Possibly the best pilot of the war?

[Kweassa]

All of this stuff is relative.

 If the USAAF or other countries also had pilots flying for 4~5 years, would the "aces" we know even survive the war?

 Who's to say that guys like Bong, Gabreski, Johnson wouldn't die off after a few years, and ultimately some previously unknown guy would emerge, surviving long war years, with his kills in the hundreds like the LW?

 That being said, ultimately, IMO no matter how seemingly great the prowess those that died in combat can't really be used as meaningful comparisons in these sorts of discussions.

 If there's anything great about Hartmann, I think it's not the 352 kills, but the fact that he flew so much and still survived.

[Smiggyy]

For me this guy was the epitomy of Britain during the war.

The guy lost both legs during a "show off" and was consigned to the scrap heap.

He battled through his own demons to walk again with the aid of tin legs.
When war broke out he fought the Ministry Of Defence who said that although he was capable of flying he wasn't fit to do so.
He challenged them and won, he flew up the ranks becoming an "ace" on way, took a rag tag bunch of Canadians who had evacuated from Dunkirk, groomed them into what was to become a famous part of the "Duxford Wing". A tactic he perfected to always have fighter squadrons airborne and not on ground. He was sick of engaging bombers and fighters on the climb.

He was shot down and captured and to the best of knowledge escaped 3 times, once even after having his legs removed as a precaution!

He finally saw out the rest of the war in Colditz.

There is a famous picture of him sat in a 109, Adolf Galland a pre-war friend, on hearing of his capture, invited him to dinner at the chateaux he was frequenting, then let him see inside the 109. It shows him in the cockpit with Galland pointing out dials etc.
The funny thing is, on the ground is another german office, luger drawn, just in case!!
His character and determination had preceded him!

He led the VE day fly over in London and I think finally attained the rank of Wing Commander.

A true "FIGHTER pilot"



Smiggs

[Shuckins]

The Nazi Reich was built on racist dogma of the worst sort.  The creed of the uber mensch was no joke.  Given the all-pervasive nature of Nazi propaganda both before and during the war, an objective military historian would find Luftwaffe combat kill claims to be extremely suspect.

British pilots in North Africa were highly trained flyers, fully on a par with the Germans.  Given the extremely light combat load of the ME-109F, the 17 kill a day claims by Marseille would only have been possible if his well-trained victims flew straight and level while he aimed and shot to his heart's content.

Despite the claims of the 109F site mentioned, British records simply do not agree with some of his claims.  Losses did occur on that day, but included fewer aircraft than Marseilles claimed, and included aircraft types that he did NOT claim.

Japanese combat claims were just as dubious.  Japanese fighter pilots often claimed kills that were an order of magnitude greater than actual American losses.

Never read Axis combat claims without taking into consideration the nature of the regimes that produced them.

[Kweassa]

Never read Axis combat claims without taking into consideration the nature of the regimes that produced them.

 Okay.

 Since Axis soliders are lying tards, let's halve his 158 kill claims.

 ...


 That's still 79 kills.

 Kozedub comes close.

[Smiggyy]

Thought the topic of this thread was "Possibly the best pilot of the war?".

Why then has it again descended into yet another claim v counter claim?

"My Dad is bigger than your Dad" or "You're a liar", "No you're the liar".

"He started it first", "No I didn't", "Yes you did"............and so on.............

Oh and not forgetting the half-wits who will flame me for stating this too.

The next logical step will be that personal insults will follow.

Smiggs.

[Tumor]

The Axis lost because the Allies beat them.

[crims]

Originally posted by Kweassa
Okay.

 Since Axis soliders are lying tards, let's halve his 158 kill claims.

 ...


 That's still 79 kills.

 Kozedub comes close.

Kweassa I don't think he was talking about the Soliders or Airmen. I took it as the Political machine.



Crims

479th Raiders FG

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by Shuckins
The Nazi Reich was built on racist dogma of the worst sort.  The creed of the uber mensch was no joke.  Given the all-pervasive nature of Nazi propaganda both before and during the war, an objective military historian would find Luftwaffe combat kill claims to be extremely suspect.

British pilots in North Africa were highly trained flyers, fully on a par with the Germans.  Given the extremely light combat load of the ME-109F, the 17 kill a day claims by Marseille would only have been possible if his well-trained victims flew straight and level while he aimed and shot to his heart's content.

Despite the claims of the 109F site mentioned, British records simply do not agree with some of his claims.  Losses did occur on that day, but included fewer aircraft than Marseilles claimed, and included aircraft types that he did NOT claim.

Japanese combat claims were just as dubious.  Japanese fighter pilots often claimed kills that were an order of magnitude greater than actual American losses.

Never read Axis combat claims without taking into consideration the nature of the regimes that produced them.

Also keep in mind again that Mersaille was intercepting RAF fighter bombers doing their job.  These were P40s and Hurricanes down low with him having the advantage in terms of air combat.

The Desert Air Force was very tactically oriented in it's role.

Nonetheless, the 'who is the best" argument is a stupid one.  Until we line them all up in duplicate airplanes fighting each fight in identical conditions and see who comes out at the end, we'll never know.

[GRUNHERZ]

Its funny to see the exteremes of both arguments:

1) Allies are no skill horde dweebs

2) LW are lying nazis

I think the truth is that the top LW pilots saw more combat actian than just about anybody, saw more enemies and shot more down. The allied pilots had less of this opportunity to kill because they flew tours and rotated back home to train new pilots and rest up, which was something they could afford to do because of men and material advantages of the allied side - which is why, in general the allies won the war. The LW guys hads to keep fighting. The remarkable thging is how many of them did survive for a long time and kept getting kill after kill.

So clearly the LW produced the most experienced and succesful combat pilots in the history of the world, but the reason they did this was the same reason they lost the war in thev long run.

[Karnak]

Well, personally, I basically put all these guys at the top of the top with the Axis guys a bit higher simply due to forced experience.

They were all extremely lethal pilots and nationality or government, nor even personal beliefs, really mean jack when just talking about their skill.

For the vast majority of enemy pilots meeting one of these guys in the air was an extremely bad thing and it didn't matter if your were Japanese encountering Bong or American encountering Nishizawa, German encountering Kozedub or Russian encountering Hartman, Commonwealth encountering Marseille or German/Italian encountering Buerling.  All of these are very bad things for the average pilot.

[Nomak]

Hmmm....

 " It seemed we were always outnumbered. We had more fighters than they did, but what mattered was how many they could put up in one area. They would concentrate in huge numbers, by the hundreds at times."

 Bud Anderson.

[Ack-Ack]

You should read the rest of his book were he also mentions numerous missions that resulted in abosolutely no contact with the enemy.


ack-ack

[Karnak]

Originally posted by Nomak
Hmmm....

 " It seemed we were always outnumbered. We had more fighters than they did, but what mattered was how many they could put up in one area. They would concentrate in huge numbers, by the hundreds at times."

 Bud Anderson.

And that is very telling how the Germans top aces put up those huge numbers.

A) They were guaranteed to encounter the enemy.

B) They concentrated their numbers so that they had the nuemerical advantage locally, allowing them to fight effectively without being overwhelmed.


What does this mean from an Allied perspective?  It means that you would fly mission after mission and not see enemy aircraft.  If you did encounter them it would be in a situation in which you did not automatically have overwhelming numbers.

[Nomak]

Originally posted by Ack-Ack
You should read the rest of his book were he also mentions numerous missions that resulted in abosolutely no contact with the enemy.


ack-ack

Please explain how your statement pertains in any way to teh discussion at hand or the comment that I made.

Or is this just the typical Ack Ack comment where you try to seem witty and intelligent then duck out of the thread whenever anyone actually comments on your post?

The point was when the allies were actually confronted with combat..... they were many times outnumberd.  How do sorties where no nme contact was made pertain what so ever?

[rod367th]

Wow glad you all think a Man was best pilot in ww2. Bet alot of russian woman laugh their ***'s off. Pretty sure You wouldv'e had nightwitches in top line fighters instead of PE-2 and they wouldv'e been unstopable. Some of these ladies had 20 plus kills of 109 190's alone not counting bombers...............



To say who's the best pilot in ww2 will never be known.... To many variables to really get who was best. Bravest has to go To brits IN MY OPINON. Alot of german aces became aces waiting for damaged bombers to fall out formations..........




 God only knows how many of these guys in ww2 had two accounts to pad scores..................