Best Tank Killer of WW2 continued

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by Dac

I was was talking about the Hs-129 and Ju-87G, when I said underpowered.

And the Hs-129 hardly made up the bulk of the Luftwaffe ground fleet. I do however agree that past 1944 the bulk of the Luftwaffe needed to defend the Reich.

[delcyros]

Extremely unlikely. The Tiger I had 28 mm bottom plating. If You put a typical Hispano Suiza MK II 20 mm round at 45 degrees impact obliquity (typical if the rejected projectile hits the bottom of the plate UNDER the tank) against the plate, the plate will be holed at 2554 ft./sc. minimum striking velocity (.5 cal rounds will always fail to make a hole). However, the yaw effects of a rejected projectile will greatly increase the minimum necessary striking velocity to penetrate the plate. Other than pure luck, I would regard these storys as fairy tales...
Typical bottom armour of light and medium tanks was only 10 mm. A .5 cal round would need a minimum striking velocity of 1776 ft. / sec. at 45 desgrees and WITHOUT YAW OR TUMBLING. Take a 33% yaw into account and the minimum striking velocity for a .5 round increases to 3.453 ft. / sec. for holing. No, these hits are not probable to knock out a tank anyway.

[Dac]

Originally Posted by DerAdlerIstGelandet

And the Hs-129 hardly made up the bulk of the Luftwaffe ground fleet. I do however agree that past 1944 the bulk of the Luftwaffe needed to defend the Reich.

Erich pointed out that the FW 190F was used in large numbers against Soviet armor, something I don't know much about. There's a lot of info on Sturmoviks and western FBs out there, I'd like to learn more about the history of Fw 190s in ground attack.

There's over 40 pages on this thread so I guess I'll start here.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Erich is also a huge wealth of info also.

[schwarzpanzer]

kiwimac:

Yeah, read somewhere they did that to the HS 129 as well. Man all you need was one of those HS 129 with the 6x75mm recoiless rifles PLUS the 55 mm rockets.

Like the a-10, not fast, but by God, the punch!

That sounds the shiznit!! Any more info?

I like the FW190F, P47 IL2 and Hurricane IID. I don't much rate the Tiffy.

I think these are the most important factors (in order):

Armament

Armour/strength/defense

Speed

Manouverability

I find it ironic that light AT weapons were probably the best at dealing with IL2's.

[Erich]

actually Bf 109G's with 20mm's and the highly effective 2cm HEI M Geschoss took out many IL-2's on the Ost front. If you study the Luftw fighter aces visibly appareant serving with JG 51, 52 and 54 esepcially and tally their IL-2 kills; quite impressive

there is a book written some years ago just on the ground attack Fw 190F variants, but unsure of the ISBN or publication date

[Erich]

from German friend C. Charles with his explanation of German Luftw. "Panzer" kills

the prozess for verification for tank claims was ordered 22. May 1944, Az. 95/44 (LP (A) 5, V) and was published on 12. June 1944 in Luftwaffenverordnungsblatt.

As with all orders from higher ranks it was quite complicated. For example it explained exactly what a "Panzer" was. As a rule it what quite similar to the prozess for verifivation of Abschüsse. What is important is, that you had to have an witness in the air or on the ground (members of your own crew were not allowed) and that the claims were confimed at the Luftflottenkommando, not at the RLM.

The order also says, that a Panzervernichtung >> generally << is to be estimated like an Abschuss. But it also says, that the circumstances of the claim are important ("5 claims at one day or single claims against an dangerous flank-attack are more worth than 5 claims during many weeks"). For that reason copies of the pilots "Leistungsbuch" had to be forwared when requesting honors for Panzervernichtungen.

IMHO this order does not say that an "Panzervernichtung" is to be counted as a "Flugzeugabschuss", but only that - in connection with the granting of military honors - it is worth as much as an Flugzeugabschuss. I don't know, whether there was a later order, allowing the direct counting of a Panzervernichtung like an Abschuss.

[tomsong3320]

fire bomb a tank talk about a tv dinner interesting

[Badsight-]

for tank "busting" you want cannon

the probable best plane for gunzo tank strafing was probably the Hurricane II-d . . . . . but slow

best tank busters that had a decent level of survival against Fighters was probably the FW190-F & Typhoon

the specialised slow-speed G/A aircraft like the Sturmovik & Hs-129 & Ju-87 were too slow speed & extremely vunerable . the Hurricane MkII-d wasnt much faster either but it carried guranteed tank openers in those vickers 40mm

the FW-F8 & the Typhoon might have had poor results from their rocket attack combat attacks , but they had the speed to survive better

bomb runs ? well you can only carry one or two decent enough to bust the tank open , so for gunzo tank attacking , the best compromise was probably the Hurri MkII-d

[Falk44]

Hello to all members!

I am a fellow of goog old Germany and especially interested in subjects
as CAS and tank busters (naturally Hans-Ulrich Rudel and the Ju 87 G
but also his antagonists in Great Britain, the U.S. or the Russians, for
Example Jefimov or Stepanjan). Can you give me any informations? For
example on prominent Hurricane tank busters? The Hurricane - I belief
to remember that the Hurricane Mk IID with two Bofors 40 mm flew
earlier than the famous Ju 87 G. More than 36.000 Iljushin 2 were
built during WW2 (about 230 Ju 87 G 1 and G 2). The Henschel 129,
a special development for CAS (as the Il-2) was build in a number
of about 800, but at no time as successful as the Ju 87 G or the Iljushin
2, perhaps because the Hs 129 had no gunner in the rear.

I would be interested how many Il-2 were armed with two 37mm guns - instead of 4 23 mm guns?

Please contact me.Also, if you have any questions about this subject.

Thanks in advance!

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Willkommen aus Ansbach hier.

[Tony Williams]

Originally Posted by Falk44

Can you give me any informations? For
example on prominent Hurricane tank busters? The Hurricane - I belief
to remember that the Hurricane Mk IID with two Bofors 40 mm flew
earlier than the famous Ju 87 G.

Not Bofors - the smaller and much less powerful Vickers S.

See THIS article on tankbuster guns.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

[wolfpath]

Originally Posted by Udet

I do not think the IL-2 is the best tank killer of WWII, at all.

The USAAF has worked hard to prove all their fighters were absolutely superior to anything the Germans had (they were not). The soviets have worked likewise.

The Shturmovik has been overinflated by the soviet propaganda.
Even the alleged nickname German troops gave to it, "Black Death" was a very dumb name invented by the soviet themselves.

The German troops never referred to it as such.

It of course made an important contribution for the soviet war effort and certainly inflicted damage to the enemy, but to say it was an extremely efficient tank destroyer is quite beyond the domain of reality.

While it could carry powerful armament like 37mm cannons, rockets and bombs, the IL-2M was not a very stable gun platform. It was an armored pig.

The Germans captured big numbers of intact Il-2s (both the single-seat and two seat versions) and after being tested they could not believe such a piece of crap had been put into massive production. Please do not tell it was for the sole purpose of "reassuring" the German soldiers in the front lines (i.e. the Germans praised the capabilities of the La-7.) who of course knew what the conditions at the front were.

The Shturmovik´s heavy weight armor could be very efficient against personal infantry weapons being fired at them, but against weapons up the mid caliber it was as vulnerable as any other plane of its size. The casualty rate of the IL-2s is perhaps the most frightful suffered by any war plane fielded by any of the nations involved.

The nearly 1 ton of armor fitted to the Shturmovik, providing "all around heavy armor protection" has similarities with the doctrine of the boxes of heavy bombers of the USAAF. The boys of the USA were convinced a massed formation of heavy bombers, each packed with up to 12 .50 cal machine guns could more than deal with the German interceptors all by itself. In the skies of western europe just like in the steppes of the Soviet Union, both notions were proved gruesome failures.

Differences however exist. The USA did not have the absolute contempt for the lives of its men the soviet side displayed, and the heavy bombers eventually received fighter escorts while the IL-2s continued to be sent in massed numbers against the enemy. Sergei V. Ilyushin spent a good part of the war with a gun pointed at his head to produce more and more of those planes.

The Shturmovik could be regarded as the aerieal version of soviet infantry. Many times, when the target was large (armored or motorized units or big concentrations of troops) they would literally charge in large numbers at extremely low altitude, being greeted by a barrier of fire involving every firing tube available, many many times receiving fatal damage, having the soviet pilot -at the very last moment- smashing his plane against the enemy positions, causing terrible losses and damage. But that has nothing to do with quality of the plane.

I have soviet propaganda footage of the Shturmoviks (made right after the war), shown diving with all 37mm blazing, and hell, it had a punch!
From the armament approach, it surely carried toys that could destroy any tank. It surely hit and destroyed panzers but not in the fashion many appear to believe.

All sides overclaimed, that is a very well known thing. Still I do think the best aerial tank busters of the war are the Germans.

Most soviet pilots were hastily trained then put in the cockpit of their machines. Pokryshkin and pupils were exceptions. Losses of soviet aircraft in 1945 alone (Jan 1st-May 9th) made +/- 11,000 aircraft (eleven thousand); does that tell anything?

These of course leads to other lines of discussion, like the alleged reorganization and re-birth of an extremely capable and highly skilled VVS masterminded by Aleksandr Novikov and many others.

A research made by Niklas Zetterling revealed the USAAF and RAF, during the previous months to D-day over Normandy, claimed numbers of destroyed panzers which surpassed the entire order of battle of panzer units in the entire Normandy campaign. In fact they destroyed nearly ten times less panzers than those claimed by their pilots.

The USAAF and RAF were far better trained air forces than the VVS ever was.

I am a teacher of history (and geography, italian and literature) and it is very interesting to me to read this kind of things...Many compliments!

[wolfpath]

Originally Posted by DerAdlerIstGelandet

Willkommen aus Ansbach hier.

beautiful picture....did you make it?

[102first_hussars]

I gotta say the Typhoon made short work of the German tanks during D-day and days after, but i would accept it being the best all-round Close Support plane