P-38s

4 of the 5 Lightnings that departed Chino Thursday on the break at Sacramento Capitol Air Show this weekend. Leftys old 38 must of had a glitch somewhere along the way.
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Awesome sight! My favorite plane of that era by far.

 

Thanks for posting. Great photo.

 

Love those things.
Must have been a hell of a ride for 19 year old back when.

 

The noise, the speed, the handling...

Is it any wonder those that survived came home with a hunger for fast cars and motorcycles?

 

Wow, love the photo and the P-38 legend.

 

The P-38 is also the easiest WW-II fighter for formation flying. No worn out leg on the rudder pedal.

Plus you could see where you were going while taxiing without S-turning (P-39, too).

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

Great photo!

The Japs sure hated them... the krauts not so much.



Terry

 

Wasn't the German translation "fork-tailed devil"?

 

Hi mate,how come?

 

The P38 wasn't a huge success in the ETO, particularly relative to other allied fighters. When it was introduced, there were lots of development problems. The superchargers gave fits and there were lots of fuel related issues. Also, it is a very complicated aircraft and tended to overwhelm newer pilots. There were complaints from some FG commanders about pilots being shot down due to slow reactions when bounced because of the planes technical sophistication.

In the ETO, combat tended to take place at much higher altitudes than in the PTO. German tactics were very different. German pilots went to great lengths to avoid swirling dogfights, preferring slashing hit and run attacks and employing "boom and zoom" tactics. This usually involved initiating and ending combat through high speed dives, something that was extremely dangerous in the early P38's due to compressibility issues. This was largely solved with the J and L models dive flaps, but by the time they reach production the die was already set in Europe. In early 1944 General Doolittle , commander of the 8th AF, requested that the 8th not be issued P38's but instead receive P51s.

An example.... Me-109 and Fw-190 drivers knew they had a distinct advantage over the P38 in roll rate and initial acceleration in a dive. So they could escape by rolling into a split S at full throttle. P38 pilots SOP was to cut throttle in such a maneuver to avoid possible terminal compressibility. This sort of tactic could enable a German pilot to put sufficient distance between himself and the P38 to effect an escape. Also, the Fw-190 maintained better control at extremely high speeds in a dive and the Me-109 tended to have better high altitude performance (25K-30K ft) due to supercharger issues with the Allison engines on the P38.

I once asked General Gunther Rall (275 victory Luftwaffe ace) which western allied fighter he feared the most and the least. He immediately named the P38 as the least. He said they were easy to spot, you could dive away from them and they were big targets. Fighter he feared the most? Spitfire!

There is massive debate about why the P38 was not a huge success in the ETO. I think it is largely because such judgement is made based on the early model P38s entering combat in mid to late 1943. The P38s went into combat in limited numbers, they suffered very high rates of mission abort due to mechanical issues, the pilots were green and lacked significant flight time in a very sophisticated aircraft and the Luftwaffe pilots they faced were the best fighter pilots on earth. In the fall of 1943, many of the German pilots fighting against the new P38s had been flying combat for 4 years. A year later, fall of 1944, had the P38L been in large scale use in the ETO the story may have been very different. US pilots had lots more training, more combat experience, the late model P38's corrected most of the bad characteristics of the early models and the German opposition was now largely made up of kids with less than 30 hours TOTAL flight time. Most of the Luftwaffe experten were gone.

In the PTO where the P38 was a massive success, the Japanese fought very differently. The A6M Zero was an excellent dogfighter, but it was slow and its high speed maneuverability was terrible. The P38s forced the combat into the vertical plane, dictated the fight with their higher speed and ruled the skies. The Zero was totally outclassed. Late in the war when much better Japanese planes came into operation (Ki-84 and N1K1 for example) the Japanese lacked experienced pilots capable of getting the most out of the planes and the production quality was terrible plaguing the Frank and George with mechanical failures.

Anyhow.... good discussion and debates on the topics here:

http://warbirdsforum.com/showthread.php?t=1177




Terry

 

The P-38 did well in the MTO, where most of the missions were at low to medium altitude and temperatures were warmer. Twin engines were also an advantage for all the over-water use, as they were in the PTO. They still had teething problems in the MTO, but performed well. In the ETO the early P-38s had cockpit heater problems that frequently caused severe visibility problems and pilot comfort problems. Early turbo-charger problems on the P-38 seem to have been largely absent in the P-47, probably because of its more central location.

With the PTO leaders screaming for P-38s, the choice was not hard to make. Unbelievably enough, once in a turn, late model P-38s could turn with any fighter using their maneuvering flaps, but, like Terry said, the initial roll rate was very slow and getting into that turn took too long against German fighters.

The one advantage the P-38 did have in the ETO was recognizability to the bomber gunners. P-51s and P-47s were regularly peppered by the gunners if they approached the B-17/24s too closely. Not a good way to die.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

Don't forget that the USAAF top scoring ace flew the P-38 Maj. Richard Bong.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Bong

 

Rob- Number two also, Tommy McGuire. McGuire AFB, NJ is named after him. Richard I. Bong AFB, WI was never opened. Bong was from WI.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

McGuire, and his wingman, were also both shot down and killed in P38s. Classic case of gross overconfidence and lack of respect for the enemy. McGuire, leading 3 P38s (one aborted with supercharger issues) encountered a lone Ki-43 Oscar. Assuming the Japanese pilot to be the typical green kid, McGuire ordered his flight to NOT drop their external fuel tanks.

It was not a green kid.... But rather Akira Sugimoto, a skilled pilot. McGuire lost control in a tight turn attempting to engage the Oscar, he was killed when the P38 spun in. Sugimotot was then shot down but immediatly after a Ki84 arrived and shot down another P38 and damaged the third. 2 dead US pilots for IJA loss.

Combat against the Japanese in '44 and '45 was far easier than against Germany but as McGuires story shows....still very dangerous/


Terry

 

Terry- Right you are. In WW-II, they called it a high speed stall, but in reality he departed the aircraft, as we now call it. When you depart an aircraft (short for departing controlled flight), you lose directional control as well as lift. The nearly full external tanks on the flight's P-38s increased weight and drag and severely limited the maneuvering capability of what was normally a very forgiving aircraft. The counter-rotating props nearly eliminated the torque roll associated with departing one of the single engine fighters and the P-38 usually recovered quickly. In McGuire's case, he was at low altitude trying to turn tightly and get Sugimoto off his wingman's tail. When the aircraft departed, he did not have enough altitude to recover. Reports are he got his wings leveled and was just beginning to recover to a nose level/up attitude when he ran out of airspace and impacted.

McGuire reportedly had a much bigger ego than Dick Bong and had just received a hunting license after Bong was recalled from combat duty. He did not want to jettison his tanks early in the mission and compromise his ability to tie or beat Bong's record of 40 victories (he had 38 at the time) on that sortie. Cost him dearly on that mission and even worse, got his wingman killed, too. Killing yourself is one thing, killing your wingman is unacceptable.

Explains why you should never pick a fight in a bar, even if you are way bigger than the other guy. No telling how good he is in a fight.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

I have known three WW2 P-38 pilots and all were successful in the P-38. Probably the most successful was Larry Blumer who shot down 5 Fw-190's in less than 10 minutes. He was a captain and led a flight of his guys into Germany he let three of his guys go after a couple of FW-190's that were stooging around. Shortly after, they radioed that they had been jumped by 20 plus FW's near an airfield. Blumer was a powerful guy with a short fuse and he yelled for everybody to follow him and they dove from 20,000 feet down to the airfield that was known by Blumer. When he arrived with his flight he was at war emergency power and going like the proverbial bat. A FW crossed his path when he got there and he gave it a short burst and flew through the debris. Pulling up into a loop through the middle of the fight he shot down another one, then on the way down he dropped another one. He told me that he just looped in and out of the fight shooting down Germans until his fuel was low so he strafed the field and went home. They lost three airplanes and shot down over half of the group that jumped them. On the way out he noticed that his engines were still at full throttle and they were removed after he returned to his base, totally shot. The name of his last airplane was SCRAP IRON 1V.
He shot down two more some time later and those were FW-190's so I have to think that in the hands of the right pilot , they were dangerous. he also got one more airplane that could never be credited to him since it was a Spit. that jumped him one day . He figured that it was a German in a captured Spitfire and as he put it, " I shot it down."
So that is my story from an ace who loved the airplane and admittedly used it in the proper way---hit and run except in the case of the Spitfire.
Larry had a cigar box full of medals and he grinned and told me that they weren't worth enough to buy a cup of coffee.
I used to fly with him in a Student Prince some times and he still knew a few things.
Switches

 

Bob- The funny thing is the medals do not mean that much to most combat crew members. They seem to impress civilians and family members much more. If they ever find out about them.

Was happy to see an F-15E crew just received DFCs for an action in SWA. The medals are a good morale builder in units and can be a separator for future promotions.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

You are correct, Terry. it wasn't about medals with Larry. He simply loved a good fight. He's dead now but he told enough about his exploits that would be a good little book.
Switches

 

I wouldn't exactly use Blumer's famous 5 kill mission as an example of "typical" P38 ETO combat.... it was after all the single most successful mission a P38 driver ever flew against the Germans!

It often went the other way too...


On 25 August 1943, 13 P-38s were shot down in a single sortie by Jagdgeschwader 53 Bf 109s without achieving a single kill. On 2 September, 10 P-38s were shot down, in return for a single kill, the 67-victory ace Franz Schiess (who was also the leading "Lightning" killer in the Luftwaffe with 17 destroyed). Kurt Buehligen, third highest scoring German pilot on Western front with 112 victories, recalled later: “The P-38 fighter (and the B-24) were easy to burn. Once in Africa we were six and met eight P-38s and shot down seven. One sees a great distance in Africa and our observers and flak people called in sightings and we could get altitude first and they were low and slow.”


Maj. Klaus Mietusch leading III/JG26 once bounced a group of 12 P38's, shooting down 8 without loss to his staffel.

For P38 drivers, getting low and slow against an old hand in a 109 was a BAD idea.


Having studied WWII air combat for 35 years, in my opinion the bottom line really came down more to pilot than plane. Put a guy like Gerhard Barkhorn, Addi Glunz or George Preddy behind the stick and whomever he ran into was REALLY in a world of hurt. The greats knew how to fight whatever plane they were flying.

When the relative performance of various planes really made a huge difference was when your talking about the average or below average stick. A P51 or Spitfire could make an ace out of a very average driver. A 109 would usually not (but the FW-190 often did)


Personally, I think the FW-190 would be my pick for greatest overall fighter of WWII. When flown to its strenghts, it was very difficult to counter. Good speed, amazing firepower (4 x 20mm MG-151 cannon plus fusalage MG's), the fastest roll rate of any WWII fighter (possible exception the F4U) and the ability to maintain excellent control at extremely high speeds in a dive. High wing loading meant the 190 was not a dogfighter.... but that is a GOOD thing. Boom and Zoom was the key to high scores and survival in WWII, not stallfighting in furballs.

Pilots who used the "Butcher Bird" to setup fast snap shots and then dive away were tough. With the firepower the 190 had, German pilots describe shooting as being just like shooting skeet. If your aim is on, the target is gone.

The P38 gave the same treatment to Zero's. Against the Japanese planes and tactics, the P38 was a real nightmare. Zero and Oscar drivers who spotted high P38s had to know they were screwed.




Terry

 

I wasn't implying that Blumer's incident was typical, but to illustrate the success in using hit and run tactics. The P-38 was not the best dog fighter but if you got hit by one burst you were gone..
Switches

 

Terry- I am going to ask you the $64,000 question. How many of those German P-38 "kills" are substantiated by losses from a P-38 unit? Overclaiming was rampant in both world wars and the number of actual kills was often a small fraction of the claimed kills.

I think your choice of the Spitfire as the best allied fighter would mean you only looked at the first 18 months of WW-II. The Spitfire was a point defense interceptor that did not have the legs to go anywhere and was nearly completely irrelevant from late 1942 onwards. The Brits understood that and introduced the Typhoon and Tempest with much longer legs. I would say the best allied low to medium altitude fighter in the ETO was the Tempest and high altitude it was the Mustang. In the PTO it was a triumverate of P-38, Hellcat, and Corsair. The Mustang came late and did not have as much impact in the PTO.

Taz
Terry phillips

 

I have not specifically researched any efforts at substantiating P38 losses. As you say... claims on both sides were often inflated. If US bomber gunner kills actually awarded were correct, the Luftwaffe would have lost several times the total number of fighters it had, never mind the air to air kills awarded. I do know that RLM victory claim confirmation procedures are generally considered more stringent than that used by the USAAF, but it is obvious that victory claims on both sides were a very inexact science.

I never said nor implied anything at all about a preference for the Spitfire, nor have I mentioned any personal opinion at all relative to ANY allied fighters. I said that General Gunther Rall said that HE personally felt the Spitfire was the most dangerous Allied fighter to engage in combat. What difference or meaning do any range issues have in such an opinion? If your being engaged by a particular enemy fighter, clearly it had the range to arrive at wherever you are. His comment about the Spitfire was not relative to its overall strategic impact on the entire war, it was relative to what type of allied fighter gave HIM personally the biggest concern when actually fighting!

As for Mustangs in the PTO.... when it came time for long range B-29 raids on Japan, which allied fighter did Curtis LeMay demand carry the burden?

Hey, I am no P38 hater. I am merely pointing out that in the ETO it was never a big success.

All other factors being equal.... Give me an FW-190D-9 please.

My allied fighter choice? Very tough call, probably an F4U4. I would say an F8F but since none actually saw combat I figure that one is out of bounds. A P-47M would also have to be a very close second, probably the best high altitude performance next to a Ta-152h.


Terry