If I ever play a few games of Classic, I’m sure I’ll figure it out so I kind of forgot about this post. Notice it was from late August.
The US in the Pacific? NO WAY!!!
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Not intelligent of me - just my main interest!
Here is the first thing I always bring up: Ever read this book?
War in the Air : True Accounts of the 2Oth Century’s Most Dramatic Air Battles by the Men Who Fought Them - Stephen Coonts (edited it)
These are the most incredible stories you have ever read, about 20 short stories from WWI all the way through Vietnam!
If you haven’t, trust me - quit reading this post and go order it from Amazon right now!!!
My favorite pilot is probably Boelcke, just for the fact that he was the pioneer of it all - the original fighter pilot.
His gravesite even had a wreath with the inscription: “To the memory of Captain Boelcke. Our brave and chivalrous opponent. From The British Royal Flying Corps”.
“A clever military leader will succeed in many cases in choosing defensive positions of such an offensive nature from the strategic point of view that the enemy is compelled to attack us in them.” - Moltke
[ This Message was edited by: Ansbach on 2002-05-17 21:33 ]
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When it comes to air combat, I usually stick to pre-Vietnam War. And let me tell you why. “There is something inherently compelling about the image of lone airmen matching wits and the performance of their respective aircraft in a one-on-one duel – modern warfare’s last throwback to a form of combat predating Homer’s Iliad, now rapidly vanishing into the smoke left by radar-guided air-to-air missiles.” The missiles say it all. With missiles, fights begin to lean a lot more to the machine then they do to the man. Furthermore, air combat has evolved into a much larger based conflict with squadron-based tactics. I am in now way degrading today’s air force though, as the America’s Air Force is the World Finest with an average kill ratio of 12 to 1 - if not higher.
War in the Air: True Accounts of the 2Oth Century’s Most Dramatic Air Battles by the Men Who Fought Them? I think I’ll check this one out. The majority of my fighter information comes from the library, so I’ll be sure to drop by there sometime soon to check if they have in stock. (Don’t blame me, I’m just a reader on a budget). I would also like to suggest “Battles with the Luftwaffe: The Bomber Campaign Against Germany 1942-1945” by Theo Boiten and Martin Bowman. A sincerely interesting read detailing the dramatics, dynamics, and daily running of the gauntlet that our brave Allied airman had to partake on a daily basis.
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I’m sure you can find War in the Air at the library. I’m right there with you on pre-vietnam - I think there’s only one or two Vietnam stories and they are about Huey pilots - those guys had balls as big as any fighter pilot!
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I don’t want to spoil any of the stories, but just to give you a sneak preview - one of them was written by a british pilot, and the last part of the story was about him limping home over the channel on his own after a bad dog fight, I think in a Hurricane. A ME-109 saw him, came up behind him, took his time lining up on him (he couldn’t manuver) and then let loose. It didn’t bring him down. The german pilot pulled up beside him, surveyed the damage to the Hurricane, then fell back behind him and did it again. It still didn’t bring the Hurricane down. I think the german pilot repeated the whole process 3 or 4 times, but the Hurricane wouldn’t go down. The german finally pulled up beside him, saluted him, and then took off. The guy made it back to base! They counted the bullet-holes in his plane and it was in the hundreds!
[ This Message was edited by: Ansbach on 2002-05-17 21:49 ]
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I have a great deal of respect for bomber crews, probably more so then fighter pilots. If I was piloting a P-51 Mustang and found myself outnumbered 10 to 1 by Me-109s and Fw-190s, I could just go full throttle and out fly them. Obviously for big bombers, this is certainly not the case. Imagine the nerve wrecking experience of seeing flak (and in Vietnam SAMs) blanketing the sky for many miles but having no other alternative then to fly through it. If that isn’t enough to knock the socks right off you, you still have to deal against nimble enemy interceptors willing to sacrifice themselves for the sake of the homeland. The only real advantage I see with bombers is really the fact that if you’re hit, at least you won’t die alone. :sad:
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My grandfather would be glad to hear you say that - he’s part of the reason I’m a big pilot buff. He flew B-24s in the Pacific. The only problem is that every time we ask him to tell us stories about the war, he says “I’m a lover, not a fighter!” and tries to pinch Grandma (or my wife) on the butt… lol! We have a lot of great photos of him though.
[ This Message was edited by: Ansbach on 2002-05-17 21:58 ]
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How neat, you also had a family member who also served in the Great War. I also had a great uncle that served in the war as a rifleman in the European theater. Now being a rifleman in the Army was like being a bombardier in the Air Force. I think that if my stats are correct, even though rifleman only composed ten percent of the Army, they suffered ninety percent of the causalities. Quite literary, the riflemen were the guys that saved our arse in the Battle of the Bulge. While that and the heroics, of George Patton and his 3rd.
I am also a huge war buff and even considered joining the military. The only problem is that war has changed a lot if the invention of nuclear weapons, biological/chemical weapons, “smart” bombs, cruise missiles, and even self sustained fighting machines. In that sense a bit of humanity has been lost. No room for heroes and cowards, just those who are dead and those who aren’t.
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Could a P-51 really outfly a FW-190 ?
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War is not an art form anymore.
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F_alk
Trust me, the P-51 could eat any WWII fighter for breakfast (maybe except for the Me-262 and other jet powered aircraft). But if you really want to know, here are the facts:
Mustang had between 3000 and 4000 lbs. more weight, and so was able to outdive either German plane.
The tightness of its turns was much better than the Me-109 and slightly better than the FW-190.
The P-51B had a range at 1080 miles and could be extended to 2600 miles when extra drop-tanks were attached to the wings. This made its range far more than any Allied or German fighter’s.
The Mustang was 50 mph faster than the Germans up to 28,000 ft., beyond which it was much faster than the FW-190 and still substantially faster than the Me-109.
The special characteristics of the P-51’s laminar-flow wing and flaps made it possible to safely exceed the top dive speed and maneuver better than any other aircraft of the time.
I think that the only area the FW-190 could’ve bested the P-51 on was armament.
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Ansbach,
That story you told about the British fighter, I heard of that too! At first I thought it was a tall-tale, told from the German Luftwaffe gatherings (indeed, the story I heard came from the German pilot who conducted the attack). It was an open target and he wasted his entire ammunition on it! Thanks for clearing the factualness of the story, while presenting me with a different point of view. :smile:There were many stories of gratitude and honor during the European Air War. Adolf “Gallant” Galland practically defines chivalry in the air. Another Me-109 pilot (name escapes me) saw a battered B-17 limping home a bombing raid. Instead of attacking it (whereupon the bomber crews expected certain death), the Me-109 took pity on the crew and escorted it across the English Channel to English soil. Later on after the war had ended, the Me-109 and B-17 bomber crew met each other at a reunion and soonafter became great friends.
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Candyman,
War is still an art form but a very changed on at that (much less romantic and more modernist). No longer will war be based on the bravery of men but high technology. I can already simulate the next major war where gene-specific biological weapons, EMP bombs, machines, and tactical nukes are used.
“Only the spirit of attack, born in a brave heart, will bring success to any fighter aircraft, no matter how highly developed it may be.” - Aldolf Galland
“The create? The create matters not. It is the man who pilots the create that truely counts” -[ This Message was edited by: TG Moses VI on 2002-05-19 10:41 ]
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When I think of art, I think of movement and emotion. There are no such traits like these in modern warfare.
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Movement and emotion? What about the emotion that accompanies entire towns being wiped off the map in seconds? That’s pretty emotional. And how about the movement of a concrete bunker shattering into the air in tiny fragments?
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Movement does play a large part in war today. Simply put, whoever can muster the most amount of forces in the least amount of time wins. Supply lines are just as crucial today as they were in Napoleon’s march on Russia. Also, the deployment of ground troops is greatly strengthened by Hercules transport planes and the helicopter. Land speed has improved with recon bikes and light vehicles. Sure beats, plain old marching that dictated movement before the invention of the auto and airplane.
War is still full of emotion. Have you seen, “Black Hawk Down?” If you haven’t, I suggest you do, it’s a very emotional movie – I have war vets that have cried after seeing the movie. However, war has become less glorified and less romanticized, meaning some spirit is lost. But compared to war, all other forms of human endeavor still shrink to insignificance.
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