It's a lot more complicated than the Merlin engine. I don't know about the Allison. The impact the German HOTAS systems had on the air war is probably not measurable in any meaningful way, but I doubt a late-war Luftwaffe greenhorn with 10 hours in trainers could operate an F4U in combat. Perhaps the fact that the Luftwaffe still existed at all in late-1944 and 1945 is the best testament to the ease of operation of a 109 or 190.
If u had 2 equal greenhorns in 2 equal plane and one of them had a engine managment system the pilot in that plane would probably win. He will have more situation awarness and most likely a plane that runs better than the guy with manual controls. There are surley individual fights where this have been a big factor to the outcome but it would be impossible to find evidence for it.
What i belive could be a bigger problem in the F4U than the engine is the stall caracteristics. That is a pretty nasty stall and it can easilly end up in a spin. Compare to the P-47
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Y3v1-WMJS8 That stalls like a cessna, i slight drop and u are flying again.
