Thorn in the Tiger's side?

[Andreas]

They were not just useful to attack tanks, so the success or otherwise in attacking tanks may have zero to do with the decision to continue the production of the IL-2.

[Sergei]

Besides, those decisions were made on the basis of the intelligence data available, not what historians knew 60 years later.

[JasonC]

Why would you think the benefit had to be against AFVs?

Sturms averaged 26 missions in their operational life in the first half of the war. Late, as the Luftwaffe declined, that rose to around 45. Overall, Sturms might have flown a million missions. Since air attack didn't inflict a quarter of German losses, the average Sturm mission didn't hit a single German soldier, let alone take out a piece of major equipment.

We forget how vulnerable the FBs are. Light flak took out tons of them for trivial cost. The only inefficiency in light flak is needing it everywhere to have some available in range when FBs show up. But it is super cheap. Even though they were armored and rugged, half of the IL-2s lost were taken out by ground fire. "Armored" meant only a few mm, the kind of armor a halftrack has, when it comes to planes. Light MGs that works against, but not 20mm and up stuff.

Similarly, the Allies probably lost more planes over Normandy than the Germans lost tanks on the ground, to all causes. Planes are a break away weapon, shot off like ammo over the course of a modest number of missions, when the enemy has serious AA. When he also contests the air with fighters, double those losses again.

In this context it is important to remember the first theorem of attritional operations research - the average weapon system fails to take out its own value on the other side over its entire operational life. Since there are weapons left at the end of the war on the winning side at least, total weapons taken out (the numerator) are somewhat less than total weapons fielded (the denominator). Ergo, only above average weapon systems succeed in taking out their own value or more.

[dieseltaylor]

Jason C

"250 were claimed in the Mortain attempt alone, while the Germans only lost 50 to all causes and 10-20 to air attack on that occasion (the uncertainty comes from categories like "abandoned")."

So taking out 20-40% of the destroyed tanks was not significant? Overclaims does not mean it was not worthwhile. Can we assume then that Mortain was a success because very rarely would the Germans try to attack in numbers in daylight because of the high risks involved. Therefore this is the proof provided at Hitler's insistence.

" As Eisenhower reported:

The chief credit in smashing the enemy's spearhead, however, must go to the rocket-firing Typhoon planes of the Second Tactical Air Force. They dived upon the armored columns, and, with their rocket projectiles, on the first day of the battle destroyed 83, probably destroyed 29 and damaged 24 tanks in addition to quantities of "soft-skinned" M.T. [Motorized Transport]. The result of this strafing was that the enemy attack was effectively brought to a halt, and a threat was turned into a great victory. "

And for a general German take

"Allied air operations over the battlefield during these weeks are best illustrated by extracts from captured enemy records. On 6 July the German 84 Corps reported: ‘The enemy controls the air to such an extent that movement on the roads is impossible. The enemy artillery guided by aerial observation is able to destroy our infantry in their defensive positions without exposing itself to any kind of retaliation.’ The same story was told on 17 July by General von Luttwitz, who commanded 2 Panzer Division: ‘The enemy have complete mastery of the air. They bomb and strafe every movement, even single vehicles and soldiers. They reconnoitre our area con- stantly and direct their artillery fire. Against all this the Luftwaffe is conspicuous by its complete absence. During the last four weeks the total number of German aircraft over the divisional area was six ….’"

from NZ electronic history

web page

Furthermore I thought the ground attack worked mainly in sweeps and taxi-ranks so any armour caught in the open was likely to be visited by more than one aircraft. [i suspect that CM actually has factored this into the game and are fully aware that single aircraft would be unlikely to be of any use within the game.]

The possibility of destroyed/abandoned tanks being the result of exhausted crews [from fighting, constantly watching the sky, lack of sleep], out of fuel[because FB's have taken out the tankers], breakdowns where the chance of fixing the tank without being attacked is negligible, or believing they were about to have 9 fighters about to drop in on them is also worth consideration.

After all what the enemy is claiming in kills is irrelevant to those on the receiving end on the ground.

[MikeyD]

If airpower isn't taking out tanks like you'd think that's because its supressing them. Like a mg in CM that shows no kills at game's end but had kept the enemy from crossing an open field, roaming airpower would keep armor off the road, under cover, behind buildings, covered in camou. Germans didn't develop the practice of night marches because it enjoyed star-gazing!

[Sergei]

Nobody ever questioned that air interdiction was effective, but that fighter bombers as tank hunters aren't quite what some think (killing Tigers with 12.7mm mg's etc.).

[Michael Emrys]

It has already been stipulated that the fighter bombers exercised a psychological-moral impact upon their opponents far in excess of the physical damage they caused. There was something about being hit from the air that really put the wind up soldiers. Could it have had something to do with superstitions about the wrath of God? I have no idea and have never seen any research on the question, nor do I expect to do so. But the fact remains that if you were in an enclosed armored vehicle, you were a lot safer to remain there during an air attack than out of it. The situation was more or less the same as with attack by artillery, and the original purpose of putting armor on vehicles was to protect them from artillery and small arms fire.

Michael

[sturmelon]

Excellent discussion and I must say that this forum often comes up during research.

I would like to address the point about Rudel's claims being inflated or otherwise innacurate.

Supposedly he flew about 2000+ Stuka missions total. He also flew 400 or so other non-Stuka missions (FW?). He supposedly used 5000 rounds of 37mm ammunition. Each full load-up of a twin 37mm Stuka (6 rounds each gun) gives about 400 or so 'tank-buster' missions. About 25% of his Stuka missions may have been with the 37mm armed Stuka then.

He claims to take out 4 tanks during his very first mission against tanks (he used the experimental versions against boats of some sort IIRC). That means an average of 3 rounds to take out those first 4 tanks (actually he would get 2 tanks with one burst and two tanks with two bursts). I assume that both 37mm had to fire semi-auto and at the same time.

My personal belief is that he may well have had 500+ successful 'attacks' against armor. This may also include bomb and 20mm success as well as the majority being 37mm.

But many 'kills' may have just been TKO's that holed the engines, radiators and transmissions of many T34s. These 37mm Stukas specifically targeted the rear engine area IIRC. I recently saw History channel footage of these attacks BTW. His rear MG gunner certainly could see the effects of the attacks on the pull out. In cases where there is catasphrophic damage (turret blown off/large flames/brew-up), then an air-to-ground 'kill' (total write-off) is evident. In cases where abandonment and large white smoke (radiator emission or diesel fuel sloshed on hot manifold) are seen, I would not count that as a kill. Its most probably just taken the tank out of the picture for days to weeks.

Its clear that they had much more precision than rocket firing or non-dive bombing ground attack aircraft. I would not lump them in with fighter-bomber stats without a closer look.

Does anyone have any data that supports that he did not have these succeses? My presumption is that these Stukas with 37mm were used against breakthroughs predominately (especially later in the war). They would be attacking armored formations that had broken through and would not have adequate AA defense (which Stuke were vulnerable to).

[ August 09, 2005, 11:08 AM: Message edited by: sturmelon ]

[dieseltaylor]

I think that the point about morale can be likened to being in a ring with a mauler who is going to knock your head off. So you circle around avoiding/blocking the lethal punch when introduced into the equation is a little boy with a BB gun who you know is unlikely to kill you unless he shoots you in the eye. He circles the ring popping up unexpectedly and shooting at you - the distraction is an overload too far.

On surviving the round you return to your corner to find the water bottle shot full of holes and your second has been driven away. Morale is at an all time low. : )

BTW if 50% of the 223 Panthers examined in the British sector had no definite cause attributed to their demise it does leave an interesting area of conjecture. Hopefully JasonC can post a link to the source and/or the methodology etc. for the figures quoted.

[Panzer76]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Light MGs that works against, but not 20mm and up stuff.

It was reported that to take down the IL-2 you needed 20 mm AP shells, not the normal HE variant. As these shells were in shorter supply, the 20mm Flak's success vs the IL2 was dependant on available 20mm AP ammo.

[ August 09, 2005, 11:09 AM: Message edited by: Panzer76 ]

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Panzer76:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by JasonC:

Light MGs that works against, but not 20mm and up stuff.

It was reported that to take down the IL-2 you needed 20 mm AP shells, not the normal HE variant. As these shells were in shorter supply, the 20mm Flak's success vs the IL2 was dependant on available 20mm AP ammo. </font>

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by sturmelon:

Each full load-up of a twin 37mm Stuka (6 rounds each gun) gives about 400 or so 'tank-buster' missions.

[snip]

He claims to take out 4 tanks during his very first mission against tanks (he used the experimental versions against boats of some sort IIRC). That means an average of 3 rounds to take out those first 4 tanks (actually he would get 2 tanks with one burst and two tanks with two bursts).

Personally, I have to admit that I am frankly sceptical of such claims. Not that such shooting is impossible, I just don't believe it has such a high probability that it could be reproduced with any sort of regularity. I have a hunch that if it were somehow possible to go back in time and closely observe all his reported "hits", what we would see is dust raised somewhere in close proximity to his target. With only six rounds per gun, he is going to go through his load pretty quickly. And in combat, drawing an accurate bead on a tank-sized target where the closing rate is hundreds of kilometers per hour is not easy.

It might be instructive if someone could compare the Stuka-37mm combo to the A-10-GAU-8 combo. Granted that the A-10 would be moving faster, but its cannon is firing much faster and has a whole lot more ammunition to expend in each burst. But under combat conditions, I doubt that even a good shot with the A-10 can count on getting a kill with every pass.

Michael

[dieseltaylor]

Flying IL-2 seems dangerous : ) Il-2's out of total aircraft shot down by pilot ace

Oblt. Otto "Bruno" Kittel 94 267

Hptm. Joachim Brendel 88 189

Maj. Johannes Wiese 70+ 133

Hptm. Franz Schall 61 133

Oblt. Günther Josten 60 178

Maj. Erich Rudorffer 58 224

Oblt. Anton "Toni" Hafner 55 204

Maj. Franz Eisenach 52 129

Hptm. Wilhelm Batz 46 237

Oblt. Kurt Dombacher 43 68

Hptm. Rudolf Trenkel 42+ 138

Maj. Diethelm von Eichel-Streiber 42 96

Lt. Herbert Bachnick 41 80

Hptm. Robert "Bazi" Weiss 40 121

Lt. Peter "Bonifaz" Düttmann 38 152

Lt. Hermann Schleinhege 38 96

Hptm. Helmut Lipfert 36 203

Oblt. Oskar "Ossi" Romm 34+ 92

Obst. Walter Dahl 34 129

Oblt. Hans Waldmann 33 134

Maj. Erich Leie 32 118

Hptm. Werner Lucas 31 106

Hptm. Erich "Bubi" Hartmann 30 352

Oblt. Fritz Seyffardt 30 30

Lt. Josef "Pepi" Jennewein 29 86

Oblt. Gerhard Thyben 28 157

Hptm. Karl-Heinz Weber 28 136

Hptm. Wilhelm Lemke 28 131

Ofw. Wilhelm Philipp 28 81

FjOfw. Heinz "Negus" Marquardt 27+ 121

Oblt. Heinrich Höfemeier 27+ 96

Hptm. Emil Bitsch 27 108

Maj. Viktor Bauer 27 106

Oblt. Hans Grünberg 27 82

Lt. Heinz Kemethmüller 26 89

Oblt. Siegfried Engfer 25 58

Maj. Walter Nowotny 24 258

Maj. Heinz Lange 24 70

Oblt. Walter Wever 24 44

Lt. Reinhold Hoffmann 23 67

Oblt. Max-Hermann Lücke 22 78

Oblt. Wolf-Udo Ettel 21 124

Lt. Rudolf "Rudi" Rademacher 21 97

Lt. Otto Gaiser 21 66

Lt. Ulrich "Seppl" Wöhnert 20+ 86

Hptm. Emil "Bully" Lang 20 173

Lt. Ulrich "Pipfax" Wernitz 20 101

Lt. Günther Scheel 20 71

Lt. Hugo Broch 18 81

Oblt. Edwin Thiel 18 76

Maj. Erwin Clausen 17 132

Lt. Walter Zellot 17 86

Ofw. Fritz Lüddecke 17 51

Oblt. Walter Wolfrum 16 137

Hptm. Alfred Grislawski 16 133

Hptm. Franz Dörr 16 128

Lt. Johann-Hermann Meier 16 78

Ofw. Heribert Koller 16 50+

Oblt. Wolfgang Böwing-Treuding 16 46

Maj. Günther Rall 15 275

Maj. Theodor Weissenberger 15 208

Lt. Hans-Joachim Birkner 15 117

Oblt. Hans Schleef 15 99

Hptm. Alfred Teumer 15 76

Lt. Hans-Joachim Kroschinski 15 76

Lt. Hans Fuss 15 71

Hptm. Lutz-Wilhelm Burkhardt 15 69

Maj. Wilhelm Moritz 15 44

Lt. Alfons Klein 15 39

Maj. Günther Bleckmann 15 33

Maj. Joachim Müncheberg 14 135

Lt. Heinz Sachsenberg 14 104

Lt. Heinz Ewald 14 84

Oblt. Hermann "Anatol" Lücke 14 78

Oblt. Kurt Ebener 14 57

Lt. Johann Badum 14 54

Lt. Georg Schwientek 14 31

Hptm. Walter “Graf Punski” Krupinski 13+ 197

Maj. Hartmann Grasser 13 103

Hptm. Hans Götz 13 82

Lt. Karl "Fuchs" Munz 13 60

Fw. Heinz "Figaro" Golinski 13 47

Lt. Franz-Josef Beerenbrock 12 117

Hptm. Hans Roehrig 12 75

Lt. Ludwig Häfner 12 52

Obst. Hermann Graf 11+ 212

Obst. Johannes "Mäcky Steinhoff 10 176

Hptm. Wolfgang Tonne 10 122

Obstlt. Helmut Bennemann 10 93

Oblt. Alfred Heckmann 10 71

Lt. Karl "Quax" Schnörrer 10 46

web page

[dieseltaylor]

Regarding the Stuka - it was a very stable aircraft indeed which made it a good gun platform. I suspect its stall speed was low so coming in at 100 mph or less would be straightforward. I note that MG's for lining up the cannon are not mentioned! but that is not to say field additions do not occur

And some details

"Ju 87G

The Ju 87G was the final version of the Stuka. It abandoned the dive attack in favour of an armament of two 37mm Rheinmetall-Borsig BK3,7 anti-tank cannon. These weapons fired special armour-piercing ammunition, with tungsten cores, at a muzzle velocity of 850m/sec. They were installed in gun pods fitted outboard of the landing gear legs. The ammunition was in six-round clips. The first operational trials were made in March 1943. The normal 7.9mm or 20mm wing guns were deleted. Dive bombing was not possible with the additional weight of the guns, so the dive brakes were also deleted -- the Ju 87G could still drop bombs, but not in a dive.

Initially, the Ju 87G was seen as quite dangerous to its crews. The additional weight and drag of the wing guns adversely affected performance and handling, and low-level attacks in the face of the Russian AAA and fighters seemed suicidal. But true as that was, it remained that the Ju 87G was extremely effective. The 37mm gun was in 1943 considered obsolete as an anti-tank gun on the ground, but from the air it was still effective, because the Ju 87G could attack tanks from the rear or from above, were their armour was much thinner."

[dieseltaylor]

As Rudel's stats were queried I thought this interesting if long article might be of use, it does discuss CAS and the US at the end.

"Historically, CAS operations have a mixed record of success and failure in large-scale mobile wars. The most notable successes on a sustained basis were in World War II:

(1) The German cannon-firing JU-87 "Stukas" in mobile defense supporting the retreat of the German forces after the Stalingrad debacle.

(2) The Americans -- primarily in P-47s -- supporting the advance of the First and Third Armies across France in 1944. And General Kenney's "Cactus" Air Forces in the Southwest Pacific, particularly at the Paratrooper drop at Nadzab, New Guinea in 1943.

German CAS on the Eastern Front.

By 1943, the Germans were on the defensive, facing a Russian adversary who vastly outnumbered them in terms of men, tanks, artillery, airplanes, and motorized transport. Although the Germans always tried to maintain strong mobile reserves, and were willing to make extreme sacrifices of front line strength to do so, the numerical imbalance was so severe that they were always short of reserve forces. Consequently, the Germans were constantly countering deep penetrations, flank attacks and encirclements by Russian armored forces. Soviet doctrine was a direct descendent of these post-Stalingrad offensive armored operations against the Germans.

Although the anti-tank operations by the cannon equipped Stukas were too small in scale to affect the outcome on the Eastern Front, their effectiveness at the tactical level was most impressive. The unit commander, Col Hans Rudel ran up a personal score of over 500 confirmed tank kills (note: confirmation required that at least two people see the tank burn or explode) in over 2700 combat missions. Col Rudel, in a series of interviews, stressed the following aspects of successful CAS operations:

Target Acquisition

Rudel states repeatedly, and most emphatically, that this is the most difficult aspect of anti-tank operations. The pilot must be completely free to concentrate all his attention on tank hunting. Therefore, if the enemy has air-superiority over the battlefield, this distraction will make it impossible to find tanks. Enemy air defenses also make acquisition much more difficult. Most important, high speed "is poison" for finding tanks. Rudel was adamant that even though high speed might be desirable, under "no circumstances" should you sacrifice low speed performance to get high speed performance. His reason is simple: you can not find tanks at high speeds. (Comment: There are several reasons why Rudel's comments should be taken very seriously on this crucial point: He was the most experienced and effective combat pilot in the history of anti-tank warfare. Tanks look pretty much the same from the air today as they did in World War II. He was describing the difficulties of finding tank in the relatively open steppes of the Ukraine as opposed to a much more cluttered environment in Central Europe. Finally, he was relating to the top speed of the slow and clumbsy Stuka.)

Generally, you had to be within 400-500 meters slant range in order to determine if a carefully camouflaged moving vehicle was a tank, determining if the tank was an enemy often required that you get much closer. Recognition problems were toughest during breakthroughs because friendly and enemy tanks became intermingled; however, air defenses were weaker because the enemy had outrun his flak.

Command and Control

The German Army had no control over the Air Force, it could simply make a request for air support. Decisions were made at Air Division headquarters; however, usually by the time an order reached Rudel, conditions had changed and the order was no longer relevant. Rudel's reputation and stature were such that he had the freedom to choose his own area of operations so he normally adjusted his response to account for the changed conditions. In effect, this informal arrangement permitted Rudel to work directly with the ground commanders, and under this decentralized arrangement, he was usually able to achieve a response time of 15-20 minutes.

Luftwaffe liaison officers were placed in special tanks which had the guns stripped out and radios installed. These tanks were normally up front with the spearheads. Although they had no control authority, they were in constant contact with the Stukas, identifying targets to be attacked, or areas to be searched. When the Stukas were making identification passes, friendly ground troops would mark their positions using color coded flare pistols (German troops were not worried about giving away their positions because each side always knew where the other was located and Russian air power was generally ineffective.) Rudel stressed repeatedly that the key to good control was that the pilots must think of themselves as Soldiers.

Target Kill

As soon as Russian tank columns were attacked, they would get off the roads and try to hide or start weaving maneuvers to defeat the aim of the attacking Stuka's. This is an important point because it illustrates the need to destroy the unit before it has time to disperse. This implies that the pilot must be able to re-attack quickly without losing sight of the target -- i.e., have a short turning radius -- and that the CAS force should attack in mass.

Survivability

The majority of losses occurred while the pilot rolled out and was tracking the target. It was essential to survival to minimize tracking time. Rudel would approach the target in hard erratic jinking maneuvers, roll out for one and a half seconds, fire, then resume the hard jinking. (Note: The HITVAL tests in the mid-1970s reaffirmed the importance of minimizing tracking time against the ZSU-23. The issue of tracking time is very important because PGMs such as the Maverick missile require in excess of 10 seconds to lock the guidance system on to the target. During this period the aircraft is flying a steady predictable flight path. Moreover, in a no-FEBA breakthrough scenario, the concept of standing off to survive loses its meaning because, although you may be standing off from an enemy tank, you may be directly over enemy air defenses.)

In general, Rudel felt attacks into static enemy positions with coordinated defenses resulted in unacceptable losses. For example, Rudel asserted that it was usually not worth the effort to attack bridges because they were quickly repaired and his losses were too heavy. He also avoided attacks on target-rich staging areas. However, after a breakthrough, the enemy forces would outrun their AAA and the enemy became much more vulnerable to air attack. (Note: This situation can be expected in the modern scenario because the delicate electronic systems and the requirements for internetting of missiles and guns make today's systems much more susceptible to breakdown or reduced effectiveness during rapid movement. On the other hand, in a static scenario, internetted modern weapons may be so lethal as to make air attack prohibitively expensive.)

American Army Air Corps/Air Force CAS on the Western Front.

Whereas Col Rudel's CAS experience is particularly enlightening at the tactical level of operations, the American Army Air Force experience in France and Germany yields important insights into the grand tactics (often referred to as the operational level of war) as well as the tactics of successful of CAS operations. The central aspect of this grand tactical dimension was the decision to integrate air and ground operations at the army level. This was done with the First and later the Third Army. Two Tactical Air Commands -- IX and XIX TACs -- integrated their operations with the operations of these armies. Here, we begin to see the potential of TACAIR as part of a combined arms team. One airman was responsible for this innovative application of TACAIR -- General Pete Quesada.

In the days immediately following the invasion of France, air support of the ground forces suffered from excessive response times and unproductive results. The leadership of the Army Air Corps (later Army Air Force) insisted on channeling requests from the beachhead back through headquarters in England. Apart from the delays, this system permitted little coordination of ground and air planning. The Air Corps' leadership centralized decision making in England because they believed, incorrectly as it turned out, that support of the ground forces would be an unnecessary diversion of resources away from the independent war-winning role of strategic bombing of German industry.

Quesada demonstrated an undogmatic willingness to decentralize the command relationships in response to the needs of the ground battle. He moved his headquarters near to General Omar Bradley's, the commander of the First Army; and established a close personal relationship with Bradley. He persuaded Bradley to put high frequency aircraft radios into special tanks and to place these tanks at the spearheads of the divisional combat commands. Army officers were given the authority to call down their own air support. Quesada was a frequent visitor to the front to see what his units were achieving and to keep in touch with the realities of the ground battle. He also worked hard to keep the ground commanders up to date on the air situation. His pilots flew as many as five missions a day, living between the sorties in the same mud and discomfort as the ground troops. When Third Army was activated, Gen Weyland, Commander of XIX TAC, patterned his operations after Quesada's. The following features of the CAS operations stand out:

Command, Control, and Reconnaissance

Each of the advancing tank columns was covered at all times by four aircraft which maintained armed recce in advance of the column. Directing their attention to the terrain in front of the column, these aircraft were permitted to attack any target identified as enemy. The divisional combat command commander would monitor the aircraft radio channel to receive their recce information, and could request the flight to attack the targets immediately in front of him. Target requests requiring more strength would be passed through air support party channels, and the missions would be accomplished by aircraft on strip alert. Friendly tank columns would often display bright fluorescent panels to identify their positions (enemy air power posed less of a threat than the bombing of friendly troops). With these arrangements, the fighter bombers could often attack enemy tanks or strong points within 100 meters of friendly positions.

Viewed from the grand tactical level, TACAIR served as a highly mobile recce/artillery force that was used to enhance ground force mobility. Perhaps the best example was the support of the Third Army; the fighter bombers served as a flank guard on Patton's right flank as he raced across France. It is clear from the memoirs of the German panzer commanders that they considered the fighter bombers to be the most effective anti-armor weapon employed by the Allies -- they felt this way because the constant pressure from the air destroyed their mobility.

Tactical Effectiveness

The following information was obtained from Col W. Yale, U.S. Army (Retired), former commander Combat Command "B" (CCB), 11th Armored Division, 3d Army. It provides some detail of the tactical cooperation that can be achieved by superb informal relations between the air and ground forces.

"The night before an action, the CCB operations staff made up small maps of the next day's prospective action and marked them with code figures showing probable hostile positions. The maps were mounted on small cardboard panels (to make them easy to hold in the cockpit) and delivered to XIX TAC with the divisional call signs on them. CCB was always prepared to provide artillery support to suppress enemy air defenses just prior to an air strike. These factors contributed to a common outlook and the spirit of mutual support. Under these conditions, normal response times were between 10 and 20 minutes, and sometimes CAS was available in 5 minutes".

As far as Col Yale was concerned, XIX TAC ...

"won the war for me."

This anecdote is impressive because it comes from a World War II U.S. Army officer (who were well-known for their disdain of air power).

web page

[Soddball]

Whenever FBs are in a game that I'm playing, their primary target for strafing or rockets is always softer vehicles - halftracks and trucks, then infantry in the open, then tanks. They'll drop bombs on the tanks but prefer to drop them on halftracks.

I'm playtesting one campaign at the moment where the Axis forces are forced to hide their units in scattered trees during the day and move them only at night or when the weather's bad.

[sturmelon]

Excellent post dieseltaylor.

From the footage I have seen, the Stukas are coming down like gulls, swaying from side to side. As has been stated, they have no air brakes. The angle is not too pronounced and some reports say they attacked side armor also (canceling out the sloped side armor afvantage by hitting it square). The tunsten rounds probably had enough penetrating ability against this side armor anyway.

I find it hard to believe they would only have the 37mm and rear firing MGs. Apparently, this is the case. A single tracer firing MG firing forward would seem to be a natural.

The 37mm seem to be direct fire sighted and using the high velocity flat trajectory to score hits. Quite remarkable.

I would assume Rudel to be an oulier and perhaps other Stuka pilots would not have his numbers. He may have only averaged 1 'kill' per sortie (if you followed the math earlier). His initial success could have been that the tanks did not take measures like those in diesel's post. They could have been a tank column all lined up on a road.

But Rudel and others would fly multiple missions in one day. They clearly needed a larger feed for the 37mm. I assume both cannons fired at the same time single shot. This is only six shots per sortie.

[ August 09, 2005, 03:49 PM: Message edited by: sturmelon ]

[JasonC]

dt - since Sturms were 1/4 to 1/3 of all Russian aircraft produced, it is hardly surprising they form a high portion of the losses as well.

On Panther losses, only about 25 are listed as actually "unknown", but another 100 are in the two categories "blown up by crew" and "abandoned". The problem is, we have no way of knowing what led to either. Mechanical failure, lack of fuel, inability to leave the repair yard they were in because of the AP round they took two days ago, scared by a Jabo, cut off by a blown bridge, cannabilized for spares, blown up immediately after a battlefield KO, we have no idea, so it is a meaningless category for the questions we are trying to address, relative weapon effectiveness.

As for the alleged higher morale effect of air attack, I sincerely doubt it is real. Are men more scared for the ten minutes it last? Undoubtedly. But the "loiter time" of hours of bombardment, or the irremovable menance of an invulnerable tank that keeps getting closer, seem just as likely to have any lasting effect. Certainly there is no actual evidence for it on the ground, in noticably different patterns of surrender or anything measureable like that.

Frankly I think half of it is simply technological fascination with obviously advanced machines. A light flak gun may in fact be more dangerous input for input to the fighter bomber, than the fighter bomber is even to a truck on the ground. (For a simple reason - flying is technically difficult and tends to end messy, and that makes planes inherently easier to knock out and less likely to be recoverable than ground vehicles). But it wouldn't make anybody identify with the flak gunner, particularly.

It is doubtful the resources poured into aircraft in WW II fully repaid the investment, compared to alternate uses of those resources, and given the counters available, the relative effectiveness of defensive fighters, etc. But people did not measure such things nicely, they just pulled out all the stops trying to win what appeared to be the highest tech portion of the war. Tanks and ground power clearly had more to do with the eventual outcome. That is not true in later technical eras, post smart munitions e.g., but it was in WW II. Scads of super expensive planes flew millions of missions and dropped millions of bombs, but a few dozen armor divisions actually decided the war.

[sturmelon]

http://www.luftwaffe.cz/tank.html

From the link provided above by dt..

Clearly Rudel was an outlier. But knowing how many missions others flew would be critical information. Not everyone oin this list is flying Stukas either.

[Guest Mike]

Presumably the Russians felt that the Tank killing properties of large calibre cannon were adequate, since they upgraded the Sturmovik from 20mm -> 23mm -> 37mm, liked the P39 & P63 with their 37mm, and put a 45mm into a Yak 9!!

There's a bit of a difference between 20mm cannon and all the otehrs - even the 23mm had about twice the muzzle energy of the Russian 20mm - these guns (23mm +) were Anti-tank cannon, not anti-aircraft cannon pressed into anti-tank use.

[dieseltaylor]

If Rudel was getting a confirmed kill on every 5 missions he ever flew. I imagine some flights where aborted by enemy fighters or failures due to strong ackack. A touch of famine and feast.

I see Bauer got 51 in a total flying career with 1071 flights. Given he was out injured for 10 months in 1942 he could have racked up many more before he switched to fighters.

"Herbert Bauer was credited with 11 aerial victories, including one flying the Ju 87 Stuka and 10 flying the Fw 190, in 1,071 missions. In addition he claimed a further 12 unconfirmed aerial victories, 51 tanks and two tank platoons destroyed and recorded hits on the Russian Navy’s battleship “Oktjabrskaya Revoluzia” and a cruiser in the port of Kronstadt."

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Mike:

Presumably the Russians felt that the Tank killing properties of large calibre cannon were adequate, since they upgraded the Sturmovik from 20mm -> 23mm -> 37mm, liked the P39 & P63 with their 37mm, and put a 45mm into a Yak 9!!

You seem to be implying that the 37mm on the P-39/P-63 was used for tank killing. It was not. In fact, those planes were never used primarily for ground attack at all, but as air superiority fighters and interceptors.

Michael

[JasonC]

Guys, I don't know how many times it has to be said before it registers, but claims of air to ground kills of any kind from the pilots themselves are complete fantasies, there is no reason whatever to assume they have any connection to reality, and they can easily by wrong by a factor of 20 without anyone having made anything up consciously.

If you want to establish that tank kills from the air took place, no amount of claim reports have the slightest bearing on the issue, from anybody. You have to find the reports from the tankers and their units, reporting their destruction and loss through air attack, specifically identifying the cause as said air attack, and the number of tanks KOed. Until you can produce them, you might as well believe in Santa Claus.

[Panzer76]

Originally posted by Michael Emrys:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Panzer76:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by JasonC:

Light MGs that works against, but not 20mm and up stuff.

It was reported that to take down the IL-2 you needed 20 mm AP shells, not the normal HE variant. As these shells were in shorter supply, the 20mm Flak's success vs the IL2 was dependant on available 20mm AP ammo. </font>

[sturmelon]

The P39 may have been intended as a fighter but was actually used as a ground attack plane. Its Russian nick-name reflected this.

At least eight additional variants were later built. Most changes to the original design involved new engines and propellers, but otherwise the airframe remained very much the same over its production life. The P-39N and P-39Q were built for the Russian air force under the Lend-Lease military assistance program, and 4,773 Airacobras were delivered to Russia by American and Russian ferry pilots. Seven P-39s were designated as the F2L and used as US Navy target drones. The Airacobra served successfully in the ground-attack role in North Africa, and in the Pacific theater, until more powerful fighters began replacing it in 1944. Other nations which acquired P-39s included Portugal, France, and Italy. The Airacobra, though hampered by its lack of a turbocharger, was a very satisfactory low-altitude attack airplane, and served as faithfully as any other combat aircraft.

Nicknames: Caribou (RAF), Britchik (i.e. "Little Shaver") (Russian nickname). "Shaving" was slang for "low-level strafing."