P51D v 109K in BoP

[Panzergranate]

The kill to loss ratio reflects losses due to air to air combat.

Unfortunately, it includes losses due to defensive gunners on bombers, not just fighter on fighter action.

Also fighter on bomber successes are also included.

If a fighter operates mainly against poorly armed bombers, it'll have a good kill to loss ratio.

It is more of a "Batting Average" than a dogfight rating.

Opportunity for engaging enmy aircraft is also a factor. By the end of WW2 the Japanese struggled to field any aircraft in meaningful numbers. There just wasn't the pickings for the later fighter planes.

By comparison, the Finns enjoyed a target rich envioronment filled with large numbers of poorly designed, underpowered, unarmoured and undergunned aircraft flown by determined but inexperienced and poorly trained pilots.

Between April 1942 and April 1943, on Finnish squadron of 18 x B-239 Buffaloes managed to shoot down a confirmed 274 Soviet aircraft with the loss of only two aircraft (one through combat damage on landing).

Two thirds of these kills were fighters such as the LaGG-1 and LaGG-3, Mig-3, La-5 and Yak.

Corsairs did spend a majority of their missions on ground support than direct combat. The Hellcat was intended as an air superiority fighter.