Mitsubishi Stuka and Thunderbolt

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by horseback

Most of the stories we hear about a solo aircraft's gunners managing to destroy or damage attacking single engine fighters usually turns out to be apocryphal if we try to investigate

Interesting. Do you have any further info to back up this claim? I'm not disputing you, I'm interested in actually figuring out what was actually going on, and I've always wondered just how good gunners actually were.

I have to wonder if it wasn't a huge amount of institutional inertia that led to bombers being heavily equipped with gunners. After all, there is a strong tendency to "fight the last war," and during WW I gunners really were a threat given the relatively short range, limited damage and poor accuracy of the frontally-fixed fighter machine guns. But, by WW 2, many WW I pilots were colonels and generals, so they might have figured that if one or two men armed with single .30 caliber MG were good, 7-8 men armed with multiple 0.30 or 0.50 (or even 20 mm) MG were even better, without realizing that higher airspeeds made gunnery much less effective.

Arguably, the best strategy for bombing during WW2 was the Mosquito - two man crew, decent bomb payload and a very fast aircraft to make interception difficult. You send them out knowing that fast fighters and flak are going to get some of them, but low manpower requirements and relatively inexpensive design means that you can absorb the losses and win via attrition.

Instead, it seems to me that most air forces made huge design sacrifices, as well as operational and human sacrifices, to load up their bombers with gunners who literally might not have been worth their weight.

Originally Posted by horseback

As for the B-52's stinger, the 'gunner' operated a radar aimed gun remotely, with the help of a slightly more advanced stabilization system

Yep. But some of the later WW2 era bombers at least had tail warning radar, even if they didn't have radar-guided and stabilized guns. My point is that the "least useless" place to have a gun on a bomber is the tail, and tailgunners (or other gunners who faced to the rear) generally had the least
complicated firing solutions. I forget the exact numbers, but most of the gunner "aces" of the 8th AF were tailgunners, with top-turret gunners coming in next.

Originally Posted by horseback

Almost any Allied fighter pilot in the theater for more than two days (i.e., long enough to visit the Officers' Club bar) could have told them that German fighters tended to belch black smoke

Yeah, but if you've got an entire squadron of gunners swearing to God that they saw big trails of black smoke, and a few guys claiming they saw fire (due to reflections, tracers, sun glare, or whatever), plus one or two guys saying that the plane was diving "out of control" then a credulous intel officer might let the claim stand.

Eyewitness accounts are pretty damned unreliable, especially in the heat of combat. But, until you realize that, you might believe "they were there, they saw it, who am I to dispute them."

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by horseback

Note also that the data is for ground testing, which means that there is no relative motion to joggle the gunner's elbow or guesstimations about where the target was going to be when the bullets got there. Chances are good that the guns were sighted in and then clamped down and fired by a fixed remote to get those figures in order to eliminate human error.

It might be possible to find the actual technical report in the National Archives. That would settle a lot of questions about methods

In any case, TD now have actual factual data for the ABSOLUTE BEST accuracy possible using certain guns, which could be extrapolated for other types.

What would really be useful is if the USN or USAAF did studies on accuracy of pintle or Scarff-ring mounted rear-facing guns.

Or, even better, did any Air Forces keep records on relative gunner accuracy during training missions against aerial targets? Were there acceptable "Go/No Go" standards for aerial gunnery against target drogues in order to graduate from aerial gunner school? At least for the USAAF, it might be a bit easier to find that sort of data since Clark Gable was an air gunner (and, unusually, a commissioned officer). Stuff that might have otherwise been tossed at the end of the war might have been kept for sentimental reasons if it involved a movie star.

[MiloMorai]

My Dad was a WAG in the RCAF and during training and his instructor wrote `excellent` in his log book for a 5% hit on the drogue, if that is any help Pursuivant.

Typical was 1-2%.

[horseback]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

It might be possible to find the actual technical report in the National Archives. That would settle a lot of questions about methods

In any case, TD now have actual factual data for the ABSOLUTE BEST accuracy possible using certain guns, which could be extrapolated for other types.

What would really be useful is if the USN or USAAF did studies on accuracy of pintle or Scarff-ring mounted rear-facing guns.

Or, even better, did any Air Forces keep records on relative gunner accuracy during training missions against aerial targets? Were there acceptable "Go/No Go" standards for aerial gunnery against target drogues in order to graduate from aerial gunner school? At least for the USAAF, it might be a bit easier to find that sort of data since Clark Gable was an air gunner (and, unusually, a commissioned officer). Stuff that might have otherwise been tossed at the end of the war might have been kept for sentimental reasons if it involved a movie star.

The Navy and Marines used more pintle/ring mounted guns on their dive & torpedo bombers than the Army used; the various float planes launched from the cruisers and battleships also had rear gun installations. I retain the impression that the pre-war trained Navy gunners had a pretty high standard for accuracy, much like the pre-war Naval Aviators (Dave McCampbell was a chain-smoking guy in his thirties when he rang up his score; you have to wonder what John Thach, one of the other acknowledged 'Top Guns' of the prewar era could have accomplished in a similar position).

As for my description of how the gun mounts were most likely tested, sighting the guns in and then clamping the gunner's end down gives you the dispersion inherent to the gun mount type; humans are terribly non standard as a rule (even from minute to minute), so you would want to limit their influence as much as possible.

MiloMorai's numbers sound about right for shooting drogues flying in formation with your aircraft; 5% for a steady state target unlikely to shoot back.

cheers

horseback

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by horseback

The Navy and Marines used more pintle/ring mounted guns on their dive & torpedo bombers than the Army used

That's why I was asking about them. If you could get decent stats for inherent accuracy of rear-mounted pintle/ring-mounted guns from the USN, then it would be very easy to extrapolate it to similar gun mounts used by other air forces. All the mounting technology was roughly comparable (although gun performance differed a bit) and the human element was probably pretty much the same worldwide.

[horseback]

Quote:
Originally Posted by horseback:
Most of the stories we hear about a solo aircraft's gunners managing to destroy or damage attacking single engine fighters usually turns out to be apocryphal if we try to investigate

Interesting. Do you have any further info to back up this claim? I'm not disputing you, I'm interested in actually figuring out what was actually going on, and I've always wondered just how good gunners actually were.

Not much beyond the few times I've tried to look up the reports of aircraft like "Pistol Packing Mama's" last fight, and been able to find nothing to actually confirm beyond reports that usually came from people in no position to see what happened.

I have to wonder if it wasn't a huge amount of institutional inertia that led to bombers being heavily equipped with gunners. After all, there is a strong tendency to "fight the last war," and during WW I gunners really were a threat given the relatively short range, limited damage and poor accuracy of the frontally-fixed machine guns. But, by WW 2, many WW I pilots were colonels and generals, so they might have figured that if one or two men armed with single .30 caliber MG were good, 7-8 men armed with multiple 0.30 or 0.50 (or even 20 mm) MG were even better, without realizing that higher airspeeds made gunnery much less effective.

I've made exactly the same general argument myself on more than one occasion.

I think that the momentum was in place by 1930 or so, with Douhet's 'the bomber will always get through' dogma, coupled with the way that big multiengine aircraft were outperforming the single engine fighters of the same period. I'm sure that the Powers That Were assumed that the fighters would never become as fast, long ranged and heavily armed as they eventually did (or if they did, they assumed that they themselves would be safely retired by then). In the cash poor Depression era US Army Air Corps, big bombers offered a lot of bang for the taxpayers' buck (and they looked quite impressive).

A lot of the men who were generals in 1942 made their marks in the early-mid 1930s as advocates of this strategy before the development of radar made locating the bomber formations a lot less chancy, and fighter aircraft became not only as fast and high flying as the big bombers, but much more so. These generals and the big aircraft companies that built the big bombers had already made a major investment in the concept before the war though, and probably really did believe that the Germans and the RAF simply hadn't used big enough formations of aircraft capable of flying as high and fast as the B-17 or B-24, with enough well trained men at heavy machine guns to swat away the few fighters able to get to altitude in time to intercept.

By the time reality had set in, it was late 1943, and the war machine had poured billions into bomber production, trained aircrew and propaganda, not to mention lost thousands of lives. You could quietly reassign the less senior responsible parties to training commands and early retirement (after the war) but you couldn't tell the world, the taxpayers (a large subset of which had become Gold Star Mothers due to your miscalculations), the 'crusading' politicians and especially the enemy that you had been terribly wrong.

Rosie the Riveter would find you and kick your *%&$$!!! and that would be the least of your problems.

Better to re-purpose the bombers and let the new long range fighters destroy the Luftwaffe (and its pilots) in the air after using the bombers to get them to come up and fight; once the fighters finally established air supremacy, you could finally use the bombers to destroy the enemy's industry, starting with fuel and lubricants, and gradually reducing the surface of his territory to a moonscape for the sake of bragging rights and a shot at a role in creating a separate Air Force and maybe even take over the aviation arms of those arrogant bastages in the Navy and Marine Corps, all while saying that was how you had planned it all along.

As RoseAnne Rosannadanna used to say "It could happen."

cheers

horseback

[majorfailure]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

In any case, TD now have actual factual data for the ABSOLUTE BEST accuracy possible using certain guns, which could be extrapolated for other types.

Hmm, what about the dual gun mounts and convergence? This would need clarification to not over/under estimate their accuracy.

And I wouldn't know what I had decided in around 1938. Then fighters were becoming faster than bombers, yes, but their range was still limited (thats why the Zero was so incredibly successful first IMHO -noone thought any fighter could have that range), and their payload was not stellar either. So you could guess right about the fighters potential and leave the bombers be. But the risk that bombers could be still capable enough was too great to not have them. And once you had them, you needed to use them...

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by horseback

In the cash poor Depression era US Army Air Corps, big bombers offered a lot of bang for the taxpayers' buck (and they looked quite impressive).

Speaking of big and impressive Depression Era bombers, in a magic world where we could have everything we wanted from a combat flight sim, I'd love to see the XB-19 modeled.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_XB-19

Underpowered and slow, but decent payload, excellent range for the era and, of course, lots of guns.

Originally Posted by horseback

A lot of the men who were generals in 1942 made their marks in the early-mid 1930s as advocates of this strategy before the development of radar made locating the bomber formations a lot less chancy, and fighter aircraft became not only as fast and high flying as the big bombers, but much more so.

Of course, this is a very American (and USAAF) point of view. The USN, Luftwaffe, VVS, RAF, Reggia Aeronautica, IJN and IJAAF all made different decisions regarding "the next war" in the 1930s.

In all cases, however, their decisions for medium or heavy bombers included adding a number of dedicated gunners, often in positions where the gun had a very limited fields of view and arcs of fire. And, one of the things that IL2 has taught me is just how freaking useless a flexible gun with limited arc of fire and field of view is.

But, as you point out, the thing that really blindsided the military strategists of the 1930s (when the major combatants were designing the air forces that would be used during WW2) was the invention of radar. The argument that "the bomber will always get through" falls short if you have a device that can detect the bombers as they take off and form up!

It even messes up decisions about where to place guns. Most bomber designs assumed that fighters would fall into a stern chase and would be attacking from below as they rose to intercept. So, lots of guns were placed to guard the plane's belly and rear.

But, with radar, fighters could position themselves ahead and above the bomber formation, so at least some of the U.S. heavy bombers had to be hastily redesigned with heavier guns to the front of the plane.

[RPS69]

Germans admited that gunners were there to improve the moral of the crew, not for achieving any brilliant results. They were there to bring the idea that they were not just flying pigeons.

The difference with B17's were the closed box formation. For the fighter groups, it was like attacking a ground position with heavy AA fire, without armored aircraft. The way they found to combat this situation, was to break the box formation to pick less riscky targets. The under wing mortars, were used to this purpose, (badly represented in game, because bomber crews got excelent morals allways!) they were fired in the general direction of the bomber formations to generate confusion and panic, but getting a direct hit was just a special bonus, and not an expected result.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by RPS69

Germans admited that gunners were there to improve the moral of the crew, not for achieving any brilliant results. They were there to bring the idea that they were not just flying pigeons.

I think that was the case for a lot of gunners who also had other jobs, like the flight engineer, navigator and bombardier on the U.S. heavy bombers. Being able to shoot back rather than just sit there and take it was probably a morale boost.

Additionally, all those gunners served as extra eyes, not just to look out for fighters or flak, but also for station-keeping in formation.

Originally Posted by RPS69

The difference with B17's were the closed box formation.

Actually, all the U.S. heavy bombers.

Originally Posted by RPS69

For the fighter groups, it was like attacking a ground position with heavy AA fire, without armored aircraft.

Even so, the U.S. practice of heavily armed bombers flying in close formation didn't work so well unless they had fighter escort. U.S. attempts at unescorted missions deep into Europe were disastrous and forced a temporary halt to U.S. bombing raids while the generals figured out a different strategy.

The British learned this lesson earlier and told the Americans, but the Americans wouldn't listen. Without extremely long-ranged fighters like the P-47, P-51 and P-38 to escort their bombers, the British had to revert to night bombing.

Originally Posted by RPS69

The way they found to combat this situation, was to break the box formation to pick less risky targets.

Yep. Of course, German squadron tactics in the game don't follow Luftwaffe doctrine at all. There's no attempt whatsoever to "break the box" and then detail a flight or section to deal with the cripples.

Likewise, U.S. heavies don't try to maintain formation (like several cripples banding together to form a slower formation), nor do U.S. fighters attempt to protect cripples as opposed to the rest of the formation.