Wildcat during the Battle of Britain

[pbehn]

Since you apparently still disagree with the simple notion that pilots that can hit enemy planes with their weapons is an asset:

Could you please explain to everyone how not having a clue about air to air gunnery is the way to win a battle? I mean I only have 43 years experience with firearms and you've never picked one up but apparently but you have seen some on TV so you must know it all. Please enlighten us.

I don't disagree with that. What I disagree with are these points Imperfect training doesn't mean no training. Poor marksmanship does not mean the RAF didn't hit anything. Training people to shoot who cant fly well enough to keep themselves alive is a waste of time. The notion that RAF pilots in the BoB did not know that hitting the crew, engines and fuel tanks was important, is fanciful to the point of insulting. The best means of attack maybe a beam attack, just work out the maths of a fighter at 300 MPH trying to hit a bomber at 200MPH at 90 degrees, if you do it right bingo, if you screw up the fraction of a second you have to hit then it is back to square one. The LW were more experienced in escorting than the RAF were in attacking bombers in 1940, they knew what "bandits" wanted to do and positioned themselves to stop it. BTW I would have thought the first issue to be confronted was to get your planes in the air, where were Thatch and his gunnery experts at Pearl Harbor, where was the radar warning and trained equipped forces, surely the most important thing is to actually take off, in 1941, a year and a half after the Battle of Britain.

 

[PAT303]

Between July and November 1940 only 900 of the 2,937 pilots credited with at least one operational sortie in a fighter claimed at all. Roughly 70% of pilots were just making up numbers.

So while I'm very much in the camp of concentrating the fire I do see the point of the spread layout, It's also why I don't see how the center line gun layout such as the 109F or P38 is an advantage, unless you have crack air gunnery skills having a very narrow cone of fire only increases the chances of missing.

 

[pbehn]

So while I'm very much in the camp of concentrating the fire I do see the point of the spread layout, It's also why I don't see how the center line gun layout such as the 109F or P38 is an advantage, unless you have crack air gunnery skills having a very narrow cone of fire only increases the chances of missing.

It is a definite advantage in hitting the target, the stream of bullets are always on the same axis as the gunsight. The problem is it is hard to get more than 2 rifle calibre guns to do it and they have a lower rate of fire than any wing mounted gun.

 

[PAT303]

The notion that RAF pilots in the BoB did not know that hitting the crew, engines and fuel tanks is fanciful to the point of insulting.

I think we all need to take a moment to remember what it was like in 1940's Britain, you had boys, and they were boys, that most likely had never traveled out of their own district or village going to fight, these were boys that grew up on their family farm or worked in the family butchery that had never seen an airplane let alone fly one, most of them had probably never kissed a girl or felt the love of a women. These boys, absolute hero's to the last in every sense of the word suddenly found themselves in a Spitfire or Hurricane doing 300 mph at 20,000ft over the channel trying to hit a similar boy in a Bf 109 who was likewise doing the same, any notion that they were aiming at anything other than the big black blob rapidly filling their windscreen is fanciful. They would all know where the important area's are on enemy aircraft, knowing and doing are two very different things. Sometimes threads become heated like this one, to bad soaringtractor got banned, he was hilarious.

 

[pbehn]

I think we all need to take a moment to remember what it was like in 1940's Britain, you had boys, and they were boys, that most likely had never traveled out of their own district or village going to fight, these were boys that grew up on their family farm or worked in the family butchery that had never seen an airplane let alone fly one, most of them had probably never kissed a girl or felt the love of a women. These boys, absolute hero's to the last in every sense of the word suddenly found themselves in a Spitfire or Hurricane doing 300 mph at 20,000ft over the channel trying to hit a similar boy in a Bf 109 who was likewise doing the same, any notion that they were aiming at anything other than the big black blob rapidly filling their windscreen is fanciful. They would all know where the important area's are on enemy aircraft, knowing and doing are two very different things. Sometimes threads become heated like this one, to bad soaringtractor got banned, he was hilarious.

It was actually a change in warfare. Pilots were like infantry, they were in lethal hand to hand combat. They needed a high degree of courage, and many physical skills of coordination ,balance, spatial awareness but also a very good basic education, like choosing which 1000 university graduates you would send into a knife fight today. Pre WW2 how many people had even driven a car let alone knew how they worked?

 

[wuzak]

Just back to the idea that about the F4F in the Battle of Britain.

In October 1940, the British had received 81 Martlets, presumably all Martlet Is, because the first production Martlet II (with 2 speed single stage R-1830) had its first flight earlier that month. And many (all?) of the Martlet Is were from the French order that the British took over.

Martlet Is don't have the performance to be effective in the BoB, and there certainly wasn't enough of them.

The first production F4F-3 had its first flight in February 1940. The second production F4F-3 in July 1940. It would seem that there was a hold up in deliveries of the 2 stage R-1830.

 

[Shortround6]

. BTW I would have thought the first issue to be confronted was to get your planes in the air, where were Thatch and his gunnery experts at Pearl Harbor, where was the radar warning and trained equipped forces

They were in San Diego, 2600 miles away. yep, the Americans screwed up the early warning, but whatever mistakes the Americans made ( many) doesn't mean the British get a pass for mistakes they made.

The first production F4F-3 had its first flight in February 1940. The second production F4F-3 in July 1940. It would seem that there was a hold up in deliveries of the 2 stage R-1830.

You are right, to go further as of Dec 31st 1940 there were only 22 F4F-3s delivered, I believe without self sealing tanks or much in the way of armor.
Early F4F-3s had -76 engines, later planes got -86 engines.

Production of Grumman fighters in 1941 was a whopping 323 aircraft, 107 of them were F4F-3s, 65 were F4F-3As (same engine as Martlet II) and 5 were F4F-4s, the rest were Martlets of some sort or origin. Actually this number doesn't add up to some other numbers but the number of F4F-3s available in 1941 is not all that great.

Getting to a hypothetical of a large number of F4F-3s in July/Aug of 1940 you also need the later .50 cal guns.

Earlier a proposal was made for lighting the F4F-3 which had one rather iffy proposal.
It was suggested to only fill the tanks with 75 gallons of fuel, While the f4F-3 with protected tanks would hold 147 gallons there is a problem.
1. these are US gallons, You are down to about 62.5 Imp gallons which is going to mean very low endurance indeed compared to a Hurricane or Spitfire.

 

[nuuumannn]

too bad soaringtractor got banned, he was hilarious.

Agree!!!

In October 1940, the British had received 81 Martlets, presumably all Martlet Is, because the first production Martlet II (with 2 speed single stage R-1830) had its first flight earlier that month. And many (all?) of the Martlet Is were from the French order that the British took over.

Yup, all French, converted for use by the British on the Grumman production line. Had to have their throttles reversed and fitting of British equipment and armament. The FAA ordered them through the British and French Purchasing Commissions in the USA, who instructed that the order go to Britain. The FAA ordered these aircraft as stop gaps. There's no way that the RAF would have ordered them, being a carrier based fighter, but if it had them, it wouldn't have left them doing nothing; the likelihood is that they would have been sent to the Far East, or North Africa or such like.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Pre WW2 how many people had even driven a car let alone knew how they worked?

In the US and to a lesser extent, Canada, Australia and Germany, many. In the rest of the world, not so many. The US generation that fought WWII grew up between wars driving and tinkering on cars, trucks, tractors, and for some, even airplanes. The vast expanse of the country demanded mechanical transportation, and the thin population density precluded profitably serving everywhere by rail. And nationalized rail, a la Europe, forget it!
You could call it "mechanical advantage". Even destitute poor folk like the Joads in Grapes of Wrath could find a way to acquire an ancient Model T Ford (converted to a pickup truck) in which to make their exodus to California, stopping along the way to grind the valves and fashion new head gaskets out of scrounged materials. This fostered a level of mechanical and operational experience and ingenuity on a broad scale that manifested itself in Construction Battalions, engine rooms, aircraft and tank maintenance shops, and a ready adaptability to aerial, mechanized, and naval warfare on a scale unmatched in the world.
There, chest thumping accomplished. Ready to receive counterfire.

 

[muskeg13]

Not only was there more of a native mechanical advantage borne of more auto use and having to make things work, outside of the few major cities, most boys began shooting at a very early age. Growing up in the sparse times of the Great Depression, every shot counted, so basic marksmanship skills were expected.

Someone mentioned Dick Bong, America's Ace of Aces several posts back. Bong grew up on a midwestern farm working with farm equipment and was proficient in small arms shooting. However, rifle shooting and deflection shots in a high speed P-38 were something else. Bong admitted his aerial marksmanship was subpar, but made up for it with his flight skills. When asked how he managed so many kills while claiming to be a bad shot, he explained that he flew his P-38 right at opponents until his nose was almost in their cockpits before he let loose, giving no chance for misses.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Not only was there an innate mechanical advantage borne of having to make things work, outside of the few major cities, most boys began shooting at a very early age. Growing up in the sparse times of the Great Depression, every shot counted, so basic marksmanship skills were expected.

And a lot of that skill was from shooting birds. Excellent prep for aerial gunnery and pulling lead on a moving target. Have you ever seen the training they had for aerial gunners? A stake body truck with a shooting platform on the back that drove around a circular track with skeet houses every fifty yards or so with their launchers aimed at different angles, and the student gunner popping pigeons with a semiautomatic shotgun. After that, they get to do it again with another truck mounting a power turret with a .30 cal shooting special short range ammo.
I think fighter pilots could have used a little of that too. Teaching "gunnery by eye" rather than gunnery by tables and calculations. It's got to become reflexive so it's less taxing on an already overloaded nugget brain.

 

[yulzari]

One aspect of the turret fighter thinking was that a gunner firing from a 'relatively' stable platform over a longer firing period was far more likely to land his rounds onto a bomber than a fighter pilot jockeying between pointing the aeroplane around the sky whilst attempting to point it accurately at a point in the sky which would have the target fly into it all whilst he is travelling at 300 mph and the bomber flying in a different direction (all in 3 axes) at 200 mph. Had the bombers not come from France with fighter escorts and not Germany without it could well have been useful. It was when used as night fighters. Defiants had a good track record when they actually got within visual range.

However, I do not want to divert this thread into a turret fighter thread. Just to contrast the singe seat fighter aiming task with a dedicated gunner task.

 

[buffnut453]

They were in San Diego, 2600 miles away. yep, the Americans screwed up the early warning, but whatever mistakes the Americans made ( many) doesn't mean the British get a pass for mistakes they made.

It's not a question of the Brits getting a pass. My frustration is the rather binary approach that some are taking regarding this sub-thread discussion. Some very bald statements about RAF pilots having "zero" air gunnery training, coupled with continued use of spread gun alignment into the BoB are patently untrue. The RAF did train in air-to-air gunnery in the 1930s and re-emphasized it starting in August 1940. There was a period where ab initio pilots coming through the flying training system lacked basic air gunnery skills but this was primarily due to the greater strategic need to keep front-line fighter squadrons at full strength, even if the new arrivals had to learn on-the-job.

It must also be remembered that, from May 1940 onwards, the RAF found itself in a position that nobody (repeat NOBODY) expected, with Britain's key ally, France, having surrendered and German fighter aircraft operating from airfields within reach of the UK. I suspect the hiatus in air gunnery training aligns quite well with the period May-September 1940 when the RAF desperately needed pilots, resulting in the drastic cuts made to the training schedule.

It's been suggested that RAF squadrons in rear areas weren't doing anything to improve gunnery skills. I have no idea whether that's a valid criticism or not, although it seems pretty clear that all of those units were put in the rear to integrate new pilots, re-equip and train ready to go back into the front lines. It would therefore seem obvious that squadron and flight commanders would take time to train new pilots in the skills they needed to survive and contribute to the squadron's effectiveness. That has to include, in some measure, air-to-air gunnery. To suggest that operationally experienced leaders directly tasked with recuperating their squadron would simply let new pilots go into combat without any sharing of operational experience is nonsense, as many contemporary testimonies and unit record books attest.

Thach was one of the supreme fighter tacticians of his age. However, he had the benefit of time to train his squadron in gunnery techniques that proved valuable and relevant. Others, who suggested that modern fighter engagements with closing speeds in excess of 600 mph would make accurate aiming impossible, were patently wrong. However, the inaccuracy of that perspective became abundantly clear very early in the fighting. By the BoB, the RAF was harmonizing its guns on a single point. Yes, some pilots opened fire at overly-long ranges but we'd need to understand the tactical situation to see whether that was valid. If you're tasked to bring down the bombers but are about to be hit by the escorting enemy fighters, some pilots may have thought it better to have a quick squirt at range in hopes of hitting something rather than trying to close to a better range and risk being shot down by the escorts. I'm not going to second-guess those kind of split-second tactical decisions. Not every squadron commander was a Thach...even within the USN.

Was RAF gunnery training non-existent? Patently not. Did individual squadron commanders strive to enhance the operational effectiveness of their units, to include gunnery training? Yes. Could RAF gunnery training have been improved? Possibly. However, the strategic and operational situation in the summer of 1940 led to cuts in training hours because, at the time, people didn't know how long the BoB would last. Reducing training may seem callous to some while, to others it was "stupid". From what I've seen, Dowding and Park had a very clear understanding of how to conduct defensive fighter operations and the operational and strategic imperatives.

This whole sub-thread discussion reminds me of the 3 parameters of capability deliver (fast, good and cheap), with the recognition that you can only ever have 2 of those 3 factors. Ideally, in the summer of 1940, the RAF would have emphasized good training but the strategic situation demanded the provision of new pilots quickly. To get good pilots fast is hard, and the training system was already at breaking point.

 

[buffnut453]

In the US and to a lesser extent, Canada, Australia and Germany, many. In the rest of the world, not so many. The US generation that fought WWII grew up between wars driving and tinkering on cars, trucks, tractors, and for some, even airplanes. The vast expanse of the country demanded mechanical transportation, and the thin population density precluded profitably serving everywhere by rail. And nationalized rail, a la Europe, forget it!
You could call it "mechanical advantage". Even destitute poor folk like the Joads in Grapes of Wrath could find a way to acquire an ancient Model T Ford (converted to a pickup truck) in which to make their exodus to California, stopping along the way to grind the valves and fashion new head gaskets out of scrounged materials. This fostered a level of mechanical and operational experience and ingenuity on a broad scale that manifested itself in Construction Battalions, engine rooms, aircraft and tank maintenance shops, and a ready adaptability to aerial, mechanized, and naval warfare on a scale unmatched in the world.
There, chest thumping accomplished. Ready to receive counterfire.

So many things to pick apart in this post.

Firstly, I just don't buy the extent of this delta between America and the rest of the developed world regarding technical proficiency and awareness. The British Army in 1940 was the most mechanised army in the world, certainly far more so than Germany's. Such technical knowledge was not simply trained "on the job" by the British military. You need to bear in mind that, certainly for the UK, a great many men were already employed in technical trades in the 1930s, some of which were a legacy from the First World War. For example, the RAF in late-1918 comprised about 300,000 men and more than 22,000 aircraft, having started with less than 5 squadrons' worth in 1914. A great many ex-servicemen were technically-proficient and went back into technical jobs during the inter-war years (and went on to raise sons who expected to work in technical positions). During WW2, the RAF grew in size to almost 1,000,000 men. You simply can't reach that scale by taking a country bumpkin who can barely read and trying to teach him about internal combustion engines.

For all your criticism of rail, it was still the primary cross-country means of transportation in America. Also, there were no (none, ZERO) entirely nationalized rail services in Europe (or the UK) in the 1930s. The closest was France where the state owned 51% of the main rail company.

IMHO the key advantages the US had over countries in Europe was the size of its population, under-utilized land, and the latent production capacity that still existed following the Great Depression which combined to enable massive growth on a scale that individual European nations simply couldn't match.

 

[MycroftHolmes]

You might also explain how the Germans lost 1,187* aircraft during the Battle of Britain

My copy of BoBTaN gives 1887 German losses in the summary table at the back of the book, but the table is inaccurate. If you go through the day-by-day listings the total comes to 1990 losses, and there were quite a few other losses that never found their way into the official loss-lists, as we know from Ultra intercepts, contemporary records (eg diaries) and the reports of the RAF crash-investigation teams.

It's clear that Luftwaffe units could get replacement planes without reporting their losses, whereas the RAF could not, though that would have changed had Park got his way. At a conference during the BoB he suggested that squadrons be allowed to get replacement a/c directly from the Maintenance Units - in other words the same system that obtained in the Luftwaffe - but his proposal was rejected.

 

[stona]

My copy of BoBTaN gives 1887 German losses in the summary table at the back of the book,

So does mine (p707), that is a typo on my part.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

For all your criticism of rail, it was still the primary cross-country means of transportation in America.

Not contesting that point; it was the backbone of long distance transportation. It just didn't (and couldn't) reach into every small farming and light industry community, necessitating development and growth of a trucking industry. Ironically, this has in the long run led to the decline of railroads in the US.

 

[pbehn]

They were in San Diego, 2600 miles away. yep, the Americans screwed up the early warning, but whatever mistakes the Americans made ( many) doesn't mean the British get a pass for mistakes they made.

.

In terms of the discussion, what is a "mistake". To replace pilot losses at the height of the BoB with pilots who have 200 hours on type and 25 hours of gunnery training you need to start expanding your training schools long before war is declared and send many front line pilots and planes into those schools? Did "Thatch" instigate such a programme or anyone else in the USA? The Battle of Britain was a battle of attrition. The aim of the LW was to destroy the RAF and the aim of the RAF was to destroy so many LW bombers and crews that they gave up. The whole "thing" for the LW was to destroy RAF fighters with pilots quicker than they could be replaced, if you take out the experienced and elite then the new to theatre combatants are easy meat, this is the same in all theatres of warfare. I can accept any discussion of poor training, or lack of training or lack of focus on marksmanship and poor marksmanship. What I cannot accept is that there was no training, that no one cared about lack of training or poor marksmanship and I will not accept that the RAF hit nothing. The "helpful" suggestion that RAF pilots in the BoB should be told to aim for the engines, fuel, or crew compartment is an insult to the intelligence, some of them were aces and they were actually winning in the battle from its start to its end. There is no doubt that the US had an excellent pilot training programme in place by 1943 but its pilots were finishing their training in UK and they had to postpone their Bombing strategy for a long time to achieve it. In the adoration of Thatch I am surprised this wasn't mentioned. Similarly with such brilliant training and marksmanship in US forces they would surely have swept the LW out of Africa in weeks? Why didnt they? I am a great admirer of John S Thatch and all he did, until someone tries to portray everyone else in the world at the time as an imbecile.

 

[Shortround6]

The US may have had a similar problem to the British. O'Hare in the spring of 1942 had four years of Naval collage, two years service on a battleship, flight training and almost two years as a pilot with VF-3. And yet he was a section leader or flight leader, not a squadron leader.
The US Navy pilots of the first half of 1942 were mostly long service career pilots/officers. It is not surprising they did very well in combat even in theri first battles. However the US (especially the army) was rapidly expanding and there may have been a dip in the quality later in 1942 and into 1943. Thach was pulled as squadron commander to be an instructor right after Midway. He was not the only one.

The huge expansion of the RAF in late 30s meant that very few squadrons (if any) had a high proportion of high time pilots and as soon as they seemed to get a squadron up to snuff (even before the shooting started) a number of pilots would get transferred to a new squadron to provide a cadre while low time pilots replaced them. This is pretty much standard for any organization under going a large rapid expansion. SO yes it is unfair to compare average BoB pilots to the US Navy pilots of early 1942.

In defence of the US the US did not pursue such idiotic schemes as the turret fighter and the "No allowance" armament schemes. Perhaps the british were devoting a large amount of time and effort into gunnery training, but in 1937-1940 it sure seems like they were also spending a lot of time and effort on schemes that would minimise the need for good gunnery training.

Perhaps the RAF could handle doing both at the same time, perhaps not. However with such divergent views there may have been several 'camps' officers could fall into which might have affected the overall training programs.

The US units showing up in Britain at the end of 1942 and during 1943 were also part of huge expansion and not the long term pilots of early 1942. It is little wonder that they needed a fair amount of polishing before being used in combat. Air to air gunnery is only part of the equation, teamwork and combat tactics also need work.

I personally think that trying to aim at cockpits is rather foolish as they are a rather small target. The only possible advantage is that it might force the pilot doing so to get in closer than he would otherwise and if he misses on a twin engine plane the bomb bay is right behind, the wing roots are full of fuel tanks, the engine nacelles are only a little further out and often the wing just outboard engines have fuel or oil tanks (the Bf 110 had the radiators just outboard of the engines) giving a rather large area of vulnerable parts.
The German bombers were hardly bullet proof in any case. The sheet metal on the fuselage and wings isn't going to offer any better protection than the canopy material.

 

[pbehn]

In retrospect a turret fighter is foolish but no one knew the war that would be fought, against unescorted bombers it may have worked. It is all very well to discuss when US pilots started operations in 1942 and into 1943, that is two to three years after the time we were talking about 1940 and the Battle of Britain, there was an age in conflict passed between the BoB and the US formal entry into the war, the war was going on and the USA could spend 18 months training and preparing and not losing any of its best to anything other than accidents.