P-38 Lightning VS F6F Hellcat, Pacific Warriors!

FLYBOYJ said:

Only if it shows that the Hellcat shot down 1,000,000 aircraft for the loss of 3.....

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You mean it didnt. You just cant trust the internet these days next thing you will be telling me the Moon landings were for real and not faked by Disney.

fastmongrel said:

You mean it didnt. You just cant trust the internet these days next thing you will be telling me the Moon landings were for real and not faked by Disney.

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And I guess that's your opinion!!!!

Garyt said:

The Hellcat itself as a fighting platform just was not that good compared to the Zero. A little faster, not much, similar rolling, did not turn or climb as well, and dove better, from a slight advantage in the dive if looking at the A6M3 to a much larger advantage if looking at earlier versions. It's more durable and armored better, and has similar firepower.

It was better than the Zero yes, but not by a real big margin.

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I'm not taking anything away from these so-called "meatballs," in their day, but tactically, in my humble opinion, they couldn't stay with these Hellcats.

fastmongrel said:

You mean it didnt. You just cant trust the internet these days next thing you will be telling me the Moon landings were for real and not faked by Disney.

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Actually, the word on the street is that the moon-landings were staged by the CIA

So then one must wonder if the incredible success of the F6F might actually be a government coverup where UFOs were used against Japan and disguised as propellor driven aircraft!

I have a pretty good database of victories by type for US aircraft, but have yet to find any reliable numbers for the Axis or even our allies. I got the Navy and Marine totals from a 1946 US Navy OpNav study and the USAAF numbers from several sources including Francis Dean. The Navy and the USAAF don't keep the same stats!

EVERYONE seems to know a different number for victories in the Battle of Britain, but NOBODY seems to have the complete numbers for the UK for the entire war. The data must be out there somewhere, but finding seems to be the trick.

I DO have a very good database of Axis (and Allied) claims by Aces (5 or more victories), but none for victories actually awarded, other than for the USA. For instance, I have a great breakdown for the top three to five guys, so the data MUST exist, but it sort of disappears for aces somewhat farther down the list, even for ones with 150+ victories. My listing for Erich Hartmann shows 352, so I figure it must be claims.

In the British list, the top scorer's victories include a lot of kills over V-1's.

In almost everyone else's book, a "victory" is one that is over an airborne, manned aircraft that is normally expected to be armed when flying. So ... technically, the V-1's don't count as victories since it wasn't manned. Also, you wouldn't expect, say, a Fieseler Storch to be armed, so a victory over one of those might technically not be counted either.

The "rules" get rather "interesting," depending on whose rules you look at, and I have noticed that nobody seems to agree on "the rules."

It is one thing to keep track of ground kills, and quite another to include them in a list of "victories" since they obviously weren't airborne when destroyed. Also, many people say that if you shoot down a plane, and it actually GOES down, but they later recover it, it doesn't count as a victory.

I say poppycock to that. If you shoot it out of the sky, it damned for sure SHOULD count. Otherwise the word victory becomes meaninglessly technical and nobody will EVER agree on ANYTHING.

So, if we DO want to start this, I can offer a good start for part of it, but maybe we should discuss the "rules" first in a dedicated "rules for aerial victories" thread. Even if we come up with a good set of rules ... the original data is VERY hard to find and vetting the list could be a labor of many years by a LOT of people ... and we might not ever FIND enough data for confirmation for the vast majority of pilots.

You can't even get 3 or 4 Americans to agree on how many Pappy Boyington shot down! Friends of Joe Foss claim he got 21 or 22 or less because they want their guy to be number one, but the US Navy / Marines still say 28. Some say 26, and others say less. And THIS is a case that is officially recognized as 28!

Still, it is an interesting thought.

GrauGeist said:

So then one must wonder if the incredible success of the F6F might actually be a government coverup where UFOs were used against Japan and disguised as propellor driven aircraft!

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Now that's just plumb implausible. Everybody knows you can't put a propeller on a flying saucer, it would fall off going at the speed of light!

VBF-13 said:

Now that's just plumb implausible. Everybody knows you can't put a propeller on a flying saucer, it would fall off going at the speed of light!

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or to put it another way 'Warp factor nine!! she canno take it any more captain'

VBF-13 said:

Now that's just plumb implausible. Everybody knows you can't put a propeller on a flying saucer, it would fall off going at the speed of light!

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Sure you can, here's how:
Rotating Prop Disc Tutorial

Pretty good try at it. I haven't really seen any that were better.

Some DID have a somewhat more widely-produced shape, though ...

Glider said:

or to put it another way 'Warp factor nine!! she canno take it any more captain'

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I love it when Kirk would call for more power and Scotty would be on his back under the machine with a wrench out or something.

GrauGeist said:

Sure you can, here's how:
Rotating Prop Disc Tutorial

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That looks like a Klingon ship. The Japanese wouldn't be fooled by it.

Does it have a corbimite device installed?

I believe those were only specific to Starships, Greg. I could be wrong. I didn't check in Wikipedia.

Galaxy class starships, to be Mr Picky.

I suppose this calls for an expedition to the secret Nazi base in Antarctica to find out...

Perhaps they can get by with some occult action. Just summon a demon.

VBF-13 said:

I'm not taking anything away from these so-called "meatballs," in their day, but tactically, in my humble opinion, they couldn't stay with these Hellcats.

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I am reading the Last Zero fighter. It is a book on real life experiences of IJN Zero Pilots. For those that encountered the Hellcat they had a good measure of respect for it.

One has to realize that during the period when the Hellcats were fully operational they were often facing zero units (A6M5) whose a/c were not top performing. They were often patched up from bullet holes with the paint worn away to the bare metal and engine maintenance that was often poor due the lack of supplies and spare parts. As one Pilot said how could we be victorious in battles with the Americans when we would launch 35 or 40 zero's only to see then off in the distance 200 Hellcats heading straight for us and our base. When they got close 100 would peel off and strafe our airfield while the other 100 would fly top cover ready to take us on. Most of these hellcats were new a/c while ours were "jalopys".

Of course it wasn't always one sided. In one instance on Formosa(Taiwan) a IJN pilot waited in his dug out while the Hellcats strafed the airfield then just after they past he ran from his dugout and jumped in his Zero and took off. Catching up to the Americans he blew the tail end charlie away and got the third a/c in a similar fashion. The leader and his wingman then executed a Thatchweave but the IJN pilot was experienced enough to not get trapped by this maneuver and rolled away with the Hellcats in pursuit. He came roaring back over the airfield and headed far out to sea. Everyone thought he was a goner but he smartly led the hellcats away from their carrier which ultimately caused them to break off pursuit and head back.

Totalize,
I just started that book and so far it seems fairly well written!
Cheers,
Biff

One has to realize that during the period when the Hellcats were fully operational they were often facing zero units (A6M5) whose a/c were not top performing. They were often patched up from bullet holes with the paint worn away to the bare metal and engine maintenance that was often poor due the lack of supplies and spare parts.

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Interesting. Makes complete sense, though I never really thought of this before.

one Pilot said how could be victorious in battles with the Americans when we would launch 35 or 40 zero's only to see then see off in the distance 200 Hellcats heading straight for us and our base. When they got close 100 would peel off and strafe our airfield while the other 100 would fly top cover ready to take us on

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This is the king of thing that I'm talking about that makes it very tough to be competitive in air kills, going above and beyond the pilot issue. And I'm sure things like better radar and better radio communications would combine to have the Hellcats usually knowing where and at what altitude the zeros would be, while Japanese fighters would usually not be privy to this information.

BiffF15 said:

Totalize,
I just started that book and so far it seems fairly well written!
Cheers,
Biff

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Biff,

It's a fine book. The author plans a few more books like this based on additional interviews with surviving pilots.