Spitfire V ME109. I have found these links on the net.

[Tante Ju]

****... worked 3/4 hours to gather range.. lost it.

But I get 422 km or 262 miles radius for 109F-4 with above conditions. Cruise out - more. Say 500+ km. Can't recall. In back route, when fuel is less (used in combat). This is distance it can get back from, after going there, burning lots of fuel in combat (5+20min) and has reserve for 20 min mimum cruise too.


By crusing at 510 kph at 7000 meter and a droptank. With exact conditions shortround pointed out.

Conditions.

400 liter internal, 300 liter in drop tank.

1 - 30 min rating. 372 liter / hour.
2 - same.
3,6. middle cruising. 510 km/h. 210 liters/hour. see http://www.beim-zeugmeister.de/zeugmeister/index.php?id=22&L=0/
5, 5 minutes 445 liter/h (this is F-4 max. or WEP, 600+ liters is wrong,, correct for 109K), 20 minutes 372 lit/hour (this is F-4)
0-min)
7, 20 minutes minimum cruise. 130 lit/hour at 410 km/h. Actually I believe even less possible. see. http://www.beim-zeugmeister.de/zeugmeister/index.php?id=22&L=0/

I only counted cruise in and out, no distance in climb, or during combat power.

Actually, quick re-do. I only need to know what remains after combat, after drop tank jettison.

109F arrives interception point, drops tank, has 400 liter internal.
5 mins at 110% - 1350 HP. 445 lit/h. -37 liter
20 mins at 100% - 1200 HP. 372 lit/h. -124 liter
30 min minimum cruise reserve - 0.65 ata / 1500 rpm. 130 liter/h. 410 km/h. - 65 liter.

37 + 124 + 65 = 226 liter. Leaves 174 liter in tank. For cruise! Note we have still reserves, already calculated in.. 65 liter. Enough for 1/2 hour very economic cruise - + 200 km range. for safety. This is margin of error, manouvers in formation etc.
Cruise back at 510 km/h, 210 liter/h = 0.82 hour cruise = 422 km or 262 miles. This is radius 109F by US standard. also G - very similiar.
Note: if max. range cruise allowed, plane can still get back to base at 410 kh / 130 lit/h.

109K may be bit less. Actually, easy to calculate.
***5 mins at 110% - 2000 HP. 650 lit/h. -54 liter*** revise!!! this is SL consumption. 109K at 7500 m do not produce 2000 HP, so do not consume 2000 HP fuel, either.. possible up to 5 km, so this is low altitude consumption, inappropriate at 75 km..
5 mins at 110% - 1550 HP (6,8 km) or less. 525 lit/h. - 43 liter
20 mins at 100% - 1285 HP at 6.8km . 425 lit/h. -141 liter
30 min minimum cruise reserve - 0.65 ata / 1500 rpm. 130 liter/h. 410 km/h. - 65 liter. I take this same as 109F/601E.
Revised. 43 + 141 + 65 = 249 liter. Leaves 141 liter in tank. For cruise! Note we have still reserves, already calculated in.. 65 liter. Enough for 1/2 hour very economic cruise - + 200 km range. for safety. This is margin of error, manouvers in formation etc.
Cruise back at 510 km/h, 210 liter/h = 0.67 hour cruise = 342 km or 212 miles. This is radius 109K by US standard (apprx. Assumes cruise is same as 109F. This is likely assumption. High speed range - given as same by German datasheet for F, G and K. So things even out..)
Note: if max. range cruise allowed, plane can still get back to base at 410 kh / 130 lit/h. In this case it can cover 442 km. But this is not compatible with above us standard, still, a possibility.

However, if rear tank in use 109K (+115 liter), it still has 256 liters in tank. Enough for 1,21 h / 621 km (386 miles) at 316mph/510 km/h, OR 2 h/ 807 km/501 miles at slower most economic cruise 410 km/h.

Cruise out and climb, takeoff, all consumed from droptank.

Translate into real world for demonstration.

109F in Calais can operate in this conditions up to Leeds or Liverpool by US stanadard.
109K in Calais can operate in this conditions up to bit beyond Birmingham by US stanadard.

In defence,

Frankfurt is in mid-west Germany.
109F in Frankfurst base can just cover out to the Channel in Holland, North Sea shore of Germany Berlin, Prague, Bremen, Hamburg, Amsterdam, and Paris, and out to the Italian border.
109K in Frankfurst base can just cover Bremen, Leipzig, München, Brussel etc.
This by returning to same base it took off from. But realistically - there were dozens of other bases on route to land..

So I do not agree 109F-K range was insufficient for task. You wrote: "A Mustang using just the 184 gallon wing tanks was rated at 150miles. With rear fuselage tank it was 325miles." 109F 262 miles, 109K 212 miles. Compares well for its task. Of course this with droptank - but 109 almost always carried it.

 

[ctrian]

Were the allied ground attack planes decisive or not? Were they good at their role ? Did they pay off the investment made in them? Were they more survivable than slow Stuka when faced with german AA?

There was no ''Western doctrine '' for ground support.There was however a battle to the death between RAF and USAAF vs their other services for money and influence.They won and they had their own private ''Strategic''TM war.Of course that meant no specialized aircraft for army support.

In relation to the first point, german accounts appear to think so. There wer after action reports that know of, and have seen in relation to allied air operations in North Africa and Normandy. Both were pretty unequivocal about the decisive effect of allied airpower on both occasions. Airpower in Italy was generally less effective, it being generally acknowledged that the terrain lessened its effects considerably.

As to cost effectiveness, I am not sure. The allies seemed to think so. If they had not spent their money on ground attack aircraft what would they spend it on. For Normandy, for example, I think ther were about 4000 aircraft amployed on Ground support operations (thats a guess really, so it might be more, it might be less), Each aircraft needed about 50 men to keep it in the air, that would release about 200000 men for duties elsewhere. So were these men as well employed in the ground support efforts??? My opinion is yes. At staff college we were trained to 5
view air support as a force multiplier. The air power was only responsible for about 5% of enemy casualtiesm, but the application of airpower could lift the effects of an attacking force by as much 50%. If the FPF factor of an Infanfantry battalion was assessed as say 6 without airpower, with airpower it rose to about 9.

The main effect of the airpower, wasnt that it killed so much, more that it acted to interdict the enemy. Suprresive fire, that kind of thing. Ihibit manouvre in particular. Moreover the text that we were given had predecesors that extended all the way back to WWII. In the earlier part of WWII, you have a point about doctrine, but from about 1942 the allies began to develop their doctrine. in this regard your assertion isnt correct. They did have a doctrne. i know this because I was trained using a derived version of that doctrine.

I dont agree that there was no specialized aircraft for support. Certainly the Allied air forces wer more versatile and wide ranging in capability compared to the germans, and certainly they used aircraft that were adapte from other roles...aircraft like the A-20, the Hurricane, Typhoon and mosquito. But these aircraft once selected for ground support were modified in different ways to undertake that mission. Some were more successful than other.

Saying there was a battle to the death between the allied armed services is an overstatement. The allied command structure was always one where there were disagreements, but decisions were always reached about courses of action. By comparison, the divisions between the armed services in the German army were monumental, and never fully resolved. A classic example of that has to be the employment of the Luftwaffe Field Divisions. They were deployed over protests of the Army, and were decimeted as predicted. Even greater divisions existed between the SS and the Army, and the navy, well the navy.....

Yep that's why Bomber Command wasted aircraft over Germany while Coastal Command begged for a few long range planes.

 

[stona]

There is an advantage to centreline armament. There is no convergence set into the armament. Many P-38 pilots claimed to have had success taking shots at extreme ranges with their armament than would have been possible had the rounds converged and started to diverge again.
Other fans of centreline armament include many Luftwaffe aces ( I remember comments by Rall for example) and,from the wrong end of the weapons, Douglas Bader,to mention a few. Were the men who were there wrong?
Steve

 

[parsifal]

Yep that's why Bomber Command wasted aircraft over Germany while Coastal Command begged for a few long range planes.

Can you explain to me how that relates to your 1st post? Apart from the obvious that the RAF was wedded to the strategic bombing offensive I guess. You did mention that, but from my perspective your point seemed to be that the allies had no effective ground support arm, and no doctrine. how does not giving aircraft to Coastal Command relate to those issues.

And just to clarify, Bomber Command did eventually give aircraft to CC, after about a three month delay in 1942. this was the VLF debate, it was eventually worked out, though i admit not without loss. But as an example of poor interservice/command co-operation it pales against the Luftwaffes treatment of OKM in its quest to establish a separate naval air arm, dont you think? Relations were so bad there that the navy abandoned construction of its carrier, in large part because they couldnt get aircraft for them on anything like sensible terms.

You will always find command rivalries, thats not a uniquiely allied issue. But that wasnt your main point either, it was more about ground support and doctrine in myopinion

 

[ctrian]

Can you explain to me how that relates to your 1st post? Apart from the obvious that the RAF was wedded to the strategic bombing offensive I guess. You did mention that, but from my perspective your point seemed to be that the allies had no effective ground support arm, and no doctrine. how does not giving aircraft to Coastal Command relate to those issues.

And just to clarify, Bomber Command did eventually give aircraft to CC, after about a three month delay in 1942. this was the VLF debate, it was eventually worked out, though i admit not without loss. But as an example of poor interservice/command co-operation it pales against the Luftwaffes treatment of OKM in its quest to establish a separate naval air arm, dont you think? Relations were so bad there that the navy abandoned construction of its carrier, in large part because they couldnt get aircraft for them on anything like sensible terms.

You will always find command rivalries, thats not a uniquiely allied issue. But that wasnt your main point either, it was more about ground support and doctrine in myopinion

You said ''The allied command structure was always one where there were disagreements, but decisions were always reached about courses of action.'' .This little disagreement needlessly cost them high losses in the most important theater (for Britain ) .As for ground attack both RAF and USAAF had to improvise during the war.

 

[Mustang nut]

Yep that's why Bomber Command wasted aircraft over Germany while Coastal Command begged for a few long range planes.

The objection to providing long range planes to coastal command was that on average it took 7000 flying hours to destroy one submarine and also involved losses which were hard to justify. Without centimetric radar a submarine is a pin in a haystack.

You said ''The allied command structure was always one where there were disagreements, but decisions were always reached about courses of action.'' .This little disagreement needlessly cost them high losses in the most important theater (for Britain ) .As for ground attack both RAF and USAAF had to improvise during the war.

I dont think any command structure in history has never made a huge foul up, the allied command certainly made a few but not as many as the opposition in my opinion.

 

[Readie]

Right ladies, I've pretty much seen enough. So un-twist your knickers and put the handbags away before I bring my hammer to the party.

People have differing opinions and some are obviously going to be different to yours and some of course will be so absurd as to be unbelievable and the full range have been shown in this thread and varying points. So I don't feel the need to express mine.

Either you share the sandpit like nice young children or the sandpit is taking away, rather simple isn't it...

Every 'sand pit' has a few grains of truth in it Gnomey . Sometimes we have to dig and throw the sand about a bit to find them all

I have left, for the moment, as I have got sand in my eyes

Cheers
John

 

[ctrian]

The objection to providing long range planes to coastal command was that on average it took 7000 flying hours to destroy one submarine and also involved losses which were hard to justify. Without centimetric radar a submarine is a pin in a haystack.

You said ''The allied command structure was always one where there were disagreements, but decisions were always reached about courses of action.'' .This little disagreement needlessly cost them high losses in the most important theater (for Britain ) .As for ground attack both RAF and USAAF had to improvise during the war.

I dont think any command structure in history has never made a huge foul up, the allied command certainly made a few but not as many as the opposition in my opinion.

It depends on the meaning of ''foul up'' had they been mildly competent the war would be over much sooner(hint read ''Brute Force'' by John Ellis).The different services run their own war and barely cooperated with each other.This was true for all combatants.In the case of the allied airforces they simply took the lion's share of resources and invested in Strategic bombing without getting their money's worth.Other services suffered because of that especially the ground troops.

 

[Juha]

Hello Ctrian

How does that connect to your previous post? .

of course it was the answer to your comment "It's the most complete study and air attacks are mentioned as a nuisance not decisive.Artillery was decisive in that battle."
We have no argument on that, especially because of the timing of the Ardennes Offensive, extensive period of bad weather on winter time, which in itself means less daytime. And attack area heavily wooded. All these factors lessen the effect of WWII airpower.
As I wrote, even during mid-summer 44, when there is hardly any nighttime here up north, Finns thought that massive Soviet artillery fire (200 guns, biggest were 12" (305mm) coastal artillery guns, per attack kilometer at the beginning of the breakthrough attack, had more effect than those over 1300 Soviet a/c that supported the attack which at the beginning hit 10km sector of Finnish main defensive line. But as I have wrote, much depended on terrain.

Quote:" Were the allied ground attack planes decisive or not?"

Sometimes they were sometimes not, same goes to LW and VVS CAS, much depended on weather and terrain and also the quality of the defensive troops and nature of the defensive system. Much of the effect of the artillery fire or air support was psychological and that effect was smaller against good quality troops than against less motivated troops. But with enough fire superiority one was capable to break through with good probability. At Dompaire P-47s clearly were very effective, all sides agree on that; north of Vire, during Tiger counter-attack (102nd SS sPzAbt IIRC) against the armoured recon battalion (2nd Northamps Yeomanry IIRC) of UK 11th Armoured Div they were not, partly because of hesitation by the FOO, who first weaved between use of Typhoons on cab rank and use of field artillery on call.

Quote:"Were they more survivable than slow Stuka when faced with german AA?"

First of all being faster and after dropping its offensive load being capable to look after itself FB needed less escort resources than Ju 87 or Il-2 in a similar air situation, so at least on that sense it was more effective. Against AA, if we compare losses of Kampfverband Kuhlmey when it operated over Karelian Istmus 16 June – 5 Aug 44, its I./SG 3's total losses were 17 Ju 87Ds, of which 4 in Soviet attack on its base Immola while it flew 1199 sorties and dropped appr. 540tons of bombs, 1./SG's total losses were 8 Fw 190s, of which 2 in Soviet attack on its base Immola, while flying 507 sorties and dropping 232,7 tons of bombs. There was a clear difference in badly dam planes, 11 Ju 87s (3 in Immola) vs 1 Fw 190, which was damaged in Immola. At least almost all air losses were to Soviet AA (all FAF bomber losses over Karelian Isthmus during Summer 44 were to AA)

Quote:"Regarding range why do people think that all airforces wanted the same things from their aircraft ?"

Who thinks that all AFs had same requirements? At least I don't. But you made a rather silly claim, that LW had no need for longer range fighter than 109F-K. Clearly they had, at least in the East for those strategic attacks on Soviet industry and for those convoy attacks in Med and against Arctic convoys. One can always argued relative merits of different requirements and what would have been optimum solution to them but surely Heer which was overwhelmed by massive artillery and tank attacks supported by swarms of Soviet a/c would not mind if LW strategic bombing against Soviet industry would have been more effective. Of course a longer range LW fighter would have meant fewer 109s and it was common thought that good long range air superiority fighter was impossible but for ex. Zero and P-51 showed that could be achieved.

Allied AFs cordoned Normandy battlefield fairly effectively, slowing the arrival of reinforcements and supply items and so had significant effect on the land war and as happened at Dompaire the Allied FB attacks could be very devastating even against Panthers when the tanks were caught in fairly open terrain. It might well be that Ju 87Gs, Hs 129Bs or Il-2s were not at least much more effective in reality, one must remember that pilots' claims are only claims. Hs 129B was IMHO too specialicied, of course as twin engine plane the big gun could be centrally mounted but on the other hand the protection of its engines was not good enough to made it almost totally invulnerable against rifle calibre fire, IMHO if one went to armoured plane the Il-2 solution was better, it was almost totally invulnerable against rifle calibre fire, giving good moral boost to its pilots and having depressive impact on enemy infantry. Of course Hs 129B had its pros but IMHO it was not very cost-effective answer to CAS problem.

Juha

 

[Juha]

Hello Tante Ju

****... However, if rear tank in use 109K (+115 liter), it still has 256 liters in tank. Enough for 1,21 h / 621 km (386 miles) at 316mph/510 km/h, OR 2 h/ 807 km/501 miles at slower most economic cruise 410 km/h....

on the MW 50 tank in 109K, IMHO pilots would not be very enthusiast to fought when it was used as a fuel tank, it was pure light metal tank with no self sealing, so any hits on it might well produce a flaming end to the plane.

Juha

 

[Juha]

Hello Steve
on the other hand some LW aces had high regard on the wing mounted armament, clearly a matter of taste. For ex. Mölders prefer centrally mounted weapons but Galland thought that at least some wing mounted weapons gave a spread which allowed an average pilot to achieve at least some hits. In essence rifle vs shot gun argument.

Juha

 

[ctrian]

Hello Ctrian
of course it was the answer to your comment "It's the most complete study and air attacks are mentioned as a nuisance not decisive.Artillery was decisive in that battle."
We have no argument on that, especially because of the timing of the Ardennes Offensive, extensive period of bad weather on winter time, which in itself means less daytime. And attack area heavily wooded. All these factors lessen the effect of WWII airpower.
As I wrote, even during mid-summer 44, when there is hardly any nighttime here up north, Finns thought that massive Soviet artillery fire (200 guns, biggest were 12" (305mm) coastal artillery guns, per attack kilometer at the beginning of the breakthrough attack, had more effect than those over 1300 Soviet a/c that supported the attack which at the beginning hit 10km sector of Finnish main defensive line. But as I have wrote, much depended on terrain.

Quote:" Were the allied ground attack planes decisive or not?"

Sometimes they were sometimes not, same goes to LW and VVS CAS, much depended on weather and terrain and also the quality of the defensive troops and nature of the defensive system. Much of the effect of the artillery fire or air support was psychological and that effect was smaller against good quality troops than against less motivated troops. But with enough fire superiority one was capable to break through with good probability. At Dompaire P-47s clearly were very effective, all sides agree on that; north of Vire, during Tiger counter-attack (102nd SS sPzAbt IIRC) against the armoured recon battalion (2nd Northamps Yeomanry IIRC) of UK 11th Armoured Div they were not, partly because of hesitation by the FOO, who first weaved between use of Typhoons on cab rank and use of field artillery on call.

Quote:"Were they more survivable than slow Stuka when faced with german AA?"
First of all being faster and after dropping its offensive load being capable to look after itself FB needed less escort resources than Ju 87 or Il-2 in a similar air situation, so at least on that sense it was more effective. Against AA, if we compare losses of Kampfverband Kuhlmey when it operated over Karelian Istmus 16 June – 5 Aug 44, its I./SG 3's total losses were 17 Ju 87Ds, of which 4 in Soviet attack on its base Immola while it flew 1199 sorties and dropped appr. 540tons of bombs, 1./SG's total losses were 8 Fw 190s, of which 2 in Soviet attack on its base Immola, while flying 507 sorties and dropping 232,7 tons of bombs. There was a clear difference in badly dam planes, 11 Ju 87s (3 in Immola) vs 1 Fw 190, which was damaged in Immola. At least almost all air losses were to Soviet AA (all FAF bomber losses over Karelian Isthmus during Summer 44 were to AA)

Who thinks that all AFs had same requirements? At least I don't. But you made a rather silly claim, that LW had no need for longer range fighter than 109F-K. Clearly they had, at least in the East for those strategic attacks on Soviet industry and for those convoy attacks in Med and against Arctic convoys. One can always argued relative merits of different requirements and what would have been optimum solution to them but surely Heer which was overwhelmed by massive artillery and tank attacks supported by swarms of Soviet a/c would not mind if LW strategic bombing against Soviet industry would have been more effective. Of course a longer range LW fighter would have meant fewer 109s and it was common thought that good long range air superiority fighter was impossible but for ex. Zero and P-51 showed that could be achieved.

Allied AFs cordoned Normandy battlefield fairly effectively, slowing the arrival of reinforcements and supply items and so had significant effect on the land war and as happened at Dompaire the Allied FB attacks could be very devastating even against Panthers when the tanks were caught in fairly open terrain. It might well be that Ju 87Gs, Hs 129Bs or Il-2s were not at least much more effective in reality, one must remember that pilots' claims are only claims. Hs 129B was IMHO too specialicied, of course as twin engine plane the big gun could be centrally mounted but on the other hand the protection of its engines was not good enough to made it almost totally invulnerable against rifle calibre fire, IMHO if one went to armoured plane the Il-2 solution was better, it was almost totally invulnerable against rifle calibre fire, giving good moral boost to its pilots and having depressive impact on enemy infantry. Of course Hs 129B had its pros but IMHO it was not very cost-effective answer to CAS problem.

Juha

I was pointing out that Allied fighter-bombers had very high losses in Italy and Normandy without being as precise as specialized aircraft even though they were ''fast'' and ''agile''.Difficult missions = losses, no need to denigrate a particular aircraft.
I've checked the Kursk losses of German fighter ,bomber and stuka units and they are low (although i don't have the sortie number i suspect it would be high so losses/sortie = very low).
Regarding my second point i think you misunderstood.A long range fighter was not needed by the LW because they had no strategic bomber force to protect.Building a new fighter with the range of P-51 would not make sence economically for the reasons you stated.Considering the use of drop tanks LW fighters were adequate.LW needed much more aircraft not specific long ranged fighters.

 

[Juha]

Hello Ctrian
Quote:"Yep that's why Bomber Command wasted aircraft over Germany while Coastal Command begged for a few long range planes."

And how that differs from KM's demands even a few more long range planes, in fact German naval aviation was even less well equipped than CC most of the war. At the beginning CC was in bad situation because of Beaufort programwas running late because of development problems and both Botha and Lerwick were total failures.

Juha

 

[Juha]

Hello Ctrian
as the experience of the Kampfverband Kuhlmey shows, against identical AA defence the loss rates of Ju 87Ds and ground attack 190s was more or less same. In fact that results favours Ju 87D because of pilots of 1./SG 5, arriving from Arctic region, were unused of the fairly powerful AA protection of a Soviet main offensive had to learn from bitter experience that repeated low-level attacks on same target were suicidal, their losses per sortie were lower than those of Ju-87s after they had adjusted their tactics to the environment.

Juha

 

[ctrian]

Hello Ctrian
Quote:"Yep that's why Bomber Command wasted aircraft over Germany while Coastal Command begged for a few long range planes."

And how that differs from KM's demands even a few more long range planes, in fact German naval aviation was even less well equipped than CC most of the war. At the beginning CC was in bad situation because of Beaufort programwas running late because of development problems and both Botha and Lerwick were total failures.

Juha

There is a vast difference in scale ,BC got huge funding and manpower during the war and they could easily spare bombers.The LW on the other hand as you very well know had only the FW200 a civilian plane in very short numbers(yes the He177 and Ju290 came later but also in small numbers).It was beyond the terribly overstretched LW to create a large efficient force for the Atlantic battle.

Regarding your second post : ok but what about results? Benefit/Cost...

 

[Juha]

Hello Ctrian
if the range of 109 was enough then from some mystery reason LW wasted its specialist torpedo force in unescorted missions and chose to prefer clearly less accurate night attacks over daytime raids when it at last saw the need stratecig attacks on the Soviet waepon industry. FAF experience was that fairly small escort force was enought in the East. I have difficulties to understand that LW could not spare a couple staffeln to escort He 111s to Gorky for ex if the 109 had the range to do that.

Juha

 

[Juha]

Hello Ctrian
on lack of Fw 200Cs, of course in place of some fewer Hs 129Bs one could have produceda few more 200Cs, all AFs had to make choises like that, even USAAF.

Results of different attack components of the Kampfverband Kuhlmey, IMHO more or less same, bomb loads per sortie more or less same, both were fairly accurate, lack of Soviet info made a exact comprasion impossible, but according to pilots' claims, Finnish observations and recon pictures that was the conclusion. And of course the results of strafing were extra for Fw 190s.

Juha

 

[Shortround6]

Oh yeah, the poor Luftwaffe couldn't afford planes or crews to support the U-boats. Pardon me but that is barnyard excrement. Nobody is talking about "a large efficient force for the Atlantic battle" but just a few dozen more aircraft at any given time for more Reconnaissance. Like 2 flights a day instead of 2-3 flights per week. A few squadrons of those long range 109s would have been a good idea for shooting down those Wellingtons and Whitleys operating over the bay of Biscay too.

 

[parsifal]

On the issue of vulnerability of allied and axis ground attack aircraft. I can only repeat that report I mentioned from the US army in latye '44.....from memory it was 500-1500 rounds of aa ammo per kill for an axis aircraft, compared to 3500-5000 rounds per allied FB. That means that an allied FB was 2-10 times more likley to survive an encounter with an Axis AA gun than an Axis aircraft was to survive an allied AA gun

 

[ctrian]

Hmm commenting here is beginning to be a second job .I asked about performance because the Stuka among other things had proved it's pinpoint performance by sinking RN and Soviet ships on the other hand i don't know about similar exploits for the FW .Just coming fast and ''spraying'' may not be very accurate.Gorky was bombed a few times? That was a strategic offensive ? I have Berngstrom's book and i remember that the losses were very low.
You said : all AFs had to make choises like that ,ehm no they didn't Western allies clearly built anything they wanted.They had the economic capability plus they didn't have to fight a ''real'' war like Germany was fighting in the East.
@Shortoround :Yep exactly as you said the LW was stretched like the guy from Fantastic 4 no reserves whatsoever,you can't waste resources in that kind of situation.By the way they used Ju-88's as heavy fighters in Bay of Biscay.

@parsifal : how many losses per sorties during ops?