For a brief time my mom was physically handicapped so that she had to use one of those adjustable raised toilet seats. She complained that it was too low, so my dad raised it again saying "If I raised it any futher, it'd need a Norden bomb sight."
My grandfather was a micro machinist who made very small screws and gears and knobs for the Norden bombsight. Grandma made engines for Pratt and Whitney, 1942 to 1982.
I remember seeing her in a comedy war movie set in Italy. She was in a bustier and giving some tongue lashing to some poor guy in Italian. I wish I remembered what the movie was, but I learned it's probably not a good idea to argue with an Italian woman...
@@davidrentonIt was an American movie, and I think perhaps Tony Curtis was in it but I am not sure. I also think it was in color but when I was a kid we had a black and white TV so...
I would suggest that part of the Thunderbolt's success in crossbow was because many Jug pilots were in fact ground attack specialists and had experience hitting small targets like tanks in support of the GIs. They (9th AF Jug groups) also had experience in flying weaving and jinking attack runs to throw off the flak gunners and still deliver the ordinance on target. 8th AF Jug groups were not ground support specialists and had lower kill counts and higher losses on such missions.
So these 4 P 47's wwere not in 8th AF. Weere they in 2ndTAF? Also how doles this elate to USMC's practice of P-47 based CAS in the Pacific? I believe that USMC were the acknowledged masters of Close Air Support. And the P- 47 their tool of choice. I may well be wrong Same training? Same target tugs? Same dummy ground targets, Same scoring system?
@@brucebartup6161 My understanding is that the USMC used the Vought F4U Corsair as their primary fighter-bomber. All of the P-47s in the SWPA theater were operated by the USAAC. The RAF operated the P-47 in the CBI theater.
Ahhmm Mosquitoes doing the Amiens prison knocked out a 30/40ft section of the outer wall and knocked the end out of the prison to allow the prisoners to escape . That repaired section of the outer wall can still be seen today I believe
I like how US and UK plane types and classes complemented each other perfectly. If one country didn't have a plane that filled a particular niche. Their ally had it covered.
I suspect that the Typhoon would have been significantly better than the Spitfire because of its robustness and also because the pilots would be ground attack specialists. Without any evidence I suspect the Spitfire crews would have far less experience bombing than dedicated Typhoon crews.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles RAF SE aircraft were used later, but mostly Spitfires and Tempests it seems. Why that split,I don't know. I presume that analysis of data showed that the Lancasters were ineffective. Loss rates were up to 15% on Lancaster raids due to the low level. Harris was unhappy about Crossbow from the outset, even more given the loss rates.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobilesClosterman describes bombing with Spitfires in The Big Show. He describes it as a hit or miss affair with a strong bias towards miss.
@@wbertie2604Accurate bomb aiming was not much of a concern for Bomber command main force. They were only required to hit a city. Switching to a target as small as a V1 site could be expected to cause difficulty. The crews just weren't trained for it.
@@alangledhill6454 Harris said the same thing, but when directed against oil targets, accuracy was very good. The issue with Crossbow is that low level attacks against targets hidden in woodland were chosen, often night raids, and that was a pretty impossible task. The idea that BC only trained for only area raids is inaccurate, though, as from 1942, attacks against point targets were carried out at night against larger factories or factory complexes. When the target area was a city, then success criteria were set relative to that which can give an incorrect impression of achievable accuracy. In reality, even area attacks were often only on part of larger cities. But you are correct, apart from 617, there wasn't much standard training for missions at 1000ft. Given the numbers involved (200 was typical) I don't think training in low level operations was given.
Pierre Closterman described the terror of attacking the " No Balls" sites in his book the "Big Show" His description of the sheer terror of dive-bombing through the 20mm flak was pretty eye opening.....!!!
@@generaljackripper666 Ditto. Back in 'the day' I flew Warbirds as part of a group representing No. 23 RAF. My love predated this, but it was nice to get to play them. That and the Mosquito.
Loved learning that Obi-Wan was an Operation CrossbowP-47 pilots. Just imagine how effective the mission would have had Yoda been able to reach the P-47"s rudder pedals. OK. I'm being weird. Awesome video Greg!
4:57 Not the ramp shape. 'Ski' sites because of the aerial view shape of the launch support buildings, labelled 'S' - observed by photo-recon interpreters ("like a ski on its side") when the V1 system was still in development. This was ~ the first definitive identifying feature of this weapon system as the ramps were extremely hard to spot/identify at that stage - or even later when known about, unless low angle illumination caused a long shadow.
There was a specialist Lancaster unit, 617, who had amazing accuracy, hitting the Turpitz, Operation Chastise (of course!), and the V3, as well as railway tunnels. The point is, properly trained, crews can do amazing things. However, hitting 'ski ramps' from 20k feet, is still very difficult. The Upkeep bomb was released at 240 feet (IIRC). The Mosquitos though specialised in high accuracy raids, such as Amiens, and other specific buildings. Interestingly, when it was used like a B-17 (q.v. other video) as the RAF did initially, it was a failure, but as what today we'd call a strike aircraft - fast, low level, accurate - it was probably the best of WWII, although the P-38 might be good here too?
4:46 I thought they are called "ski sites" because the curved storage buildings looked like skis when viewed from above, and not because of the launch rail...
The support building shape got changed as it was too much of a giveaway. The British would just have made lots of inflatable ones and covered one of the less fashionable counties like Rutland with them.
The V-1's greatest effect was probably the diversion of allied aircraft from more productive uses. Even after D-Day, there were days when just under half of the total allied air effort was devoted to attacking V-1 sites and intercepting V-1s. The political pressure on allied governments--especially the British--from their publics was intense. With the end of the war in sight, they weren't prepared to endure casualties from the V-1. The governments had to show they were responding and the air effort was that response.
-Operation crossbow cost the allies 200 fighter bombers and the Luftwaffe essentially lost no aircraft or FLAK guns in return. I doubt the launch ramps themselves were expensive. The V2 cost about 180 hours to manufacture and another 80 hours for the auto pilot. It's said that if a V1 hit a potato field in Britain the potatoes lost were more than the cost of the V1. The V1 was improving too with low cost wooden components being used for non structural components. -The V1 was actually to fast to intercept but deterioration of the reed valves in the engine dropped speed from 420mph to about 365-370 over the UK coast and allowed interception by hot roded fighters. Frank Reuters book on the A4/V2 and details experiments to increase the V1 with minor aerodynamic improvements and improved engines with higher pressure fuel systems that produced 480mph (in test), 495mph (in theory) and 515 (in theory). -Greg mentions that the V1 was never a precision weapon. In fact that was the plan with the Ewald II system in field testing. The standard V1 had an autopilot that used the nose anemometer to to measure distance and sequence one in flight direction change so that dog leg course would prevent radar back tracking. Initially 5% of V1 (increasing to 50%) contained an "Ewald I" radio beacon whitch was used to asses wind correction for subsequent missiles and asses accuracy. This probably lead to the 70% increase in accuracy. -In the "Ewald II" a clock on the V1 trigger a single coded pulse of varying frequency from the missile at about the half way point which was received by 3 ground stations in German controlled territory. Time differences were then used to accurately determine the V1 position and send a correction range and heading. The correction was stored as time differences on and endless loop magnetic tape on the V1. It was a cheap system and essentially unjamable since the coded pulse would be at the German end of the receiving stations before it could be detected let alone analysed and interfered with. -Obviously a second pulse could be sent near target. Assuming 100m radar accuracy and 3% of distance and the coded pulse was sent 2km from target you could expect about 150m accuracy.
No, they had plenty aircraft to do whatever they needed them for, you claim that they could have been used for "more productive" things, like what? Destroying enemy equipment used to kill Allies? That's exactly what they were doing by attacking V1 launch site's and shooting down V1's, and they still had all the aircraft needed to do whatever else it is they wanted to do. By that point in the war it was the Axis powers who were back on their heels and were suffering shortages, those V1's didn't grow on tree's and at the end of the day any resources used to counter them wasn't even a kink in the Allies efforts but manufacturing them was a serious drain on Germany's resources. You've actually got it backwards, it's their resources that were drained and diverted by the V1's not the Allies.
I think you'll find that USAF activity vs the V1 sites was limited to days when ther preferred targets were obcured by low cloud. The Brits by this time GEE Navigation and OBOE bombing aids plus a whole practice of path finding and target indicating. So they only had political pressure to deal wiith.
@@brucebartup6161 No need to estimate, the data is there. See Mighty Eighth War Diary and Bomber Command War Diary. There were days when the entire 8th AF heavy bomber effort was directed against V sites. There were days when the entire Bomber Command effort was against V sites. It was a really big deal until the sites were over run. And then there were the tactical air forces although there isn't a good book summarizing there effort day by day.
Greg, great video and quite informative. I had the pleasure several times at Oshkosh to interview Gabby Gabreski. He was fearless and he loved the P-47.
My dad was stationed at Eglin during WWII and told me a story where, being part of the transport/motor pool, was tasked with picking up and hauling back a specific type of sand used to construct a test target. When you mentioned the testing at Eglin of a ski jump site, my eyes lit up and wondered if possibly that's what they might have been doing. Don't know what year that would have been. One major test he did witness was Doolittle training for their raid, and one of the first B-29's that crashed there.
My mother lived on the south coast of England due north of Sword beach (the two villages are now twinned). She told me that her mother was far more terrified of doodlebugs than other raids because they were unmanned. I take on board Greg's point about civilians being targets but a small village is really not worth hitting even if you are aiming to kill civilians.
Another Awesome Video…. An excellent comparison method…. And the outcome is perfectly fine that… the P47 shines in the analysis! Thanks for sharing your time and many talents. All the best, Chuck
Excellent video as always Greg. I especially enjoy that you always show your methodolody and state what data you used so we can see for ourselves. Thank you.
Phenomenal analysis as always Sir. Have you previously done a video comparing ground-attack success rates between the various Allied fighter-bombers? I'd love to see it.
Great video Greg. This isn’t surprising for me as the fighter bomber pilots would have been tasked with attacking vehicle and other moving targets in a close air support environment. If the Germans had ever figured out how to guide a V1 we’d have been in trouble.
@@kirotheavenger60 and usually by the time they got there the V2s and their support infrastructure were gone. The Germans realized early on that fixed launch sites for the V2 were not viable and went to mobile launchers. Now the RAF raid on Peenemunde was a blazing success and really set the project back.
@michaelporzio7384 oh absolutely! They didn't get much "tracing back" the V-2s, but it's still cool and interesting that it was done. They switched to roving patrols over the Dutch forests trying to spot launch sites as they were setting up. Was it "Big Ben" raids they were called?
@@kirotheavenger60 USA tried the same tactics in the Gulf War to interdict Iraqi Scud missiles prior to launch. If I recall correctly, also with very limited to no success.
Good video. Wow, to have this level and amount of comparative information is something you don't expect to get in the real world. Kudo's to Greg to break it all down.
Dear Greg, I am new to your channel and enjoy it very much. I recently viewed your video on the B-26 Marauder and my hair stood on end when you mentioned a Marauder pilot dropping a torpedo on a Japanese carrier. You stated that you didn't know much about the story, and I thought you would like to know more. I left a long comment on that video with references, but in short, the pilot was my father's first cousin, Captain George W. Thornbrough. His story appears in the Time Life World War II series. As my comments there might suggest, I would also like to know more about the planes on the Lexington used in the Battle of the Coral Sea. P.S. I even like the car videos.
Interesting stuff as always. Surprised the mediums didn't do a little better. Not surprised that the P-47 did well. Not surprised that Hap Arnold didn't get his way -- stressed higher ups often simply don't listen to the experts.
Thanks. Got a P-47 mug as P-47s were my Dad's ship. I got to see a couple of them fly at the Millville Army Air Force Museum, Millville NJ where my Dad was before shipping out.
Thank you very much, I appreciate that. Plus it helps me buy more art from Spacer. There are no pictures of P-47s on Crossbow missions, so I had him make one.
That's what my granny always called it. In fact, she still does - 97 now and still got all her marbles. She survived the blitz and was evacuated, but not before nearly being killed, once by conventional bombs and once by a doodlebug. The British never called it a buzzbomb as far as I know. It was either referred to as a V1 or the Doodlebug.
@@MajorT0m what even is a doodlebug and why the V1's sound resembled it? I'm 30 years old and this bugs me since I first read this name as a child (I'm foreign but WWII book I read mentioned that British called them "Doodlebugs")
@@czwarty7878 I wish I knew. I don't think there is such a creature as a doodlebug - my guess would be that we called the V1 a Doodlebug because it was a funny sounding name and hence good for morale - if you ridicule something, it makes it seem less frightening. The British did that a lot during those dark years. We still do - we make a joke out of unpleasant things and laugh at them!
Just read about a couple of early RAF raids by lancs and Stirling where the inaccurate heavies missed due to bad target marking by GH equipped "accurate" mosquitos........sods law
The British towards the end of the war, used mosquitos (Pathfinders) to accurately drop flares on German targets. The Lancaster squadrons would follow and bomb on the flares. The Germans got tricky and started placing decoy flares, but I think the British responded by using color combination flares.
Entire transport in Europe was based on railroad, lots of trains going around and the locomotives were easy to spot (due to large puffs of black smoke) as well as being easy targets - massive pressure inside meant the locomotives violently exploded when peppered with API .50cals or 20mm, which meant a field day for loitering fighters looking for targets of opportunity even when their bombs or rockets were already spent (or weren't equipped at all)
I had a girlfriend in the early 1970's whose father had flown Typhoons with the RAF; he told me that railway locomotives were his favourite targets, either with rockets, or particularly the Typhoon's 20mm cannon.
Great video. I understand using Crossbow figures because of the comparisons between so many aircraft and that is useful. Another way to look at the issue is mission effectiveness. For instance, bridge destruction missions were really one of the specialties of the mediums, especially the B-26s of the 9th Air Force, while industrial production destruction was the purview of the heavies and the P-47 and other fighter bombers were of great use in tactical air support to the ground forces and such missions as train busting-Battlefield Air Interdiction.
I don't know if you'll catch this Greg, and I'm guessing you've certainly received this request before (I'd be shocked otherwise) but I'd love to see you do a piece on the Fieseler Fi 156 Storch. That would be particularly fascinating. Reportedly a 25 mph stall speed? Amazing...
On the Storch: my father was a Luftwaffe techo. A Storch made an emergency landing at the local soccer field, the field in a small town in Southern Germany and surrounded by buildings and trees. After repairs, the Storch took off across the field (the short dimension) and made it over the houses and trees and flew away. Great little aircraft.
I've seen frequent references to mosquito attacks, including V1 sites using a combination of low level and shallow dive bombing but never much in the way of exactly how or why. Two possibilities come to mind - 1. It allowed more planes to bomb in a smaller window? And / or 2. The 2 angles of attack helped split the defenders fire? It would be interesting to see if there are any stats for 2 Group RAF who carried out low level (largely daylight) attacks in a variety of British and American 2 engine bombers (Blenheim, Boston, Ventura, Mitchell, Mosquito and more.)
1st: love the channel. Thanks for posting this look at bombing accuracy. Stopped at : 00:00:49. My personal Corsair-a-boo guess? The P38. My reasons? Twin engine stability. The P38 is a known quantity as a precision ground strike weapon. Durability. I appreciate the "radiator" argument, but P38s took plenty of punishment, too, and most came home. P38 could carry overweight wing loads of bombs, could fly on one engine (something ya can't expect the P47 to do), was the testbed for underwing free flight rockets (which it rocked). Unlike the P47, the Lightning was always looking for a specialist role to fill in order to justify its Packard intensive existence. Without Luftwaffe bombers to hunt, it lacked purpose. Pressed into every possible role other than carrier air, it did well enough. But, as a frei jagd shoot and scooter, I believe it was the equal of any other plane. And P38 could under special conditions carry a couple tons of bombs . . .
Yes, the P-38 could do well as a bomber, I have a video about just that comparing the Mosquito FB VI to the P-38G. However there is no data for them in the report on Crossbow. It appears they were not used for those missions, thus don't fit into this video.
To your point about confidence in taking hits, that was one of the things I remember mohrle like to say. He would show people an 8mm bullet he fished from his parachute upon which he sat while flying, and go on about all the other hits he took, always coming back.
Greg, If you haven't seen it already, there is some data on this subject in the book 'Mission Completed', a memoir by Basil Embry published in 1957. From May 1943, Embry commanded No 2 Group of RAF 2nd Tactical Air Force. On page 257, Embry has a table comparing the effectiveness of aircraft operated by British Bomber Command, British 2nd TAF, US 8th and 8th Air Forces against V1 launch sites during Operation Crossbow. He compares the performance of the Fortress, Marauder, Mitchell, Boston, Mosquito VI, and Typhoon fighter-bomber but does not include other aircraft such as the Thunderbolt. Embry concludes that the most effective of these aircraft was the Typhoon FB operated by Nos 83 & 84 Groups and the British TAF with an average of 0.68 aircraft casualties per site destroyed. Second is the Mosquito VI with a score of 0.87 and third is the Boston with 2.0. No source is given for this data. I hope this is helpful. Many thanks for another fascinating video.
That is helpful, but casualties per target destroyed is quite different from accuracy. Still, based on the USAAF report it's hard to beat the Thunderbolt's casualty rate of 0.
The Lancaster is a hard one to judge because it has such outliers of performance, and neither is due to the airframe. Line Bomber Command squadrons didn’t have a hope of hitting something so small: they weren’t trained to, especially against a tiny, camouflaged target. They were trained to aim at bright Pathfinder markers or at already burning cities. Meanwhile the other end of Lancaster precision with 617 Sqn is equally unrepresentative: these were experienced, dedicated crews who trained to achieve pinpoint precision with a unique weapon in the earthquake bombs (aided by the SABS bombsight and marker precision argued to be superior to the regular Pathfinders). Their impact is also hard to quantify as they successfully hit and destroyed the armoured underground factories of the V2, hit V3 before it could be completed, and many more. What is clear is that if you want to hit something small and avoid collateral damage, you have to go low in a tough plane.
@@tomhutchins7495 617 did take part in Crossbow. In one mission (near Abbeville, IIRC) it dropped its Tallboys with apparently a CEP of only 80 yards (I'm not sure from what altitude) onto the markers. Unfortunately, the markers were 350 yards off target. The main force of 100 or so followed up with 1000lb bombs, also on the erroneous markers, at least for the first dozen, after which dust and smoke obscured things. In many ways a great effort. In another, like trying to knock in a nail by dropping a bag of big lump hammers around the place. Or in this case, next to but not on the nail. The wrong tool for the job. Accurately marked, the Tallboys probably would have been sufficient as 80 yards was within the effective range.
The more I learn about the P-47, the men who flew them and the things it accomplished the more impressive it becomes. I have always liked it since I was a kid in the 70's. However the spitfire, Mustang, Corsair and Dauntless were what seemed to be the hero's in the books I was always reading back then.
Note that Greg DID NOT say that this means the allies should have used P-47s for ALL bombing missions during WW2. Different types of "bombers" are better suited for different types of bombing missions over others.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobilesWhat I had heard wasn’t specific, only in that the Norden wasn’t the greatest thing since sliced bread in bombsights contrary to popular lore. Figured you may have some insight into that.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles I've read that the Sperry S-1 sight was better, but production was stopped in 1943. Certainly, the Norden was not as accurate as Norden suggested. Note, not the Sperry T-1, which was simply a version of the British Mk. XIV. SABS was very accurate, but was rarely used above 15,000 ft so there isn't much information on high altitude (if that's defined as, say, above 20,000ft) and they were hand-built so not exactly comparable to the Norden, the mass production of which exceeded requirements.
@@sorryociffer I'll offer my amateur insight: the Norden company did an awful lot of myth-making for their bombsight, but that doesn't mean that it was actually a "bad" bombsight, as some people now like to smugly contend. It was an incredibly advanced system (and yes, it was a whole system, not just a bombsight). In the right conditions, with the proper training, it was better than any other bombsight (except for perhaps the Sperry bombsight, a US competitor with some advantages and some disadvantages compared to the Norden). In poor conditions, it was certainly no worse than any other optical bombsight. Detractors of the Norden often rely on criticisms that have nothing to do with the Norden itself, but rather are fundamental flaws with high-altitude precison bombing as a whole. A modern computer-based optical bombsight would still struggle if the weather is cloudy, or the aircraft is evading flak, or the navigator put you over the wrong part of the city. Like I said, in these conditions, any bombsight would be next to useless. However, in more ideal conditions, the Norden does indeed deliver higher accuracy than its contemporaries. Ultimately, the dream of high-altitude precision bombing wouldn't be fully realized until the proliferation of guided weapons, but that's not the bombsight's fault.
this is totally me spitballing, but I would personally say that stuff like "best bombsight" is a relatively small contribution to bombing accuracy, and at the end of the day doesn't matter *that* much. After all, it doesn't matter if you have the best bombsight in the world if you're not *over the target* because of smoke, navigation inaccuracy, getting shot at, etc. And if the bombardier couldn't find and ID the target because they're flying at 30,000 feet past cloudcover, smoke, and 30mm minengeschoss, then the actual reliability of the bombsight is kind of pointless
I remember seeing that movie on the Wildwood Boardwalk I believe it was in the Strand movie theater. I was really into aircraft when I was a young boy. And seeing a V1 with Provisions for a pilot was truly fascinating to me. Then watching it fly and you're in the cockpit with the pilot was mesmerizing. Operation Crossbow (later re-released as The Great Spy Mission) is a 1965 British espionage thriller set during the Second World War. This movie concerns an actual series of events where British undercover operatives targeted the German manufacturing facilities for experimental rocket-bombs.
I see a few references to the A36 in the comments. It was a P51 modified with dive brakes and other things for dive bombing. 500 of them were made for primarily political reasons, and they were used in North Africa and Italy. They were not used in France that I know of. They’d make a great RUclips video. I suspect they were more accurate than most of the contenders on this list, and maybe even the Thunderbolts. The don’t use thunderbolts issue is another example of Glypnir’s rule of technology. In any technological issue the politics will exert 10x the force of the technical. I talked to a Tuskegee airman sergeant, and he told me that those big radials in front of the Thunderbolts were pretty good armor by themselves.
Greg -- You mentioned having training manuals from this era. I inherited a number of training manuals for aircraft mechanics from the 1940's, and would like to find a new home for them. They are: Aircraft Electrical Systems, Hydraulic Systems, and Instruments by Rollen Drake 1949 Aircraft Engines buy Rollen Drake 1948 The Student Pilots Training Primer by Hugh Knee 1941 Airplane Engine Mechanics Questions and Answers by Rolla Hubbbard 1944 Aircraft Maintenance for the Airplane Mechanic by Daniel Brimm 1941 Aircraft Handbook by Fred Colvin 1942 Air-Age Education Series Mathematics in Aviation by George Osteyee 1943
Great data analysis. It would have been cool to have Typhoon/Tempest/Beaufighter data to have a heavier and radial British fighter bomber comparison, but alas for us, they weren't in the operation.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles She definitely was a True Believer. And probably one of the better Test Pilots ever. Definitely the, "ride or die" type.😏
She was one of the major players behind pushing the German V1 Kamikaze idea. Even HITLER HIMSELF was freaked out, and said that they were forbidden to try it until he decided that the situation was so lost that nothing else would work.
Is there an approximate kill ratio for the Mosquito? Given the Brits used the Mossie as a night fighter with pretty good success, overall it's performance was ridiculous in all the best ways.
@@VASHXKALIBER The Tetse version was very lethal .. that 67 mm cannon could blow a JU 88’s engine off the wing with one shot .. I saw a pilot interview
To add in response to some comments on this video: I think it would be honestly more valuable for commenters to try to find then post links to figures, data and statistics that would disagree or confirm those that Greg found. The obligation isn’t on Greg to go out and find data that agrees with your beliefs.. you can do that! It’s a tad trite to argue against data which may be admittedly limited without trying to make at least similar efforts to the content creator to actually research a topic.. you’ll find data is limited & Greg did great to find this & share it. Appreciation Greg & encouragement to others to go out and do the same rather than try to pick without support. Also this isn’t a top trump of aircraft types by fanboys like the Mossie lovers who seem to want to view everything as pro or anti that. It’s doctrine, mission type and pilot/ crew training & experience too with analysis based on data not feelings and bias.
Excellent episode as always .. but it does raise the question if which was the most accurate Bomb .. Turpitz was hit by the very first Tallboy dropped of the final raid .. It seems that a heavy and spin stabilized bomb would suffer less wind deflection and be a little bit more stable and predictable in its trajectory
Absolutely. The biggest challenge at that time was hitting anything reliably with it. The big factor in 617’s success was relentless crew training in precision bombing from altitude both day and night, using the precision of the SABS bombsight (a kind of British Norden equivalent) and the bomb’s consistency. Interestingly their biggest challenge was spotting targets, which led to the squadron borrowing first a Mosquito and later a USAAF Mustang to fly very low and drop marker flares or smoke. They would hit the markers, so those had to be very precise.
@@tomhutchins7495 I always wondered why the RAF didn’t use a Mosquito with the biggest version of a Tall Boy it could carry or a modified naval shell like what was used at Pearl Harbor ..The Tall Boys worked “ overkill “ in that they punched right through Tirpitz .. but the Mossie may have been a better plane for the mission .. with just a slight change in ordnance .. Churchill did have an understandable obsession with sinking it ..
@@stephenrickstrew7237 the Mosquito was nowhere near capable of carrying a Tallboy. Even a Lancaster - a far bigger aircraft with twice the power - could only just barely do it. You would have had to design and test and manufacture an entirely new bomb from scratch.
@@juneabbey9538 a smaller scaled down version version of a tallboy that would fit in a mossie..with similar aerodynamics .. it only had to penetrate the deck of tirpitz .. it was a modified surplus naval shell that was used at Pearl Harbor ..
Greg, amazing video as always. Do we know if any of the fighter-bombers used gun/cannon along with bombs? I love that Batumi, an airfield we know and love in DCS, is named after the Jug's designer.
@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles Pierre Clostermann made some pretty colorful description of his training and actions in order to bomb V1 site with Spitfire in his book "the big show" (Le grand cirque in french).
A great vid as per, thanks for posting. Not the results I would have initially thought, but throughly explained. Yes, if you had to do that shit, the Thunderbolt's the one to take..
It's a very minor point, and just for your info: the term 'ski site' came from the photo reconnaissance interpretation, and refers to the buildings labelled 'S' in you drawing shown at around 00:04:23. The point being that they vaguely resembled skis in overhead pictures. I believe it was several months after the first realisation that the ski sites were important, that the interpreters were able to identifiy the actual launch ramp - yes the photos were 3D, but the ramps are very low, and it needed just the right light and angle to see they were ramps - of course once they knew what they were looking for, it became more obvious, but these sites were first identified well before any V1's had been launched at Britain.
Regarding you comment about the Lancs hitting the Tirpitz. A lot of bombs from many different aircraft were dropped on the Tirpitz, including a lot of earthquake bombs, with few, albeit critical, hits.
Greg, you briefly touched upon this with the Thunderbolts, but for the other planes (especially the heavy bombers), was there any notable difference in crew training/experience? I could imagine that a veteran bomber crew would vastly outperform fresh replacements, regardless of the plane they flew.... 🤔
Reminds me of a video from some other channel I don't remember that suggested that the strategic bombing should've been done with low level strikes by planes like the Mosquito rather than cramming a bunk of folks in 4 engine heavies at high altitude. I recall you did a video discussing this idea, kind of, but not that specific video's argument that it would've been more accurate and cost effective, IIRC. I believe they referenced the raid on Gestapo HQ in Denmark as proof of this claim. Regardless of it's veracity, it was a compelling argument.
The arguments ignore the entire mission of the 8th. It wasn't really about bombs on target. I have an entire video on the Mosquito as a replacement for the B-17 and I talk about it there.
My dad was sleeping in a hotel in London, on leave before shipping out to Burma with the RCAF to fly in the Combat Cargo Task Force supporting the assault on Mandalay. In the morning while he was in that emerging-from-a-dream stupor, he said the raspberry sound of a V1 became part of the dream, silence as he woke up, than a crash/boom he said he initially thought was a dresser falling over on the floor above in his drowsy state. Then he went to the window and looked out to see a plume of smoke in the distance.
I've read Leonard Cheshire used to dive bomb in a Lancaster to mark targets with flares for 617SQN at night. Quite stressful on the plane but it worked. One day he thought a Mosquito might be better, tried it & never looked back. The Germans were lucky there no SBDs in Europe (except for the Ranger).
So, I was right! My guess is, a P-47 pilot felt confident to approach target to very close distances before releasing bombs. Don't know what technique they used in real life, in Il-2 sim we used delayed fuses and dropped bombs from very low altitude. Usually, just a 100m or less.
This is another great video, keep it up you are adding greatly to what really happened rather than the emotion that occurs shortly after a battle. I'm not sure that you are being entirely fair to the heavies. Not all Crossbow raids were on V1 launch sites, many were against V2 infrastructure, and the fighter bombers could not have inflicted the type of damage for instance against La Coupole. In your description of the V1 you say it could have carried other weapons, please can you expand,
I'm not saying the heavies are useless and neither did the report. This was a very specific discussion, one about tonnage dropped per A kill on a Ski site. . I thought that was pretty clear. As for alternate payloads, no, I won't talk about it on youtube, it would cause problems with the overseers here.
Could you do a video or series of videos on medium bombers? Not just the planes but the tactics and uses. There were lots of great and interesting bombers in this class but it’s never really been clear how they were used in WWII
For a brief time my mom was physically handicapped so that she had to use one of those adjustable raised toilet seats. She complained that it was too low, so my dad raised it again saying "If I raised it any futher, it'd need a Norden bomb sight."
Now that's a dad joke
Was she able to get her pickles in the barrel?
what! do you want her to miss?
I'm really not sure I needed that information about your poor mother.
My grandfather was a micro machinist who made very small screws and gears and knobs for the Norden bombsight. Grandma made engines for Pratt and Whitney, 1942 to 1982.
Your grandma made P&W engines for 40 years?
The Norden was a propaganda tool to boost American morale by making people think that they could actually hit point targets.
I often wondered, there must have been a cottage industry that made all the instruments and switches that were inside WW2 aircraft.
@@notmenotme614 They were both employed at and by Wright Patterson Airbase and Pratt and Whitney. No cottages... Huge huge factories in Ohio
@PaxAlotin-j6r thanks for the laughs! He actually was a rather short Blackfoot Indian
Can we all agree on the incredibly powerful effects of watching a young Sophia Loren! Definitely a bombshell worth remembering.
a stunning women
I remember seeing her in a comedy war movie set in Italy. She was in a bustier and giving some tongue lashing to some poor guy in Italian. I wish I remembered what the movie was, but I learned it's probably not a good idea to argue with an Italian woman...
@@PappyGunn was it in B&W, was it Italian or American, i'll find it for u
@@davidrentonIt was an American movie, and I think perhaps Tony Curtis was in it but I am not sure. I also think it was in color but when I was a kid we had a black and white TV so...
@@PappyGunn maybe Scandal in Sorrento 1955 (Pane, amore e.....)
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow 1963
(Ieri, oggi, domani)
I would suggest that part of the Thunderbolt's success in crossbow was because many Jug pilots were in fact ground attack specialists and had experience hitting small targets like tanks in support of the GIs. They (9th AF Jug groups) also had experience in flying weaving and jinking attack runs to throw off the flak gunners and still deliver the ordinance on target. 8th AF Jug groups were not ground support specialists and had lower kill counts and higher losses on such missions.
So these 4 P 47's wwere not in 8th AF. Weere they in 2ndTAF?
Also how doles this elate to USMC's practice of P-47 based CAS in the Pacific? I believe that USMC were the acknowledged masters of Close Air Support. And the P- 47 their tool of choice. I may well be wrong
Same training? Same target tugs? Same dummy ground targets, Same scoring system?
@@brucebartup6161 My understanding is that the USMC used the Vought F4U Corsair as their primary fighter-bomber. All of the P-47s in the SWPA theater were operated by the USAAC. The RAF operated the P-47 in the CBI theater.
Ahhmm Mosquitoes doing the Amiens prison knocked out a 30/40ft section of the outer wall and knocked the end out of the prison to allow the prisoners to escape . That repaired section of the outer wall can still be seen today I believe
@@brucebartup6161 No USAAF planes in the 2 TAF
@@brucebartup6161 The Masters of CAS anywhere were the RAF/ Friends dating back to 1941 in North Africa with the Hurricane
I like how US and UK plane types and classes complemented each other perfectly. If one country didn't have a plane that filled a particular niche. Their ally had it covered.
I suspect that the Typhoon would have been significantly better than the Spitfire because of its robustness and also because the pilots would be ground attack specialists. Without any evidence I suspect the Spitfire crews would have far less experience bombing than dedicated Typhoon crews.
Maybe, but the British didn't send Typhoons on Crossbow.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles RAF SE aircraft were used later, but mostly Spitfires and Tempests it seems. Why that split,I don't know. I presume that analysis of data showed that the Lancasters were ineffective. Loss rates were up to 15% on Lancaster raids due to the low level. Harris was unhappy about Crossbow from the outset, even more given the loss rates.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobilesClosterman describes bombing with Spitfires in The Big Show. He describes it as a hit or miss affair with a strong bias towards miss.
@@wbertie2604Accurate bomb aiming was not much of a concern for Bomber command main force. They were only required to hit a city. Switching to a target as small as a V1 site could be expected to cause difficulty. The crews just weren't trained for it.
@@alangledhill6454 Harris said the same thing, but when directed against oil targets, accuracy was very good. The issue with Crossbow is that low level attacks against targets hidden in woodland were chosen, often night raids, and that was a pretty impossible task.
The idea that BC only trained for only area raids is inaccurate, though, as from 1942, attacks against point targets were carried out at night against larger factories or factory complexes. When the target area was a city, then success criteria were set relative to that which can give an incorrect impression of achievable accuracy. In reality, even area attacks were often only on part of larger cities.
But you are correct, apart from 617, there wasn't much standard training for missions at 1000ft. Given the numbers involved (200 was typical) I don't think training in low level operations was given.
Pierre Closterman described the terror of attacking the " No Balls" sites in his book the "Big Show" His description of the sheer terror of dive-bombing through the 20mm flak was pretty eye opening.....!!!
The A-20 needs more love, it’s a beautiful aircraft
One of my absolute favorites.
@@generaljackripper666 Ditto. Back in 'the day' I flew Warbirds as part of a group representing No. 23 RAF. My love predated this, but it was nice to get to play them. That and the Mosquito.
It was the first plane i wanted to really get in warthunder
@@T.S.Birkby wasn’t it the most exported of all the lend lease aircraft ..? Russia got 3400 alone ..
@@stephenrickstrew7237 the Soviets used more than the USAAF
Loved learning that Obi-Wan was an Operation CrossbowP-47 pilots. Just imagine how effective the mission would have had Yoda been able to reach the P-47"s rudder pedals.
OK. I'm being weird. Awesome video Greg!
We all know the most accurate allied bomber of WW2 was the SBD with the Mk1 Eyeball bomb sight, but this is the European theater.
The "deadly" part of Slow But Deadly. Nerves of steel, balls of brass - US Naval Aviators.
A-36 was even more accurate
A-24 Banshee (aka Dauntless) has entered chat...
Big cop out here. Sorry Greg.
@@SoloRenegade RAF and Friends were the best WITH Hurricanes Whirlwinds Typhoons Mossies
4:57 Not the ramp shape. 'Ski' sites because of the aerial view shape of the launch support buildings, labelled 'S' - observed by photo-recon interpreters ("like a ski on its side") when the V1 system was still in development. This was ~ the first definitive identifying feature of this weapon system as the ramps were extremely hard to spot/identify at that stage - or even later when known about, unless low angle illumination caused a long shadow.
There was a specialist Lancaster unit, 617, who had amazing accuracy, hitting the Turpitz, Operation Chastise (of course!), and the V3, as well as railway tunnels. The point is, properly trained, crews can do amazing things. However, hitting 'ski ramps' from 20k feet, is still very difficult. The Upkeep bomb was released at 240 feet (IIRC).
The Mosquitos though specialised in high accuracy raids, such as Amiens, and other specific buildings. Interestingly, when it was used like a B-17 (q.v. other video) as the RAF did initially, it was a failure, but as what today we'd call a strike aircraft - fast, low level, accurate - it was probably the best of WWII, although the P-38 might be good here too?
4:46 I thought they are called "ski sites" because the curved storage buildings looked like skis when viewed from above, and not because of the launch rail...
This is correct, IIRC. Later the buildings were changed as the shape was so distinctive it was such a giveaway.
Nothing like a ski jump, then?
I had always thought that was the purpose of the whitish concrete ramps.
@@20chocsaday there were ramps but the term "ski site" is not derived from the ramps but from the shape of the original support buildings.
The support building shape got changed as it was too much of a giveaway. The British would just have made lots of inflatable ones and covered one of the less fashionable counties like Rutland with them.
The V-1's greatest effect was probably the diversion of allied aircraft from more productive uses. Even after D-Day, there were days when just under half of the total allied air effort was devoted to attacking V-1 sites and intercepting V-1s. The political pressure on allied governments--especially the British--from their publics was intense. With the end of the war in sight, they weren't prepared to endure casualties from the V-1. The governments had to show they were responding and the air effort was that response.
-Operation crossbow cost the allies 200 fighter bombers and the Luftwaffe essentially lost no aircraft or FLAK guns in return. I doubt the launch ramps themselves were expensive. The V2 cost about 180 hours to manufacture and another 80 hours for the auto pilot. It's said that if a V1 hit a potato field in Britain the potatoes lost were more than the cost of the V1. The V1 was improving too with low cost wooden components being used for non structural components.
-The V1 was actually to fast to intercept but deterioration of the reed valves in the engine dropped speed from 420mph to about 365-370 over the UK coast and allowed interception by hot roded fighters. Frank Reuters book on the A4/V2 and details experiments to increase the V1 with minor aerodynamic improvements and improved engines with higher pressure fuel systems that produced 480mph (in test), 495mph (in theory) and 515 (in theory).
-Greg mentions that the V1 was never a precision weapon. In fact that was the plan with the Ewald II system in field testing. The standard V1 had an autopilot that used the nose anemometer to to measure distance and sequence one in flight direction change so that dog leg course would prevent radar back tracking. Initially 5% of V1 (increasing to 50%) contained an "Ewald I" radio beacon whitch was used to asses wind correction for subsequent missiles and asses accuracy. This probably lead to the 70% increase in accuracy.
-In the "Ewald II" a clock on the V1 trigger a single coded pulse of varying frequency from the missile at about the half way point which was received by 3 ground stations in German controlled territory. Time differences were then used to accurately determine the V1 position and send a correction range and heading. The correction was stored as time differences on and endless loop magnetic tape on the V1. It was a cheap system and essentially unjamable since the coded pulse would be at the German end of the receiving stations before it could be detected let alone analysed and interfered with.
-Obviously a second pulse could be sent near target. Assuming 100m radar accuracy and 3% of distance and the coded pulse was sent 2km from target you could expect about 150m accuracy.
No, they had plenty aircraft to do whatever they needed them for, you claim that they could have been used for "more productive" things, like what? Destroying enemy equipment used to kill Allies? That's exactly what they were doing by attacking V1 launch site's and shooting down V1's, and they still had all the aircraft needed to do whatever else it is they wanted to do.
By that point in the war it was the Axis powers who were back on their heels and were suffering shortages, those V1's didn't grow on tree's and at the end of the day any resources used to counter them wasn't even a kink in the Allies efforts but manufacturing them was a serious drain on Germany's resources.
You've actually got it backwards, it's their resources that were drained and diverted by the V1's not the Allies.
I think you'll find that USAF activity vs the V1 sites was limited to days when ther preferred targets were obcured by low cloud. The Brits by this time GEE Navigation and OBOE bombing aids plus a whole practice of path finding and target indicating. So they only had political pressure to deal wiith.
@@brucebartup6161 No need to estimate, the data is there. See Mighty Eighth War Diary and Bomber Command War Diary. There were days when the entire 8th AF heavy bomber effort was directed against V sites. There were days when the entire Bomber Command effort was against V sites. It was a really big deal until the sites were over run. And then there were the tactical air forces although there isn't a good book summarizing there effort day by day.
@@davidpf043 I can't find the source I used. I've checked 5 or so more, you are bviously right.
my apologies.
Greg, great video and quite informative. I had the pleasure several times at Oshkosh to interview Gabby Gabreski. He was fearless and he loved the P-47.
I also recommend his book
Would have been interesting to see figures for the Typhoon. The Typhoon pilots certainly had a lot of experience on this type of attack profile
My dad was stationed at Eglin during WWII and told me a story where, being part of the transport/motor pool, was tasked with picking up and hauling back a specific type of sand used to construct a test target. When you mentioned the testing at Eglin of a ski jump site, my eyes lit up and wondered if possibly that's what they might have been doing. Don't know what year that would have been. One major test he did witness was Doolittle training for their raid, and one of the first B-29's that crashed there.
Been to the museum there.
My mother lived on the south coast of England due north of Sword beach (the two villages are now twinned).
She told me that her mother was far more terrified of doodlebugs than other raids because they were unmanned.
I take on board Greg's point about civilians being targets but a small village is really not worth hitting even if you are aiming to kill civilians.
Another Awesome Video…. An excellent comparison method…. And the outcome is perfectly fine that… the P47 shines in the analysis! Thanks for sharing your time and many talents. All the best, Chuck
Good info. I had never considered this about V1 launch site strikes.
One of the themes of WW2 air power is just how effective and useful Fighter/Bombers were and how little that was realized pre-conflict.
Excellent, as usual! Thanks!
Excellent video as always Greg. I especially enjoy that you always show your methodolody and state what data you used so we can see for ourselves. Thank you.
Typically great video and gift about to be ordered:
Jug vs Flying Bug, on a mug. Who could say no?
Thank you very much.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles you’re most welcome. I have the Albatross mouse mat and it brings dash to my desk.
Phenomenal analysis as always Sir. Have you previously done a video comparing ground-attack success rates between the various Allied fighter-bombers? I'd love to see it.
Great video Greg. This isn’t surprising for me as the fighter bomber pilots would have been tasked with attacking vehicle and other moving targets in a close air support environment. If the Germans had ever figured out how to guide a V1 we’d have been in trouble.
Tempests had a succesful career dive bombing V2 sites.
(There's a whole book on the subject)
It's very interesting how they went searching for the V-2 sites by "back tracking" the rocket's flight path, since they flew on ballistic arcs
@@kirotheavenger60 and usually by the time they got there the V2s and their support infrastructure were gone. The Germans realized early on that fixed launch sites for the V2 were not viable and went to mobile launchers. Now the RAF raid on Peenemunde was a blazing success and really set the project back.
@michaelporzio7384 oh absolutely! They didn't get much "tracing back" the V-2s, but it's still cool and interesting that it was done.
They switched to roving patrols over the Dutch forests trying to spot launch sites as they were setting up. Was it "Big Ben" raids they were called?
@@kirotheavenger60 USA tried the same tactics in the Gulf War to interdict Iraqi Scud missiles prior to launch. If I recall correctly, also with very limited to no success.
@@kirotheavenger60 yes, Big Ben
Good video. Wow, to have this level and amount of comparative information is something you don't expect to get in the real world. Kudo's to Greg to break it all down.
Thanks Greg, you put in a fair amount of work on this.
Top work as usual Greg. Thank you very much.
been a brilliant video filled with great information,thank you for sharing.
Dear Greg, I am new to your channel and enjoy it very much. I recently viewed your video on the B-26 Marauder and my hair stood on end when you mentioned a Marauder pilot dropping a torpedo on a Japanese carrier. You stated that you didn't know much about the story, and I thought you would like to know more. I left a long comment on that video with references, but in short, the pilot was my father's first cousin, Captain George W. Thornbrough. His story appears in the Time Life World War II series. As my comments there might suggest, I would also like to know more about the planes on the Lexington used in the Battle of the Coral Sea. P.S. I even like the car videos.
Interesting stuff as always.
Surprised the mediums didn't do a little better.
Not surprised that the P-47 did well.
Not surprised that Hap Arnold didn't get his way -- stressed higher ups often simply don't listen to the experts.
Thanks. Got a P-47 mug as P-47s were my Dad's ship. I got to see a couple of them fly at the Millville Army Air Force Museum, Millville NJ where my Dad was before shipping out.
Thank you very much, I appreciate that. Plus it helps me buy more art from Spacer. There are no pictures of P-47s on Crossbow missions, so I had him make one.
Another name the English gave the V-1 was the doodle bug, how very British sounding. Sorry, back to the video.
That's what my granny always called it. In fact, she still does - 97 now and still got all her marbles. She survived the blitz and was evacuated, but not before nearly being killed, once by conventional bombs and once by a doodlebug.
The British never called it a buzzbomb as far as I know. It was either referred to as a V1 or the Doodlebug.
@@MajorT0m what even is a doodlebug and why the V1's sound resembled it? I'm 30 years old and this bugs me since I first read this name as a child (I'm foreign but WWII book I read mentioned that British called them "Doodlebugs")
@@czwarty7878 I wish I knew. I don't think there is such a creature as a doodlebug - my guess would be that we called the V1 a Doodlebug because it was a funny sounding name and hence good for morale - if you ridicule something, it makes it seem less frightening. The British did that a lot during those dark years. We still do - we make a joke out of unpleasant things and laugh at them!
@@MajorT0mseismic personnel on board seismic ships are called doodlebuggers
@@thadiusthudpucker Before or after the name was given to V1s?
Really great job...just discovered you. I look forward to more of your videos.
Just read about a couple of early RAF raids by lancs and Stirling where the inaccurate heavies missed due to bad target marking by GH equipped "accurate" mosquitos........sods law
Those attacks used OBOE marking and the Ground markers missed the aiming points on average by 400 to 600 yards.
The British towards the end of the war, used mosquitos (Pathfinders) to accurately drop flares on German targets. The Lancaster squadrons would follow and bomb on the flares. The Germans got tricky and started placing decoy flares, but I think the British responded by using color combination flares.
Between June '44 - May '45 - 9000 locomotives were destroyed by P-47s ALONE!!!! NINE THOUSAND!!! WHAT!!!!!
It turns out Locomotives are easy to find for a low flying Fighter Bomber than can range all over enemy territory.
Entire transport in Europe was based on railroad, lots of trains going around and the locomotives were easy to spot (due to large puffs of black smoke) as well as being easy targets - massive pressure inside meant the locomotives violently exploded when peppered with API .50cals or 20mm, which meant a field day for loitering fighters looking for targets of opportunity even when their bombs or rockets were already spent (or weren't equipped at all)
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles steam engines being large pressure vessels ready to explode if given the chance probably helped as well.
I had a girlfriend in the early 1970's whose father had flown Typhoons with the RAF; he told me that railway locomotives were his favourite targets, either with rockets, or particularly the Typhoon's 20mm cannon.
@@terryjacob8169 There is a video on here showing a Typhoon following a train around a curve and every shot is bang on target .
Fascinating. Excellent research and very professional presentation - thanks!
I like that p47 mug. Just ordered mine. I’m not surprised the p47 was the most accurate of the planes used.
Great video. I understand using Crossbow figures because of the comparisons between so many aircraft and that is useful. Another way to look at the issue is mission effectiveness. For instance, bridge destruction missions were really one of the specialties of the mediums, especially the B-26s of the 9th Air Force, while industrial production destruction was the purview of the heavies and the P-47 and other fighter bombers were of great use in tactical air support to the ground forces and such missions as train busting-Battlefield Air Interdiction.
Well, that was both amazing and informative. Great work.
Thanks Greg, fifteen minutes well spent!
Great breakdown on the subject.
Excellent video again as usual !. Regards from the UK.
I don't know if you'll catch this Greg, and I'm guessing you've certainly received this request before (I'd be shocked otherwise) but I'd love to see you do a piece on the Fieseler Fi 156 Storch. That would be particularly fascinating. Reportedly a 25 mph stall speed? Amazing...
On the Storch: my father was a Luftwaffe techo. A Storch made an emergency landing at the local soccer field, the field in a small town in Southern Germany and surrounded by buildings and trees. After repairs, the Storch took off across the field (the short dimension) and made it over the houses and trees and flew away. Great little aircraft.
I've seen frequent references to mosquito attacks, including V1 sites using a combination of low level and shallow dive bombing but never much in the way of exactly how or why. Two possibilities come to mind - 1. It allowed more planes to bomb in a smaller window? And / or 2. The 2 angles of attack helped split the defenders fire? It would be interesting to see if there are any stats for 2 Group RAF who carried out low level (largely daylight) attacks in a variety of British and American 2 engine bombers (Blenheim, Boston, Ventura, Mitchell, Mosquito and more.)
1st: love the channel. Thanks for posting this look at bombing accuracy.
Stopped at : 00:00:49. My personal Corsair-a-boo guess?
The P38.
My reasons?
Twin engine stability. The P38 is a known quantity as a precision ground strike weapon.
Durability. I appreciate the "radiator" argument, but P38s took plenty of punishment, too, and most came home. P38 could carry overweight wing loads of bombs, could fly on one engine (something ya can't expect the P47 to do), was the testbed for underwing free flight rockets (which it rocked).
Unlike the P47, the Lightning was always looking for a specialist role to fill in order to justify its Packard intensive existence. Without Luftwaffe bombers to hunt, it lacked purpose. Pressed into every possible role other than carrier air, it did well enough. But, as a frei jagd shoot and scooter, I believe it was the equal of any other plane. And P38 could under special conditions carry a couple tons of bombs . . .
Yes, the P-38 could do well as a bomber, I have a video about just that comparing the Mosquito FB VI to the P-38G. However there is no data for them in the report on Crossbow. It appears they were not used for those missions, thus don't fit into this video.
To your point about confidence in taking hits, that was one of the things I remember mohrle like to say. He would show people an 8mm bullet he fished from his parachute upon which he sat while flying, and go on about all the other hits he took, always coming back.
Greg, If you haven't seen it already, there is some data on this subject in the book 'Mission Completed', a memoir by Basil Embry published in 1957. From May 1943, Embry commanded No 2 Group of RAF 2nd Tactical Air Force. On page 257, Embry has a table comparing the effectiveness of aircraft operated by British Bomber Command, British 2nd TAF, US 8th and 8th Air Forces against V1 launch sites during Operation Crossbow. He compares the performance of the Fortress, Marauder, Mitchell, Boston, Mosquito VI, and Typhoon fighter-bomber but does not include other aircraft such as the Thunderbolt. Embry concludes that the most effective of these aircraft was the Typhoon FB operated by Nos 83 & 84 Groups and the British TAF with an average of 0.68 aircraft casualties per site destroyed. Second is the Mosquito VI with a score of 0.87 and third is the Boston with 2.0. No source is given for this data. I hope this is helpful. Many thanks for another fascinating video.
That is helpful, but casualties per target destroyed is quite different from accuracy. Still, based on the USAAF report it's hard to beat the Thunderbolt's casualty rate of 0.
The Lancaster is a hard one to judge because it has such outliers of performance, and neither is due to the airframe. Line Bomber Command squadrons didn’t have a hope of hitting something so small: they weren’t trained to, especially against a tiny, camouflaged target. They were trained to aim at bright Pathfinder markers or at already burning cities.
Meanwhile the other end of Lancaster precision with 617 Sqn is equally unrepresentative: these were experienced, dedicated crews who trained to achieve pinpoint precision with a unique weapon in the earthquake bombs (aided by the SABS bombsight and marker precision argued to be superior to the regular Pathfinders). Their impact is also hard to quantify as they successfully hit and destroyed the armoured underground factories of the V2, hit V3 before it could be completed, and many more.
What is clear is that if you want to hit something small and avoid collateral damage, you have to go low in a tough plane.
@@tomhutchins7495 617 did take part in Crossbow. In one mission (near Abbeville, IIRC) it dropped its Tallboys with apparently a CEP of only 80 yards (I'm not sure from what altitude) onto the markers. Unfortunately, the markers were 350 yards off target. The main force of 100 or so followed up with 1000lb bombs, also on the erroneous markers, at least for the first dozen, after which dust and smoke obscured things.
In many ways a great effort. In another, like trying to knock in a nail by dropping a bag of big lump hammers around the place. Or in this case, next to but not on the nail. The wrong tool for the job.
Accurately marked, the Tallboys probably would have been sufficient as 80 yards was within the effective range.
I think they also used their tall boys on U-boat submarine pens in France.
The more I learn about the P-47, the men who flew them and the things it accomplished the more impressive it becomes. I have always liked it since I was a kid in the 70's. However the spitfire, Mustang, Corsair and Dauntless were what seemed to be the hero's in the books I was always reading back then.
Thanks Greg for the great content.
Thunderbolt. Proving that the big guys get it done every time.
Great video, Greg...👍
Note that Greg DID NOT say that this means the allies should have used P-47s for ALL bombing missions during WW2. Different types of "bombers" are better suited for different types of bombing missions over others.
Great video Greg. Thanks!
The P-47 Thunderbolt is possibly the most underrated plane of WWII.
Great stuff! As always, thank you!
Greg very obviously loves the P-47! And i can’t blame him😅
It was NOT the best there.
I’ve heard the Norden was not “all that” and not a great advancement or dramatically more functionality more accurate. Is this true?
Hmm, I guess it depends. What WW2 bomb sight have you heard is more accurate from high altitude.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobilesWhat I had heard wasn’t specific, only in that the Norden wasn’t the greatest thing since sliced bread in bombsights contrary to popular lore. Figured you may have some insight into that.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles I've read that the Sperry S-1 sight was better, but production was stopped in 1943. Certainly, the Norden was not as accurate as Norden suggested. Note, not the Sperry T-1, which was simply a version of the British Mk. XIV. SABS was very accurate, but was rarely used above 15,000 ft so there isn't much information on high altitude (if that's defined as, say, above 20,000ft) and they were hand-built so not exactly comparable to the Norden, the mass production of which exceeded requirements.
@@sorryociffer I'll offer my amateur insight: the Norden company did an awful lot of myth-making for their bombsight, but that doesn't mean that it was actually a "bad" bombsight, as some people now like to smugly contend. It was an incredibly advanced system (and yes, it was a whole system, not just a bombsight). In the right conditions, with the proper training, it was better than any other bombsight (except for perhaps the Sperry bombsight, a US competitor with some advantages and some disadvantages compared to the Norden). In poor conditions, it was certainly no worse than any other optical bombsight. Detractors of the Norden often rely on criticisms that have nothing to do with the Norden itself, but rather are fundamental flaws with high-altitude precison bombing as a whole. A modern computer-based optical bombsight would still struggle if the weather is cloudy, or the aircraft is evading flak, or the navigator put you over the wrong part of the city. Like I said, in these conditions, any bombsight would be next to useless. However, in more ideal conditions, the Norden does indeed deliver higher accuracy than its contemporaries. Ultimately, the dream of high-altitude precision bombing wouldn't be fully realized until the proliferation of guided weapons, but that's not the bombsight's fault.
this is totally me spitballing, but I would personally say that stuff like "best bombsight" is a relatively small contribution to bombing accuracy, and at the end of the day doesn't matter *that* much. After all, it doesn't matter if you have the best bombsight in the world if you're not *over the target* because of smoke, navigation inaccuracy, getting shot at, etc. And if the bombardier couldn't find and ID the target because they're flying at 30,000 feet past cloudcover, smoke, and 30mm minengeschoss, then the actual reliability of the bombsight is kind of pointless
I love any video that puts the P-47 or the Mosquito in a good light.
In my opinion, two of the best planes in WW2!
I think I remember someone saying nothing could beat a P-47 in a dive.
I remember seeing that movie on the Wildwood Boardwalk I believe it was in the Strand movie theater. I was really into aircraft when I was a young boy. And seeing a V1 with Provisions for a pilot was truly fascinating to me. Then watching it fly and you're in the cockpit with the pilot was mesmerizing. Operation Crossbow (later re-released as The Great Spy Mission) is a 1965 British espionage thriller set during the Second World War. This movie concerns an actual series of events where British undercover operatives targeted the German manufacturing facilities for experimental rocket-bombs.
Mosquito, P-47 and Spitfire also had the advantage of cannon and heavy machine guns as for light flak suppression.
I read the Allied photo-recon interpreters became very good at spotting well-disguised V-1launch sites.
I see a few references to the A36 in the comments. It was a P51 modified with dive brakes and other things for dive bombing. 500 of them were made for primarily political reasons, and they were used in North Africa and Italy. They were not used in France that I know of. They’d make a great RUclips video. I suspect they were more accurate than most of the contenders on this list, and maybe even the Thunderbolts.
The don’t use thunderbolts issue is another example of Glypnir’s rule of technology. In any technological issue the politics will exert 10x the force of the technical.
I talked to a Tuskegee airman sergeant, and he told me that those big radials in front of the Thunderbolts were pretty good armor by themselves.
Greg, the use of Spitfire for this type of missions is very well described in the book called The Big Show, written by Pierre Clostermann
hello greg thank you for your videos man they are very nice
Greg -- You mentioned having training manuals from this era. I inherited a number of training manuals for aircraft mechanics from the 1940's, and would like to find a new home for them. They are:
Aircraft Electrical Systems, Hydraulic Systems, and Instruments by Rollen Drake 1949
Aircraft Engines buy Rollen Drake 1948
The Student Pilots Training Primer by Hugh Knee 1941
Airplane Engine Mechanics Questions and Answers by Rolla Hubbbard 1944
Aircraft Maintenance for the Airplane Mechanic by Daniel Brimm 1941
Aircraft Handbook by Fred Colvin 1942
Air-Age Education Series Mathematics in Aviation by George Osteyee 1943
Great data analysis. It would have been cool to have Typhoon/Tempest/Beaufighter data to have a heavier and radial British fighter bomber comparison, but alas for us, they weren't in the operation.
Since you ring up "Operation Crossbow." A pretty good movie by the way. Was Hannah Reitsch that skilled or that crazy to test fly a V-1?🙋🏾♂️
I think she was that good, but also a bit crazy. Those two things are not mutually exclusive.
unapologetic Nazi...like many involved in German aviation during those years. Not a good human being.
@@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles She definitely was a True Believer. And probably one of the better Test Pilots ever. Definitely the, "ride or die" type.😏
She was one of the major players behind pushing the German V1 Kamikaze idea. Even HITLER HIMSELF was freaked out, and said that they were forbidden to try it until he decided that the situation was so lost that nothing else would work.
@@WALTERBROADDUS Maybe the prototype for the guy riding the bomb in Dr Strangelove!
Is there an approximate kill ratio for the Mosquito? Given the Brits used the Mossie as a night fighter with pretty good success, overall it's performance was ridiculous in all the best ways.
@@VASHXKALIBER The Tetse version was very lethal .. that 67 mm cannon could blow a JU 88’s engine off the wing with one shot .. I saw a pilot interview
Excellent as always
To add in response to some comments on this video:
I think it would be honestly more valuable for commenters to try to find then post links to figures, data and statistics that would disagree or confirm those that Greg found.
The obligation isn’t on Greg to go out and find data that agrees with your beliefs.. you can do that!
It’s a tad trite to argue against data which may be admittedly limited without trying to make at least similar efforts to the content creator to actually research a topic.. you’ll find data is limited & Greg did great to find this & share it. Appreciation Greg & encouragement to others to go out and do the same rather than try to pick without support.
Also this isn’t a top trump of aircraft types by fanboys like the Mossie lovers who seem to want to view everything as pro or anti that. It’s doctrine, mission type and pilot/ crew training & experience too with analysis based on data not feelings and bias.
Good post Gary.
Excellent episode as always .. but it does raise the question if which was the most accurate Bomb .. Turpitz was hit by the very first Tallboy dropped of the final raid .. It seems that a heavy and spin stabilized bomb would suffer less wind deflection and be a little bit more stable and predictable in its trajectory
Absolutely. The biggest challenge at that time was hitting anything reliably with it. The big factor in 617’s success was relentless crew training in precision bombing from altitude both day and night, using the precision of the SABS bombsight (a kind of British Norden equivalent) and the bomb’s consistency.
Interestingly their biggest challenge was spotting targets, which led to the squadron borrowing first a Mosquito and later a USAAF Mustang to fly very low and drop marker flares or smoke. They would hit the markers, so those had to be very precise.
@@tomhutchins7495 I always wondered why the RAF didn’t use a Mosquito with the biggest version of a Tall Boy it could carry or a modified naval shell like what was used at Pearl Harbor ..The Tall Boys worked “ overkill “ in that they punched right through Tirpitz .. but the Mossie may have been a better plane for the mission .. with just a slight change in ordnance .. Churchill did have an understandable obsession with sinking it ..
@@stephenrickstrew7237 the Mosquito was nowhere near capable of carrying a Tallboy. Even a Lancaster - a far bigger aircraft with twice the power - could only just barely do it. You would have had to design and test and manufacture an entirely new bomb from scratch.
@@juneabbey9538 If a Lancaster could only barely carry a Tallboy, how did they carry Grandslams that were twice the weight?
@@juneabbey9538 a smaller scaled down version version of a tallboy that would fit in a mossie..with similar aerodynamics .. it only had to penetrate the deck of tirpitz .. it was a modified surplus naval shell that was used at Pearl Harbor ..
Greg, amazing video as always. Do we know if any of the fighter-bombers used gun/cannon along with bombs?
I love that Batumi, an airfield we know and love in DCS, is named after the Jug's designer.
@GregsAirplanesandAutomobiles Pierre Clostermann made some pretty colorful description of his training and actions in order to bomb V1 site with Spitfire in his book "the big show" (Le grand cirque in french).
A great vid as per, thanks for posting. Not the results I would have initially thought, but throughly explained. Yes, if you had to do that shit, the Thunderbolt's the one to take..
Very interesting - as always. Thanks.
I love the squadron the thunderbolt on your mug is from,Greg. 365th FS, 358th FG. One of the cleverest squadron emblems ever imo.
Thanks and yes, that's the squadron that flew the Crossbow raids.
My father flew 104 missions with the 366 sq 358fg from oct 43 to oct 44
@@scottinohio701 Amazing. What men they were.
Hi greg! You're smart, more people should be like you.
It's a very minor point, and just for your info: the term 'ski site' came from the photo reconnaissance interpretation, and refers to the buildings labelled 'S' in you drawing shown at around 00:04:23. The point being that they vaguely resembled skis in overhead pictures. I believe it was several months after the first realisation that the ski sites were important, that the interpreters were able to identifiy the actual launch ramp - yes the photos were 3D, but the ramps are very low, and it needed just the right light and angle to see they were ramps - of course once they knew what they were looking for, it became more obvious, but these sites were first identified well before any V1's had been launched at Britain.
Thanks Greg
The V1 was always termed the “Doodlebug” in England due to its doodling around once the engine cut and before the explosion.
Oh man! I am a sucker for these coffee mugs! 😊
I really hope the next video explains the political factors you didn’t want to get into in this one. Thanks Greg!
Regarding you comment about the Lancs hitting the Tirpitz. A lot of bombs from many different aircraft were dropped on the Tirpitz, including a lot of earthquake bombs, with few, albeit critical, hits.
Greg, you briefly touched upon this with the Thunderbolts, but for the other planes (especially the heavy bombers), was there any notable difference in crew training/experience?
I could imagine that a veteran bomber crew would vastly outperform fresh replacements, regardless of the plane they flew.... 🤔
Reminds me of a video from some other channel I don't remember that suggested that the strategic bombing should've been done with low level strikes by planes like the Mosquito rather than cramming a bunk of folks in 4 engine heavies at high altitude. I recall you did a video discussing this idea, kind of, but not that specific video's argument that it would've been more accurate and cost effective, IIRC. I believe they referenced the raid on Gestapo HQ in Denmark as proof of this claim. Regardless of it's veracity, it was a compelling argument.
The arguments ignore the entire mission of the 8th. It wasn't really about bombs on target. I have an entire video on the Mosquito as a replacement for the B-17 and I talk about it there.
and lord knows the number of bombing missions flown by the USAAF P47 in Italy from Corsica. The Jug was the go-to ground attacker.
ref no 138 wing - Lasham - I've 'flown' gliders out of there. 40+ years ago. Still a top glider field
My dad was sleeping in a hotel in London, on leave before shipping out to Burma with the RCAF to fly in the Combat Cargo Task Force supporting the assault on Mandalay. In the morning while he was in that emerging-from-a-dream stupor, he said the raspberry sound of a V1 became part of the dream, silence as he woke up, than a crash/boom he said he initially thought was a dresser falling over on the floor above in his drowsy state. Then he went to the window and looked out to see a plume of smoke in the distance.
I've read Leonard Cheshire used to dive bomb in a Lancaster to mark targets with flares for 617SQN at night. Quite stressful on the plane but it worked. One day he thought a Mosquito might be better, tried it & never looked back.
The Germans were lucky there no SBDs in Europe (except for the Ranger).
Now he was a ' cool cat'.
I still have his obituary somewhere.
So, I was right! My guess is, a P-47 pilot felt confident to approach target to very close distances before releasing bombs. Don't know what technique they used in real life, in Il-2 sim we used delayed fuses and dropped bombs from very low altitude. Usually, just a 100m or less.
A-36 pilots were more accurate
What would be the best 20th century plane to combat the Zombie TV theme? Greg rules only.
This is another great video, keep it up you are adding greatly to what really happened rather than the emotion that occurs shortly after a battle.
I'm not sure that you are being entirely fair to the heavies. Not all Crossbow raids were on V1 launch sites, many were against V2 infrastructure, and the fighter bombers could not have inflicted the type of damage for instance against La Coupole.
In your description of the V1 you say it could have carried other weapons, please can you expand,
I'm not saying the heavies are useless and neither did the report. This was a very specific discussion, one about tonnage dropped per A kill on a Ski site. . I thought that was pretty clear. As for alternate payloads, no, I won't talk about it on youtube, it would cause problems with the overseers here.
If you want test data Project Ruby tests the B17 and B29. In clear weather, 1-2 mile long run in. 220 mph at iirc 17k ft.
Could you do a video or series of videos on medium bombers? Not just the planes but the tactics and uses. There were lots of great and interesting bombers in this class but it’s never really been clear how they were used in WWII
Good job guys. I always follow you.