Originally posted by davidpt40
Please...where is Major Preddys name? I think this little 'cooking of the books' qualifies you as a liar.
But don't overlook the obvious fact that by your low-class reply you risk qualifying as a love muffin.
Clearly, the list is incomplete. However, I see no evidence that there was any intent to deceive.
Besides, Beeson flew the P-47 and P-51
Zemke flew the P-47, then the P-38 and finally the P-51.
Preddy scored well, but he was far from the top of the list in the raw talent department. In fact, during his 7 month combat tour with the 49th FG in the SWPA, he did miserably. Guys who flew with him prior to his mid-air wreck thought him sub-par. He certainly got it together, but he suffered thru a prolonged period of development as a fighter pilot. On the other end of the scale, we have Robert Johnson, of whom Zemke said; "Johnson was the most talented fighter pilot I ever saw, and I saw most of them."
In their massive reference work "Fighter Aces," aviation historians Raymond Tolliver and Trevor Constable compared Johnson's record with that of two German aces. Werner Molders was the first ace to score 100 aerial victories and Erich Hartmann is the top scoring ace of all time with 352.
The authors noted that Johnson "emerges impressively from this comparison." He downed 28 planes in 91 sorties, while Molders took 142 sorties to do the same, and Hartmann, 194.
After the war, Luftwaffe historians indicated that Johnson may have shot down as many as 32 German fighters. Johnson flew 91 combat missions. On those missions, he encountered German fighters 43 times. In 36 of the 43 encounters, Johnson fired his guns at the enemy. A result of those 36 missions where he fired on German fighters, 37 aircraft were hit; with as few as 27 or as many as 32 going down. I knew Bob Johnson and had many long conversations with him.
I also knew Gabreski, although not very well. He lived just a few minutes from my home, and I often bumped into him shopping or on the road where his vanity license plate "T Bolt" gave him away.
Gabby was a highly skilled fighter pilot, but he needed 26 missions in the Spitfire and 193 more in the P-47 to exceed Johnson's score by one.
In my opinion, the two most talented fighter pilots in the USAAF were Johnson and George Welch.
As to the best USAAF fighter of WWII, I lean towards the P-47 too. Above 25,000 feet (and that's where the bulk of combat took place prior to D-Day), the P-47 was superior to the Mustang. Below 25k and lower, the P-51 had an increasing edge. But, understand that the P-47 was DESIGNED for high altitude combat, with a critical altitude of 32,000 feet. Up there, the Luftwaffe had nothing to compare with the Jug until very late in the war. 32k was far above the Mustang's best altitude as well.
As a fighter-bomber, the Jug was superior to the P-51 in lifting ability, strafing and durability (by a lot in the last category). Even in the area of range the P-47 would eventually out-class the P-51D with the ultra long-range P-47N (it had a combat radius 150 miles greater than the Mustang). As a demonstration of the P-47N's range, one was flown from Republic field on Long Island to Eglin Field in Florida, whereupon it turned around and flew back again, all non-stop.
The P-38 first took the war to the Luftwaffe in the west, and the P-51 delivered the death blow. However, it was the P-47 that broke the back of the Luftwaffe. It was 700+ Jugs flying as far as the Rhine that literally drove the Luftwaffe back into the relative safety of Germany.
Widewing
