P-40 vs. Yak-1 vs. Hurricane

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The following is slightly off topic (sort of). I would have substituted figures for
the Bf 109G-2 and used the G-6 performance, but in 1943 it was no better.
OK then, lets see how the P-39N would have faired with this group when it
was delivered in November 1942 and became operational in June 1943.


The P-39, because of its lower altitude supercharger that limited its ability
at higher altitude, it can not be considered as a first class, first line fighter.
But if we drop the fight down to 5,000 m. and lower, the later versions of
P-39s (P-39N-Q) could hold there own.
 

In the Med, by mid 1942 Hurricanes were very rarely if ever being used for air superiority missions like combat air patrol, fighter sweeps, armed recon (not to be confused with Tac-R), or bomber escort. In fact Hurricanes themselves (carrying bombs) were routinely escorted - by P-40's or Spitfires.

In a couple of the other threads on here we crunched the numbers for the Med in Oct 1942, based on records from Christopher Shores Mediterranean Air War Vols II and III. October is significant because that is when the 2ndf Battle of El Alemain started. In that month the DAF consisted of the following fighters:

The Air Forces

DAF Fighters
(This is theoretical strength not counting aircraft down for maintenance / damaged etc.)
336 fighters (155 front line fighters - Spit and late model P-40s, 194 older fighters - Hurricanes and older P-40s, plus 32 fighter bomber only Hurricane IID)
  • 128 x RAF* P-40s (about 50 Kittyhawk Mk I, 16 Tomahawks, 32 x Kittyhawk Mk II**, and about ~30 Kittyhawk Mk III)
  • 128 x RAF Hurricanes (Mostly Mk IIc, with a few IIb and ~ 20 Mk I still flying)
  • 32 x Hurricane II D
  • 75 x USAAF P-40 F/L** (plus a few P-40K in the 57th Fighter Group)
  • 48 x Spitfire Mk V (mostly VB with a few VC)
Axis Fighters
(German Data for August 1942 per Shores - this is supposed to be real on-hand air strength)
Axis 515 fighters (307 front line Bf 109 and MC 202, 150 biplanes and 12 bf 109E Jabos, 46 Bf 110). Most of the heavy lifting though was being done by about 100 Bf 109s.

German Fighters 97 Bf 109F, 12 Bf 109E, 46 Bf 110:
  • Stab / JG 27 -2 x Bf 109F-4
  • I./JG 27 - 23 x Bf 109F-4
  • II./JG 27 - 24 Bf 109F-4
  • III./JG 27 - 24 Bf 109F-4
  • JaboStaffel/JG 27 -12 Bf 109E
  • III./JG 53 - 24 Bf 109E & F
  • Jagdkommando/JG 27 - 3 Bf 109F (Crete)
  • III./ZG 26 46 Bf 110C,D, E ad F (Crete)
  • 4.(H)/12 Bf 110E and Bf 109E-7 Jabo (number not listed)
The Germans also had a number of bombers, but only the Stukas and occasionally Ju 88s were being used in the land campaign. Ju 88's were mostly doing maritime patrols, attacking convoys and so on. Older German bombers like He 111 were largely parked or relegated to night bombing / maritime patrol as they were too vulnerable. Ju-52s of course were already starting to fly supply runs and were getting jumped by Beaufighters and others. The Italian bombers were also basically relegated to the Maritime operations (where they had some success).

Italian air strength in North Africa reached its peak in October 1942 with the following operational groups:
(could not find Italian Air strength in Shores going back to June so I got it from this website can't be certain if it's accurate)
  • 7 groups (approx. 210 planes) of Macchi MC202 fighters***;
  • 5 groups (approx. 150 planes) of Fiat CR42 fighter-bombers****;
  • 1 group (approx. 20-30 planes) of Junkers Ju 87 Stuka dive-bombers;
  • 1 group (approx. 20 planes) of Z1007 bombers;
  • 2 groups (approx. 40 planes) of SM79 bombers;
Anyway that is nominal strength I think. Real strength was probably half that.

In October III./JG 53 was transfering back to Sicily while elements of JG 77 were coming in by the end of the month. By 20 Nov 1942 81 fighters from JG 77 were operating against the DAF, mostly Bf 109G -2 and some 109F-4

Combat
There was 'significant combat' (resulting in one or more aircraft shot down) on 19 of the 31 days in Oct 1942

Claims
(Counting only 'confirmed' victories and no probables or damaged claims.)
  • The Allies claimed 134 'confirmed' victories (105 by RAF pilots / 29 US)
  • The Axis Claimed 238 victories (107 by the Germans / 131 by the Italians)
All of the German claims were by Bf 109s, all of the Italian claims by Mc 202s
The Allied claims included 35.5 Claims by Spitfires (26%), 57.5 Claims by RAF Kittyhawks (44%), 12 Claims by Hurricanes (8%), and 29 Claims by USAAF P-40 "Warhawks" (21%)

The biggest days for the Germans were on Oct 9 (23 claims), 27th (12 claims) and 20th (11 claims)
The biggest days for the Allies were on Oct 27 (15 claims), 26th (11 claims), Oct 28th (10 claims) and Oct 9 (11 Claims)

Losses
(Only counting losses attributed to air to air combat or unknown causes, and excluding losses to flak, accident, or air to air collision with "friendly")

Of that force in the Month of October, actual
Axis losses in air combat (not counting accidents or losses to flak) amounted to 60 shot down (46 fighters and 14 bombers) and 17 crash landed

34 Bf 109 + 7 crash landed, 10 MC 202 + 8 crash landed, 2 CR 42 shot down + 2 Crash landed, 11 Ju 87, 1 each Ju 88, Ju 52 and He 111, for a total of 60 shot down and 17 Crash landed.

Allied losses were very close at 61 shot down (57 fighters and 4 bombers) and 16 crash landed
Allied losses included 11 Spitfires + 1 crash landed, 29 P-40s +12 crash landed, and 17 Hurricanes +2 crash landed, plus 2 Baltimores, 1 B-25C shot down + 1 crash landed, and 1 Bisley shot down.
  • If you add it up, Spitfires did the best not surprisingly - with 11.5% of the DAF fighter force, they made 26% of the claims and took 17% of the losses.
  • RAF + US P-40s combined were 49% of the force, made 65% of the claims and took 50% of the losses.
  • Hurricanes were 31% of the force (not counting the IIDs) made 21% of the claims and took 29% of the losses.
  • If you counted the US P-40 squadrons alone though they did the best since as 18% of the force, they made 21% of the claims and took 5% of the losses.
Overclaiming
(To be fair about the overclaiming, I combined actual shot down plus crash-landed, as an aircraft damaged badly enough to crash land could reasonably be assumed to be shot down by the pilot who hit it.)
  • Allies claimed 134 and got 77 (60+17) for a ratio of 1.74
  • Axis claimed 238 and got 77 (61+16) for a ratio of 3.09
So I would say based on Shores et al, in October of 1942 anyway the Axis overclaimed a little bit worse, though it went back and forth. If you could separate out the German and Italian claims to victories (which wouldn't be easy because they both fought together on the same claiming days, often at the same time of the day) the Germans were also definitely more accurate.

A few more random observations:

+ German morale probably was low, as their claims dropped in the second half of the month and there were several days where they took casualties but made no claims
+ Italians clearly overclaimed much more than the Germans
+ Both Italian and German fighters claimed to have shot down P-46 or P-39s when they were in fact fighting with late model P-40s (which looked different as they were longer and often had different markings)
+ A lot of Kittyhawks in particular were badly damaged but still landed at base (and managed to land properly so not counted as a crash landing). Probably at least 20 of them. This would account for a good amount of overclaiming.
+ All the CR 42 casualties were on one big raid on Oct 27
+ The P-40 was the main aircraft reported to have shot down German planes by the Germans themselves in Oct 1942
+ Quite a few Axis planes were destroyed on the ground by bombers, especially by US B-25s and Hurricane fighter bombers, probably 2 or 3 times as many as they lost in the air.
+ A lot of Allied bombers, esp. the older Baltimores etc., and a fair number of fighter bombers were shot down by Flak over German airfields.
+ About half of the combat in October was either right over or very near Axis airfields. Then it switched to the front line of the big tank & infantry battle.
+ It is also telling that JG 77 was brought in with newer model Bf 109G-2 and G-4s in early November and Fw 190s were sent in not long after.
+To give an idea of the relative levels of commitment, in spite of having much greater numbers Italian fighters only operated about half the days in the month in any numbers and took casualties on 10 days in October, whereas the Luftwaffe took casualties on 18 days.
+ Though the Axis lost more bombers and a bit fewer fighters, most of the Hurricanes and older model P-40s were lost while operating as fighter bombers.
+ It is worth noting though that even in late 1942 both Hurricanes and older model P-40s could still 'bite' and shoot down Bf 109s once in a while.
+ But most of the victories were by Spitfires and the later model P-40s. The P-40 claims broke down to 57.5 from newer model P-40s (29 by USAAF P-40F/L, 13 by Kittyhawk II, 15.5 by Kittyhawk III) vs 11 by older model planes (9 by Kittyhawk I and 3 by Tomahawk) and only 12 by the Hurricanes even though there were more older model Kittyhawks and Hurricanes than anything else in the DAF force.
+ The Axis were hampered by fuel shortages, I think especially the Italians (but not certain about that). By this point the Italians (who had already been fighting a year or two longer than their German allies) certainly seemed to be less aggressive in terms of flying missions and mostly seemed to fight when their bases were attacked.

Based on that month anyway - I wouldn't say the Hurricanes were very good in air to air combat in that Theater though they could still pose a threat when attacked and were still pretty good at shooting down bombers for sure. I don't think you can find any month in 1942 where the Hurricane pilots shot down more enemy aircraft than the Tomahawk and Kittyhawk pilots did, let alone the Spitfires once they arrived.

S

* this also included RAAF units and SAAF units, the RAAF had some of the better Kittyhawk Mk II (3 RAAF) while SAAF had almost all older Kittyhawk Mk Is and all of the 16 Tomahawks still operating in the Theater

** Merlin XX Engined, increased effective ceiling up to 20,000 ft

*** I am pretty sure at least some of these were still actually MC 200 but I'm not sure how many.

**** The CR 42s were not truly fighter bombers as they carried a pretty small bomb load (440 lbs according to Wikipedia but I suspect that is a bit overstated) and I don't think they could dive-bomb. But they could essentially only be used as either fighter-bombers or for point / airfield defense so they were labeled as such (that section on the Italian fighter force was copied from the linked website). They were only sent out once in October and maybe one or two times in September IIRC.
 
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The main advantages the P-40 had over the Hurricane was dive speed and roll. Together this meant the ability to disengage, catch fleeing enemy fighters, and regain energy via zoom climb, as well as a high combat agility. Everybody, the Russians, the British DAF pilots, the Commonwealth DAF pilots, the Germans, and the Italians all said that the P-40 was a much bigger threat than the Hurricane.

The Italians didn't think much of the P-40, but were impressed with the P-38. The Germans rated it the second biggest threat after the Spitfire, and thought little of the P-38 which they compared to their Bf 110.

P-39 of course had a terrible record in the Med.

The fact that Hurricanes were being used almost exclusively as bombers, or occasionally to attack bombers (they were good Stuka killers) in the Med by mid 1942 pretty much tells the story.

Oh and by the way in that Golodnikov interview he mentions (to the surprise of the interviewer) that the P-40 could easily out-turn the Yak 7.

It's worth noting also that in Russia, they initially got Tomahawks which they did will with initially but quickly burned out the engines on (and had other maintenance problems), they they got a large number of P-40Es, which they did pretty well with (and had figured out some of the maintenance issues by then) then by fall 1942 they got a few hundred P-40Ks which they did very well with. Many Soviet Aces including several HSU, a few double aces and at least two x4 Aces flew P-40K. P-40Ks definitely had the best down low performance by a long shot and I think was the Russians favorite type.

P-40K had 1500 hp at Sea Level at "official" WEP power setting (not talking about illegal overboosting). They used P-40Ks until they burned out all the engines by the fall of 1943.

By the time the Russians started getting P-40Ns they had basically relegated all lend lease fighters except the P-39 to PVO (air defense) or Maritime coverage of the Baltic area. As far as I can tell they either never got any P-40F or got so few of them that they were not significant. I have never been able to find a pic of a Soviet P-40F or merlin engined P-40 of any kind.

Similarly in the Med, by the time they got the P-40N all the remaining RAF / Commonwealth P-40 units were flying 90% dive bomber missions or the equivalent, while the USAAF units were converting to P-47s or later P-51s. The main air to air Theater for the P-40N was the CBI and then the Pacific.

S
 
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I would also add, I think it's definitely a fair point that the Hurricane was a much older design. The best Hurricanes were going into production when the first (not quite combat ready) P-40's were coming online. The Hurricane peaked in 1940 was diminishing in value earlier than the P-40 did but held on to it's niche almost as late in the war, which considering it's lifespan was a lot longer.

So from the point of view of a design the Hurricane was better in many respects as they got more mileage out of it so to speak and it may have actually shot down more enemy planes (not certain about that as P-40 numbers would have to be compared between US, RAF, Commonwealth and Soviet sources).

On the other than in terms of actual impact in the war the P-40 may win out because it was definitely doing more damage to the enemy including (sorry guys but this is a fact) shooting down a lot of Bf 109s in the critical years of 1941 and 1942, and well into the middle of 1943. Even once Spitfires and P-38s arrived in the Med the P-40s were still playing an important and often leading role because they had almost twice the effective range of the Spitfire and seemed to hold up better against the Bf 109s and MC 202s than the P-38s at lower altitudes, where a lot of the fighting was taking place due to the Tactical nature of the war.

I do think the Hurricane and Tomahawk / Kittyhawk combat record was marred by very poor Tactics by the DAF in the first several months of their use against the Luftwaffe. Both Allied (Duke for example) and many German pilots commented on this. It was not just performance, they would remain often well below their performance ceilings down around 8,000 feet, went far too quickly into defensive circles and were not flying pairs.

Even in later 1942 when the USAAF squadrons came in they seem to have done much better than the equivalent RAF / Commonwealth units (a handful of elite aces not withstanding) which really doesn't make any sense, but can be explained by their embrace of using pairs and generally adopting more aggressive Tactics - like flying sweeps and bomber missions over the German bases.

The Yak was a very sophisticated design which was initially plagued with severe production problems and pilot training issues. Once they started getting those worked out, not easy to do when under the kind of onslaught they faced, the Yak began to emerge as a very serious contender and could definitely hold it's own against Bf 109s. Later model Yak 1B was a lethal aircraft. It was also specifically tailored to the Russian Front operating conditions. Up thread someone, I think GregP pointed out that the Russian planes would fly in the Winter. That is a very good point! Lend Lease planes had major problems with this as did the Luftwaffe.

So the TL DR is I think you could make a case for all three fighters, actually. I like the P-40 a lot myself obviously but I can't honestly say it was better, it depends for what mission and what Theater. For the Russian Front probably the Yak -1b, (at least once the kinks were worked out). For the CBI, the Pacific, or the Med in 1942 or 1943 I'd say the P-40, but for the Med in early 1941 (or anywhere in Europe), I'd say the Hurricane.

S
 
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My calculation on Hurricane victories is about 3750 confirmed excluding Far East and Russia, about 2750 confirmed for the P-40 excluding Russia.The P-40F/L had superior altitude performance to the majority of the British Commonwealth P-40 Fighters so higher victory scores don't surprise me. Below 20000 feet the Merlin version had comparable performance to the Bf 109F/G in 1942/43 as opposed to 12000 feet for the Alison version. However, from late 42 with over boost the Allison versions had as much horsepower as a Fw 190A, so they should have been able to give a good account of themselves to.
 

Very interesting. Can you give me the source of your numbers? Is that a count of claims or 'verified' victories (I assume the former but worth asking).

This website gives the total P-40 "confirmed" victory claims in US service only at 2,225.5 - and I'm not sure that includes AVG victories. If your above is meant to include RAF / Commonwealth claims would mean that there were only 524.5 claims for RAF, RAAF, RNZAF, and SAAF P-40's combined for 1941-1944,.in the Med, Pacific and CBI.

I find that unlikely when US P-40 units alone in the very brief time (late 42 - mid 43) they were involved in the Med claimed 592 victories there and 660.5 in the Pacific (where RAAF and RNZAF P-40 units were also very active)? Seems pretty low! This site has the claims for RAAF and RNZAF squadrons in the Pacific and I think you'll find at least 100 or so in there (I haven't counted yet).

I know there were 46 Commonwealth Aces who claimed 5 or more of their kills while flying P-40s. In the Med alone you have 112 RAF, 250 RAF, 260 RAF, 3 RAAF, 450 RAAF and a bunch of South African squadrons I can't remember the numbers of. Do you have sources for all those units?

Do you have sources for Hurricane claims in the Med?

S
 
P-40 claims for USAAF are on ones of these forums, so MTO = 592, CBI =741, PTO = 661 and Total = 1994 so I guess the AVG figures are omitted. Curtiss Kittyhawk gives British and Commonwealth Kittyhawk claims in the Med as 420. Curtiss P-40 Warhawk - Wikipedia gives 77 Tomahawk claims for 2 squadrons and 283 Kittyhawk claims for 3 squadrons, so I've marked up the Tomahawk claims by 50% (77 to 115)so same uplift as per Kittyhawk claims (283 to 420).So yes that's a little fudge, I admit. If you go onto this website Pacific Victory Roll - Home and look up RAAF and RNZAF claims then there are 149 and 99 claims respectively if you total up the numbers. So, I guess you'll get to about 3000 P-40 claims overall plus the Soviet ones.
Hurricane claims. Okay, look up Fighter Command on Wikipedia for the Battle of France and Battle of Britain. BoF, 400 Hurricane victories. BAE website claims Hurricanes scored 60% of BoB victories. Now the next question is, what timeline for BoB, British timeline ends in Oct 40, German in May 41. Raids continued until Operation Barbarossa. Hurricane finally withdrawn as interceptor fighter end 41 during which it continued to score victories. I'm taking 60% of a 2700 claims figure I've seen, can't remember where as my figure, so 1620, not 60% of 1800 for the RAF's BoB which would be 1080. So I would be allocating the same number of extra victories for the whole of the UK as were achieved in Malta for just 2 squadrons in the same time period. 1942/43, Hurricane IIc used as night intruder with 60 victories in first quarter use, I've extrapolated this up to 240. Malta victories 500 against mostly Italian, but also Germans when they were mainly using Me 110 fighters, source "Hurricanes over Malta", forgive me if I've added this up wrong. I've extrapolated an estimated 750 victories for them for the Western Desert as they had 3 squadrons there as opposed to the two in Malta and the same sort of opponents. Also there are 128 Sea Hurricane victories. The Sea Hurricane was a standard Hurricane which was converted to a FAA fighter by means of, if you like, a conversion kit. Haven't totalled Far East victories, don't know what Soviet ones were. So you get to 3628 or thereabouts. Nothing for Greece either.I think 3750 would be a reasonable figure easily achievable.
 

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In defence of the Hurricane, no one knew when the war would start, or exactly what the capacities of the enemy were. If Hitler had gone on the march in 1938(if Germany could) The only allied aircraft that could deal with the Bf 109 in Sept 1939 was the Hurricane, the UK only had slightly more than 100 spitfires. The time for the Hurricane should have been Sept 1939 to Sept 1940, if enough had been produced to give sell lease to Poland France Czechoslovakia Hungary Norway Netherlands and France then Germany would maybe not have not started the BoB or have ended it in such a state that an invasion of Russia would not be considered.
 

Ok so that is kind of what I figured - you are doing a mixture of some numbers you found here and there with a bit of estimating. Which is fine and fairly reasonable, but I don't think it's necessary at this time or really a sound basis for making any kind of point. Real wartime data tends to always be a bit surprising, that it the one constant. Logic comes into play later as part of the analysis.

You can get Hurricane and Tomahawk / Kittyhawk claims from the Med from Christopher Shores MAW Volumes I-III - and add up each days claims. A lot of work but it's doable if you have the time, I wish I did. When Volume IV comes out in a few days I'll definitely add up the time for at least one month in 1943 for another close look like I did for Oct 1942.

I agree Pacific Victory Roll is a good source for RAAF and RNZAF claims in that Theater. 149 and 99 sounds about right. 450 for the Med for Kittyhawks sounds a bit low to me for reasons I already stated, but I'll reserve judgement until I see an actual count based on some data I can look at myself.

It may take a while to get the Soviet claims but I have no doubt they are available in Russian somewhere and in spite of all the tensions these days we do have communication between aviation enthusiasts here and there.

So I'd say, rather than fudging or guessing, wait a while and make the effort to find the real numbers. I have a feeling we will know them soon enough.

S
 

Yes it's a shame that wasn't done!
 
That isn't to say the Hurricane didn't have it's day in the Middle East.

The war there went through 8 phases

A motley crew of oddball planes - 1940- initially, wonderfully strange and exotic 1930's era aircraft that could be scrounged up were fighting it out, Westland Lysanders, Britstol Bulldogs, Gloster Gauntlets, Martin Marylands, Bisleys, CR 32s, CR, 20's, SM 79's, Blenheims and so on. And seaplanes like Sunderlands and CANT Z.506. This is a very interesting period for anyone who likes early war military planes.

Italian involvement - the biplane era - Winter 1940 to Spring 1941- Then there was a period of intense fighting as some Gladiator squadrons were sent in and met face to face with large numbers of Cr 42s and some Cr 32s. Some pretty impressive fights took place with 20 and 30 planes on either side, which seemed to be about even - some days the British won and some days the Italians did. SM 79 Torpedo bombers were wreaking havoc on English shipping. There were a few Hurricanes around the Med but not many as the focus was more on Greece and other Theaters. The British sent in a lot more bombers mostly Blenheims, Marylands and Baltimores.

English escalation - Summer 1941 then the English started sending in more Hurricanes, to which the CR 42s were losing badly. There were some fights with the Vichy French Air Forces, including one very amusing incident described by Roald Dahl I think in Syria (he had initially flown Gladiators then Hurricanes). The Italians started feeding in some of their MC 200's and a few Fiat G.50's to try to even the score but they couldn't hold their own with the Hurricanes. The Hurricanes - still mostly Mk I, were dominant at this point.

German involvement- Fall 1941 As the land war started heating up, the Germans sent in reinforcements, initially Ju 87 and some Ju 88 bombers, and a few Staffel of Me 110s. The Italians also sent in more MC 200's and began phasing out the CR 42s from fighter duty. The British countered this with the first Tomahawks (112 'Shark' Squadron and then 250 Sqn), but the Hurricanes - now increasingly upgraded to IIb and IIc marks, were still very much holding their own and the Axis were losing a lot of fights. English Tomahawks also basically finished off Vichy French forces in the East (MS 406 and D.520). The British sent in the first A-20 Boston bombers which were hard for the slower planes to intercept. This was probably the peak for the Hurricane squadrons.

German escalation- Winter 1941 - Summer 1942 Then the Germans sent in JG 27 initially with Bf 109E7 and then Bf 109F2s. These really tipped the balance in the Axis favor particularly once the F2s arrived. The Italians also introduced the first of their excellent MC 202 fighters. The Tomahawks were bearing the brunt of the fighting, while the British brought in their new Kittyhawks but they basically used poor tactics, had a lot of trouble adjusting to them and they got the worst of it. They probably did worse than the Tomahawks initially. The old Blenheim etc. bombers were very vulnerable too. Somebody, supposedly Clive Caldwell, came up with the idea of putting bombs on the fighters. Hurricanes were relegated more and more to fighter bomber missions from this point onward though it was a gradual process. A few (about ten) elite RAF pilots did very well with the Kittyhawks but most struggling to survive. This was the heyday of JG 27

Torch to Tunisia - Summer to fall 1942 In late Summer 1942 British air operations began to improve and their stance stiffened. They started bringing in the first Spitfire Mk V's (three squadrons in 244 Wing by Oct 1942) and adopted much better fighter tactics such as flying pairs. Four of their Kittyhawk squadrons 112 RAF, 250 RAF, 260 RAF, and 3 RAAF emerged (unofficially) as their more elite units, with several pilots becoming famous aces at this time.Then the Americans arrived with the Torch landings in November, starting with a short but very spirited (and quite bloody) battle between the F4F and SBD's of the US Navy and the D.520s and MS 406s of the Vichy French Air force in Morocco which from Shores records looks about even, US losing about 50 Navy planes in air to air combat. Once the French surrendered the Americans were brought into Tunisia with P-40Fs flying in from the USS Wasp. First US fighter group was the 33rd Fighter group which shot down a lot of German planes by attacking them over their own airfields (but also took a lot of casualties). Germans countered aggressively and fighting got very intense. The Italians sent in several more squadrons of MC 202s to bolster their forces, though morale was declining by this time.

Anglo-American escalation - Spring 1943 As fighting shifted to the German airfields, the Americans sent in P-38Fs of the 14th Fighter Group (which got chewed up pretty bad) and 82nd Fighter Group (which did a bit better) to the mix, and two more US groups equipped with P-40F/L, the 57th, and 79th FG's. The Americans also brought in more B-25s and some large B-24s to the mix - the latter proving to be particularly good at smashing up Axis airfields. The British brought in an elite Polish led, internationally piloted Spitfire squadron (145 Squadron "Polish Fighting Team") flying Spitfires. The new tactics and new planes caused problems for the Luftwaffe. With heavy losses including several of their experten, JG 27 was pulled out of North Africa for a rest. The Germans sent in JG 77 and elements of JG 53 with newer Bf 109G-2, G-4 and G-6 fighters. The Germans also sent in squadron of Fw 190A-4s (III./ 9/ 10/ and 11/ SkG 10 and II./JG-2, 6./JG 2 and 4./JG 2) which on one occasion (Feb 2 1943) bounced and slaughtered some P-40Fs of the 33rd FG, leading them to be pulled out for a brief rest. The Italians started sending in some more of their elite new MC 205 fighters.

Crossing the Med and Italy The Germans were pushed out of North Africa, an entirely air campaign broke Pantelleria and Lampedusa, then engaged in hard fighting in Sardania and Sicily. The Americans brought in two more P-40 Fighter groups for a total of 5: the 33rd, 57th, 79th, 324th and 325th. The 57th and 325th in particular had very good records. By this time Italy was on the verge of collapse and the Axis in general was badly weakened in the area. Fighting died down with the Invasion of Italy and then by the time of Anzio the Germans came back pretty strong with Bf 109G and Fw 190s in particular - the latter doubling as fighter bombers. There were multiple P-38 squadrons, P-40F/L squadrons, and American Spitfire Mk Vs. The British started sending in the first of their excellent Spitfire Mk IXs. The last major air to air combat for P-40s took place at this time with P-40 units scoring pretty well against Fw 190s. A-36 Apaches (Allison engined P-51s) were in pretty heavy use as fighter bombers. After Anzio both P-40s and Hurricanes were basically relegated to Fighter Bomber missions as P-40 units started converting to P-47s, with some British squadrons converting to Mustang III and IV. A few Hurricane and Kittyhawk squadrons soldiered on as fighter bombers...



Here is Roald Dahls personal account of the raid against the Vichy Airfield copied from this article who excerpted it from his autobiography Going Solo. It's hard to find a more fantastic wartime story than this:

They had American Glenn Martins [B-10s] and French Dewoitines and Potez 63s, and we shot some of them down and they killed four of our nine pilots …

Once we went out to ground-strafe some Vichy French planes on an airfield near Rayak and as we swept in surprise low over the field at midday we saw to our astonishment a bunch of girls in brightly-colored cotton dresses standing out by the planes with glasses in their hands having drinks with the French pilots, and I remember seeing bottles of wine standing on the wing of one of the planes as we went swooshing over.

It was Sunday morning and the Frenchmen were evidently entertaining their girlfriends and showing off their aircraft to them, which was a very French thing to do in the middle of a war at a front-line aerodrome. Every one of us held our fire on that first pass over the flying field and it was wonderfully comical to see the girls all dropping their wine glasses and galloping in their high heels for the door of the nearest building.

We went round again, but this time we were no longer a surprise and they were ready for us with their ground defenses, and I am afraid that our chivalry resulted in damage to several of our Hurricanes, including my own. But we destroyed five of their planes on the ground."
 
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It did well in the early years and wasn't a bad aircraft, but its big advantage was its ease of production. If enough Merlin engines could have been produced and it was available everywhere the LW was operating in an earlier war then it could have made a decisive difference (just a private "what if")
 

i would pick the hurricane,just because of its armament and survivability
 
VonAlex said:
i would pick the hurricane,just because of its armament and survivability
Click to expand...
If only the Canadians had picked the P-40 for production instead of the Hurricane, but powered it with the Rolls-Royce Merlin III. Okay, it wouldn't have been available until after the BoB, but instead of Tomahawks being only suitable for army co-operation in Europe, we would have had a fighter with a better range better suited to escorting our bombers on daylight attacks. The Canadians probably knew about 'War Plan Red', so they didn't. They built the trusty old Hurricane instead.
 
You might want to rethink that one. The Merlin III wasn't magic.
A P-40B with four wing guns and basic armor and basic self sealing tanks (not as good as the P-40C and later) weighed almost as much empty equipped (guns etc.) but without fuel oil ammo and pilot as a Spit I did ready for take-off.
The early Allison engine was also good for 1040hp at 14,300ft. The Merlin III was good for 1030hp at 16,200ft.

Fitting Merlin IIIs was not going to turn the early P-40 into an escort fighter or change it's altitude capabilities very much. The P-40s extra 1000-1200lbs of weight is just too much for either engine.
 
The Merlin III of 1940 had 1320 hp with 12 lbs boost, by 1941 16 lbs boost and 1440 hp. Max speed of Tomahawk would have been at same altitude as Spitfire and Hurricane. So its heavier, it can dive faster and has a longer range, so not as good as an interceptor, but much better when used in the 1941 France Air Offensive. More suited.
 
Yeah I tend to agree to a limited extent - certainly Merlin XX powered P-40F and L variants were doing just fine as escorts in 1942 and 1943.

And Tomahawks (P-40B and C) actually performed better in terms of climb and acceleration than the early Kittyhawks, (at least until they started overboosting the engines on the Kittyhawks and that probably didn't start until mid 1942). One problem though which was evident in the Med was what bombers to escort? Blenheims lumbering along at 100 mph left escorting fighters pretty vulnerable. And even with escorts, a bomber needed to be able to defend itself.

Shortround certainly knows more than I do about the differences from the III and the XX , but even with the Allison engine Tomahawks made a difference in Russia and the Middle East, and certainly did better in combat than Hurricanes. It is hard to imagine how raising their altitude ceiling and performance substantially would not have helped.

Without a doubt, (merlin engined) P-40F/L fighters were effective escorts. They shot down hundreds of Bf 109s in the Middle East and in the escort role enabled thousands of sorties by B-25s and A-20s to drop bombs of Axis airfields and survive the trip there and back without heavy casualties. They would have made more Merlin engined Warhawks if the engines had been available. They were more combat useful than P-40M or Ns for that Theater and I think they were better as medium bomber escorts than early P-38s (though that is debatable).

I do also think had large fleets of Hurricanes been available to Poland and France in 1940 WW2 may have never become the conflagration it did. But that is another big can of worms. In 1940 the Hurricane was definitely competitive with the early Bf 109s.

Of course those speculative type questions are tricky and rather too open-ended. They seldom really tell us much.

S
 
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Merlin III was single speed.

Merlin XX was 2 speed.

The P-40B didn't get into production until 1941.

Probably looking at Merlin XXs or a Merlin 45. At least for the first 6 months the engine supply would had to have been British, as Packard came up to speed.
 
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