Rickt asked me to post this on his behalf:
Did the TA-152 see combat in WWII? Yes, and I think I was misunderstood of someone believed I argued otherwise. The text buffer online isn't the greatest media for such things. However, should one consider it a WWII fighter? I would say no. Students of the air war over Europe 1939-45 have to be struck by the massive size of the effort. So when judging an aircraft's role in the war I think that "quantity changes quality." The post notes that the first combat sortie of the TA152 was in March of 1945.
I trust that folks understand that by that date the Luftwaffe was falling apart physically and psychologically - as was the German war effort in general (the collapse of the Wehrmacht in March stunned Ike and precipitated the "drive to Berlin" controversy inside US-Anglo command).
So, sure a few AIRCRAFT made it to the front and I don't doubt the pilots liked them when they weren't thinking about the prospect of being the last man to die for Goering. (In the West, it was a very rare fighter that SAW a German opponent in 1945: outside of Kamikaze action and a few weeks in the PI, much the same was true in the Pacific.) If there were ever more than 50
in the air on the same day I would be amazed. My sources don't give precise numbers (hard to come by when considering the LW in the war's twilight catastrophe) but imply a few dozen delivered to squadron. Also when looking at German efforts it is very important to make a clear distinction between production and actual operational deployment. German factories proved remarkably successful at "going through the motions" until very late in the war, even if the product they delivered was not fully complete - a problem that plagued the TA152 among other late war efforts. As far as the TA152 goes, allow me to quote from the _Warplanes of the Luftwaffe_ (ed. David Donald, but written by the contributors to the splendid English periodical, "World Airpower Journal"): "It is hard to regard the Ta 152 as anything but a waste of time and resources and another distraction from the Luftwaffe's main aim of trying to stem the allied advance." So if a few dozen planes made it to the front and fired their guns, the TA 152 was a WWII fighter.
However in a world where combat importance was measured in THOUSANDS of aircraft, I'd have to say that the TA 152 was a very undistinguished footnote. I doubt that the good old Nazi Kurt Tank was able to make much use of the knowledge acquired when he fled to Argentina after the war. Aces High surely has more TA 152 jockies than the Luftwaffe.
There are a few other AH aircraft that don't deserve to be there if history matters. The F4U-C was deployed to two Marine squadrons flying out of Okinawa in the spring of 1945, right at the tail end of the Kamikaze effort. So they got to fire their guns during the war and thus are in AH. (Our folks do like their cannon.) In terms of numbers, we are again looking a couple of dozen in the air - a joke during WWII. The LA7 also got into
the war - barely. A few Guards squadrons got it in spring of 45 in Europe and it was used during Stalin's blitz of Manchuria in the summer. The Yak and LA5 were the workhorses of the Red Air Force in the last two years of the war. The 205 was indeed deployed in 1943 in very small numbers. However, most of the aircraft produced ended up flying for the ALLIED Italian government that was in theory an Associated Power (not an ally) in the Western alliance against Hitler. (It was the 202 that earned the respect of allied pilots in the Med.) Obviously some big names in the war are missing. Not sure how many AH loyalists would up a P39 but they were produced in large numbers. The La3 wouldn't get a lot of fans. There are other duds not available and I can't fault HT for that: do we really nead a Gladiator? (I would like to see the Oscar, however. It would murder Hurricanes.) Some aren't there, I think, because they'd be too popular. The Ki-84 Hayate (another Typhoon) equipped several squadrons and nearly 3,000 were produced in 1944-45. The Mitsubishi JM2 Raiden (another Thunderbolt) was also a real plane with 500 or so delivered in late 44-early 1945. The
US made P63 "King Cobra" didn't serve in US forces because it shared the P39s miserable range, but a couple of thousand went to the USSR and I'm sure there were some happy Red fighter jocks. The Spitfire 16 was a nasty number and was a front line plane by war's end. My guess is that none of these planes are employed in AH because performance means everything and
operational considerations are secondary. Thus, all of the buggies mentioned would have to be heavily perked, even though they were real fighters. (Look at the Tempest and Spit14: both were front line aircraft by late 1944 but fit AH like a glove so they're heavily perked. The LA7, which has a much more modest claim to be a WWII aircraft isn't because of poor high altitude performance.) Anyway, enough trivia for the day.
Eric Bergerud (rickt)
