day and within the operational range of the aircraft involved, then they should be counted. If there are odd circumstances you can put an asterix on it for further investigation later. But as we know, some people are so invested in one side or the other they just can't let things go - that's fine, it's how we figure a lot of things out frankly, but it needs to be separated so it doesn't bog down the count.
  
• How do you count damaged aircraft? This one is tricky. On the DAF side, if it says Cat III damage, or "written off", "destroyed" etc., then I counted it as destroyed. If not damaged (and therefore not counted in the victory / lost ratio). For the Germans I counted any aircraft with more than 50% damage as destroyed, though that is a bit arbitrary. German losses were often reported as just damage percentage, 60%, 80% etc. I know there was a certain threshold beyond which many aircraft were out of commission for a long time and ultimately written off, as the repair capabilities in remote fields were limited, especially in late 1942 and 1943 as the Germans were often retreating and leaving a lot of planes behind (both in the Med and in Russia). But I'd have to do more research to find that out*. Bottom line is I think that most lightly or moderately damaged aircraft should be ignored in the kill count and tallied separately, while severely damaged aircraft can be counted as killed so long as the criteria are clear and consistent. I also think you should keep a separate tally of damaged aircraft because that does help paint the picture.

Obviously the most important is that the count of losses are done by as close to the same criteria as possible for all air forces on both Axis and Allied sides, and that these criteria are consistent. I do think that is a bit of a challenge but it's also doable.

S

* one other thing that occurred to me, this would take a fiendish amount of effort but in MAW, Shores does list the serial numbers of damaged planes, and then the serial numbers of planes "destroyed by own troops" presumably due to a base evacuation. So if you entered all this into a database or just painstakingly matched them one by one, you could probably determine with some degree of accuracy which German planes in particular that got damaged were ultimately destroyed before they could be repaired and put into action. So maybe those should be counted as destroyed.

 

[Juha2]

There were late Yaks and late Yaks. 4,239 Yak-9Ms were produced from May 1944 to June 1945, max speed at SL 518 km/h and 573 km/h at 3,750 m. Not necessarily a "Super fighter" in late 1944 or early 1945.

 

[Juha2]

According to Jefford's RAF Sqns 81 sqn got Mk IXs in Jan 1943, it had got Mk VCs in Oct 1942. Used both until Nov 43 when it got Spit VIIIs.

 

[Schweik]

There were late Yaks and late Yaks. 4,239 Yak-9Ms were produced from May 1944 to June 1945, max speed at SL 518 km/h and 573 km/h at 3,750 m. Not necessarily a "Super fighter" in late 1944 or early 1945.

Lets try to be realistic though, by 1944 you had the Yak 9U (575 kph at Sea level 672 at altitude - with a 23mm cannon) and Yak 3 (567/646), not to mention La 5FN (583 / 634) and La 7 (613/661) so I think, between the better Yaks and Lavochkins, the Soviets gave the Germans plenty to think about, (and the Liebensraum they were longing for was back at home which they wish they had never left).

 

[Freebird]

By that logic the Gloster Gladiator is better than both...

By that logic the Whirlwind was the best...


Why isn't the He 177 on the list?

It would make the choice soooo easy....

 

[Tieleader]

Overall I'd have to say the Mustang. Don't misunderstand,it was certainly a capable fighter but it only showed up in numbers later on. The P-38s and P-47s had born the brunt of an experienced and capable LW force. The 51s came on the scene after the LW wasn't even capable of defending itself much less Germany. Here is a well built fighter constructed by patriot Americans to the highest standards, flown by pilots that had an obscene amount of training in the states (and expanded upon by Clobber Colleges in England) going against an enemy that was forced to use replacement pilots that were lucky to have 20 hours training in an A/C that in all probability was built by untrained slave labor that sabotaged what they could get away with. Doesn't matter how good your airplane is if you're outnumbered 10-1 or more. Not to even mention the fuel differences.
All the earlier A/C did the heavy lifting, the Mustang just had a great PR guy...

 

[Juha2]

Lets try to be realistic though, by 1944 you had the Yak 9U (575 kph at Sea level 672 at altitude - with a 23mm cannon) and Yak 3 (567/646), not to mention La 5FN (583 / 634) and La 7 (613/661) so I think, between the better Yaks and Lavochkins, the Soviets gave the Germans plenty to think about, (and the Liebensraum they were longing for was back at home which they wish they had never left).

Realistic? I have no problems with Yak-3 and La-5FN and -7, even if the latter had its engine problems, but during the war in 1944-45 Soviets manufactured 1,700 more Yak-9Ms than -9Us. And VK-107A engine was problematic most of 1944, especially anoing was its tendency to overhear even in level flight with combat power, speaking nothing on climbing. So during the summer 1944 it was recommended that the use of combat power setting be avoided. Engine problems were mostly solved in late 1944 and during the test at the end of 44 and the beginning of 45 -9U was able to reach speeds you mentioned.

 

[Juha2]

.... . Not to even mention the fuel differences...

What fuel differences? German late war C3 was appr 95+/130 PN. Fuel shortage was the main problem

 

[Dan Fahey]

Think the most over rated aircraft was the Spitfire. Find for home defense just could not stay in the air more than an hour. Was not as rugged or versatile as the P40. Its main issues was it lacked range and second ruggedness. It was an expensive time consuming plane to build. Could it fight yeah.. like to know the shoot down numbers of the Spit.

 

[Dan Fahey]

Overall I'd have to say the Mustang. Don't misunderstand,it was certainly a capable fighter but it only showed up in numbers later on. The P-38s and P-47s had born the brunt of an experienced and capable LW force. The 51s came on the scene after the LW wasn't even capable of defending itself much less ermany. Here is a well built fighter constructed by patriot Americans to the highest standards, flown by pilots that had an obscene amount of training in the states (and expanded upon by Clobber Colleges in England) going against an enemy that was forced to use replacement pilots that were lucky to have 20 hours training in an A/C that in all probability was built by untrained slave labor that sabotaged what they could get away with. Doesn't matter how good your airplane is if you're outnumbered 10-1 or more. Not to even mention the fuel differences.
All the earlier A/C did the heavy lifting, the Mustang just had a great PR guy...

NOT TRUE
Two Issues.. The P38 had the range but painful problematic tuning issues that caused a lot of turn backs. They never fully fixed them either. The P47 could barely get into France without turning back due to poor fuel range, just like the Spit. They could not reach the Fighters and Germans knew it. Only after Allied Troops landed in Europe and P47 range was not an issue could it contribute. However the P38 despite its issues had the range and shot down more Axis planes per sortie than the Thunderbolt. It was a far more maneuverable plane to take a shot at their prey. However the P47 was more survivable because it could roll and dive quickly like the P40.

Unlike the P51 the P38 and P47 were large easier targets to identify. These allied planes were picked off by the experienced Axis planes and AAA.

Most every Fighter Plane had comparable tools to shoot the other sides plane down. What made the difference was having the fuel and range and still have the competitive combat ability to shot down the other plane. This is what made the Zero so damn dangerous. Like the P51 raided your territory and the other side could not get to theirs.

In Africa the Range of the P40 allowed deep interdiction strikes on Rommel and German Airbases. A key issues the Axis single engine planes lacked. One of the understated features of the longer range US planes, by the time they got into enemy territory they were about 1000 lbs. lighter making very nimble fighters.

The P51 shoot down almost twice as many planes as the P47 its closest rival and flew less missions doing it.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

NOT TRUE
Two Issues.. The P38 had the range but painful problematic tuning issues that caused a lot of turn backs. They never fully fixed them either.

NOT TRUE. The P-38L had all those issues addressed and then some but by the time it was rolling out of the factory it was too little too late, at least in the ETO and especially in the eyes of the brass.

 

[Stig1207]

Think the most over rated aircraft was the Spitfire. Find for home defense just could not stay in the air more than an hour. Was not as rugged or versatile as the P40. Its main issues was it lacked range and second ruggedness. It was an expensive time consuming plane to build. Could it fight yeah.. like to know the shoot down numbers of the Spit.

Strangely, though, the Spitfire wasn't gradually phased out and replaced by newer fighters by the RAF unlike a certain more 'rugged or versatile' fighter was by the USAAF.