This is going to go way into the dead horse section. We were talking about the relevance and contribution of the P-51 and the demise of the Luftwaffe. I am in the camp that it was the P-51 was hugely responsible for this. Others are in the camp that the attrition happened before the P-51 showed up. Well, The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, was a board of experts assembled to produce an impartial assessment of the effects of Anglo-American strategic bombing of Nazi Germany during the European theatre of World War II. In one section of that report, there is the analysis: ...... The Attack on German Aircraft Plants The heavy losses over Schweinfurt caused an important revision in the tactics of daylight bombing. Until then it had been believed that unescorted bombers, heavily gunned and flying in well designed formations, could penetrate this deeply over the Reich. At least, so far as a small force was concerned, this was proven wrong. For the remainder of 1943 after the Schweinfurt raids, daylight penetrations beyond fighter escort were sharply circumscribed. Meanwhile the U. S. heavy bomber force increased substantially in strength. In December of 1943, the P-51 (Mustang) long-range fighter first became available and in the early months of 1944 the numbers increased. With this plane, in some respects the most important addition to Allied air power during the European war, augmenting the P-47 (Thunderbolt) escorts which in the meantime had materially increased their range, daylight operations in depth were again launched. Sorry Horsey :)
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 00:47:09 +0000
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