Super vrs Uber

[Angus]

Argghh, the Barham image didn't come. Well,- you get the point.

[Crumpp]

As I understand it the Marianas Turkey Shoot happened when we caught their forward training area and massacred their trainee pilots.

Can you check on that.  All the info I have seen is they were regular IJNAF fighter units.

The USA was not even at war with Germany untill Dec 1941, and had no combat planes in England at all. Im sure you have enough books of your own that covers the buildup of the 8th AF units, and missions they flew over Germany from 1943-45.

In Dec 1942 The USAAF had on hand in Europe 1058 1st Line Fighters:



The US alone had delivered to England:

1673 fighters in 1941

2271 fighters in 1942

3944 US fighters delivered to England not including a single British built fighter.



That is 5002  US built fighters total facing across the channel:



Some 1400 total Luftwaffe fighter strength.  Of course we have not even added in the VVS.  That's another 1700 US Fighters alone!!

In December 1942 the Allies had overwhelming numerical superiority just in US Fighters alone.

As for pilot training:



The Luftwaffe was the poorest trained Air Force in the European Theater from Oct 1942 until the end.

So why did it take so long to win air superiority?

All the best,

Crumpp

[Angus]

Hey Crumpp!
Look how much of the US planes were bombers. Coastal command got many and we had loads of them here in Iceland. (Although they probably mostly came straight from the U.S.)
Lockheeds, Douglases, Catalinas, P40's, P38's, Northrops and such.
Many many engines on the go!
Anyway, very nice. LW holding the Brits at bay on their coastline in 1943 my arse

[Squire]

Your arguements are based on leaps of logic like the fact that "delivered planes" means combat units deployed, or "poorer trained pilots" means average combat experience. As if suddenly, in Jan 43 the LW is comprised of a bunch of novices...

Nobody is arguing that the allies possessed more a/c, or that on average, as the war progressed past 1942 that they had a better average of replacement pilot. They did, on both counts.

Your question, quite simply is over broad "why did it take the allies so long to gain air superiority", well, in what operation?, and how exactly do you define "air superiority"?

If you want to look at daytime operations over Germany? only the 8th USAAF had the operational mandate for that prior to the invasion of France.  RAF Bomber Command bombed by night. RAF Fighter Command was limited by #1 the fact that Bomber Command was attacking at night (and therefore could not support most of their ops), and #2 the fact that their fighters lacked the range to get to Germany in any case. They were never tasked with missions past France, except for the Night Fighter Force.

The 8th USAAF had for June 1944: 961 fighters and 1947 bombers (crewed and available for ops). Its a large force, but a LW fighting over home ground with a large a/c industry behind it can still hold out in a daily attritional battle.

Did they get worn out? sure they did, gradually, but you seem to think that the USAAF was supposed to destroy them utterly, by comparing the Japanese Navys suicidal *attack* with 400 odd a/c (many of them bombers) vs the USNs 900 strong Fast CV Groups (479 of them Hellcats, with radar to help them). On top of that, they sent them in seperate raids, as opposed to all at once. Their pilots were much poorer, and the USN was probably at its height in pilot quality in the Fall of 44. Its no wonder it was an unmitigated massacre, just as Leyte Gulf was in October 1944, which ended Japans Navy as a fighting force.

Btw, Germany produced 25,000 fighters (off all types, mostly 190s and 109s) in 1944. Hardly small potatoes. Why didnt they invade Britain?

Regards.

[TheOtto]

Originally posted by Angus
Ok DeWilde ammo came from India?
Spitfires came from South Africa? P40's? P38's? Hurricanes?
Aviation fuel? Spares? Bombs?
Tanks? Tracks? Jeeps? Trucks? Amphibs?
Enfields? BAR's? M1's? Tommy guns? Howitzers? 50cal Brownings?

You're holding a straw now. Maybe a Dum-Dum inside yer head?
Will be back with a quote.

The Belgium DeWilde ammo never was produced in Britain, but if you're referring to the .303 B. Mk VI round (completely redesigned by Major Dixon btw.), then YES it was produced in Britain, India, South Africa, America and about 20 other nations during WWII.

As for the rest of your "list" of items; do you seriously believe they shipped all this to the British Isles first and then re-shipped these items to INDIA or AUSTRALIA? Are you completely dimwitted? Spitfires and Hurricanes were the oddbirds of the African campaign. The P-40 was the primary British fighter for which Jochen and his friends were feasting upon. Do you seriously believe the American produced P-40s were first shipped to the British Isles for then to be re-shipped half way across the world to the colonies? Are you that stupid? They were shipped directly from America to Australia via the Pacific and to South Africa via the South Atlantic. Do you realize that most of the fighter squadrons in Egypt were Commonwealth units and not from the UK? South Africa alone had 28 P-40 squadrons there. The Aussies and New Zealanders had many many more.

Originally posted by Angus
Back for the giggle round. This one also had me tickling:
"Perhaps if the U-boat commanders knew that they wouldn't have prioritized the ships inbound to the UK laden with goods fuel and armaments."
Now you mentioned shovelling, you just made a hole for yourself.
The US-UK convoys were a priority, later on the sub war moved to the US waters, then as well onto the Murmansk routes, and, - the Med.
Goods were freighted US-UK US-USSR, UK-USSR, UK-MED and US med, - for Egypt convoys were routed past the south cape.
The med was a tough place for both Allied and Axis convoys and many a ship went down, - even big ones.
Lookie here - HMS Barham, - torpedoed by sub:


And here HMS Ark Royal, Torpedoed by sub:

And this is already in 1941. To say that Allied ships didn't have to sail through perilous waters in the med gives a good statement on your "education"
To get as far as Libya say alone Egypt, the gap between Tunisia and Sicily needed to be crossed, - a preferred way was to skip it and take the long road. Clear as daylight and a well established fact. Not quite without danger though. The U-Boats were quite active outside Portugal as well. At a stroke of faith a subpack was hunting a convoy (where they sank 13 from 37 ships) outside Madeira at the same time as the invasion force for Torch was en route to Gibraltar.
(From Martin Gilbert's second world war, p.373)
Same author P. 376:
"Hitler fearful of a drive to Tunis, hurried German troops to Bizerta on November 9. Three days later British troops landed at Bone. The Struggle for  Tunisia had begun.
Retaining his grip on Tunisia would enable Hitler to deny the Allies the short sea route to Egypt and India and compel them to use the very much longer route round the cape."
Quite a lot of troops were actually airlifted from Sicily on that day at the order of Kesslering. Obviously Hitler did not want to give up the N-African theater yet, he moved 500 aircraft there (4/5 from the USSR) as well as several hundreds of transport aircraft, - as mentioned before pressing bombers into transport role at Stalingrad,- Görings words on that were "There died the core of the German Bomber fleet"
So enough of that for now. Happy

We've been over this already: Those ships were sunk while escorting supply convoys to MALTA, not EGYPT. Malta is not part of AFRICA and thus not part of THIS ARGUMENT. The is no argument over the Malta convoys.

Originally posted by Angus
To say that Allied ships didn't have to sail through perilous waters in the med gives a good statement on your "education"

At least I can READ; I've never said the "Allied ships didn't have to sail through perilous waters in the med" you idiot. I said that the allies didn't have to sail through perilous waters to get to EGYPT.

Here you even say so yourself:

Originally posted by Angus
Egypt convoys were routed past the south cape.

See, even YOU agree that supplies bound for Egypt DIDN'T "run the gauntlet" through the Med. Are you even incapable of agreeing with yourself?

Be kind to your farm animals Angus. You're more like them than you think.

[Bronk]

Otto keep it up.
How many bbs acounts are now persona non grata ?
I'm betting that pyro is getting is starting to get fed up with you.
I'm just wondering if he can block you permenently. If he can i bet it's otw soon.

I'm thinking if you would just tone down the attack mentality you have things would smooth out. You seem to have a great amount of info on the subjects you post about, but the attitude sucks.

Just my 2 cents.

Bronk

[Crumpp]

Btw, Germany produced 25,000 fighters (off all types, mostly 190s and 109s) in 1944. Hardly small potatoes. Why didnt they invade Britain?

Got any documentation on that or a reference?  The total production for FW190A fighter variants was just over 13,000 for the entire war.



Seems a rather fantastic claim.  You do know you are claiming a 1000% attrition rate in 1944.  Sturmstaffel 1 did not even approach that kind of attrition!

The documents detail the number of US fighters delivered.  Of course a portion will not see combat due to accidents, maintenance, etc..

However these factors also effected the Luftwaffe and this is a good base to compare relative force size.  A good argument could be made that some of these effected the Luftwaffe even more as they did not have as high a training standards.

Nobody is arguing that the allies possessed more a/c, or that on average, as the war progressed past 1942 that they had a better average of replacement pilot. They did, on both counts.

No the argument and facts support the allies having an overwhelming numerical superiority.

They did not just posses a few more or some more, they overwhelmed the Luftwaffe.  

These planes were manned with superior trained pilots.

 

Your arguements are based on leaps of logic like the fact that "delivered planes" means combat units deployed, or "poorer trained pilots" means average combat experience.

No my arguments are based on documented facts posted above.

Do you think they delivered those US fighters just to see if they could get them to England?  


All the best,

Crumpp

[TheOtto]

Originally posted by Bronk
Otto keep it up.
How many bbs acounts are now persona non grata ?
I'm betting that pyro is getting is starting to get fed up with you.
I'm just wondering if he can block you permenently. If he can i bet it's otw soon.

I'm thinking if you would just tone down the attack mentality you have things would smooth out. You seem to have a great amount of info on the subjects you post about, but the attitude sucks.

Just my 2 cents.

Bronk

I think the nazi avatar thing got me banned, not my demeanor. As for the "attack mentality": I never start purse-fights like this one, but I do finish them, and Angus' condescending comments are all it takes.

[Bruno]

FYI poster ArtieBob posted the following on Butch's AAW2 forums (total 190 production figures).

Total Fw 190 production (This data is from FW factory production book and C-Amt Monatsmeldung so should be pretty solid. )

To 30.11.43
A-1 (102)
A-2/3 (952)
A-4 (905)
A-5 (675)
A-6 (783)
A-7 (27)
B-1 (5)
F-1 (18)
F-2 (270)
F-3 (366)
G-1 (50)
G-2 (625)
G-3 (329) Total 5107

December-missing A-6 (SWAG approx. 200)
72 A-7
5 F-3
58 G-3 Total 5442

January-117 A-6
199 A-7
1 F-3
66 G-3 Total 5825

February-45 A-6
137 A-7
55 F-3
53 G-3 Total 6115

March- 17 A-6
182 A-7
83 A-8
5 F-3
98 F-8
44 G-3 Total 6544

April-1 A-6
8 A-7
347 A-8
2-A-9
265 F-8
83 G-8/R 5 Total 7250

May-492 A-8
15 A-9
177 F-8 Total 7934
June-430 A-8
103 A-8/R2
21 A-9
390 F-8 Total 8878

July –502 A-8
180 A-8/R2
70 A-9
515 F-8 Total 10145

August- 648 A-8
202 A-8/R2
30 A-9
511 F-8 (1391) Total 11536

September-465 A-8
159 A-8/R2
14 A-8/R11
122 A-9
55 A-9/R11
40 D-9
536 F-8 Total 12927

October-293 A-8
123 A-8/R2
79 A-8/R11
14 A-9
80 A-9 R11
89 D-9
412 F-8 Total 14017

November-482 A-8
88 A-8/R2
33 A-8/R11
99 A-9
58 A-9/R11
237 D-9
294 F-8 (1291) Total 15308

December-missing 6 (SWAG approx. 1250) Total 16558

January-328 A-8
51 A-8/R2
73 A-9
73 A-9/R11
228 D-9
76 D-9/ R11
220 F-8
147 F-9 (1196) Total 17754

February to Capitulation-missing (SWAG approx. 1550)

Total approx. 19300

As can be seen, there are some gaps and I made some guesses based on additional data (Karlsruhe). IMHO the final total is probably within a few hundred of the actual number (does not include Ta 152s). Note that these are all Neubau aircraft, the figures for Umbau were kept separately. The Umbau numbers do not add to the total of aircraft built, but are important as they increase the number of aircraft available to the Truppe during a given period. For example, in August 44 there were 159 Fw 190s repaired and all but one were available for Truppe use. This was about an additional 15% above the Neubau total for the month. Unfortunately, the Umbau/Instandsetzung records available to me have many gaps in them. One of the best authors on Luftwaffe subjects is working on a book that deals with this subject. I am anxiously awaiting this book and it should answer many questions concerning production totals and types.

Best regards,

Artie Bob

Poster Zamex compiled the data into excel:

[Crumpp]

Good Stuff Bruno.

The table I posted only shows the fighter variants and does not include the bomber or close support aircraft.

All the best,

Crumpp

[MiloMorai]

Agh Crumpp, did you not think that 25,000 number might be a typo? Probably not.

Total the 190 and 109 production and what number do you get. Close 52,000.

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by Crumpp


We are talking about the War in the Air.

How in the world did the Luftwaffe maintain air superiority over Europe until 1944?

The USAAF alone had more fighters in Europe than the entire Luftwaffe form Feb. 43 until the end!

Yet it took a year to wrestle air superiority?

All the best,

Crumpp

Not seeing the forest for the trees Crumpp.  Squire's already said it but just to reiterate.  It ultimately came down to the USAAF having fighters with the range to cover all of Germany.  The bomber guys in the USAAF were very determined to proove that they could fly unescorted daylight bombing raids to Germany successfully.  Sadly, at the cost of many lives, it didn't work.  The fighters they had with the range to escort the buffs all the way from the get go, were sent to North Africa for Torch, These being the P38s that had the ability to carry the drop tanks.  The Jugs that got to England weren't even initially equipped to carry drop tanks.

The Luftwaffe in the west was in a position to choose when to engage and when to stay on the ground.  A lot of targets in France were hit often trying to get the LW up.   They often times just didn't fly.  Using the logbook of that Spit pilot that I have.  In 289 offensive operations, he saw the LW 4 times and never got close enough to engage.  These were fighter sweeps, escorting medium bombers, rhubarbs etc.  And this was between December 9, 1941 and August 16, 1944.

Wasn't it Goering who said he knew the jig was up when he saw Allied fighters over Berlin with the bombers? That's March of 44.  And that's the few 38 groups and the arrival of the Mustangs.  Soon the Jugs had been modified enough that they could range over Germany as well.

Bottom line is that numbers were not the issue so much as having the range to be able to engage the LW fighters over Germany anytime, anywhere.  This was happening prior to D-Day.  Once the Allied Air Forces were on the continent, it could only get worse as the short range fighters could get in the game easier as well.

So the Luftwaffe's "control" had much more to do with range issues for the Allies and the Allies not being on the continent.  That control being the ability to engage or not as they chose.  

Germany never really solved the range problems while the Allies did.

[Crumpp]

Not seeing the forest for the trees Crumpp.

No Guppy,

I certainly am seeing the forest and the trees.   Study the IJNAF.  When forced into a pitched battle with overwhelming numbers and superior aircraft, they were destroyed.  They simply were not a factor after the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot.

While the Luftwaffe offered battle almost every day, that never happenend to them.  As the numerical disparity rose ever against them they took increasing casualties. but they were never destroyed in a decisive battle by the allies.

Fighting only a portion of the force as well.  The VVS was occupying the rest.

Even from January 1944 it took the allies almost a year to destroy the Luftwaffe.  A full year of hard fighting with the allies having enormous numerical superiority.

During Operation Argument, the allies won air superiority because allied raids had grow so large that they could no longer effectively engage them.

"Ich bin ein Floh" is the expression they used.  

So they started attempting to mass their forces and attack were they could.  Navigation though, especially in the european weather is difficult at best and almost impossible with poor training.  Rarely could they mass more than 200 fighters in the same area to go against the sometimes thousands of escort fighters.  Now these are not 200 planes flying in formation, that is 200 planes coming from different bases all over Europe which you hope will end up in the same vicinity at roughly the same time.  Very rarely did it happen.

Bodenplatte, more than any other operation destroyed the Luftwaffe as they took very poorly trained pilots to begin with and asked them to do a mission for which they had no training at all.  Operational accidents and friendly fire pushed their casualties over the edge.

Numbers was the issue and even when the allies got the range it was a hard fight.  Not one decisive engagement but a war of attrition with the allies having decisive numerical advantage.

It was not "even numbers in the air" by any stretch of the imagination.  Only to the man in the USAAF fighter cockpit in the heat of battle did it seem that way.

Germany never really solved the range problems while the Allies did.

Sure if your refering to the BoB or Russia in the early war. The Luftwaffe was never a strategic air force.  However during the same period the allies were working on a solution for the long range problem, the Luftwaffe was too.  It soon became a waste of resources though as they increasing had to turn to defense.

That overspecialization of doctrine cost them heavily.
More than anything, strategic blundering on the part of the Nazi regime both caused the war and Germany eventual defeat.  Goering was a complete idiot and IMHO, if the German Armed forces were not hypersensative because of the events of 1918, they would have sacked him.

In 289 offensive operations, he saw the LW 4 times and never got close enough to engage. These were fighter sweeps, escorting medium bombers, rhubarbs etc. And this was between December 9, 1941 and August 16, 1944.

You should probably cross reference the log with the German OOB.  You will see exactly what I am talking about.

All the best,

Crumpp

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Crumpp
Study the IJNAF.  When forced into a pitched battle with overwhelming numbers and superior aircraft, they were destroyed.  They simply were not a factor after the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot.

Heh.  Japanese naval air forces were really destroyed during the Solomons operations in 42-43, while the Army got ground down in New Guinea.  Because Japan had such a lousy pilot training program (in the sense that it didn't train many pilots before the war, and trained lousy pilots once the war got started), the poor slobs who flew the mostly-inferior aircraft in the Marianas operations didn't stand a chance.

Even from January 1944 it took the allies almost a year to destroy the Luftwaffe.  A full year of hard fighting with the allies having enormous numerical superiority.

Measured from the time that we got serious escort operations going - late summer of 1943 - it was more like six months.  While the Luftwaffe was able to put up opposition until the end of the war, it could no longer oppose every major daylight raid after Bigweek, in February, and certainly not after the Berlin missions in March.  We went when and where we wanted after those two campaigns.  The large kill rates we had after that were scored against an increasingly young and inexperienced German pilot pool, as you have pointed out - which was, in effect, the same as the Marianas thing.

During the six months it took to gut the Luftwaffe, I'm not persuaded that we had overwhelming numbers.  The zone defense we had to play because of the P-47's range restrictions meant that at any one location the Luftwaffe controllers had the ability to obtain their own overwhelming local superiority, as happened quite often.  

Just my thoughts.

- oldman

[Crumpp]

Measured from the time that we got serious escort operations going - late summer of 1943 - it was more like six months.

Need to check that history and the documents posted above, Oldman.   The Luftwaffe halted the USAAF efforts at daylight bombing during 1943.  Their defense was successful.  However it is almost impossible to win a war by being defensive.

These two ineffective raids brought outrage by the American public and lead to the Army Air Crop reviewing the idea of daylight precision bombing. Daylight bombing was halted until February of 1944.

http://history.acusd.edu/gen/ww2Timeline/memphis3.html

When Big Week came about, the Luftwaffe tried the same tactics.  They used individual JG's conducting intercepts, the idea being that many smaller units attacking at once would have a better chance of getting through.

During Big Week, February 20-26, 1944, the Allies flew heavily escorted missions against airframe manufacturing and assembly plants and other targets in numerous German cities, including Leipzig, Brunswick, Gotha, Regensburg, Schweinfurt, Augsburg, Stuttgart, and Steyr. In six days, the Eighth Air Force bombers flew more than 3,000 sorties and the Fifteenth Air Force more than 500. Together they dropped roughly 10,000 tons of bombs and seriously disrupted German fighter production, denying the enemy hundreds of aircraft at a time when they were badly needed. The United States lost 226 heavy bombers and 28 fighters.

The weeklong offensive also seriously eroded the morale and capability of the Luftwaffe. U.S. aircrews claimed more than 600 German fighters destroyed and achieved almost immediate air superiority. The Luftwaffe never recovered from the downing of so many skilled fighter pilots. It had to abandon full-scale opposition to the daylight bombing missions in favor of rationing resistance as circumstances and capabilities dictated. In effect, the Germans conceded air superiority to the Allies.

http://www.usaaf.net/ww2/atlanticwall/awpg4.htm

From the 22 Feb. USAAF Operations report:

Mission 230: "Big Week" continues with 799 aircraft dispatched against German aviation and Luftwaffe airfields; 41 bombers and 11 fighters are lost.
 1. 289 B-17s are dispatched against aviation industry targets at
Aschersleben (34 bomb), Bernburg (47 bomb) and Halberstadt (18 bomb) in
conjunction with a Fifteenth Air Force raid on Regensburg, Germany; 32 hit
Bunde, 19 hit Wernegerode, 15 hit Magdeburg, 9 hit Marburg and 7 hit other
targets of opportunity; they claim 32-18-17 Luftwaffe aircraft; 38 B-17s are
lost, 4 damaged beyond repair and 141 damaged; casualties are 35 KIA, 30 WIA and 367 MIA.
  2. 333 B-17s are dispatched to Schweinfurt but severe weather prevents aircraft from forming properly and they are forced to abandon the mission prior to crossing the enemy coast; 2 B-17s are damaged.
  3. 177 B-24s are dispatched but they are recalled when 100 miles (160 km) inland; since they were over Germany, they sought targets of opportunity but strong winds drove the bombers over The Netherlands and their bombs hit Enschede, Arnhem, Nijmegen and Deventer; they claim 2-0-0 Luftwaffe aircraft; 3 B-24s are lost and 3 damaged; casualties are 30 MIA.

Escorting these bombers is:

These missions are escorted by 67 P-38s, 535 Eighth and Ninth Air Force P-47s, and 57 Eighth and Ninth Air Force P-51s; the P-38s claim 1-0-0 Luftwaffe aircraft, 1 P-38 is damaged beyond repair and 6 are damaged; the P-47s claim 39-6-15 Luftwaffe aircraft, 8 P-47s are lost and 12 damaged, 8 pilots are MIA; the P-51s claim 19-1-10 Luftwaffe aircraft, 3 P-51s are lost and 3 damaged, 3 pilot are MIA.

The Luftwaffe flew 339 sorties against these missions.  They lost a total of 48  twin engine fighters and 16 single engine fighters.

If you compare victories, the Luftwaffe consistantly gave as good they got.  However when you compare loss rates and factor in the size of the forces, The Luftwaffe sustained an average of 15.7 % loss rate while the USAAF sustained about a 5 % loss rate.

Pure attrition warfare and weight of numbers won the air war for the Allies.

I think you should check out your history of the PACWAR as well.

All the best,

Crumpp