While the argument can be made that Germany was propping up Italy in 1943 and after, many of the early gains were made in North Africa with some assistance by the Italians.  I don’t think it would have kept Germany out of the Balkens as the oil fields of Romania were much too important for their war machine.  Focusing on the fact that Germany had to poor troops into Italy to keep it in the war, overlooks the fact that it kept the US/UK in Italy instead of a sooner move on France or Norway.  I think Germany moved on North Africa for the same reasons as the Balkans, for the oil.

who is for Dr. Who, the poplular British sci-fi show that started the same year I did in 1963.  69 is for the world champion '69 Kansas City Chiefs.  Picture in my avatar is the ship I use for my TOS movie era sim USS Beowulf.  http://www.ussandromeda.us/Beowulf/sms-2.0.2-standard/

@polywog:

I can’t think of much to add to the original 15, but I suppose if you’re Canadian, you’re probably thankful that Benedict Arnold got stomped in his horribly bad invasion of Quebec at the start of the revolution.

Can you say “Northern United States”?

I wouldn’t at all say stomped.  In fact he was not defeated, merely not able to further advance due to the logistics.

Battle of Yorktown would be more decisive.

I would agree post 1851 of adding Midway and Stalingrad.  Both turned what looked to be certain defeat into victory and turned the tides in those theatres.

Looking back on this thread, I see that I made a mistake and called the Hellcat, F4F which of course was the wildcat.  I’m not sure anyone would choose that as their dream plane as it was underpowered and undergunned.  The F6F Hellcat on the other hand was the most dominant plane of the whole war.  Just saw another show on History Channel and they indicated that it had a 50:1 kill ratio, by far the highest of any plane in any war.

Yamamoto never made it to fight against the American fleet. For a leviathan, it sure sunk quickly. Battleships were an idea whose time had passed by the time the war came. Airpower ruled in the Pacific.

@stuka:

I only fly Stukas regardless of how many got shot down. :lol: :wink:

That’s good, but you’re a bomber pilot then. I’m going to be a fighter pilot and get all the girls.

@haxorboy:

The Spitfire was nice, but the Hurricane was the plane that fought the majority of Battle of Britain. The Spitfire had a flaw with the canopy being sunk flush with teh back of teh plane, which lead to angle of attack advantages to the German’s, it was teh same issue with teh P-40, which lead to the bubble canopy’s of the later fighters rolled out like the P-51 and the later models of the Spitfire to correct that problem.

The Brits would have been wiped out if the German luftwaffe would have used more commen sense with the blitz on bombing Berlin. It was the decision to not increase fuel capacity on the Me109’s that lead to the bombers being easy targets for teh Hurricanes and Spitfires. Overall though the Spitfire was teh model for teh P-51, without looking it up didn’t we use the engine for it on the Mustang?

The P51 was originally underpowered until the British suggested the Rolls Royce engine for it.
The major flaw of the spitfire was that it had a carburator instead of fuel injection. When the plane went inverted, gravity caused it to stall as there was no fuel for the carb. German planes would often try to force the Spitfires to do this.

almost any plane can be a dive bomber. 4fu corsairs were loaded with bombs and sent to do close combat support. everyone is trying to make up rules for things that are already taken into account. if you have an amphibious assault its pretty much implied that paratrooper may be included, but they do nothing different from a normal infantry. fighter planes can be equipped with bombs. Heavy tanks would be mixed with light and medium tanks and an armor unit is an unit of equal strength.

I always liked watching Baa Baa Blacksheep so I voted Corsair. I also like the look of the Flying Tigers P40s with the sharks teeth painted on.

@haxorboy:

I voted Zero as I was out at the Dulles Air and Space Museum yesterday and the tour guide had all these facts on performance and manuverability and it sounds like the Zero was the best in teh sky overall. But if I had my druthers I would pick the Me262, would have been fun to fly around in a jet back then.

BTW if any of your are air/space buffs, the Enterprise exhibit is completed and you can walk right up to it sitting there in the museum, pretty cool to look at. The SR-71 sitting in front of it just makes it look that much cooler.

The Zero had a big disadvantage in that it was so light that the American planes could go into a dive to escape it. Once the Americans learned this, it was lights out.
The Spitfire had a disadvantage that it used a carburator instead of fuel injection so the Germans learned they could try to induce the Brits to go inverted and stall them. The Messerschmidts had their own disadvantage in fuel tank capacity. In the Battle of Britain, the Brits waited until the fighter cover had to return to base and then go wild on the German bombers. In dogfights, the two planes pretty much traded off kills.