Best Tank Killer of WW2 continued

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by stasoid

In fact, the Soviets never targeted civilians deliberately in contrast to the Allies or Nazis.

Are you smoking crack???!!!!

You dont actually believe that do you?

You should come over here and speak to my wifes grandmother and she can tell you stories of civilians being lined up in the streets and killed by Soviet soldier. You should listen to the story of how she was raped by one when she was 7 years old... 7 years old!

Want some facts:

Winter War between Soviets and Finland
Soviet soldiers and partisans attacked civilian areas on multiple occasions. In 2006 photos were released, showing the civilian dead.

Soviet Invasion of Poland 1939
Soviet Policy included "Ethnic Cleansing"

Between 1939 and 1941 1.5 Million Poles were deported to Labor Camps in the Soviet Union. The majority did not return.

100,000 (estimation) Polish Prisoners of War were executed by the Soviet Army.

Germany 1945

Aprox. 2 Million German civilians killed (many by cold and lack of food) by Soviet Soldiers.

There were mass killings and mass rapings (read above my statement about my wifes grandmother).

Information below is from wikipedia but it is no secret that it is pretty accurate:

"Fleeing from the advancing Red Army, more than two million people in the eastern German provinces of (East Prussia, Silesia, Pomerania) died, some from cold and starvation, in the post-war ethnic cleansing, or killed when they got caught up in combat operations. The main death toll, however, occurred when the refugee columns were caught up by units of the Red Army. They were overrun by tanks, looted, shot, murdered; women and girls were raped and afterward left to die (see also: Prussian Nights).[25][26][27] In addition, fighter bombers of the Soviet air force penetrated many kilometers behind the front lines and attacked columns of refugees.[25][26]

Those who did not flee suffered by taking the burden of Red Army's occupying rules: Murder, rape, robbery, and expulsion. For example, in the East Prussian city of Königsberg, in August 1945 there were approximately 100,000 German civilians still living there after the Red Army had conquered the city. When the Germans were finally expelled from Königsberg in 1948, only about 20,000 were still alive (see also expulsion of Germans after World War II)."




[b]

[kool kitty89]

A far cry from Lenin's image for the country. He was by no means perfect either, and he may have agreed to the integation of the Red Terror (an idea originally suggested by Stalin as well iirc), but I dout he'd ever condone the atrosities committed under Stalin's rule. (Lenin's ideas and ideals may have been the closest to ever get Comunism to work) I do wonder how things would have gone had Lenin lived longer...


But one thin that's really ironic is thier images, which one looks more sinister compared to reality of their actions:





But we're gettin way off topic. (and I personally don't like to get into the moral, phylosphical, and political aspects too deeply in these discussions, it's certianly interesting but it tends to get way off topic, and cause very heated debates and can escalate to worse...)

[Udet]

Kool Kitty: that this abomination was mummified and that´s still being kept in Moscow makes me feel like vomitting. But oh well, several other superb criminals of war such as Spaatz, "Civilian Bomber" Harris and Eisenhower are honoured as heroes.

Also on July 5th, 1943 in the Kursk salient:

JG 51 destroyed 10 IL-2s
JG 52 destroyed 17 IL-2s
JG 54 destroyed 17 IL-2s.

[kool kitty89]

I thought they removed Stalin's body and buried it, though Lenin's is still there.

His body was preserved in Lenin's Mausoleum until October 31, 1961, when his body was removed from the Mausoleum and buried next to the Kremlin walls as part of the process of de-Stalinization.

[parsifal]

Guys
this thread is just too big to read all of the posts, so please pardon me if i am about to cover old ground

You guys all seem to favour the gun armed bombers. ive seen elsewhere some scathing attacks by some of you about the lower effectiveness of the FFAR, but if that is the case, why were FFARs more or less adopted as the standard Fighter Bomber equipment after the war for dealing with ground targets. Larger calibre cannon (37mm and above) virtually disappeared didnt they, after the war. Wouldnt this be due to the inherent superiority of FFAR

If i am right (and i am not suggesting that yet), wouldnt the western FBs like the P-47 etc be a better choice than the stukas, given their much greater level of survivability???? I guess Im saying that in the post war wash up, it appears that FFARs were judged to be more effective than big guns on planes

[Ramirezzz]

In the very first day of operations of JG 3 for Unternehmen Zitadelle, meaning July 5th, 1943, the pilots of the Geschwader shot down 43 IL-2s; one should also add the IL-2s destroyed in the same day by pilots of the gruppen of JG 51, JG 52 and JG 54 flying in the same area [and those lost to Flak].

you should know Udet these losses were caused due to the poorly planned and performed operation by the Soviets , in fact the whole idea of the preemptive air strike at Zitadelle was ill - fated from the very beginning.

[quote]
During the summer of 1943 when JG 52 became the only complete Geschwader operating in the East, the German boys of the Geschwader continued to chalk up air victories, with the IL-2 as the main dish.
The only theatre of the war where the Stuka remained operational in significant numbers throughout the entire conflict was precisely the Eastern Front, fulfulling its role: ground attack plane. With much less armor than the IL-2 the Stuka proved to be a highly survivable plane in the Eastern Front.

Need examples? See the air battles in the Kuban bridgehead during 1943 where large formations of Stukas of Fliegerkorps I flew in operations; they never came close to take the losses the IL-2s did, say, in the opening day of Zitadelle.

the organisation, tactics and equipment of the ShAPs in the early 1943 were still unsufficient enough to provide effective teamwork with the fighter regiments of the VVS -that doesn't mean the aircraft as such was bad. I can mention even worser examples than Kuban - just take a look at the horrible losses on the Kalinin Front in 1942, where some of the ShAP's were replaced some two or three weeks after arriving to front.
The key element though was the air superiority - the Stukas performed as bad as Il-2 when the Luftwaffe couldn't achieve any - airbattles over the Dnjepr bridgeheads are just what comes to mind where some of the STGs were decimated by the VVS fighter regiments. So my point is the losses of any aircraft type in a single operation aren't good example to estimate its combat value.
Altough I must admit the early versions of the Il-2 were far away from being of really effective CAS aircraft indeed - in fact, it was underpowered, heavy beast with poor gun and bomb sights.

Originally Posted by Udet

Again the IL-2...

If there was a prize deserved by such plane that would be something like the "Best refugee strafing plane" as it occurred during late 1944 and 1945, when millions of civilians fled across the Baltic States and Poland, fleeing the advancing Red Army. Nobody will ever know the number of civilians that were murdered by soviet pilots.

Not a very demanding target: huge columns of civilians moving across vast portions of land...in many places there were dozens of thousands of them at the time and even more...even the hastily trained soviet pilots would hit them. Easier to kill than Panzers.

please keep such insulting comments to yourself - nobody calls Bf-109 or Ju-87a "best refugee strafing plane" ,because of what your beloved Luftwaffe boys did on the Eastern front in much greater scale when it was Russians who retreated back to Moscow and Stalingrad.

[kool kitty89]

Originally Posted by parsifal

Guys
this thread is just too big to read all of the posts, so please pardon me if i am about to cover old ground

You guys all seem to favour the gun armed bombers. ive seen elsewhere some scathing attacks by some of you about the lower effectiveness of the FFAR, but if that is the case, why were FFARs more or less adopted as the standard Fighter Bomber equipment after the war for dealing with ground targets. Larger calibre cannon (37mm and above) virtually disappeared didnt they, after the war. Wouldnt this be due to the inherent superiority of FFAR

If i am right (and i am not suggesting that yet), wouldnt the western FBs like the P-47 etc be a better choice than the stukas, given their much greater level of survivability???? I guess Im saying that in the post war wash up, it appears that FFARs were judged to be more effective than big guns on planes

The problem was that the rail launched 60 lb 3" rockes of the RAF and the 4.5" rockets launched from 3-tube launchers ("tripple bazooka") were not very accurate and the launchers put a severe penalty on performance. (albeit not as much as cannon posd would) The HVAR used from "zero length" launchers and the Panzerblitz II (anti tank variant of R4M) were both more accurate and offered much less of a performance penalty, particularly after firing.
For fighter-bombers at least these are the best choice. For the P-47, F4U, or Fw 190.

But for dedicated attac a/c the cannon would be better, particularly in a centerline mounting as in the Hs 129. For a modern comparison look at the A-10. (GAU-8 30mm cannon) Granted this isn't a complete parallel but there are alot of similarities. In fact the Hs 129 is probably the best dedicate attack plane of these. It could have used some better engines though, and better development in general.

For the engined the RLM had forced Henschel to use "low priorety engines" so they firt went to the far too underpowered ~450 hp As 410 engines, and ended up using ~700 hp Gnome-Rhône 14M radial engines, but while much improved this still left somthing to be desired. (particularly at full combat load) As I mentioned on the previous page:
There were still other relatively low priority radial engines that could have given the 129 sufficient performance (albeit all at larger diameters than the tiny 14M, weight would be a bit more too) The Gnome-Rhône 14N, Bramo 323, BMW 132, and maybe some others would fit the bill.

[lesofprimus]

Agreed 100% KK...

[kool kitty89]

I know les, you said that already. I was just repeating it for parsifal's post.

And parsifal you should read the last 2-3 pages on it there are some good points on this. Also there's also this: http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/pol...2-a-12055.html (The Best Anti-Tank Aircraft of World War 2....)

[Udet]

[quote=Ramirezzz;345465]you should know Udet these losses were caused due to the poorly planned and performed operation by the Soviets , in fact the whole idea of the preemptive air strike at Zitadelle was ill - fated from the very beginning.

During the summer of 1943 when JG 52 became the only complete Geschwader operating in the East, the German boys of the Geschwader continued to chalk up air victories, with the IL-2 as the main dish.
The only theatre of the war where the Stuka remained operational in significant numbers throughout the entire conflict was precisely the Eastern Front, fulfulling its role: ground attack plane. With much less armor than the IL-2 the Stuka proved to be a highly survivable plane in the Eastern Front.

the organisation, tactics and equipment of the ShAPs in the early 1943 were still unsufficient enough to provide effective teamwork with the fighter regiments of the VVS -that doesn't mean the aircraft as such was bad. I can mention even worser examples than Kuban - just take a look at the horrible losses on the Kalinin Front in 1942, where some of the ShAP's were replaced some two or three weeks after arriving to front.
The key element though was the air superiority - the Stukas performed as bad as Il-2 when the Luftwaffe couldn't achieve any - airbattles over the Dnjepr bridgeheads are just what comes to mind where some of the STGs were decimated by the VVS fighter regiments. So my point is the losses of any aircraft type in a single operation aren't good example to estimate its combat value.
Altough I must admit the early versions of the Il-2 were far away from being of really effective CAS aircraft indeed - in fact, it was underpowered, heavy beast with poor gun and bomb sights.



please keep such insulting comments to yourself - nobody calls Bf-109 or Ju-87a "best refugee strafing plane" ,because of what your beloved Luftwaffe boys did on the Eastern front in much greater scale when it was Russians who retreated back to Moscow and Stalingrad.

May i ask you to elaborate further on your comment St.Gs were "decimated" by VVS fighter regiments? Over the Djneper? When and how many Stukas were lost?

And i do not know if i should know the horrific casualty rate endured by the VVS during the Kurks battles of the summer of 1943 was the consequence of poor planning on the part of the Soviets...what i do know is the Luftwaffe did not stop slamming the VVS wherever they met until the OKL decided to send a significant part of the Jagdwaffe to the West.

I am very sorry but i do not think i will stop calling the so-called "Black Death" the "Top/Best refugee strafing plane of the war", a rigthfully earned reputation.

Also this is hilarious, are you suggesting an exodus similar to that of the millions trying to flee the advancing Red Army during late 1944 occurred in the Soviet Union as the Wehrmacht advanced further into the Bolshevik pond during 1941 and 1942 and that my boys took advantage of that to straf fleeing civilians as standard procedure [like the brave IL-2M flyers did during late 1944]?

How many documented cases you think you might have on my boys strafing Soviet civilians? Notice what you just posted there, that my boys "did on the Eastern Front in much greater scale...". What are those based on? Wait! Don´t tell me...Ilya Eherenburg´s Patriotic/Anti-German pitch?

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

[quote=Udet;346256]

Originally Posted by Ramirezzz

Also this is hilarious, are you suggesting an exodus similar to that of the millions trying to flee the advancing Red Army during late 1944 occurred in the Soviet Union as the Wehrmacht advanced further into the Bolshevik pond during 1941 and 1942 and that my boys took advantage of that to straf fleeing civilians as standard procedure [like the brave IL-2M flyers did during late 1944]?

How many documented cases you think you might have on my boys strafing Soviet civilians? Notice what you just posted there, that my boys "did on the Eastern Front in much greater scale...". What are those based on? Wait! Don´t tell me...Ilya Eherenburg´s Patriotic/Anti-German pitch?

Actually Udet it is a known fact that from the Polish campaign onward there were plenty of instances of civilians being straffed by German aircraft.

When I get my book back from my friend I will give you the ISBN and you can check it out yourself. There are plenty of pics in it to prove it as well.

Fact is that it was done on both sides, so there is no need to try and church up your "boys"...

[parsifal]

The germans certainly strafed refugee columns in the west during the 1940 campaign. moreover it served a legitamte military purpose. Congestion of the road system brought military redeployment and manouvre on the allied side to a virtual standstill.

Even the terror bombings of places like Warsaw, Rotterdam (admittedly a mistake) and Belgrade had purpose. They were factors that brought wavering nations to the peace table

The ultimate terror bombing, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, can only be justified on that basis.

This is a very sensitive issue, and i dont have the final answer. This is the basic question....when is a target a legitimate military target???

[Tony Williams]

Originally Posted by parsifal

Guys
You guys all seem to favour the gun armed bombers. ive seen elsewhere some scathing attacks by some of you about the lower effectiveness of the FFAR, but if that is the case, why were FFARs more or less adopted as the standard Fighter Bomber equipment after the war for dealing with ground targets. Larger calibre cannon (37mm and above) virtually disappeared didnt they, after the war. Wouldnt this be due to the inherent superiority of FFAR

Guns are far more accurate than any unguided rockets.

There were two reasons why powerful guns for ground attack went out of fashion (until they were revived in the A-10, the MiG-27 and the Su-25). One was that a plane carrying a big gun was limited in its usefulness to ground attack only, whereas a fighter bomber with RPs could be used for a variety of tasks. Air Forces much prefer to have such flexibility (in contrast, Armies prefer to have dedicated ground attack planes supporting them, but they don't order the planes...). The other reason is that tanks were getting so well-armoured that increasingly big and powerful guns were needed to deal with them. The A-10's 30mm GAU-8/A is effective against tanks mainly because it uses depeleted uranium ammo, which wasn't available for a long time after the war.

[parsifal]

Thanks Tony, that does make sense, along with the fact that in WWII super heavy gun armament really adversely affected performance more than the launcher rails for the rockets.

I wonder if there are any records on the numbers of vehicles and trains shot up by rocket equipped FBs in France in 1944

[OGGleep]

The A-10 is my favorite aircraft by far. I couldn't imagine being in a ditch in some desert watching 2 circle in for their attack run on my position.

I imagine a C-130 would have the same "crap in my pants" factor only you probably wouldn't notice them until everyone around you starts imploding.