Night fighters could certainly have a place in AH, even more so with extended night scenerios. Tac hits it - the MA nightime is so short that a heavy night fighter could take off in the twilight of sunset and not reach operating altitude before the sun comes up. But, serious concessions would have to be made with the length of darkness, radar and icon availability to replicate the environment WW2 pilots experienced.
Period nightfighter radar, by itself, would be several steps back from what we have now. The existing AH radar indicates a god's eye view of all target's bearing, ground track and range by looking at the clipboard map. Combined with the icons providing aircraft type, country of origin and exact range, we have a system many generations ahead of the radars found in a the typical WW2 fighter. The vast majority of modern fighters can't track every target within range with a 360 degree view vertically and horizontally while unerringly providing accurate IFF.
(The old displays resembled small oscilliscopes that were difficult to use even when they worked right. They basicly showed the strength of one jumpy line that indicated the strongest radar return. The very skilled pilot or operator had to decipher the number of contacts, range, azimuth, and bearing if they were lucky enough to have a target fly in front of them. They didn't have rotating radial lines, labeled dots, the ability to "see" down (ground clutter), behind or to the sides. And they still had to get within visual range before opening fire to verify that the target was indeed an enemy airplane.)
Too many pilots vehemently hate night, though, to expect any kind of wide-scale acceptance. Sure would be neat though.
MiG
