Worst aircraft of WW2? - Page 101 - Aircraft of World War II

Shortround6 · 10-06-2009, 11:13 AM

Something to remember about these battles is that while on occasions the Buffaloes might have posted kill to loss ratios of 2:1 or higher it may not have been against fighters. While shooting down bombers counts as a kill is does not mean that the kill to loss ratio reflects the actual fighter vrs fighter capability of hte Buffalo. I will leave it to those who have better access to the combat reports to decide if there is anything to this theory.

FLYBOYJ · 10-06-2009, 11:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shortround6

Something to remember about these battles is that while on occasions the Buffaloes might have posted kill to loss ratios of 2:1 or higher it may not have been against fighters. While shooting down bombers counts as a kill is does not mean that the kill to loss ratio reflects the actual fighter vrs fighter capability of hte Buffalo. I will leave it to those who have better access to the combat reports to decide if there is anything to this theory.

I believe you might be correct. If I get a chance I'll go through Bloody Shambles for some of the documented airbattles over Malaya.

buffnut453 · 10-06-2009, 11:57 AM

Parsifal,

You state "The Japanese gained air superiority over Malaya with just 25 Zeroes, and a similar number of Oscars. I forget how many Nates were involved, but many of these were transferred to Burma after December 23rd. Post war allies revionist histories have tried to portray the Japanese as heavily outnumbering the Allies. This might be true in terms of the overall numbers, but in terms of the critical fighter numbers, the Japanese achieved enormous things with just a handful of aircraft. A big part of that success was the near total failure of the Buffalo to achieve anything meaningful at all. this might be an affront to American sensibilities, but it is the cold hard truth I am afraid."

Can you please cite sources for your so-called "truth"? Here are some facts from Japanese and UK original sources as pertaining to the start of the Malayan campaign:

Total number of Ki-43s deployed = 59
Total number of Ki-27s deployed = 108
Total number of Buffalos deployed = 63 (15 per Sqn for 243, 488 and 453 Sqns, and 18 for 21 Sqn).

The Zeros only appeared very late in the campaign but, even if we take your figures, that adds another 25 fighters against the dwindling number of defenders, most of whom were lost in flying accidents or destroyed on the ground rather than shot down in combat by fighters. Also, a large number of Nates continued operations over Malaya - basing in Thailand enabled the IJAAF to retask fighters between Burma and Malaya with relative ease (interior lines of communication etc) and, even late in the Malayan campaign, Nates were actively involved in defending recently-captured airfields in southern Malaya.

The Commonwealth fighter squadrons in Malaya were outnumbered by almost 4 to 1 in fighters alone. THey had no comprehensive early warning system, were equipped with mediocre aircraft and staffed with pilots who were mostly fresh out of the training system. What on earth do you expect could the Commonwealth fighter defences have done with these sorts of resources when faced with the elite of the IJAAF (and yes, the Ki-43 units were the best which is why they got the Ki-43s first)? Even Spitfires would have failed under these conditions so to roast the Buffalo as, in large part, a victim of circumstance, is hardly fair.

I will agree that the Buffalo was far from a war-winner but given the odds, I still think the Commonwealth units in Malaya did a remarkable job (and that includes the ground crews). More could have been done had AHQ Far East concentrated its fighter strength on neutralising the Japanese-held airfields in Thailand but they were playing a waiting game in hopes of reinforcement and by the time they realised no reinforcements were coming it was too late.

By the way, I'm not American so no sensibilities affronted here!

Kind regards,
Mark H

Juha · 10-06-2009, 12:51 PM

Finns installed armoured seat to their B-239s, IIRC they also put some self-sealing to the tanks nearest to the pilot later, but that I must check from a/c papers. And Finns also installed reflector gun sights to their Brewsters fairly early.

Juha

parsifal · 10-06-2009, 01:27 PM

Hi Buffnut and welcome

Good general references in English are virtually impossible to locate, and because nearly all the post war accounts of losses and actions are based on one or two wartime allied intelligence reports, they need to be treated with a great deal of circumspection. This probably means that virtually everything you have read is innaccurate and wrong ( I apologise for the assumption I make there....perhaps yopu can read Japanese and have consulted their official histories)....

To help you understand what I am on about, have a look at this quick summary....it describes the problem better than I can

http://www.warbirdforum.com/jaaf.htm

Reasonable sources do exist, however, to get a basic idea of the initial order of battle, you should look here

Imperial Japanese Army, 8.12.1941

Dr Niehorster is reasonably accurate, and as you can see only 35 Oscars were available to 3rd hikoshidan, grouped in the 64th Chutai (Wing). If your figures are referring to the total commitment over some time period, that may explain the discrepancy, but ther were definately not fifty (or so) Ki-43s available to the 3rd air fleet (or indeed the entire JAAF) at this time. Those 35 represented the entire strength of the type, and as such that 35 could never be used as a total force. For the first month of the war, the japanese were lucky to have more than 20 serviceable at any given time.

The page I sent you to does not cover the IJNs contribution to the battle. Still using Niehorster resources, I direct you to this page

22nd Naval Air Flotilla, 11th Air Fleet, Imperial Japanese Navy, 7.12.1941

As you can see, the 22nd flotilla had deployed to Indochina before the war, and this unit included the Yamada detachment with 25 aircraft. given that only the zeroes of this unit were capable of reaching Malya from Indochina, that no fighters were deployed into Burma until after 23rd December, and that only one wing was deployed into Malaya itself (until after December), it was this small force of zeroes that decimated the allied forces. They were most definately ther from the beginning, incidentally, Japanese records are very clear about that....

Ther are good sources for Japanese strengths, losses and deployments, but they are in Japanese, mostly. A few are beginning to be translated, but they are meeting voracious criticism, because they completely upturn the traditional histories based on those faulty intell reports that I mentioned.

Some examples that I know of include: Dai 22 Koku Sentai sento shoho (Battle Reports of the 24th flotilla) and the Daitoa senshi minami taieiyo sakusen (greater East Asia war operations summary) being amongst them. Several Japanese sources have been translated, but the process is occurring slowly

buffnut453 · 10-06-2009, 02:40 PM

Hi Parsifal,

Thanks for responding. From the ORBAT charts you kindly shared, it seems we are in broad agreement over the number of Ki-27s available for the invasion of Malaya and Thailand (approx 108 in total). The main discrepancy lies in the 59th Sentai which was in the process of re-equipping from Ki-27s to Ki-43s in Nov-Dec 41. The ORBAT you provided lists that unit as only having Ki-27s when, in reality, it had a mixed complement of aircraft. Therefore, my figure of 59 Ki-43s is probably not too far off the mark, although I agree not all would have been available simultaneously.

I firmly disagree that the IJN's Zeros were the only fighters capable of reaching Malaya. They were not involved in any way in the early invasion effort into southern Thailand and northern Malaya. It was the IJAAF Ki-43s that spearheaded efforts to gain air superiority over northern Malaya operating from 2 newly-created airfields on the island of Phu Quoc. These operations (known as "aerial exterminating action") included bomber escort, air interception and airfield strafing missions and were pivotal to the success of the Japanese landings on the east coast of the Kra Isthmus. (See Yokoyama, Hisayuki (2004), ‘Air Operational Leadership on the Southern Front’ in Bond, Brian and Tachikawa, Kyoichi eds., British and Japanese Military Leadership in the Far Eastern War 1941-1945 (London and New York: Frank Cass) for more information on these tactics). The Ki-43s and Ki-27s operating from Phu Quoc and the nearby airfield(s) of Kampong Trach and Tani Kep were speedily redeployed to Thai airfields as soon as they were taken by the IJA, enabling them to sustain pressure on the RAF in Malaya.

Thanks for an interesting discussion...

Kind regards,
Mark H

Juha · 10-06-2009, 05:19 PM

On the self-sealing fuel tanks nearest to the cockpit in B-239s of FAF. I have digiphotos on the papers of 3 B-239s. The set of one didn't include repairs and maintenance cards, one can see from the cards of the two others, that the work is ordered in Aug 40, but is done only to one in Dec 43, installation of reflector sight was ordered Dec 40, and done rather soon after that, back and head armour was ordered March 41 and done rather soon after that.

Juha

Elvis · 10-07-2009, 03:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Juha

On the self-sealing fuel tanks nearest to the cockpit in B-239s of FAF. I have digiphotos on the papers of 3 B-239s. The set of one didn't include repairs and maintenance cards, one can see from the cards of the two others, that the work is ordered in Aug 40, but is done only to one in Dec 43, installation of reflector sight was ordered Dec 40, and done rather soon after that, back and head armour was ordered March 41 and done rather soon after that.

Juha

Its my understanding that one of the first things the Finns did to the B-239's was to chznge out the gun sight.
I just don't know if the work was doine in Norway, where the planes originally landed, or whether that work occurred in Finland, upon those planes arrival.
I forgot about the armoured seats. Thanks for the reminder.

Elvis

proton45 · 10-07-2009, 04:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by buffnut453

Hi Parsifal,

Thanks for responding. From the ORBAT charts you kindly shared, it seems we are in broad agreement over the number of Ki-27s available for the invasion of Malaya and Thailand (approx 108 in total). The main discrepancy lies in the 59th Sentai which was in the process of re-equipping from Ki-27s to Ki-43s in Nov-Dec 41. The ORBAT you provided lists that unit as only having Ki-27s when, in reality, it had a mixed complement of aircraft. Therefore, my figure of 59 Ki-43s is probably not too far off the mark, although I agree not all would have been available simultaneously.

Thanks for an interesting discussion...

Kind regards,
Mark H

According to the book, "Japanese Army Air Force Fighter Units And Their Aces", the 59th was equipped with the Ki-43 in June of 1941...and by December of 41 had a total of 21 battle worthy Ki-43lb's ready for combat. While the 64th sentai had 35 (equipped in Aug 41). I can't find any reference to any combat claims made by the Ki-27 for either of these units made after June 41, and August 41 respective...

Available fighters for the combined Malaya-Burma campaign...

1st Sentai 42 Ki-27
11 Sentai 39 ki-27
77 Sentai 27 ki-27
4th Chutai 9 ""
=117 Ki-27

This number is in addition to the 56 battle ready Ki-43's of the 64th & 59th

buffnut453 · 10-07-2009, 07:53 AM

Thanks Proton45. I had forgotten about that reference. I don't think we need get overly excited about the level of precision in these numbers - I think we can fairly safely say that there were 55-60 Ki-43s and 108-120 Ki-27s. Irrespective, this is far more than Parsifal's "approx 25" fighters and my previous post refutes his claim that 25 Zeros did all the damage in the fight for air superiority over Malaya - they weren't even committed to operations over the Malay peninsula until mid-Jan 42.

The history of the Ki-27 units over Malaya is very, VERY sparsely documented. We know that they flew CAPs over the invasion convoys from Phu Quoc Island during the early stages of the campaign, and there are references to them performing airfield fighter defence in Thailand and in southern Malaya but there are few details beyond this. We know a number were used in Burma but that was much later in December after the airfields in northern Malaya had been abandoned by the RAF and taken over by the IJAAF. The activities of the Ki-27 units is one area where I wish further research was focussed - there are just too many aircraft available to assume they only did airfield defence, and I can't see any commander letting his fighters sit on the ground in the middle of a campaign.

Kind regards,
Mark

Juha · 10-07-2009, 11:56 AM

Hello Elvis
The B-239s were shipped to Bergen in Norway, then moved by rail to Trollhättan in Sweden, where they were assembled and test flown, then flown to Finland. Finns got them without USN equipment, ie without weapons; anyway Finns bought new ones from US, dials, sights etc. That was a bit surprise to Finns who had thought that they have bought complete a/c. Finns bought from GB Aldis telescope sights, and these were put to planes first. As I wrote earlier, in Dec 40 it was ordered to change the Aldis to Revi 3c/Väisälä reflector sights and this was done during the early months of 41.

Juha

Elvis · 10-07-2009, 06:18 PM

Juha,

So you're saying that the gun sight was changed twice?
I only recall seeing referrnce to one change.
Regardless, sounds like the work was done in Finland. Correct?
Also, you're saying that all B-239's sent to Finland were brand-new planes?
If so, I have a problem with that statement.

Elvis

Shortround6 · 10-07-2009, 07:12 PM

From accounts I have read The US navy agreed to give up planes on production line or to be built against original order to the Finns in return for a better price on on the "Improved" F2A-2 model to be delivered later. Not sure of that but the Finns could have gotten both a few used aircraft and a bunch of "new" aircraft. In any case they would have been knocked down and crated for shipment. Which would require assembly and test flights on the other end.

buffnut453 · 10-07-2009, 08:26 PM

FYI, the book "Aces Wild" by Robert Winston provides a first-hand account by a Brewster test pilot who flew the Finnish aircraft as they came off the re-assembly line in Sweden.

Mark H

vikingBerserker · 10-07-2009, 11:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shortround6

From accounts I have read The US navy agreed to give up planes on production line or to be built against original order to the Finns in return for a better price on on the "Improved" F2A-2 model to be delivered later. Not sure of that but the Finns could have gotten both a few used aircraft and a bunch of "new" aircraft. In any case they would have been knocked down and crated for shipment. Which would require assembly and test flights on the other end.

That's pretty much what F2A Buffalo in Action by squadron/signal states.

10-06-2009, 11:57 AM	#1503
buffnut453 Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 49	Commonwealth Buffalos in Malaya Parsifal, You state "The Japanese gained air superiority over Malaya with just 25 Zeroes, and a similar number of Oscars. I forget how many Nates were involved, but many of these were transferred to Burma after December 23rd. Post war allies revionist histories have tried to portray the Japanese as heavily outnumbering the Allies. This might be true in terms of the overall numbers, but in terms of the critical fighter numbers, the Japanese achieved enormous things with just a handful of aircraft. A big part of that success was the near total failure of the Buffalo to achieve anything meaningful at all. this might be an affront to American sensibilities, but it is the cold hard truth I am afraid." Can you please cite sources for your so-called "truth"? Here are some facts from Japanese and UK original sources as pertaining to the start of the Malayan campaign: Total number of Ki-43s deployed = 59 Total number of Ki-27s deployed = 108 Total number of Buffalos deployed = 63 (15 per Sqn for 243, 488 and 453 Sqns, and 18 for 21 Sqn). The Zeros only appeared very late in the campaign but, even if we take your figures, that adds another 25 fighters against the dwindling number of defenders, most of whom were lost in flying accidents or destroyed on the ground rather than shot down in combat by fighters. Also, a large number of Nates continued operations over Malaya - basing in Thailand enabled the IJAAF to retask fighters between Burma and Malaya with relative ease (interior lines of communication etc) and, even late in the Malayan campaign, Nates were actively involved in defending recently-captured airfields in southern Malaya. The Commonwealth fighter squadrons in Malaya were outnumbered by almost 4 to 1 in fighters alone. THey had no comprehensive early warning system, were equipped with mediocre aircraft and staffed with pilots who were mostly fresh out of the training system. What on earth do you expect could the Commonwealth fighter defences have done with these sorts of resources when faced with the elite of the IJAAF (and yes, the Ki-43 units were the best which is why they got the Ki-43s first)? Even Spitfires would have failed under these conditions so to roast the Buffalo as, in large part, a victim of circumstance, is hardly fair. I will agree that the Buffalo was far from a war-winner but given the odds, I still think the Commonwealth units in Malaya did a remarkable job (and that includes the ground crews). More could have been done had AHQ Far East concentrated its fighter strength on neutralising the Japanese-held airfields in Thailand but they were playing a waiting game in hopes of reinforcement and by the time they realised no reinforcements were coming it was too late. By the way, I'm not American so no sensibilities affronted here! Kind regards, Mark H Last edited by buffnut453; 10-06-2009 at 01:28 PM.

10-06-2009, 01:27 PM	#1505
parsifal Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2008 Posts: 1,988	Hi Buffnut and welcome Good general references in English are virtually impossible to locate, and because nearly all the post war accounts of losses and actions are based on one or two wartime allied intelligence reports, they need to be treated with a great deal of circumspection. This probably means that virtually everything you have read is innaccurate and wrong ( I apologise for the assumption I make there....perhaps yopu can read Japanese and have consulted their official histories).... To help you understand what I am on about, have a look at this quick summary....it describes the problem better than I can http://www.warbirdforum.com/jaaf.htm Reasonable sources do exist, however, to get a basic idea of the initial order of battle, you should look here Imperial Japanese Army, 8.12.1941 Dr Niehorster is reasonably accurate, and as you can see only 35 Oscars were available to 3rd hikoshidan, grouped in the 64th Chutai (Wing). If your figures are referring to the total commitment over some time period, that may explain the discrepancy, but ther were definately not fifty (or so) Ki-43s available to the 3rd air fleet (or indeed the entire JAAF) at this time. Those 35 represented the entire strength of the type, and as such that 35 could never be used as a total force. For the first month of the war, the japanese were lucky to have more than 20 serviceable at any given time. The page I sent you to does not cover the IJNs contribution to the battle. Still using Niehorster resources, I direct you to this page 22nd Naval Air Flotilla, 11th Air Fleet, Imperial Japanese Navy, 7.12.1941 As you can see, the 22nd flotilla had deployed to Indochina before the war, and this unit included the Yamada detachment with 25 aircraft. given that only the zeroes of this unit were capable of reaching Malya from Indochina, that no fighters were deployed into Burma until after 23rd December, and that only one wing was deployed into Malaya itself (until after December), it was this small force of zeroes that decimated the allied forces. They were most definately ther from the beginning, incidentally, Japanese records are very clear about that.... Ther are good sources for Japanese strengths, losses and deployments, but they are in Japanese, mostly. A few are beginning to be translated, but they are meeting voracious criticism, because they completely upturn the traditional histories based on those faulty intell reports that I mentioned. Some examples that I know of include: Dai 22 Koku Sentai sento shoho (Battle Reports of the 24th flotilla) and the Daitoa senshi minami taieiyo sakusen (greater East Asia war operations summary) being amongst them. Several Japanese sources have been translated, but the process is occurring slowly __________________ Do not judge on abilities, but on choices

10-06-2009, 02:40 PM	#1506
buffnut453 Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 49	Hi Parsifal, Thanks for responding. From the ORBAT charts you kindly shared, it seems we are in broad agreement over the number of Ki-27s available for the invasion of Malaya and Thailand (approx 108 in total). The main discrepancy lies in the 59th Sentai which was in the process of re-equipping from Ki-27s to Ki-43s in Nov-Dec 41. The ORBAT you provided lists that unit as only having Ki-27s when, in reality, it had a mixed complement of aircraft. Therefore, my figure of 59 Ki-43s is probably not too far off the mark, although I agree not all would have been available simultaneously. I firmly disagree that the IJN's Zeros were the only fighters capable of reaching Malaya. They were not involved in any way in the early invasion effort into southern Thailand and northern Malaya. It was the IJAAF Ki-43s that spearheaded efforts to gain air superiority over northern Malaya operating from 2 newly-created airfields on the island of Phu Quoc. These operations (known as "aerial exterminating action") included bomber escort, air interception and airfield strafing missions and were pivotal to the success of the Japanese landings on the east coast of the Kra Isthmus. (See Yokoyama, Hisayuki (2004), ‘Air Operational Leadership on the Southern Front’ in Bond, Brian and Tachikawa, Kyoichi eds., British and Japanese Military Leadership in the Far Eastern War 1941-1945 (London and New York: Frank Cass) for more information on these tactics). The Ki-43s and Ki-27s operating from Phu Quoc and the nearby airfield(s) of Kampong Trach and Tani Kep were speedily redeployed to Thai airfields as soon as they were taken by the IJA, enabling them to sustain pressure on the RAF in Malaya. Thanks for an interesting discussion... Kind regards, Mark H Last edited by buffnut453; 10-06-2009 at 03:53 PM.

10-07-2009, 07:53 AM	#1510
buffnut453 Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 49	IJAAF ORBAT for Malaya Thanks Proton45. I had forgotten about that reference. I don't think we need get overly excited about the level of precision in these numbers - I think we can fairly safely say that there were 55-60 Ki-43s and 108-120 Ki-27s. Irrespective, this is far more than Parsifal's "approx 25" fighters and my previous post refutes his claim that 25 Zeros did all the damage in the fight for air superiority over Malaya - they weren't even committed to operations over the Malay peninsula until mid-Jan 42. The history of the Ki-27 units over Malaya is very, VERY sparsely documented. We know that they flew CAPs over the invasion convoys from Phu Quoc Island during the early stages of the campaign, and there are references to them performing airfield fighter defence in Thailand and in southern Malaya but there are few details beyond this. We know a number were used in Burma but that was much later in December after the airfields in northern Malaya had been abandoned by the RAF and taken over by the IJAAF. The activities of the Ki-27 units is one area where I wish further research was focussed - there are just too many aircraft available to assume they only did airfield defence, and I can't see any commander letting his fighters sit on the ground in the middle of a campaign. Kind regards, Mark

10-07-2009, 06:18 PM	#1512
Elvis Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Little Norway, U.S.A. Posts: 811	Juha, So you're saying that the gun sight was changed twice? I only recall seeing referrnce to one change. Regardless, sounds like the work was done in Finland. Correct? Also, you're saying that all B-239's sent to Finland were brand-new planes? If so, I have a problem with that statement. Elvis __________________

10-06-2009, 11:13 AM	#1501
Shortround6 Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 486	Something to remember about these battles is that while on occasions the Buffaloes might have posted kill to loss ratios of 2:1 or higher it may not have been against fighters. While shooting down bombers counts as a kill is does not mean that the kill to loss ratio reflects the actual fighter vrs fighter capability of hte Buffalo. I will leave it to those who have better access to the combat reports to decide if there is anything to this theory.

10-06-2009, 12:51 PM	#1504
Juha Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Helsinki Posts: 1,356	Finns installed armoured seat to their B-239s, IIRC they also put some self-sealing to the tanks nearest to the pilot later, but that I must check from a/c papers. And Finns also installed reflector gun sights to their Brewsters fairly early. Juha

10-06-2009, 05:19 PM	#1507
Juha Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Helsinki Posts: 1,356	On the self-sealing fuel tanks nearest to the cockpit in B-239s of FAF. I have digiphotos on the papers of 3 B-239s. The set of one didn't include repairs and maintenance cards, one can see from the cards of the two others, that the work is ordered in Aug 40, but is done only to one in Dec 43, installation of reflector sight was ordered Dec 40, and done rather soon after that, back and head armour was ordered March 41 and done rather soon after that. Juha

10-07-2009, 11:56 AM	#1511
Juha Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Helsinki Posts: 1,356	Hello Elvis The B-239s were shipped to Bergen in Norway, then moved by rail to Trollhättan in Sweden, where they were assembled and test flown, then flown to Finland. Finns got them without USN equipment, ie without weapons; anyway Finns bought new ones from US, dials, sights etc. That was a bit surprise to Finns who had thought that they have bought complete a/c. Finns bought from GB Aldis telescope sights, and these were put to planes first. As I wrote earlier, in Dec 40 it was ordered to change the Aldis to Revi 3c/Väisälä reflector sights and this was done during the early months of 41. Juha

10-07-2009, 07:12 PM	#1513
Shortround6 Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 486	From accounts I have read The US navy agreed to give up planes on production line or to be built against original order to the Finns in return for a better price on on the "Improved" F2A-2 model to be delivered later. Not sure of that but the Finns could have gotten both a few used aircraft and a bunch of "new" aircraft. In any case they would have been knocked down and crated for shipment. Which would require assembly and test flights on the other end.

10-07-2009, 08:26 PM	#1514
buffnut453 Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 49	FYI, the book "Aces Wild" by Robert Winston provides a first-hand account by a Brewster test pilot who flew the Finnish aircraft as they came off the re-assembly line in Sweden. Mark H

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