F4U-4 vs YaK-9U (3 Viewers)

F4U-4 vs. YaK-9U


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Yeah, I pretty much do. The Germans might have overclaimed same as we did and the Japanese did, and we all had a love for propoganda, but the Germans were very internally competitive and very good about documenting things on their own soil.

I don't trust information under the heels of a man who routinely purged his officers. You wouldn't falsify internal documents to stay alive and out of the Gulag?

Hitler didn't KILL Goring for his failure to win the Battle of Britain.

Yeah, Hitler was a real sweetheart. As far as military purges go, the main difference is that Hitler had his in 1934 (the Night of the Long Knives) whereas Stalin had his in 1937-1938 (when he admittedly killed more than Hitler did in 1934 - bigger army, bigger purge). Hitler didn't kill his generals, he just took all their power away as the war went on, where at least Stalin had the sense to listen to his generals more as the war went on. I'm not defending Stalin or saying I trust the information that came out of the Soviet Union - far from it. I'm trying to draw a comparison between two progaganda-driven dictatorships, both run by murderous thugs. I find your trust in German record-keeping under the Nazis rather quaint. It's not as if the Luftwaffe existed under some kind of a magic bubble which rendered them immune from the propaganda pressures of the Nazi regime. People on this forum sometimes act as if the Luftwaffe was somehow apart from the putrid monstrosity that was Nazi Germany - they weren't. They were knee deep in it and I frankly find the near-hero worship that goes on regarding some of their aces rather sickening ("The Blond Knight" Erich Hartmann anyone?). The head of the Luftwaffe was an obese, morphine addict Nazi true believer that I don't think for a second was above fudging the numbers to try and rescue his reputation with the Fuehrer after the debacle of the Battle of Britain. I believe the veracity of the Lufwaffe statistics - about as far as I could comfortably throw Hermann Goering.

Venganza
 
No I didn't, sorry if I was unclear. 319 is the total of *combat* losses given in German and Seidov's "Krasnye d'iavoli na 38-i Paralleli", and all combat losses were air combat, UN AA never fired at MiG's. The book details almost 300 of those in the various chapters. Comparing it to more detailed sources that cover partial periods of the war, they tend to leave a few out here and there, and a few they describe as non-combat losses look like combat losses when referring to US details of the same combats. The tone of the book is quite overtly nationalistic. I don't see a plausible argument that that book overstates Soviet MiG combat losses.

Around 90 F-86's were lost in air combat, but considerably less than all of them to the Soviets. The Chinese and NK's claimed around 250 F-86's together, v around 650 claimed by the Soviets. So prorating by claims the Soviets probably downed around 65 F-86's, that's almost 5:1 based on the Soviet combat losses, and few actual victories were scored by any other type than the F-86. Assume the Soviet claims were more accurate than Chinese (though I don't see much evidence of it investigating individual cases where Soviet and Chinese details are know for conflicting claims) and maybe the ratio is closer to 4:1. Anything lower than that is fudging to make it lower for some non-objective reason.

Joe

i want try, if i understand you tell that 319 soviet, 224 chinese and <50 korean are the MiG 15 loss in combat (in total ~600 MiG 15) this are all combat, after you add that no MiG 15 was loss for western AA, so that number it's all for air to a air combat versus all western plane not only USAF Sabre. you tell also that USAF Sabre lost ~90 Sabre in air to air combat, so versus all eastern planes. This number don't give a 6/7:1 for USAF Sabre why we need know how many MiG 15 and USAF Sabre were killed from other planes.
There is an other, the not combat loss for USAF Sabre are ~150% of combat loss, for chinese MiG 15 ~75%, for soviet MiG 15 under 10%?? this is not reasonable, illogic.
 
Hello Vincenzo
non-combat losses have no direct relationship to combat losses, they were related to for ex. the number of sorties, to number of flight hours, to type of operations, to environment etc. There are losses even in peacetime. 
Theoretically, a rather extreme case, if one side flew 200 000 sorties, shot down 500 planes and lost 395 and the other side flew 100 000 sorties, shot down 75 and loss 580. The first AF lost 320 a/c by non-combat reason per 200 000 sorties, the latter 80 per 100 000 sorties. If the average sortie of the first nation was 2 hours long and that of the latter AF 1 hour long, so the first nation lost 320 a/c per 400 000 flight hours and the latter AF 80 a/c per 100 000 flight hours, so both lost 80 a/c per 100 000 flight hours and still to the first AF the non-combat losses were over 4 times the combat losses and those of the latter AF were only 16 % of combat losses.

Juha
 
My personal experiences is that the Luftwaffe fighters claimed two to one, as did the USAAF fighters in certain, perhaps isolated but pretty significant cases over europe.
Neither of both (the USN included for it´s comparable overclaim rate) are enthusiastic overclaimers, it´s likely more representative for the limitations exposd to them wrt observation and recognition of different factors.
Since we have an even, systematic error applieable to both sides, the numbers are still comparable.


wrt to korean war losses, I remain very sceptical. The 10% operational loss rate for the given time frame for VVS squads is IMHO unbelievable and does not compare with peacetime loss rates.
There are a number of cases where F-86 were officially lost to operational, non combat relates causes, when in fact, ground recovery crews reported 23mm and 37mm hits in the fuselage. Coincidence? No.
 
Del, I agree that even though the raw numbers may be in error, proportionately one can make comparisons off of those numbers. I think that is what you are saying.
 
i want try,

1. if i understand you tell that 319 soviet,
2. 224 chinese
3. and <50 korean are the MiG 15 loss in combat
4. (in total ~600 MiG 15) this are all combat,
5. after you add that no MiG 15 was loss for western AA,
6. it's all for air to a air combat versus all western plane not only USAF Sabre. you tell also that USAF Sabre lost ~90 Sabre in air to air combat, so versus all eastern planes. This number don't give a 6/7:1 for USAF Sabre why we need know how many MiG 15 and USAF Sabre were killed from other planes.

7. There is an other, the not combat loss for USAF Sabre are ~150% of combat loss, for chinese MiG 15 ~75%, for soviet MiG 15 under 10%?? this is not reasonable, illogic.
I'm not sure I fully understand your post either, there seems to be a language barrier here, but I will try again.

1. Yes, I quote a Russian language book written by a *Soviet veteran* of the Korean War, co-authored by a well known Russian aviation historian. And that book gives 319 as the *combat losses* of Soviet AF MiG's. It mentions almost 300 of them one by one. The book doesn't discuss operational losses, except for giving a few individual cases.

And another book, "Natovskie iastreby v pritsele stalinskikh sokolov" by VP Naboka describes the combats only from Nov 1950 to July 1951, but in much more detail. In fact Naboka's book is basically a transcription of Soviet combat reports. It mentions all the same combat losses mentioned one by one in the German and Seidov book for that same period, plus a few others. I see no *logical* reason why those combat reports would describe losses as combat when they really were not.

So, skipping to point 7: the actual Soviet operational losses are an interesting question, but there is no logical reason to doubt a Soviet AF MiG-15 combat loss total of 300+. We can look at those books and see them described in detail. We're not just relying on a total.

2. The PLAAF said they lost 224 MiG's in combat, official figure quoted in a number of works.
3. The defector No Gum Suk said the NK's lost 100 MiG's to all causes. Statements he made that could be verified other ways were uniformly accurate.
4. Right 600 combat losses we know pretty accurately, in additional to other categories of loss we may not know as accurately.
5. No Western or 'MiG' source describes any engagement of MiG's by UN AA.
6. F-86's (including RAF, RCAF, USMC, etc pilots in F-86 units) were credited with 792 MiG's, other USAF fighter types 14, non-USAF fighter types 14, B-29's 26. But I've investigated the B-29 combats one by one and all but perhaps 2-3 are overclaims (similar to WWII where bomber claims were also very inaccurate). So F-86's probably scored 792/(792+14+14+3)=96%+ of the victories. All F-86's downed in air combat were shot down by MiG-15's (a Chinese La-11 damaged an F-86 in one incident). So ~600/~90=~6-7:1 for F-86 v MiG-15 is close enough. Of course MiG-15's shot down a substantial number of other UN a/c, around another 80-90, but here we are speaking of F-86 v MiG, head to head.

Joe
 
1. wrt to korean war losses, I remain very sceptical. The 10% operational loss rate for the given time frame for VVS squads is IMHO unbelievable and does not compare with peacetime loss rates.

2. There are a number of cases where F-86 were officially lost to operational, non combat relates causes, when in fact, ground recovery crews reported 23mm and 37mm hits in the fuselage. Coincidence? No.
1. See the response above, and Juha's too. We know the Soviet combat losses from ex-Soviet sources in fair detail. We don't (or I don't) know the specific cases of the operational losses. The 10 operational losses implied by the often quoted 345 total/335 combat is probably just wrong. Even with 319 as combat, 345 total might not be correct. 319 might not be exactly correct either, but it's clearly close building bottom-up from published sources directly related to Soviet records. If the issue is combat losses, there's no big mystery.

2. The 90 I quoted for F-86 combat loss is from my own research in original records, in view of detailed MiG claims (including quoted wreck evidence). The difference between that and official 78 is mostly sloppy totalling, unknown or vague causes which appear to be MiG in light of MiG claims, and some damaged never repaired a/c I cout as 'lost' (in the original records some such are so counted already, others not, it wasn't consistent). I know of no cases such as you mention.

The only case I know where Soviet wreck evidence purporting to confirm a kill lists a US a/c given as operational loss is indicative I think: 726th Fighter Regiment claims v F-84's August 20 1952. One was verified by a wreck with 'buzz code' FS-574C, ie. F-84E 51-574, lost to engine failure per US accounts. The interesting thing is that the time and place of 726th's claim exactly matches a combat recorded by VF-191 F9F's: no claims, none lost. No F-84's met MiG's even the same day. MiG's routinely id'ed F9F's as other types (not clear they ever id'ed F9F's as F9F's! :D ). Soviet wreck teams arrived days after combats, and there were a lot of wrecks.

The majority of Soviet credits were awared based on wreck evidence of 'crashed in the bay' (Yellow Sea). A large additional chunk were based on general reports of crashes by NK authorities and Chinese units; they didn't start surveying wrecks themselves until 1952. A small % of the credits are backed by surveys quoting real USAF a/c serial numbers, and those all execpt the example I gave, AFAIK, correspond to a/c listed lost in air combat or disappeared per the US (I count all those lost air combat). Some give serials which appear to be fake (though none of 100's of photo's I know of USAF fighters in Korea show any carrying fake s/n's). Some wreck reports give equipment serials, which seems strange, and further research on US side shows something very interesting, which I won't go into but suffice to say doesn't show USAF loss mistatements.

I found ~90 F-86 air combat losses studying each case one by one. AFAIK nobody has done the same thing and found something very different (a couple of published works looked at it, less completely I believe, one author readily conceded that, and came up with numbers bracketing mine). Everyone I know who claims lots more F-86 air combat losses hasn't done such research. I'm very open to revising my views but based on specific checkable examples, not general statements.

Joe
 
I will see what I can. Have forwarded a question to an author who worked through losses basing on wreckage id and published his article in a magazine recently.
Note that I am no expert and appreciate Your input here.

best regards,
 
Joe -

I was recently reading the book "Boyd" by Robert Coram, and it seems that John Boyd often pondered the question of the kill ratio of the F-86 to the MiG-15. According to the book, the E-M charts for the MiG-15 show it having an overall edge over the F-86. However, that left the problem of why the F-86 had such a high kill ratio (quoted as 10:1 in the book). You attribute this to superior pilots and pilot training, which is one possibility. However, Boyd came up with a different explanation, and one that I think merits looking into. According to the book, the F-86 had full hydraulic controls while the MiG-15 did not. As a result, MiG pilots had to muscle their planes, to the extent that they would lift weights to improve their strength so they could handle their aircraft. This led to the F-86 being much better in flowing from maneuver to maneuver and in reacting to input from the pilot. Have you found this to be the case in your research, concerning the MiG-15 and the lack of hydraulic controls? If this is indeed the case, doesn't that throw into question the assertion that Soviet pilots were demonstrably inferior in skill and training?

Cheers,

Nightwitch
 
100+ kill aces have only happened in one war and all against one opponent, the Soviet Union. Numerically the Soviets had more wins and more Aces. That is extremely impressive if you don't care at all about losses. The Soviets probably lost more fighters in any given year from the Beginning of their war with Germany than the U.S. lost in all three of the wars I named put together.

US losses were about 40,000 aircraft, compared to about 80,000 combat aircraft for the Soviet Union. So, the Soviets probably lost about twice as many, which doesn't jive at all with what you said above, especially considering that these losses include the obsolescent aircraft of 1941, and that the US wasn't substantially involved in the air war in Europe until 1943 when the heavy bombing campaign really took off. Plus, the losses to the Luftwaffe on the Western front were shared with the RAF, the RAAF, the RCAF, and all of the other western allies, whereas the Soviets took on the Luftwaffe on the Eastern front alone.
 
Joe -

I was recently reading the book "Boyd" by Robert Coram, and it seems that John Boyd often pondered the question of the kill ratio of the F-86 to the MiG-15. According to the book, the E-M charts for the MiG-15 show it having an overall edge over the F-86. However, that left the problem of why the F-86 had such a high kill ratio (quoted as 10:1 in the book). You attribute this to superior pilots and pilot training, which is one possibility. However, Boyd came up with a different explanation, and one that I think merits looking into. According to the book, the F-86 had full hydraulic controls while the MiG-15 did not. As a result, MiG pilots had to muscle their planes, to the extent that they would lift weights to improve their strength so they could handle their aircraft. This led to the F-86 being much better in flowing from maneuver to maneuver and in reacting to input from the pilot. Have you found this to be the case in your research, concerning the MiG-15 and the lack of hydraulic controls? If this is indeed the case, doesn't that throw into question the assertion that Soviet pilots were demonstrably inferior in skill and training?

Cheers,

Nightwitch

NW - Boyd also postulated that the 360 degree visibility of the 86 canopy was an added intangible in a.) improving defensive visibility, and b) reducing pilot fatigue for 'swivel head' activity.

I also suspect you are correct about manuever stick forces being a factor.

It probably was a factor between the Fw 190 and Me 109 versus the Mustang and seemed to be especially true at high speeds... both the former having an edge in low speed manueverability but suffering at high speed.
 
US losses were about 40,000 aircraft, compared to about 80,000 combat aircraft for the Soviet Union. So, the Soviets probably lost about twice as many, which doesn't jive at all with what you said above, especially considering that these losses include the obsolescent aircraft of 1941, and that the US wasn't substantially involved in the air war in Europe until 1943 when the heavy bombing campaign really took off. Plus, the losses to the Luftwaffe on the Western front were shared with the RAF, the RAAF, the RCAF, and all of the other western allies, whereas the Soviets took on the Luftwaffe on the Eastern front alone.

The late start is deceiving as the total number of sorties flown by US matched all combined Allies in West against Germay by war end (IIRC- I will check) - as well as the number of German aircraft destroyed by USAAF in last two years

NW - gNot sure where your statistics were obtained, nor the context. If you are discussing US Losses versus Germany, the number is 20,419 all in - combat and ops and accidents in ETO and MTO.

The total for USAAF all theatres for all causes is 40,259 in ETO/PTO/MTO/US, etc in 2,362,800 sorties. It does not include USN/USMC statistics.

List of Tables: Operations

The USSR also contributed nothing in the PTO until the very end of the war.. only point out that it had no reserves to fight a two fron war. That is not to denigrate the USSR contribution to defeat of Axis - it was massive - but the USSR did not break the back of the Luftwaffe - that was RAF holding the line and USAAF crushing LW in 1944.
 
Joe -

I was recently reading the book "Boyd" by Robert Coram, and it seems that John Boyd often pondered the question of the kill ratio of the F-86 to the MiG-15. According to the book, the E-M charts for the MiG-15 show it having an overall edge over the F-86. However, that left the problem of why the F-86 had such a high kill ratio (quoted as 10:1 in the book). You attribute this to superior pilots and pilot training, which is one possibility. However, Boyd came up with a different explanation, and one that I think merits looking into. According to the book, the F-86 had full hydraulic controls while the MiG-15 did not. As a result, MiG pilots had to muscle their planes, to the extent that they would lift weights to improve their strength so they could handle their aircraft. This led to the F-86 being much better in flowing from maneuver to maneuver and in reacting to input from the pilot. Have you found this to be the case in your research, concerning the MiG-15 and the lack of hydraulic controls? If this is indeed the case, doesn't that throw into question the assertion that Soviet pilots were demonstrably inferior in skill and training?

Cheers,

Nightwitch

I suggest you go through some of the threads that JoeB posted about the F-86 and MiG-15 in Korea. I think in reality you were looking more like a 5 to 1 kill ratio in favor of the F-86 against all combatants.

As far as the boosted controls - a huge advantage IMO and I also know that in some MiGs I seen the stick was lengthened to accommodate more leverage for the pilot. To say that the Soviet pilots demonstrated inferior skills, well it depends how you look at it. There were some characteristics that MiG was able to exploit against the F-86. In the end they did not do this effectively as communist forces were never able to attain full air superiority. The MiG threat did make UN forces change tactics but never fully hampered the aerial assault of North Korea.

I've had the opportunity to work on both MiG-15 and F-86 owned by a private collector. There is no doubt the F-86 is a superior machine despite being a lot heavier and not being able to accelerate as quickly. On the MiG's side, very simple to maintain and operate, although it's low speed handling characteristics are poor when compared to the -86.
 
However, Boyd came up with a different explanation, and one that I think merits looking into. According to the book, the F-86 had full hydraulic controls while the MiG-15 did not. .... If this is indeed the case, doesn't that throw into question the assertion that Soviet pilots were demonstrably inferior in skill and trainin
Most MiG-15's in Korea were VK-1 powered MiG-15-bis, which did have hydraulically boosted aelirons. Only a few Soviet units units used the RD-45 powered all manual control 'regular' MiG-15's right at the beginning, though they served in Chinese and NK units until 1952. Exactly half the MiG's lost by the Chinese in combat were MiG-15 according to their official figures, the other half MiG-15bis; and the NK defector No Gum-suk described how his unit converted to the MiG-15bis in IIRC late 1952. He brought a 'bis' with him to South Korea just after the armistice in 1953, the a/c fully evaluated by the US afterward and still in the USAF museum. The early non boosted aeliron MiG's also had a wing assymetry problem which could lead to forces beyond a pilot's strength just to keep the wings level at high speed, but again that affected few Soviet AF MiG's in Korea.

As I said before, most US pilots, if not the great majority, thought the F-86 the more effective practical fighter-fighter combat machine. However I find it implausible that differences in the planes explained very much of a 4-5:1 ratio. The Soviets didn't think the F-86 anywhere near that much better (well of course they maintained that the kill ratio was in their favor via highly inflated claims, we just don't know to what degree they believed those claims themselves).

If we focus on just one aspect, like high speed handling, then the F-86 might be pretty far superior, or another the fact that F-86 pilots wore g-suits, MiG pilots didn't. But focus on another very key stat, thrust/weight ratio and therefore climb and ceiling: the MIG was pretty far superior, especially in early war MiG-15bis v F-86A matchup. The MiG, also using its sanctuary, could start any set piece combat with altitude advantage, and that's usually thought of as big advantage in fighter combat.

So in general I'd maintain the MiG-15 and F-86 were generally comparable planes, each with its advantages, which added up generally on the F-86's side for fighter combat (though not for say intercepting high flying bombers, the MiG was definitely better at that); but not enough to explain much or most of a 4-5:1 kill ratio, especially also considering the general tactical (close to bases, sanctuary) and numbers (combined MiG force often heavily outnumbered the F-86 force) advantage to the MiG.

Remember also Boyd is viewed as pretty much extremist/purist for a certain type of fighter design later on, and was usually mainly arguing for that by way of historical examples.

Also when I say pilot factors it's not limited to individual skill in handling an airplane or even in shooting (as or more important but doesn't show up in 'friendly' dogfight practice, only in combat). I also include the effectiveness of the pilot's military organization: leadership, tactics, indoctrinating new pilots entering combat, etc. If we focus too much on the individual, we can IMO get off track onto 'everybody's basically equal' kind of emotional reactions. Every country might be equally capable in theory of producing excellent fighter pilots, but every military system has not in reality produced equally capable fighter *units*, as far as the human factors, just haven't. And I believe the MiG/F-86 unit combat in Korea is one of the many examples.

Joe
 
Remember also Boyd is viewed as pretty much extremist/purist for a certain type of fighter design later on, and was usually mainly arguing for that by way
of historical examples.

Joe

Joe - I actually listened to a lot of pro/con conversations regarding Boyd from people like my father and others like Gordy Graham. His bitterest enemies also agreed his thesis that we gave away fighter-fighter advantage in developing and buying multi role fighters - but despised Boyd for bypassing the chain of command, including 'outside' to DoD civilian chain.

SAC was king, TAC was bastard stepchild and ADC had a completely different mission - so the 104 and the F-4 and the F-101. F-102 and F-105 were not designed with ACM as the fundamental spec... The USAF was very worried about losing much of TAC to Army and Navy and Marines in that timeframe so the aircraft all had to be capable of some load carrying capability - so sacrifices were made to wing design (and overall weight for load carrying structure) which reduced ACM.

We put all our eggs in the air to air missle basket and it was less than spectacular in Vietnam.

I also contributed some sweat into refining the EM models he developed at Eglin while on Co-Op assignment as an undergrad aero. I never met the man but recall that he was not only a great stick guy but also the father of the Fighter school Tactics 'manual' for USAF - with many extracts pilfered by USN.

Bomb throwing anarchist - yes.
Extremist - yes.
Right? - YES!!!
 
Bomb throwing anarchist - yes.
Extremist - yes.
Right? - YES!!!
I agree, more right than wrong at a certain point in time. Although nowadays you have people spouting Boydism when it's kind of out date and out of context IMO (as with some anti-F-22 sentiment...OK that's *too* far off topic! :D ).

I'm just saying that in his view the F-86's, F-86 unit's, success in Korea was mainly a starting point for his views and argument about a later time, not the main thing he was interested in. And it was anyway at that time somewhat harder to study, it wasn't fully known what the F-86's success really was or who it's opponents really were in Korea, not in detail.

Joe
 
I agree, more right than wrong at a certain point in time. Although nowadays you have people spouting Boydism when it's kind of out date and out of context IMO (as with some anti-F-22 sentiment...OK that's *too* far off topic! :D ).

I'm just saying that in his view the F-86's, F-86 unit's, success in Korea was mainly a starting point for his views and argument about a later time, not the main thing he was interested in. And it was anyway at that time somewhat harder to study, it wasn't fully known what the F-86's success really was or who it's opponents really were in Korea, not in detail.

Joe

Joe - I'm not sure of the geneology but I don't think the 86 per se had that much to do with his crusade other than as an airframe at the last point in time in which EM for USAF air superiority fighters was above or on par with USSR.

I have only read his book and tried to bounce that against what I heard in whiskey conversation.

When he went to Georgia Tech to get his aero degree, he first became technically competent enough from an analytical perspective to break down relative a/c performance - which in turn led to extensive and methodical approach to studying EM.

When he started to model the MiG variants against the 86, then the F-94 and F-100 he started seeing the trend to the F-4 and the century series - and started the preaching in the mid to late 60's.

IIRC his first full blown model was done on an IBM 7090 series before the CDC and IBM 360 family... so that would time it to mid 60 timeframe for the models
 
US losses were about 40,000 aircraft, compared to about 80,000 combat aircraft for the Soviet Union. So, the Soviets probably lost about twice as many, which doesn't jive at all with what you said above, especially considering that these losses include the obsolescent aircraft of 1941, and that the US wasn't substantially involved in the air war in Europe until 1943 when the heavy bombing campaign really took off. Plus, the losses to the Luftwaffe on the Western front were shared with the RAF, the RAAF, the RCAF, and all of the other western allies, whereas the Soviets took on the Luftwaffe on the Eastern front alone.
Way to sneak unescorted bombers into your numbers.
 

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