Quote:
Originally Posted by tabs
The German fighter pilots thought the P-38 was a sitting duck for them, knocking them down with regularity. Heinz Bar in paticular liked the P-38. That is why they were not used in great quanity in the ETO...read Horrido by Trevor and Constable...
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The P-38s
IMMEDIATELY brought US heavy bomber losses down to sustainable levels. That's from mission 1. From the very first mission that P-38s escorted US bombers to the target at no point did US bomber losses ever cross into unsustainable territory ever again. And that's with no work ups, no war gaming, no dedicated escort doctrine and a LOUSY twin engine fighter training program.
The Lighting and it's pilots for all intents and purposes were just thrown into the game with no preparation whatsoever and virtually no exprience at all in those sorts of high altitude operational conditions.
And sometimes those P-38s were fighting deep inside Germany while outnumbered
10:1 or more against the cream of the crop of the
early war Luftwaffe.
All they did was get the job done.
The USAAF did everything it could to make the P-38 seem unsuitable because admitting they had a plane from DAY ONE of the air war in the ETO that could have escorted our bombers all the way to Berlin and back was simply not going to happen. Too many careers at stake, too many questions to answer about how they let thousands of our boys die needlessly in unescorted raids to prove their beloved mantra of "the bomber will always get through."
The early models (F/G/H) had some severe limitations but these were all fixed in the J models with the dive brakes and powered aileron boosters, and with the introduction of heated flight suits (SEVERE frost bite was a very real problem in the early birds).
A P38J could outturn and (hugely) out climb a P51D mustang, match it in a dive, and had far more effective firepower, no engine torque turning/gunnery issues due to it's contra-rotating props, and comparable range. It also offered twin engine reliability as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tabs
In the Pacific it was a different story..the P-38 had range, speed, firepower and was up against a more obslecent fighter plane....Bong and McGuire ran up quiet a few kills using the P-38.
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P-38s were extremely succesful flying in the Med vs the Luftwaffe and the Italians. Their exploits at The Battle of the Bismarck Sea in particular are the stuff of legend.
As far as the Japanese having obsolete fighters, i don't think a Fw190 or Me109 pilot would -ever- want to get into a turning fight with a Zero, and the Frank was as good a fighter plane as any piston engined German fighter, if not better.
The Frank could even intercept B-29s at operational altitude, something that the Fw190d and Me109 would have been very hard pressed to do.
The P-38J/L were phenomenal aircraft (the L could carry the same bombload as an early war B-17 Flying Fortress!), and the cancelled P-38K(not put into production because it would have meant shutting down the line for 2 weeks to do some minor retooling- which shows you just how important the plane really was) would have been even better.
The P-38 did have it's flaws though, mainly in the area of the cockpit and ergonomics, which were reportedly just not good compared to say, the Mustang.