Considering the number of aircrews and planes (if you pretend that the 1945 USAAF was engaging modern day USAF, as opposed to say a 1942 or 1943 Vs 2009 scenario, then I would get every available WW2 plane into the air in one monumental mass raid (who cares what the target is!).

 

I reckon this alone would saturate the skies and make it too hazardous for modern jet fighters to fly at high speeds and would possible give rise to a few of the modern era jets falling prey to the old timers. Some, but not many.

 

One big happy flying circus.

I suspect there might be a problem the first day of the war with morale, when the first 1000 bomber raid is intercepted as it stacks over its own bases and is ripped to shreds, and any survivors find themselves picking their way between cluster bomblets and craters.

 

The 1995 USAF would have a massive C3I advantage and total air dominance. I don't think they'd be waiting for a strike to come to them.

 

Ian

 

 

Not correct about the P-51 ver...

UsaJoe is perfectly correct- the Mustang could not *intercept* a 262 - if it caught one loitering in a low energy state, unawares, of course it could engage - but it didn't have the speed to catch one or stop one at altitude and speed.

 

Most 262's shot down were taken as they landed or taxied, they were too quick otherwise. F15's would enjoy very similar advantages, coupled with much better situational awareness (Access to JTIDS, JSTARS, their own quite good radar system etc)

 

In the main, I think a rapid, aggressive and concentrated offensive on day 1 would be so overwhelming that the 1945 guys would really hesitate to get into the cockpit. I suspect they'd be worried about getting into the *briefing* room.

 

Ian

 

 

Quite correct except for three things.

I guess with a fuller reply to the original request as to what my plan would be - well, assuming I get to use Jstars, Prowlers and what not, I'd tracking the bombers being formed up on the ground, and have full oversight of the airfields. I'd know what they were doing the whole way, and I'd even more than likely be able to track individual cars returning from local pubs come closing time.

 

That's a very powerful advantage, magnified by the fact that I can deny use of radio communications and radar to the enemy, and totally refuse any attempts to perform aerial reconnaissance of my own areas. 

 

I could go on but I think it's pretty obvious that those advantages mean I can pick my moments, and kill a lot of the enemy bomber force on the ground as they load up - it took a fair while to form up a bomber group, and those preparations would be very visible to Jstars.  Anything that made it off the ground wouldn't have any fighter escort because I could challenge those fighters over their own bases and mission kill them by making them drop any external tanks. They'd likely be returning to bases that were still burning anyway.

 It'd be incredibly ugly, put it that way. I don't think that the 1945 guy would have any chance of bringing those numbers to bear.

 

Ian

 

No doubt that modern side would have a huge advantage. if you exclude airfield attack its virtualy impossible to destroy their plane. modern plane can evade at all time due to speed and altitude advantage.

 

But number still give a non negligible opportunity to  WW2 side.  Large and dense formation would make so much Radar/IR noise that missile may not be able to lock on a individual target. And unlike what you see in independce day movie, its a very bad idea to launch 200 missiles at the same time. its just like if every missile would have 199 radar/IR decoy all around them.

 

AWAC would have no problem to locate big formation, but they cant track more then 900 plane. and even if they could, AWAC crew would have a some problem to dispatch individual target.

 

 

 

 

If i was a wing commender on the modern side, what i would do is:

 

I would spread my wing at high altitude over the enemy formation. From that angle enemy plane more spread, radar would have less problem to target individual plane. burning plane that are crashing are also less likly to disturb missile from that angle.

 

I would not border targeting particular plane, it would be difficult to do because every sqKm would have 20+ targets, and that look bad on a 12inch radar display. My wing would fire IR missiles first on target away from each other, then i would fire my sparrow, again, on target away from each other.  Why IR first? because if i lunch them after the radar one they have good chance to lock on burning or crashing plane. 

 

When all missiles would have been fired, all plane would dive and try to shoot down bomber using their canon.

F-15 have a m61 vulcan with 960 round, with a rate of fire of 6000rpm, many round would be waisted. but each plane could probably take out about 6 bomber. some f-15 are likely to go down to due to the huge cluster f**k.

 

Anyone have a plan for the WW2 side?

 

 

If a fulcrum can destroy a small uav with their missiles it is very possible to a sidewinder destroy a piston aircraft.

 

The computer controlled modern guns have much longer range than any WWII air-to-air weapon, the f-15  and f-16  could always get the best positions and would shoot before the piston aircraft even try maneuver to evade the rounds.

and while old planes were armored, modern ones are much larger and have very strong struture so they may also stand a lot of punishment from .50 or even 20mm cannons.

 

If evething goes wrong you can try to pass at higth supersonic speeds close to them, it works with helicopters at least.

projection

persistence

performance

precision

deterrence

deception

disruption

detection

political will and intent

who ever has the majority of any of those and can dictate the fight wins

again there seems to be a focus on platforms when what we're looking at is a capability focused red force with a scintilla of effective battlespace comms fighting a systems based force with comms and sensor dominance.

the jets don't even have to fight, they can go in and bait piston aircraft because of the feeds from their own sensors, or worse (from a 1945 perspective) - the E3 Sentrys.  The E3's have a minimum publicly declared 450km sensor range (IOW its greater) - so they can vector in and out whatever assets they want.  They can refuel and stay up longer than the pistons, they can resupply faster and with greater regularity and persistence.  Starlifters and Galaxys vs DC3's?

Any of the modern jets in 1991 USAF can look down at altitude and dictate when and where they want to engage.  They can force the pistons to change the way that they have to do battle without changing or compromising their own strengths.

The modern force can go in and strike the logistics arms and strangle the opfor whenever they want because they can drop ord with better CEP whenever they basically choose - and can go up and fight in wider weather conditions.

Trust me, when the runways light up with cluster bombs, and planes start falling out of the sky onto the same runways, it'll be a short war. Planning fights based on the capability of the various aircraft is about as relevant as comparisons between the USAF and the Iraqi fighters were in either gulf war - they're not going to launch.

As to comms, I'm absolutely sure a Prowler or Raven could shut down comms over most of Northern Europe from over the channel- they've got a lot of power to throw at the problem. In any event, ship to ship chatter in the formation isn't going to be relevant - they won't know where they're going (no recon), can't find it (poor navigation) and won't get close to the target (high possibility of interception)

The actual aircraft aren't as important as the mismatch in intelligence capabilities - and those bomber crews will simply refuse to fight if they start taking 90+% casualties before they make the channel. 

Ian