The Germans needed a better tactical bomber in 1942 (1 Viewer)

[Steamed_Banana]

The 190G was pretty rangy - with one 500 kg bomb, up to 1770 km for the G-8 (fuel = 640L internal + 2x300L drop tanks). If it was powered by the DB 605A, it would've been even more rangier.

That's very interesting, and news to me! when did the 190G go into combat in significant numbers? I'm reading mid 1943 is that right? It looks like 1300 were built. Maybe they just needed to build this variant earlier than they did, and maybe a few more of them. They took out the wing cannon to make space for fuel, which seems reasonable.

A combat radius of 500-700 km puts it way from a tactical bomber niche, IMO. Sometimes, having horses for courses is the best bet - just like the Mosquito is a better tool than the Typhoon or even a P-51 when it is about carrying worthwhile bomb load over the distance - thus my suggestion for other aircraft, like a developed Fw 187.


That aircraft was the Ju 88.

I meant equivalent speed of an A-36, with the range of the Ju 88 but that sounds like it might be the Fw 190G, which I must admit was totally unaware of. I think I just sort of glossed over it as another F variant, but the range is quite good, not quite as far as a Ju 88 maybe (not sure with external bombs on the Ju)

 

[tomo pauk]

That's very interesting, and news to me! when did the 190G go into combat in significant numbers? I'm reading mid 1943 is that right? It looks like 1300 were built. Maybe they just needed to build this variant earlier than they did, and maybe a few more of them. They took out the wing cannon to make space for fuel, which seems reasonable.

All the internal fuel was in the fuselage. The earlier Gs were without the 115L rear tank, and thus were a bit less rangier.

The Fw 190 with extra internal fuel tankage in the wings, like what the Ta 152 was supposed to get, along with some very late 109Ds, is an interesting suggestion for the even longer-ranged 190. Caveat is that these wing tanks were unprotected (but so were also the drop tanks).

I meant equivalent speed of an A-36, with the range of the Ju 88 but that sounds like it might be the Fw 190G, which I must admit was totally unaware of. I think I just sort of glossed over it as another F variant, but the range is quite good, not quite as far as a Ju 88 maybe (not sure with external bombs on the Ju)

Between the Fw 190F/G and the upgraded 187, there is a lot of real estate covered.

 

[Steamed_Banana]

Do you have performance specs on the Fw 190G? Did it have wing cannon or not? I was getting that from Wikipedia but i don't have any better source, alas

 

[Steamed_Banana]

Also, do you know the exact ranges of the different sub-variants of Fw 190G? I'm finding this hard to track down.

 

[tomo pauk]

Do you have performance specs on the Fw 190G? Did it have wing cannon or not? I was getting that from Wikipedia but i don't have any better source, alas

Also, do you know the exact ranges of the different sub-variants of Fw 190G? I'm finding this hard to track down.

This doc has a lot of data.
From this thread.

 

[Howard Gibson]

or 1943 at the latest.

Much has been made of the Germans lack of a real strategic bomber during WW2. But they had a big problem with tactical bombing as well.

The problem with tactical bombers is that you require air superiority. Even good fighter bombers had problems while flying with useful ordinance. The enemy can also develop effective anti-aircraft fire, making it dangerous to fly over their positions. A lot of light bomber tactics were developed on proving grounds where nobody was shooting at them.

In the ETO after D-Day, there were no specialised light bombers operating directly over the battlefields. It was all Hawker Typhoons and P-47 Thunderbolts, both of which had the performance to look after themselves if an opposing fighter showed up.

 

[Shortround6]

A lot depends on what is meant by "tactical bomber" as the whole concept is rather fuzzy. It depends on which air force you are talking about and which year and in some cases Which theater/front.

We also have to be somewhat suspicious of the German Ju 87. It gets some credit for things the German Artillery did, but Sukas made for better newsreel footage/propaganda.
That and British/French tactical air well and truly sucked in 1939-40-41.

I have said it before, you could have given the British 250 Ju-87s in March/April 1940 and the Battle for France would have gone exactly the same.
For tactical air to work you need;
1, good recon to figure out where air strikes are going to do the most good.
2. timely decisions so the targets are still there when the bombers arrive OR the targets have not had time to set up dozens of AA guns.
3. fighter escorts so the tac bombers actually have a chance of reaching the target.
4. fighter escort so the tac bombers make it home so that they have a chance of flying a mission the next day. One and Done is not the way to win an air war.
5. use mass, not penny packets, to overwhelm defenders to make sure targets are destroyed the first time and to reduce losses. 5 different attacks spaced out over hours lets the enemy defeat the attackers in detail.

Germans were good at Tac Air not because of the Ju 87 but because they did a lot of the above rather well. But it was the allies' interest to credit the German plane rather than the allies shortcomings. That cut down on court marshal's or being posted to Greenland or to the Northwest Frontier (Afghanistan).

Getting back the Germans the Ju-88 was not all that hot. 290mph with no external load at 17,400ft is not that good a basis for a "tactical bomber". How fast was it at 1-3,000ft? How fast was it with 2-4 largeish bombs outside? Defensive guns pretty much sucked. Ability to strafe (or suppress AA) also sucked unless it was carrying external gun pods (which means slow).
Granted the Germans used Ju-88s to good effect in Russia but the soviet air defense was rather lacking at the time (1941/early 1942).
And back to what is Tac Air?
Attacking troops on the ground in static positions?
Attacking positions to aid a breakthrough?
Using Tac Air to stop a counter-attack?
Using Tac Air to prevent resupply/reinforcements from reaching the battle area/s? How many kilometers behind the front are such missions considered Tac Air and not some other form of air power?
Where does ground support turn into interdiction?

You can use a lot of planes for Tac Air missions, some will be better than others depending on mission details. Any plane assigned to Tac Air is better than no planes doing Tac Air missions. But such use has to be balanced against losses. Bf 109s strafing Soviet fuel trucks might stop a Soviet counterattack and be worth losses. Bf 109s strafing Soviet infantry in foxholes/trenches and taking losses is probably not a good idea.
Flying anything (even Hs 129s) into heavy AA is probably not a good idea unless the ground situation is desperate.

British and American tactical AA got exponentially better in 1943/44 than British/French tactical AA in 1940. Air tactics that worked in 1940-41 was not going to work in 1943/44 in the west.

 

[Alan Stevens]

The Ju 87 Stuka deserves much of the credit for German armored breakthroughs in fighting in Poland, France, Russia, and North Africa in 1940-42. The accuracy of the Ju 87 as a bomber (by WW2 standards) meant that big holes could be blasted through positions of enemy anti-tank guns, tanks, artillery, and infantry allowing tanks to break through, making it a decisive factor in many offensive victories in the early part of the war. It was effectively the offensive equivalent of the much vaunted Flak 18 / 36 / 37 / 41/ 43 etc. on defense.

Germany chose production numbers over improvements. Tweaking its designs only as much as it didn't slow down production. It has to be seen if early modifications of its designs would have made them better off, since they would have built less of those better aircrafts.
Main problem with middle to late war Germany tactical bombing was that German tactics were no more a surprise, and Germans generally fought in numerical inferiority both on land and in air. It wouldn't have been much better in France, had the French had more aircrafts, and the experience of a pair of years of war.

As for the dive bombing. Dive bombing installations and necessities are enemies of performances. A dive bomber as accurate as the Stuka (capable of an about 90 degrees dive) would never be a prestational aircraft.
For all of its aerodynamic improvements IE, the Breda Ba.201 prototype gained only 50km/h speed over the Stuka with the same engine. Provided the Germans, with better aerodynamics, and a better engine, could have reached 500, or even 550 km/h. In 1943 it would have been a slow aircraft anyway (and those figures would have been true only without the bomb, and carrying one was the reason the aircraft was in the air).

EVAP!

 

[Alan Stevens]

or 1943 at the latest.

Much has been made of the Germans lack of a real strategic bomber during WW2. But they had a big problem with tactical bombing as well.

View attachment 870981

The Ju 87 Stuka deserves much of the credit for German armored breakthroughs in fighting in Poland, France, Russia, and North Africa in 1940-42. The accuracy of the Ju 87 as a bomber (by WW2 standards) meant that big holes could be blasted through positions of enemy anti-tank guns, tanks, artillery, and infantry allowing tanks to break through, making it a decisive factor in many offensive victories in the early part of the war. It was effectively the offensive equivalent of the much vaunted Flak 18 / 36 / 37 / 41/ 43 etc. on defense.

It is a myth that the Ju 87 was proven obsolete during the Battle of Britain. It proved ill-suited to that type of bombing campaign, but in subsequent battles in the regions listed above it continued to prove a decisive weapon in the hands of German forces, a major complimentary addition by the Luftwaffe to the German ground forces campaigns, particularly for the mobile forces which sometimes moved ahead of their artillery.

ey ignored? Did they put too much emphasis on the jets?

I visited the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago in July.
They have on display one of only 2 Stuka that still exist in the world.
Hanging from the ceiling in a dive -- quite a sight to see!

Also toured the U-505 u-boat.

 

[Steamed_Banana]

A lot depends on what is meant by "tactical bomber" as the whole concept is rather fuzzy. It depends on which air force you are talking about and which year and in some cases Which theater/front.

We also have to be somewhat suspicious of the German Ju 87. It gets some credit for things the German Artillery did, but Sukas made for better newsreel footage/propaganda.
That and British/French tactical air well and truly sucked in 1939-40-41.

I have said it before, you could have given the British 250 Ju-87s in March/April 1940 and the Battle for France would have gone exactly the same.
For tactical air to work you need;
1, good recon to figure out where air strikes are going to do the most good.
2. timely decisions so the targets are still there when the bombers arrive OR the targets have not had time to set up dozens of AA guns.
3. fighter escorts so the tac bombers actually have a chance of reaching the target.
4. fighter escort so the tac bombers make it home so that they have a chance of flying a mission the next day. One and Done is not the way to win an air war.
5. use mass, not penny packets, to overwhelm defenders to make sure targets are destroyed the first time and to reduce losses. 5 different attacks spaced out over hours lets the enemy defeat the attackers in detail.

Germans were good at Tac Air not because of the Ju 87 but because they did a lot of the above rather well. But it was the allies' interest to credit the German plane rather than the allies shortcomings. That cut down on court marshal's or being posted to Greenland or to the Northwest Frontier (Afghanistan).

Getting back the Germans the Ju-88 was not all that hot. 290mph with no external load at 17,400ft is not that good a basis for a "tactical bomber". How fast was it at 1-3,000ft? How fast was it with 2-4 largeish bombs outside? Defensive guns pretty much sucked. Ability to strafe (or suppress AA) also sucked unless it was carrying external gun pods (which means slow).
Granted the Germans used Ju-88s to good effect in Russia but the soviet air defense was rather lacking at the time (1941/early 1942).
And back to what is Tac Air?
Attacking troops on the ground in static positions?
Attacking positions to aid a breakthrough?
Using Tac Air to stop a counter-attack?
Using Tac Air to prevent resupply/reinforcements from reaching the battle area/s? How many kilometers behind the front are such missions considered Tac Air and not some other form of air power?
Where does ground support turn into interdiction?

You can use a lot of planes for Tac Air missions, some will be better than others depending on mission details. Any plane assigned to Tac Air is better than no planes doing Tac Air missions. But such use has to be balanced against losses. Bf 109s strafing Soviet fuel trucks might stop a Soviet counterattack and be worth losses. Bf 109s strafing Soviet infantry in foxholes/trenches and taking losses is probably not a good idea.
Flying anything (even Hs 129s) into heavy AA is probably not a good idea unless the ground situation is desperate.

British and American tactical AA got exponentially better in 1943/44 than British/French tactical AA in 1940. Air tactics that worked in 1940-41 was not going to work in 1943/44 in the west.

It's not anywhere near as complicated as you are making it. For purposes of this discussion 'tactical bomber' means anything other than strategic. Something that can hit either airfields and bridges or ships, artillery and tanks. I'm just not talking about the Americabomber here. Pretending to just be utterly baffled by the entire concept of a tactical bomber seems like a put-on. Most bombers were tactical bombers. Real strategic bombers as such were the oddity.

I never said the Ju 88 was particularly special, it was just the best the Germans had availbable. My whole point is that they needed a better tactical bomber.

When it comes to air strikes, there are degrees of air escort and air superiority. True, full air superiority or "air supremacy" was fairly rare in WW2, especially in the period I'm referring to, i.e. prior to 1944. It might exist for a moment, but that moment was fleeting. In my opinion it's disingenuous to imply that air escort is some binary, either / or thing. You could have bombers escorted by a minimal number of fighters or an overwhelming number. Bombers under strict close escort by fighters or very 'broadly defined' escort. Protected by fighters say within 1 km and 5 minutes or within 20 km and half an hour.

Some aircraft types required much more protection than others to survive, but in the real operational history in the mid-war, later 1942 and 1943, truly thorough protection was very rare. Bombers often had to fend for themselves to some degree. You can see in the operational history that US medium bombers like B-25s and B-26s, even light bombers like A-20s and Baltimores, and without a doubt heavy bombers like B-24s and B-17s were clearly risky for Axis fighters to attack. Many Axis fighters were shot down and it was logged in their own records that they were lost to defensive fire from bombers.

Nor were Allied fighters immune to this. Many US fighters were shot down, according to our own records, by defensive fire from fairly weak Axis bombers, including Ju 88s, but also planes like D3As, Stukas, B5Ns, Ki-21s and Ki-48s, G3Ms and G4Ms, SM 79s, Ju 87s and many others not renowned for their defensive firepower.

 

[Shortround6]

I am pointing out that the JU-87s actual performance is somewhat overblown by its reputation. This is for a number of reasons. When the allies tried to duplicate its success with supposedly better aircraft they failed for the most part. Mostly due to failing to understand why the Ju-87 succeeded where and when it did. Or failing to understand why it failed at other times. Escort fighters were important.

Protected by fighters say within 1 km and 5 minutes or within 20 km and half an hour.

even 5 minutes is way out of sync. 20km and 30 minutes and the escorts might as well have stayed on the Ground. This is where the British and French screwed up in the BoF.
Germans understood this and either close escorted (visual distance, not flying in close formation) or worked to eliminate enemy air resistance. Poles had very few fighters left after the first few days.

Using light/medium bombers (twins) also is somewhat dependent on the AA defenses. They are larger targets, usually slower than fighters and usually less agile. You can find exceptions.
British tried to take out German/Italian airfields to make it easier to do ground support. Germans and Italians tried to the same thing in return.

In 1942 the Germans were fighting a two front war and in 1943 it was still two fronts but the conditions were changing on both fronts.

The Germans are falling somewhat behind the British/Americans in regard to light/medium bombers. The American built but British (and commonwealth) flown bombers using 1600hp Wright R-2600s were fast (for their time) and somewhat well-armed but that did not make up for stupidity. No 221 squadrons first strike with Baltimore's suffered 100% losses. Of course, with only 4 planes dispatched to attack a German airfield perhaps expectations were too high? Not helped by malfunctioning guns and no escorts. And this was the end of unescorted missions but British light bombers, at least for some time.
Back to the Germans. Without more BMW 801s or earlier Jumo 213s or DB 603s it is hard to see what the Germans could have done much different in regards to aircraft.
Keeping pretty much the same aircraft, it might seem that the Germans might have taken their heads out of their backsides and figured out how to make a decent powered gun mount or turret instead of relining so much on hand aimed 7.9mm single guns. Everything is a war of attrition and things that can increase enemy losses while reducing your own even if not by large percentages may pay off.
The British and Americans bought into their own doctrine of power turrets too much. They helped but did not replace escorts it took a while (much too long) to figure this out.
But even the Blenheim had two fast firing guns in a powered mounting (it did not turn 360 degrees) which was far better than most axis bombers.

The question is how many bombers are being lost compared to how many fighters. Adding 2-3 men to man 2-3 single barrel, slow firing, limited ammo capacity. limited arc hand aimed guns does not seem to be a good idea.

 

[SaparotRob]

I am pointing out that the JU-87s actual performance is somewhat overblown by its reputation. This is for a number of reasons. When the allies tried to duplicate its success with supposedly better aircraft they failed for the most part. Mostly due to failing to understand why the Ju-87 succeeded where and when it did. Or failing to understand why it failed at other times. ...

Could its success be in part due to that automatic pull-up doohickey?

 

[Shortround6]

somewhat. But the automatic pull-up doohickey doesn't do anything against AA guns or fighters or find targets to begin with or help evade anything once the plane has pulled out.
It does keep a certain percentage of crews from coming into highspeed contact with mother earth and that may reduce losses a bit

The doohickey got more crews to pull out at the proper height which increase accuracy instead of pulling out too early. It didn't do anything for left and right errors or for over-unders that were not release height related.

 

[Steamed_Banana]

I am pointing out that the JU-87s actual performance is somewhat overblown by its reputation. This is for a number of reasons. When the allies tried to duplicate its success with supposedly better aircraft they failed for the most part. Mostly due to failing to understand why the Ju-87 succeeded where and when it did. Or failing to understand why it failed at other times. Escort fighters were important.

Yeah but maybe they weren't really better. The Ju 87 had two really big advantages - it was as far as i know the only dive bomber that really did true 90 degree angle dive bombing, and it had the automatic pull out system, so even if the pilot wasn't a superhero he could still do those high angle dive bombing attacks. It seems to have been the most accurate bomber in the war, barring the use of wire guided munitions or something.

Stukas were instrumental in several early offensive victories which are attributed to German tanks, but that isn't really the case. The stukas performed the break through at Arras and in several battles in North Africa and Russia. When not forced to stick to a tight formation (which they lacked sufficient defensive firepower to make worth while) and allowed to maneuver, they often evaded fighters, even though in many cases Allied fighters thought they shot them down. As I noted, they seemed to have a better survival rate in North Africa than the Ju 88.

even 5 minutes is way out of sync. 20km and 30 minutes and the escorts might as well have stayed on the Ground. This is where the British and French screwed up in the BoF.
Germans understood this and either close escorted (visual distance, not flying in close formation) or worked to eliminate enemy air resistance. Poles had very few fighters left after the first few days.

There is a wide divergence between the theory and practice of fighter escort. In North Africa and in the Pacific and Burma, Allied fighters often disappeared when they engaged enemy fighters (usually near the target) and bombers were often on their own for the egress. Sometimes fighters would return to help but often they did not. Sometimes a part of the fighter escort would remain with or within sight of the bombers, sometimes (often) they didn't.

Using light/medium bombers (twins) also is somewhat dependent on the AA defenses. They are larger targets, usually slower than fighters and usually less agile. You can find exceptions.
British tried to take out German/Italian airfields to make it easier to do ground support. Germans and Italians tried to the same thing in return.

AA was a huge challenge, for bombers on both sides, and high threat AA environments were often hit by fighter bombers or dive bombers (both of which still took pretty heavy losses). The Soviets did this too in some cases with their Pe-2s. In the Western Desert it was possible to learn the AAA positions, which were hard to hide in the open spaces, and fly around them. They often flew elaborately long distances for targets a relatively short distance away to avoid the AAA concentrations.

Both German / Italian and Allied air forces managed to hit each others airfields in the Med and do serious damage, several times. But over time this was happening more often to the Axis. And the Allied attacks were both often more effective and less costly in terms of bomber losses. As we know against the Japanese AAA was less formidable, though it was still a problem and cause of steady attrition.

In 1942 the Germans were fighting a two front war and in 1943 it was still two fronts but the conditions were changing on both fronts.

The Germans are falling somewhat behind the British/Americans in regard to light/medium bombers. The American built but British (and commonwealth) flown bombers using 1600hp Wright R-2600s were fast (for their time) and somewhat well-armed but that did not make up for stupidity. No 221 squadrons first strike with Baltimore's suffered 100% losses. Of course, with only 4 planes dispatched to attack a German airfield perhaps expectations were too high? Not helped by malfunctioning guns and no escorts. And this was the end of unescorted missions but British light bombers, at least for some time.
Back to the Germans. Without more BMW 801s or earlier Jumo 213s or DB 603s it is hard to see what the Germans could have done much different in regards to aircraft.

Sounds like that Fw 190G and maybe the Fw 187 were both good options...

Keeping pretty much the same aircraft, it might seem that the Germans might have taken their heads out of their backsides and figured out how to make a decent powered gun mount or turret instead of relining so much on hand aimed 7.9mm single guns. Everything is a war of attrition and things that can increase enemy losses while reducing your own even if not by large percentages may pay off.

Possibly though we also have the shining example of the Mosquito with no defensive guns, and the less capable but still pretty effective at survival, because fast, A-20A,B, and C and Martin 167 and 187 all which had light protection and limited armor. Later Baltimore as I noted had a serious Martin power turret, I think there was also one mark which had a Boulton Paul turret with quad .303 guns... and the A-20G had a (I think Martin) power turret with 2 guns. The A-26 had even more guns but was still very fast (350 mph).

The Germans eventually started putting those remote control gun barbettes with heavier guns like 13mm etc. which seem like they might be good but I don't know anything about how effective they actually were. These kinds of systems worked well on the B-29 from what I understand.

The British and Americans bought into their own doctrine of power turrets too much. They helped but did not replace escorts it took a while (much too long) to figure this out.

I used to think that but operational history is kind of (partly) changing my mind. If they are shooting down one or two enemy fighters every time they get attacked there is real value in that. I still think the sweet spot is somewhere in the middle between Mosquito speed and B-25 armament.

But even the Blenheim had two fast firing guns in a powered mounting (it did not turn 360 degrees) which was far better than most axis bombers.

The question is how many bombers are being lost compared to how many fighters. Adding 2-3 men to man 2-3 single barrel, slow firing, limited ammo capacity. limited arc hand aimed guns does not seem to be a good idea.

I agree that's not going to cut it. It's also a problem when all your defensive gunners are in the same place (along with pilot and other crew). One explosive shell can wound or kill all or most of them at once...

 

[Steamed_Banana]

somewhat. But the automatic pull-up doohickey doesn't do anything against AA guns or fighters or find targets to begin with or help evade anything once the plane has pulled out.
It does keep a certain percentage of crews from coming into highspeed contact with mother earth and that may reduce losses a bit

The doohickey got more crews to pull out at the proper height which increase accuracy instead of pulling out too early. It didn't do anything for left and right errors or for over-unders that were not release height related.

Ju 87 seemed to have a really impressive track record at, for example, hitting enemy ships. I remember seeing some charts in another thread here.

It also seems, anecdotally, that hitting dive bombers could be pretty hard. Probably both for targeting and psychological reasons (especially with those sirens blaring...)

 

[Steamed_Banana]

I'd also mention the small, fast, but lightly armed Japanese Army Ki-48 which seems to do surprisingly well in all the fighting in CBI, albeit with typically very heavy fighter escort.

It's worth noting that the Ki-48 had a much better survival rate than the just as fast, larger, much more heavily armed, and also better armored and protected Ki-49, which seemed to have an almost comically / nightmarishly (depending on your perspective) moribund operational history. Like the Beaufort but worse.

The dimnuative Ki-48-IIa with 3 x 7.7mm machine guns, top speed 314 mph

Ki-49 IIb with 1 20mm, 5 x 12.7mm machine guns, top speed 306 mph

 

[z42]

I think a problem with 'traditional' dive bombing is that the faster you go (to survive), the higher the drop height must be, thus reducing accuracy, assuming the limitation is how much G's the aircraft structure not to mention the squishy parts inside can take. Germany had some(?) kind of solution to this in the form of shallow angle dive bombing sights (Lofte & Stuvi?), that might have allowed some kind of useful compromise between speed, G loading, and accuracy. I don't think any of these were used on the FW190F/G though. But maybe they should/could?

So, my 2c:

As mentioned above, use the FW190F/G as the fighter bomber, and for replacing the Ju87 particularly if you can add some kind of useful bomb sights to improve accuracy.

For a next generation twin engine tactical aircraft, if we postulate using actually existing engines, they're pretty much stuck with the Ju211, or maybe BMW 801 if lucky, in the 1942/43 time frame. In order to achieve useful speed, must thus be relatively small and sleek. So something Ta 154 / Mosquito-like, two-man crew, unarmed. Maybe make it out of aluminum to avoid issues with the glue, though. Similar to the Mosquito, make two main versions, an unarmed bomber (& long range recon?) version with a glass nose for the bombardier, and then a night fighter version with both forward and upward (Schräge Musik) firing cannons, and radar as soon as airborne radar is in a useful shape. Later versions maybe could upgrade to 213/603 engines when those become available. If done well, could in principle replace most other twin engine combat aircraft in the LW inventory?

Late in the war, they'd really need some jet engined bomber (Ar 234?) to give the speed necessary to survive against the crushing numerical superiority of Allied air power. Of course, by then nothing like that would turn the war around, in the best case maybe losing slightly slower.

 

[z42]

The Germans eventually started putting those remote control gun barbettes with heavier guns like 13mm etc. which seem like they might be good but I don't know anything about how effective they actually were. These kinds of systems worked well on the B-29 from what I understand.

AFAIU the Americans spent a lot of elbow grease making those remote turrets work as well as they did on the B-29. If the Germans cannot afford the same, with proper gyro gunsights and all, maybe better to skip it entirely, saving on weight and drag, and rely on speed instead?

I agree that's not going to cut it. It's also a problem when all your defensive gunners are in the same place (along with pilot and other crew). One explosive shell can wound or kill all or most of them at once...

Well, if an explosive shell incapacitates the pilot(s), the plane is most likely going down regardless of whether the gunners are there in the cockpit beside the pilot or spread out all over the aircraft..

 

[ssnider]

I think a problem with 'traditional' dive bombing is that the faster you go (to survive), the higher the drop height must be, thus reducing accuracy, assuming the limitation is how much G's the aircraft structure not to mention the squishy parts inside can take. Germany had some(?) kind of solution to this in the form of shallow angle dive bombing sights (Lofte & Stuvi?), that might have allowed some kind of useful compromise between speed, G loading, and accuracy. I don't think any of these were used on the FW190F/G though. But maybe they should/could?

So, my 2c:

As mentioned above, use the FW190F/G as the fighter bomber, and for replacing the Ju87 particularly if you can add some kind of useful bomb sights to improve accuracy.

For a next generation twin engine tactical aircraft, if we postulate using actually existing engines, they're pretty much stuck with the Ju211, or maybe BMW 801 if lucky, in the 1942/43 time frame. In order to achieve useful speed, must thus be relatively small and sleek. So something Ta 154 / Mosquito-like, two-man crew, unarmed. Maybe make it out of aluminum to avoid issues with the glue, though. Similar to the Mosquito, make two main versions, an unarmed bomber (& long range recon?) version with a glass nose for the bombardier, and then a night fighter version with both forward and upward (Schräge Musik) firing cannons, and radar as soon as airborne radar is in a useful shape. Later versions maybe could upgrade to 213/603 engines when those become available. If done well, could in principle replace most other twin engine combat aircraft in the LW inventory?

Late in the war, they'd really need some jet engined bomber (Ar 234?) to give the speed necessary to survive against the crushing numerical superiority of Allied air power. Of course, by then nothing like that would turn the war around, in the best case maybe losing slightly slower.

think the Ju 87 used the Revi sight as did the Fw 190. Also the 190 used the skip bombing technique.

 

[Steamed_Banana]

AFAIU the Americans spent a lot of elbow grease making those remote turrets work as well as they did on the B-29. If the Germans cannot afford the same, with proper gyro gunsights and all, maybe better to skip it entirely, saving on weight and drag, and rely on speed instead?

Getting 'Mosquito fast' is tricky, though presumably they did it with the Arado 234. It just needed to arrive earlier, and maybe a bit more debugged. Could they do some equivalent earlier with piston engines? Not sure. Tomo's idea of FW 187 is fairly convincing. Fw 190G looks pretty good too for at least part of the problem.

Not quite 'Mosquito fast', but say, 'A-20 fast' plus some decent defensive guns seems also like a viable route to go. It would have been better than what they had with the Ju 88.

How good or bad were the remote defensive guns like on the Me 210 or 410? On the Grief? Did they work?

B-29 seems to be kind of in a class all it's own.

Well, if an explosive shell incapacitates the pilot(s), the plane is most likely going down regardless of whether the gunners are there in the cockpit beside the pilot or spread out all over the aircraft..

Sure but it just means that there are really only three targets on that plane, right engine, left engine, cockpit. Whereas on a B-25 you might want to go get the pilot but you also have to think about tail gunner, door gunners, top turret gunner etc. And the bulbous nature of that cockpit on the Ju 88, designed so the gunners can shoot in every directions, means it can also be attacked from any direction.

Going through summaries of the operational histories of the Ju 88, for all it's capabilities, and they are impressive in some respects, it seems like high attrition and rather appalling losses were rather a constant with the type, going back to the Battle of France, and in a wide variety of situations and roles.