Poor Strategic Decisions in Aviation Development

[Chingachgook]

Originally Posted by FLYBOYJ

The Swordfish performed well, especially in the clutch but would of been mauled if there was a heavy opposition of fighters. Could you imagine Swordfish being used at Midway!

Could you imagine Devastators being used at Midway!

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by Chingachgook

Could you imagine Devastators being used at Midway!

No!!!

[syscom3]

Originally Posted by Chingachgook

Could you imagine Devastators being used at Midway!

They were used and slaughtered so badly, that it was the last time they were used in combat.

Underpowered, short ranged, small payload and slow.

They were so slow, once they went into their attack runs, a Japanese carrier could turn to run from them and extend their approach runs by 1/3. All the while AA and fighters are after them.

Now imagine the Swordfish doing this. And remember the Swordfish didnt even have the speed to maintain formation with the SBD's and F4F's getting to the target.

[Chingachgook]

Perhaps my sarcasms is under-appreciated...

You Californians are so uptight!

[the lancaster kicks ass]

Originally Posted by Glider

During the battle for France there were a number of ocaisions where German troops were attacked by the RAF and they achieved basically nothing.
The Battle and the Blenhiem had one LMG firing forward, hardly enough to cause much trouble, they were large, slow targets that had to come in from a low altitude and were not very accurate as they were doing a task they were not trained for.
The Skua would have come in high, been far more accurate with their bombs and when straffing, had four LMG's which while not fantastic was a lot better than one.
Read one report of a British Army unit in France attacked by a Blenhiem by mistake. After making numerous attacks the Blenhiem went back. Honours were considered even as all he destroyed was one truck without hitting anyone, whilst he was shot up pretty badly by the troops but made it home and by dumb luck, no one in the crew was hit.

there were about 150 in service at the start of the war, suppose 80 of these were sent to France (a lot more than the FAA would allow anyway), she would be far, far outnumbered by other RAF types and her numbers would have dropped considderably as you cannot claim she would've faired better than the hurricane as a fighter, thus the Skua would've been dead meat in the LW's what was effectively air superiority, with a limited production run of 190 aircraft there'd be even fewer spares and ground crew for them, so however many you loose to fighters you'll probably loose as many through the fact you can't service them out in France! so you send 10 out on a sortie, what the hell are they supposed to to in terms of damage? and this is the thrust of my point, in the unlikely event all of them get through, they're up against the entire German war machine! there're thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks coming their way, their very, very minimal effect will barely be felt by the Germans, the types already out there to do the bombing and attacking the problem wasn't in their ability it was in the poor communications (hence the friendly attack you decribe- hardly the fault of the bomber!) and supporting network, the Skua would've fared even worse due to their minimal numbers, there was just no point in such small numbers going up against such large numbers..........

[Glider]

No one is saying that the Skua would have been used as a fighter. As a type I am saying that as a dive bomber she would have been far more effective as a Ground Attack plane than anything else we had at the time.

The fact that she was able to at least have a fighting chance when attacked isn't a point that I made but she would have at least had a better chance than a Battle or a Blenhiem.

Regarding targets. Bridges if nothing else. The RAF literally lost entire squadrons of planes trying to destroy bridges in France and achieved little if anything for their losses. The Battles and Blenhiems reached their targets so I don't see why a Skua wouldn't make it through.
As the Ju87 proved many times, a dive bomber stands a much better chance of hitting these types of targets. Of course they would have had losses and well have had very heavy losses, but they stood a much better chance of at least achieving something.

It should be remembered that the first Cruiser sunk in WW2 by a dive bomber was a German cruiser sunk by Skuas.

[merlin]

I think you'll find that the FAA Skua did see action - dive bombing in support of the troops - around the Dunkirk & Calais area. They would've gone further inland but the RAF objected!! But worse, the Hawker Hector (biplane) was also thrown into the fray, by dive-bombing German positions around Calais.
Much better would've been the Henley, it was faster than the Battle, and it might have been mistaken for the Hurricane at a distance!
But talking about the Battle - when they realised it was obsolete but wouldn't stop production because the 'shadow factories' had make something and they were all tooled up for it; I wonder could it have been adapted into a twin -like the P-82 Twin Mustang? That is, it would've been faster, and carry a better bomb load.
And just in case someone objects that you can't change over production in the middle of a battle! I am not saying that - such a decision could perhaps have been made 1938!
Thoughts & comments anyone

[the lancaster kicks ass]

the RAF doesn't like anything extraordinary, too new or different, they only just allowed a wooden bomber, to allow the coupling of two aircraft into one aircraft before the war would never happen the top brass would object..........

I think you'll find that the FAA Skua did see action - dive bombing in support of the troops - around the Dunkirk & Calais area

and did they stop the advance? no, and that's my argument, we'd need thousands of ground attack aircraft all in France to stop the German onslaught- which was never going to happen, of course ground attack was needed but we already had battles and Blenheims for that, and lots of them, as they were sent purely to support the BEF it made sence to use what they already had, not to up production of a naval aircraft that would do no more in support of the troops and not stop the advance.........

[Glider]

Lanc. Remember that I am saying only that the Skua would have been a far more effective GA plane than the Battle and the Blenhiem which were close to useless for the role. The evidence also seems to bear this out

Over Norway the 29 Skuas claimed 29 german aircraft and while I recognise that these are claims and the actuals would have been less, they do provide a good indication that the Skua could take care of itself better than any Blenhiem or Battle.

Skuas did fly over Dunkirk not as part of the Allied Expeditionary Forces and they did well in the circumstances. They only came under the control of the RAF at the end of May 1940 to assist with the evacuation.

Over Dunkirk On the 31st May ten Albacores and nine Skuas bombed German pontoon bridges over the Nieuport Canal, near the coast North East of Dunkirk. Direct hits were claimed. Returning home the Skuas were engaged by 12 Messerschmitt Bf 109s of I/JG20 and two Skuas of 801 Squadron (L2917 and L3005) were shot down. Another Skua crash landed back at Detling. The battle was not all one sided, the Skuas claimed one Bf109 shot down and another damaged.
On this very day the British 12th Infantry Brigade (consisting of the 2nd Bn Royal Fusiliers, 1st Bn South Lancashire Regt and 6th Bn The Black Watch) were holding the sector of the Dunkirk perimeter opposite Nieuport. They had just beaten off a strong German attack but at 5pm massive German reinforcements were observed moving along the canal. Just then bombing by British aircraft stopped the enemy movements and the Germans turned and fled.
If nine Battles or Blenhiems were attacked by 12 109's I believe the losses would have been far greater and I also doubt that they would have achieved anything.

[plan_D]

I am going to agree with Glider here. While the Skua would not have stopped the advance anymore than the Battles or Blenheims, it would have had more of an effect on the German offensive.

The Blenheims and Battles were suffering 70% - 90% losses over France per sortie. And very rarely did they achieve anything above a stalling action for the Wehrmacht.

Your argument, lanc, seems to be that the Skua would not stop the advance - so why use it? Well, why use the Blenheim and Battle - they didn't have a chance of stopping anything. The idea of the aircraft was to inflict as much damage as possible to the German ground forces, it was the Allied ground forces' job to stop the advance.

[the lancaster kicks ass]

that's not quite my argument, my argument is that none of the aircraft could have stopped the advance so why manufacture an aircraft just to not achieve a great deal more than what you've already got, you might as well use what you've already got because you still wont stop the advance, the RAF needed fighter aircraft and they knew it, as much production should've gone into fighters as possible not on aircraft that wouldn't get much further than the ones you've already got?

[Glider]

Originally Posted by the lancaster kicks ass

that's not quite my argument, my argument is that none of the aircraft could have stopped the advance so why manufacture an aircraft just to not achieve a great deal more than what you've already got, you might as well use what you've already got because you still wont stop the advance, the RAF needed fighter aircraft and they knew it, as much production should've gone into fighters as possible not on aircraft that wouldn't get much further than the ones you've already got?

There are only two reasons that I can come up with: -

a) They would have achieved more and at least slowed the Germans a bit more
b) A lot of aircrew lives would have been saved if Skuas had been in numbers rather than Battles.

[the lancaster kicks ass]

slowed the germans down at what cost? the more skuas you produce the less spitfires and hurricanes are produced, so eventually the Germans arrive at Dunquirke a week later, you wont make up the deficit of lost fighters in a week.........

[Glider]

Originally Posted by the lancaster kicks ass

slowed the germans down at what cost? the more skuas you produce the less spitfires and hurricanes are produced, so eventually the Germans arrive at Dunquirke a week later, you wont make up the deficit of lost fighters in a week.........

Lanc, you seem to have a fighter fixation. We are talking about GA planes and my argument all along has been if we had built fewer (or preferably no) Battles which were useless and had replaced them with Skua's. The RAF would have achieved more at less cost. That was the Strategic Error in my view.

[Jabberwocky]

Some RAF ones:

Decision not to produce the Spitfire Mk III, which would of significantly ameloeriated the performance advantage the LW possesed during the 'Focke Wulf summer'. Had the Mk III been produced it would of been significantly faster, longer ranged and better armed then the Mk V.

Decision to abandon the concept of a support bomber/stroke fighter, and hence not to produce the Hawker Henley as a bomber and not procure the Gloster F.9/37 for development . The Henley was some 60 mph faster, more manouverable and more survivable than Faiery Battle, and would of worked much better as a close support bomber. The Gloster F.9/37 would of given the RAF an alternative to the Whirlwind as a twin engine, single seat fighter, particularly good below 15,000 feet. The F.9 would of been a very capable strike fighter until the Mossie came along.


Decision to allow Rolls Royce to kill development of the Peregrine engine, effectively ending the Whirlwind programme at the Mk I with just 144 airframes produced, denying the RAF an effective single seat escort fighter until 1944.

FAA policy of a dedicated crew of two for fighters, essentially neutering the performance of the Faiery Fulmary and Firefly, making them some 1000 lbs overweight.