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Subject: Best All-Around Fighter of World War II
sentinel28a    10/13/2009 3:38:03 PM
Let's try a non-controversial topic, shall we? (Heh heh.) I'll submit the P-51 for consideration. BW and FS, if you come on here and say that the Rafale was the best fighter of WWII, I am going to fly over to France and personally beat you senseless with Obama's ego. (However, feel free to talk about the D.520.)
 
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earlm       5/12/2011 9:52:05 AM
The 190 struggled above 20,000 feet.  Below that it was a contender.  With a high altitude engine it could be #1.
 
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1967250s    Best?   5/13/2011 6:05:34 AM
I'll toss in a new one here--Hawker Tempest. 2400 HP supercharged 24 cylinder engine. 400+ Mph. 4x 20 cannon
Shot down more V1's due to it's fantastic speed than any othe fighter- I believe over 600? AA got most of the rest.
It  had a great big wing and could fight with any fighter. Britain's last piston fighter, albeit with a radial as the Fury., flew with lots of AF's, too.
   51's and 47's, F4U's, all had their strong points. It all depends on how they are fought. The reason the German aces ran up their scores so high was they knew what they could do with their planes, and what not to do. I also remember somewhere that F-6's shot down more planes?
   I keep wondering, too, what the P-38 would have been like with some Merlins on it, instead of Allisons.
Thoughts?  
   http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/6-64012/aolemb://2CC8FDA3-E5FB-49FE-9ABD-38386F00E065/carlopics2009%20(1283).jpg" width="480" border="0" />    
 
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earlm       5/13/2011 7:16:35 PM
You can look up the Merlin powered P-38.  I don't recall how it compares to the Allison version.  There was a proposal for a P-38 with two R2800 engines.  That's 5600HP.
 
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Aussiegunneragain       5/13/2011 11:23:11 PM

Don't be a stick in the mud bergegol, this is way more fun than uniformed arguments about modern fighters! At least discussions on historical aircraft can be based on unclassified historical data, rather than on assertions of people who frankly aren't in a position to know shit about the topic.

 
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Aussiegunneragain       5/13/2011 11:37:46 PM
Earl,
 
The radial engined Fw-190A's did have decreasing performance over 20,000 feet reletive to contemporary fighters but the Fw-190D9 with it's inverted V matched it with the best at altitude. The definative Ta-152 could frankly hand any piston engined type at the time it's ass. Thank goodness it came to little, to late to make much of a difference - Cargyill suggests that if the Germans hadn't wasted so many resources on pie in the sky projects and focussed on getting the Ta-152 into service, the Bomber offensive might have been so stinted that the course of the war might have been altered.
 
However, I would note that prior to late 1943 when the Mustang escorted bomber threat materialised the A series performed most of it's missions below 20,000 feet and had compensating features that allowed it to neutralise it's  disadvantage at higher altitudes. Caygill relates how during the Dieppe raid the Fw-190A's excellent time to height combined with radar warning of incoming Spitfires Mk V's flying top cover at 25,000 feet, allowed them to get to 28,000 feet with time to spare and attack from the advantage of height. They fought the Spits down to an altitude that suited them better and defeated them.
 
Really, when you are talking about "the best" I think you have to look at the entire capability package plus when it came into service. For example, I consider the Mustang from the B on to be the other contender for the best. Comparing it to the Fw-190 it had much better range and until the advent of the D-9 in Autumn of 1944, altitude performance as well. However, the Fw-190's radial was less vulnerable to damage making it a better ground attacker and it entered service a full two years before the P-51B. Double the amount of wartime service has to count for something and I reckon it tips the balance in favour of the Fw-190! I would also note that even when the P-51B and C did enter service it had a lot of handling and mechanical problems which were only resolved fully in the D model, while the Fw-190's mechanical problems had been solved long before.
 
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Aussiegunneragain       5/13/2011 11:46:08 PM

I'll toss in a new one here--Hawker Tempest. 2400 HP supercharged 24 cylinder engine. 400+ Mph. 4x 20 cannon

Shot down more V1's due to it's fantastic speed than any othe fighter- I believe over 600? AA got most of the rest.

It  had a great big wing and could fight with any fighter. Britain's last piston fighter, albeit with a radial as the Fury., flew with lots of AF's, too.

   51's and 47's, F4U's, all had their strong points. It all depends on how they are fought. The reason the German aces ran up their scores so high was they knew what they could do with their planes, and what not to do. I also remember somewhere that F-6's shot down more planes?

   I keep wondering, too, what the P-38 would have been like with some Merlins on it, instead of Allisons.

Thoughts?  

   http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/6-64012/aolemb://2CC8FDA3-E5FB-49FE-9ABD-38386F00E065/carlopics2009%20(1283).jpg" width="480" height="329" />    


The Tempest rocked but it only came into service in 1944 as a derivative of the troublesome but ultimately useful Typhoon, so I don't think it can count. It's a shame that they couldn't get the Mk-1 up and running though, that would have been a real match for the Ta-152! Here is a site dedicated to the Tempest which I think is very good.
> />
I'm sure that Merlins or R-2800's would have made the P-38 more competitive, but at the end of the day the inherant limitations of "bomber destroyer" types in terms of a minimum standard of agility, along with the expense of the type, in my opinion would exclude it from the running.
 
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burjegol       5/13/2011 11:54:03 PM

Don't be a stick in the mud bergegol, this is way more fun than uniformed arguments about modern fighters! At least discussions on historical aircraft can be based on unclassified historical data, rather than on assertions of people who frankly aren't in a position to know shit about the topic.


man, the people you're saying that were not in a position to know shit in this topic were pilots themselves of the 4 FG and the 56 FG.
This discussion were never ever settled ever since. what can we say then? we are in the knowledge? chairborne dogfighters? 
People looked down upon the P-40s. but, in the hands of a good pilot, that shark nosed plane can out-turn a zero. Many say that the P-38s were cumbersome and not suited for dogfighting. That same lightning can make a spitfire pilot realize its own mortality. And not to say that Bong and McGuire were using the P-38s. Many said that the 7 ton milk bottle is not suited below 15,000 ft. Ask Dom Gentile about that, or the polish pilot who borrowed Johnson's plane and was found by his squadron mates on the deck, matching the FW 190 turn for turn trying to run him out of gas over his own base, as the jug's guns had jammed. Nor Johnson, who in a mock dogfight with a spit over the skies of England, out-manuevered the nimble spit and was able to come to a firing position. and by the way, R.S. Johnson was never trained as a combat fighter pilot. He was trained as a bomber pilot. He failed his aerial gunnery test, but emerged as the second highest US pilot in aerial kills in ETO. Was he considered to be a good stick? And Francis Gabreski with 31 kills, also of the famed 56 FG was piloting a jug.
Now, for the f4us, ask Boyington how his blacksheep squadron handled the zeros of the IJN. Nor ask Campbell on how he downed 9 zekes in a single sortie over the skies of Luzon flying the f6f hellcat. 
The brewster buffalo, in the early wars in the pacific, the pilot is already considered lost upon taking off in one when tangling with zekes. but amazingly, in finland, it performed well. the p-39 airacobra was considered meat on the table by the IJN, but it was well liked by the ruskies.
Now the p-51's only edge against all these fighters was only that it could bring the fight to the enemy. It has an outstanding range! Meaning, it can reach out far inside enemy territory and dogfight the adversary, mostly novice pilots being guided by on or two expert LW pilots. But on the early stages of the air war in ETO, it was the novice p-38s and p-47s pilots who slugged it out against the best LW pilots, the yellow noses of Abbevile (JG 26) in their FW 190s and Me 109s and pushed them back toward their border in Germany. The allied pilots wrestled the aerial superiority from the Germans over the skies of France, Belgium and Holland and later, when the Mustangs came in greater numbers, also over the skies of Germany.
So, what is the best all around fighter of WW 2? I'd say, all of the above. http://www.strategypage.com/CuteSoft_Client/CuteEditor/Images/emteeth.gif" align="absmiddle" border="0" alt="" />.
 
Tally Ho!
 
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Aussiegunneragain       5/14/2011 12:15:57 AM
Burjegol, I have re-read my previous post and I think I may have been a little ambiguous. I was talking about people not knowing shit during these debates about the Rafale and F-22 and whatever else, because so much data is classified. Therefore I see informed discussion on historical aircraft as being far more feasable and interesting.
 
As for your broader assessment that every US aircraft of the war is the best, including that a well flown P-40 could out turn a Zero, let's just say that I admire your patriotism ... http://www.strategypage.com/CuteSoft_Client/CuteEditor/Images/emwink.gif" alt="" />.
 
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burjegol       5/14/2011 12:22:36 AM

Burjegol, I have re-read my previous post and I think I may have been a little ambiguous. I was talking about people not knowing shit during these debates about the Rafale and F-22 and whatever else, because so much data is classified. Therefore I see informed discussion on historical aircraft as being far more feasable and interesting.

 

As for your broader assessment that every US aircraft of the war is the best, including that a well flown P-40 could out turn a Zero, let's just say that I admire your patriotism ... http://www.strategypage.com/CuteSoft_Client/CuteEditor/Images/emwink.gif" alt="" align="absMiddle" border="0" />.

Check six aussie. remember, t'was the lowly p-40s who stood between the japs and the mainland aussie, combating them over the owen stanley mountains. John Landers in his "big doll" learned it the hard way.
And methink twas also in this mountains where Neal Kearby bought a farm in his jug.
 
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Aussiegunneragain       5/14/2011 12:35:01 AM

Check six aussie. remember, t'was the lowly p-40s who stood between the japs and the mainland aussie, combating them over the owen stanley mountains. John Landers in his "big doll" learned it the hard way.

And methink twas also in this mountains where Neal Kearby bought a farm in his jug.


I never said that the P-40 couldn't defeat a Zero and make a useful contribution to the War, it clearly did. What I was contesting was your assertion that it could outturn the Zero, which is wrong. The P-40's made their contribution in the Pacific and in China by using their superior dive speed and ability to absorb punishment to make hit and run attacks on more agile but slower diving and more fragile Japanese fighters. The likes of Chenault absolutely reinforced that his pilots shouldn't attempt to turn with the Japanese.
 
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