Saburo Sakai Zero vs Bf-109

[Soren]

German pilots were much superior to Jap ones ! The cream of Jap pilots was lost in Midway.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

actually at the start of the war the japs had some of the est pilots that came out of one of the best training rageim in the world, but you're right, most were lost at midway, but that's not to say they were worse than the germans...........

 

[Soren]

actually at the start of the war the japs had some of the est pilots that came out of one of the best training rageim in the world, but you're right, most were lost at midway, but that's not to say they were worse than the germans...........

Just look at the loss records and you'll realize how big the difference really was.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

you're basing your claims on loss records??

 

[Soren]

you're basing your claims on loss records??

Lancaster, the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost. The Training the Jap's got was also inferior, as it relied almost purely on slow T&B Dogfighting, and not on team effort. The U.S. pilots beat the Jap's with team effort almost everytime they met, and hadn't it been for these team-tactics, then almost all the F4F's who fought the Zeke's in 41-42 would have been easely shot down. (But they werent)

 

[Anonymous]

you're basing your claims on loss records??

Lancaster, the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost. The Training the Jap's got was also inferior, as it relied almost purely on slow T&B Dogfighting, and not on team effort. The U.S. pilots beat the Jap's with team effort almost everytime they met, and hadn't it been for these team-tactics, then almost all the F4F's who fought the Zeke's in 41-42 would have been easely shot down. (But they werent)

Again, while that is true for the IJN, it is not true for the IJA. The IJA lost no pilots at Midway! It took longer for the US pilots to wear them down. There were still IJA units staffed with vetran pilots right up to the end of the war.

 

[Soren]

you're basing your claims on loss records??

Lancaster, the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost. The Training the Jap's got was also inferior, as it relied almost purely on slow T&B Dogfighting, and not on team effort. The U.S. pilots beat the Jap's with team effort almost everytime they met, and hadn't it been for these team-tactics, then almost all the F4F's who fought the Zeke's in 41-42 would have been easely shot down. (But they werent)

Again, while that is true for the IJN, it is not true for the IJA. The IJA lost no pilots at Midway! It took longer for the US pilots to wear them down. There were still IJA units staffed with vetran pilots right up to the end of the war.

That still doesnt change the fact that the were overall poorly trained !

The Jap pilots were great in a one on one Dogfight (Preferably a T&B fight), but severely lacking in team-fights ! And as the U.S were superior in numbers they could always team up on any Jap fighter threat, giving the U.S. full advantage !

 

[R Leonard]

the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost

What's "most"?

How many IJN pilots were at Midway and how many were lost? And what percentage was that?

And how many pilots did the IJN have available, overall, at the start of the war and what percent of the overall were the Midway losses?

Your claim, you supply the numbers.

And when you find them, explain how that's the "most."


Rich

 

[evangilder]

The biggest loss for the Japanese at Midway was the secrets of the Zero that crashed near Dutch harbor in the Aleutians. The Japanese couldn't find the lightly damaged airplane. The Americans, with the help of Alaskan Scouts did find it. This led to the the Americans finding out all of the weaknesses of the Zero and enabled them to design the Hellcat to exploit those weaknesses.

 

[Nonskimmer]

Ah, so that was basically the beginning of the Hellcat, eh? Interesting.

 

[Wildcat]

I tried to find exactly how many pilots the Japanese lost at Midway but couldn't (probably wasn't looking hard enough!) Instead I found an excellent article which believes the loss of the ground crews and mechanics was more devastating than the losses sustained by the pilots.
Article can be found at -
http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/mil/html/ml_034100_midwaybattle.htm

The Japanese carriers were caught while refueling and rearming their planes, making them especially vulnerable. The Americans sank four fleet carriers—the entire strength of the task force—Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Hiryu, with 322 aircraft and over five thousand sailors. The Japanese also lost the heavy cruiser Mikuma. American losses included 147 aircraft and more than three hundred seamen.

Analysts often point to Japanese aircraft losses at Midway as eliminating the power of the Imperial Navy's air arm, but in fact about two-thirds of air crews survived. More devastating was the loss of trained mechanics and aircraft ground crews who went down with the ships.

 

[R Leonard]

Ummm, not to contradict a perfectly good urban myth, but the Alaska Scouts had nothing to do with finding Koga's A6M. And neither reports from action to date, nor Koga's Zero, nor any other Japanese fighter, had anything whatsoever to do with the development of the F6F.

Rich

 

[Nonskimmer]

That's it Rich, bust my bubble why don't you.

It sounded so good.

 

[evangilder]

That contradicts what I have read about the F6F development. It was obviously a follow-on design to the F4F using lessons learned from the wildcat. But I have heard from many sources that finding the Zero and determining it's weaknesses was part of the development of the hellcat.

Regardless of how it was found, with or without Alaskan scouts, the fact remains that the Japanese could not find it before the Americans did. And because of that, the vulnerabilities were able to be discovered that would not have otherwise been known for awhile.

 

[Anonymous]

you're basing your claims on loss records??

Lancaster, the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost. The Training the Jap's got was also inferior, as it relied almost purely on slow T&B Dogfighting, and not on team effort. The U.S. pilots beat the Jap's with team effort almost everytime they met, and hadn't it been for these team-tactics, then almost all the F4F's who fought the Zeke's in 41-42 would have been easely shot down. (But they werent)

Again, while that is true for the IJN, it is not true for the IJA. The IJA lost no pilots at Midway! It took longer for the US pilots to wear them down. There were still IJA units staffed with vetran pilots right up to the end of the war.

That still doesnt change the fact that the were overall poorly trained !

The Jap pilots were great in a one on one Dogfight (Preferably a T&B fight), but severely lacking in team-fights ! And as the U.S were superior in numbers they could always team up on any Jap fighter threat, giving the U.S. full advantage !

Again you need to study a little more. IJA pilots used "team tactics". Units which upgraded to the Ki-44 "Tojo" had forsworn the "turn fighter" tactics in favor of energy tactics, since the Ki-44 was a poor turning plane. Part and parcel to this was the use of "team tactics". These are the units later recieved the Ki-84's.

And against the IJA the US rarely had significant numeric advantage. Early in the war the IJA had the numeric advantage, and later in the war only the longest rang USAAF fighters could reach the IJA fighters over Korea and Japan, which tended to result in combat at more even numbers.

=S=

Lunatic

 

[Anonymous]

Ummm, not to contradict a perfectly good urban myth, but the Alaska Scouts had nothing to do with finding Koga's A6M. And neither reports from action to date, nor Koga's Zero, nor any other Japanese fighter, had anything whatsoever to do with the development of the F6F.

Rich

This is contrary to what I've read. Specifically, I've read that the speed and especially turn evelopes of the F6F were bumped up about 25-30 mph in response to tests done on the two captured Zero's, the Koga plane and I think one captured by the Aussies(??).

Tests on the Koga plane were done in San Diego and they have (or used to have) a real nice presentation on how the plane was tested and data was forwarded to Grumman engineers. Upon discovery of the fact that the Zero's manuver performance litterally died above about 250 IAS it was determined that if the Hellcat could maintain at least 275 IAS through combat manuvers it would be nearly invulnerable to the Zero.

=S=

Lunatic

 

[Anonymous]

the Jap's had great pilots up until Midway, where most were lost

What's "most"?

How many IJN pilots were at Midway and how many were lost? And what percentage was that?

And how many pilots did the IJN have available, overall, at the start of the war and what percent of the overall were the Midway losses?

Your claim, you supply the numbers.

And when you find them, explain how that's the "most."


Rich

The Japanese lost 332 of their finest aircraft and more than 200 of their most experienced pilots.
http://www.cr.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/90midway/90facts2.htm

The Japanese lost 256 of their finest aircraft, and more than 200 of their most experienced pilots and several thousand sailors perished.
http://midway.fws.gov/past/ww2.html

Carrier pilot losses were much more costly for the Japanese than for the Americans. They had fewer carrier pilots, and it took longer to train replacements. Japan had begun the war with only about four hundred experienced, first-line carrier pilots.
http://www.nwc.navy.mil/press/Review/2000/summer/art3-Su0.htm

...
the JNAF loses one tenth of its best pilots in the battle of Midway.
http://www.flyandrive.com/sakai02.htm

So it appears that the IJN lost about half its vetran 400 carrier pilots at Midway, and that these made up about one tenth of all IJN vetrans, implying about 2000 vetran IJN pilots at the start of the war, some 1600 of which were ground based pilots (twin engine bombers and fighter support?).

Another 60-75 IJN pilots had been lost at the Battle of the Coral Sea.

=S=

Lunatic

 

[R Leonard]

This is contrary to what I've read. Specifically, I've read that the speed and especially turn evelopes of the F6F were bumped up about 25-30 mph in response to tests done on the two captured Zero's, the Koga plane and I think one captured by the Aussies(??).

Tests on the Koga plane were done in San Diego and they have (or used to have) a real nice presentation on how the plane was tested and data was forwarded to Grumman engineers. Upon discovery of the fact that the Zero's manuver performance litterally died above about 250 IAS it was determined that if the Hellcat could maintain at least 275 IAS through combat manuvers it would be nearly invulnerable to the Zero.

The Zero that crashed on Akutan Island was #4593, built in February 1942. Its crash site was discovered by the crew of a PBY, piloted by Lieut. William Theis, on July 10, 1942, while on routine patrol.

The association of the development of the Grumman F6F-3 with the restoration of #4593 A6M2 is one of the great urban legends of WWII. Nothing of the kind happened. Other then the fact that the Navy knew the F4F was just holding its own against the A6M2 and needed replacement with something better, the A6M2 had absolutely nothing to do with the development of the F6F and, specifically the "Koga" or "Aleutian" Zero had nothing to do with its development.

The only USN/USMC fighter combat experience at with the A6M at the time that Koga's plane was being recovered, and at the time the XF6F was being first flown, occurred with the VF squadrons that fought at Coral Sea, VF-2 and VF-42, and the VF squadrons at Midway, VF-3 (and 59% of the combat flying pilots in VF-3 were from VF-42), VF-6 and VF-8. By the time the F6F-1 was ready to take to the air, the after action reports from these actions had yet to be distributed. Further, having read those reports, I can safely say that there is not much in them at all that could possibly be of interest to a Grumman designer, especially since the F6F-1 was already built.

The "Aleutian Zero" was # 4593, recovered, loaded aboard the USS St Mihiel, then shipped to, and restored by US Navy personnel at North Island NAS, San Diego, California. Grumman had absolutely nothing to do with the restoration. In fact, the Grumman plant was located at Bethpage, New York. The airplane arrived in San Diego from Alaska on August 12, 1942. It first flew with a US pilot (Lt Cdr Eddie Sanders) on 20 September 1942. My father's log book show that he flew this same airplane on 14 September 1944, 19 September, 14 October, 21 October, and 25 October 1944. It was destroyed in a taxiway accident in February 1945. My father salvaged the port wingtip and some instruments all of which he donated to the USN Museum at the Washington Navy Yard in the mid-1980's.

The US Navy asked Grumman to start the design of the F6F in June 1941 as a hedge against problems with the development of the Chance-Vought F4U which was scheduled to replace the Grumman F4F series. Grumman was already out of the starting blocks on this having begun studies on a concept for an improved F4F in early 1938; by 1940 the concept had received a company designation of G-50. The Navy's order of 30 June 1941 was for two of the G-50 models, now designated as the XF6F-1 and the XF6F-2. As things turned out having Grumman design its own replacement for the F4F was a good idea as there were development and deployment problems with the F4U.

The Grumman XF6F-1 first flew almost a year later, on 26 June 1942, (20 days after the Battle of Midway and 7 days after VF-3, VF-6, and VF-8 arrived back at Pearl Harbor), with a Wright R-2600 engine. Even at that time, it was already obvious that the 1600 hp R-2600, in either its R-2600-10 version in the XF6F-1 or its R-2600-16 version in theXF6F-2, was not going to provide the speed desired for the airplane. The solution, which Grumman had already identified, was a switch to the 2000 hp Pratt Whitney R-2800 engine. The XF6F-1 flight with the R-2600-10 was essentially a test to verify what Grumman and the Navy already suspected - the need for more power. The XF6F-3, the re-designated XF6F-1 now mounting the R-2800 engine, first flew on 30 July 1942. This was 20 days before the Koga Zero arrived in San Diego and almost two months before A6M2 #4593 got into the air over North Island. The F6F-3 was version of the Hellcat that first entered combat and of which some 4403 were produced. The Navy, with remarkable prescience, placed its first order for the F6F-3 on 23 May 1942, before any version ever got in the air (and a scant two weeks after USN fighter pilots had encountered the A6M2 for the first time at the Battle of the Coral Sea).

The F6F was developed independent of the restoration of the A6M2 # 4593 and most, if not all of the basic design work accomplished long before the USN VF squadrons first ran into the A6M2 at the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942.


Rich

 

[evangilder]

Rich, I appreciate your thorough response, although respectfully, I have seen it in several sources that while the F6F-1 was already designed before the war began, lessons learned from the Koga Zero did help in the decision to put the P&W engine in the -3. I do not remember which book I read that in, but I have seen this on the web:

Although the F6F had been on the drawing boards at Grumman, even before Pearl Harbor, the advent of the war gave great impetus to the development of the replacement for the Wildcat. From the start it was a much bigger airplane. Leroy Grumman, and his two top engineers, Leon Swirbul and Bill Schwendler, laid out a plane with higher performance, more fuel ammunition, and huge wings. The wings extended over 334 square feet; the average was less than 250 sq. ft.. The wings folded back and pivoted ingeniously, so that they folded up next to and alongside the fuselage.
The first prototype, the XF6F-1, was under development when the war started. Based on combat experience against the Zero and the intact A6M captured in the Aleutians, it was clear that speed and better climb would be needed from the Hellcat. Test pilot Robert L. Hall first flew the XF6F-1 in late June, 1942. Powered by a Wright Cyclone R-2600-16 engine (1,600 horsepower), the aircraft didn't have the needed performance. Grumman proposed the Pratt Whitney 2800 Double Wasp (2,000 horspower). Equipped with the P&W 2800, the original prototype airframe became the XF6F-3. A month later, Bob Hall flew the new configuration. Despite a crash of the XF6F-3 in August, the Navy placed an order.
http://www.acepilots.com/planes/f6f_hellcat.html


There are others as well, possibly looking at the same source. Obviously, we have conflicting sources. Either way, for the Japanese to lose their premier fighter to the enemy was a big loss for them. Masatake Okumiya, author of the classic book ZERO, claimed that the loss of Koga's Zero was no less serious than the Japanese defeat at Midway.

 

[R Leonard]

Responding to various comments on IJN aviator losses at Midway -

While some like to believe that the cream of the IJN carrier aviators were wiped out at Midway, that is not exactly true. The loss of the four carriers in this battle meant that, no matter what, all of their aircraft were lost. So, probably about 256 planes were lost. This does not equate to the loss of 256 pilots; rather, the Japanese only lost somewhat less than 100 pilots and aircrewmen in the battle (best estimate is between 94 and 100), most of whom met their ends aboard sinking carriers as opposed to air combat operations. Where the curve of the loss of experienced pilots started to drop off the chart was in the Solomons where both land based pilots and, thrown in as reinforcements, carrier pilot losses, went beyond the IJN's training programs ability to replace them with a quality product. The short hiatus from the Solomons campaigns to the Mariana's allowed the IJN some training and preparation respite, but it really was never enough to build air groups of the pre-war caliber. A substantial majority of these newly trained pilots, along with many of the residual experienced leaders, were lost in the Battle of the Philippines Sea. Essentially, this action eliminated the second generation of IJN carrier pilots and was a blow from which the IJN never recovered.

On the subject of Japanese losses I suggest John Lundstrom's "The First Team - Naval Air Warfare from Pearl Harbor to Midway" or Robert Cressman, Steve Ewing, et. al. "A Glorious Page in Our History" both considered to be definitive works on Midway. Recommended reading at the Midway Roundtable (www.midway42.org).

The Japanese Navy had, as near as I can figure, some 3500 "front line" pilots of whom about one half were carrier current, that is, assignable to carrier squadrons. These numbers pretty much correlate with those of the USN/USMC. Just looking at active 1941 USN squadrons yields a similar number of available aviators. As far as Japanese carrier qualified pilots are concerned, that is a more difficult number ascertain from the sources I have available. USN carrier squadrons, at the end of 1941 only mustered about 580 flying slots in 38 squadrons. Land-based USMC VMF and VMSB squadrons probably accounted for another 200-250 readily available carrier qualified pilots. Certainly this was not the total pool of available carrier qualified USN/USMC pilots as it does not take into account carrier qualified pilots assigned to such mundane activities as training and staff positions, as well as land based squadrons. The same would be true of the IJN, there were undoubtedly many carrier qualified pilots not actually assigned to a carrier squadron and so operating.

Additionally, it was USN practice to move pilots from "community" to "community," e.g. from dive bombers to fighters. Famed fighter pilot Jimmy Thach, for example spent two or three tours in patrol planes, five to six years, if not more. My father got his wings in November 1941 and went to USS Ranger in a scout-bomber squadron, VS-41. In March 1941 the entire squadron was changed to a fighter squadron and it became VF-42. All USN pilots, prewar were carrier qualified at some point regardless of the community to which they were eventually assigned.

In preparing for the war, the IJN brought it's operational aircraft up to a level of about 1800 aircraft, with about 1200 of them shore based and 600 ship based (aircraft carriers and battleship and cruiser scouts). If there were indeed only 1500 carrier qualified IJN pilots, then, obviously they had twice as many pilots as carrier pilot slots. And if they lost about 100 pilots and crewmen, figure, generously, *75* actual pilots, the rest being obsevers and rear gunners, that means 75 pilots out of about 1500 available . . . about 5%.

As near as I can put together, during the course of the war the IJN trained some 24,000 pilots of all stripes. Roughly 18,900 of them, and their pre-war compatriots, were killed, either in action, training, or operationally. Over 2500 of these were killed in suicide attacks.

If you look at USN pilot training, in the years 1925 through 1941 (very few aviators from classes prior to 1925 were still in flying billets by 1941) 7,061 pilots had completed the program. Of these, 44 percent, 3,112 completed the program just in 1941. Those most likely to endure the most of the fighting were those who completed flight training between 1934 and 1941, some 5,687 pilots. How many of these were carrier qualified? All of them at some point as was USN training doctrine.

In 1942 USN pilot training programs started to ramp up; 10,869 aviators received their wings of gold, almost twice as many as had completed the program in the previous 8 years. In 1943 there were 20,842 graduates; 1944, 21,067; and, with then end of the war in sight, 1945 ended with 8,880 graduates. Thus in the period 1942 to 1945, the USN produced more than 2.5 times the number of pilots as the IJN. And each of those USN pilots went through a program of primary, intermediate, advanced, and, for the carrier pilots combat preparation in RAGs before heading west. New pilots were arriving for action in USN carrier squadrons with as many as 600 hours flying under their belts and as much as 200 hours of that in type.

This was a level of training and preparation with which the IJN could never dream of competing. The IJN training programs suffered from an insufficient number of qualified instructors, lack of fuel for extensive flying time, poor maintenance of training aircraft, and shortages of ordnance. There two most critically lacking areas were a continued adherence to traditional adversarial nature of their programs (for every one graduate, there were nine others who did not) and, of course, time. There was never enough time to develop the students' skills, to practice attack tactics or defensive actions. Most of them arrived in combat squadrons with less than 200 hours in all, by the very end of the war, less than 100 hours. Most had to learn combat skills on the job once assigned to a combat squadron. By then, it is too late and few survived.

Rich