Best Fighter Plane Of The War?

Hello all

Late 1939-40 I vote for Spit Mk 1 and BF109E and late war I'd go with P-47N with the final spec P-38L as a very close second if not equal to it.

But they cost almost double a P-51D so .........

 

Got to say spitfire,

It was far and away the easiest, most maneuverable, and best of all the WW2 planes I ever flew in modded CFS2.

Could take some damage too.

"Fighter plane" to me is perhaps too a broad category though, unless I can qualify.

For me the Mustang was far and away the best escort, the spitfire never quite felt like it had the legs, although it could carry drop tanks these seemed to negate a lot of its fighter characteristics and I'd have to drop them in combat right away.

The hurricane certainly felt like a good bomber interceptor, it was fast enough to intercept and keep up and a good steady platform to line up the sights from if you needed to sustain fire on a big target. For the spitfire vs. bombers I found you had to really crank down the engine and stay very steady on the stick if you wanted to fly at the slow pace and lower maneuverability of a bomber in order to shoot at it and not ram into it instead

Nothing else felt like the spitfire though for the ability to pounce on enemy fighters, it would have been interesting to see how numbers of spitfires would have fared against the zeros in the latter stages of the war. Most of the other British plane mods in CFS2 seemed outclassed by them, even in the later stages of the "war"

Landing a seafire (spitfire) on a carrier in CFS2 though was a bit touch and go. It was one of the easiest to take off from even one of the shortest carriers - like the great "HMS Argus" though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Argus_(I49) - and I would not have wanted to land on that in real life - except maybe in a swordfish http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairey_Swordfish and then only as an observer with a very good pilot

I think the American's later war carrier bourne fighter models like the Corsair had a slight edge in the ship borne fighter theater, and interestingly for the Corsair it took the Brits to show the Americans how. I admit it was darned hard to see out of the front of it though, so not one I would have liked to have had to land on a carrier first try Could be a bit of a widow maker for rookies or even some veteran flyers of other makes.

 

Late war Spitfires would have gone through late war Zeros like '**** through a goose', as 'Gen' George C Scott would say.

Easily 100 MPH faster, higher ceiling, double the firepower, armored, radios and better pilots with better tactics.

 

I used to fly an A5M (Claude)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitsubishi_A5M
Mod in CFS2 off the early era Japanese carriers like the
Hosho
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_H%C5%8Dsh%C5%8D
&
Ryujo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Ry%C5%ABj%C5%8D

It seemed to handle quite well on those, and that was a nimble little plane. Landing a zero on a smaller flattop sometimes felt a bit more dicy. It almost feels like it's only really fair to compare like-with-like and in it's day (really only around 1937 and the 2nd Sino-Japanese war) it was a real star. It's tough to get accurate reports from those days in Japanese accounts though and it's losses might have been higher at the time than was more widely known.

The US is supposed to have thought that it was the Japanese front line carrier bourne fighter and we are led/supposed (?) to believe that the Zero came as a complete surprise. Although this is widely doubted now, perhaps at the time at least to the general public this would seem to have been so?

http://chinahistorypodcast.com/chp-151-the-flying-tigers-part-1

It was rapidly outclassed in later years though until by the "Battle of the Coral sea" the carrier that they were serving on - the Shoho - was sunk. I think I saw some reports that even said that the 2 A5Ms (Claudes) did better in this fight than the 4 A6Ms (Zeros) but this might have been due to the pilots, that has a lot to do with how well all these planes were flown. As they could never take much damage and if you were a "bad" or "poorly trained" pilot no matter what, you were a sitting duck.

 

The Mosquito - need I say more

TD

 

Ah! Another plane that is close to my heart

[sharedmedia=gallery:images:28166]

I could see them intercepting bombers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Havilland_Mosquito#Fighters

...but were they good for dog fighting other fighters though?
Wasn't completely sure that I'd find an example but I saw one straight off here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogfights_(TV_series)

• 15. Supersonic (2/29/08): Often in a dogfight, the faster plane is at an advantage. The episode includes aerial combat by James F. "Lou" Luma and his DH.98 Mosquito and Jerry O'Keefe and his F4U Corsair in World War II; Bruce Hinton and his F-86 Sabre in the Korean War; and Phil Handley and his F-4 Phantom in the Vietnam War.

Still don't know how it pans out fighter vs. fighter though.

For a plane originally conceived as an "unarmed fast bomber" you've got to give them very high marks for adaptability! And the ability to form almost every role.

Rm.

 

I don't think the Mossie was ever deployed as a day fighter, was it?

Great light bomber and night fighter but it didn't have climbing or acceleration performance of a fighter. Plus rear visbility was pretty bad (for a fighter), especially to the pilot's right.

 

best fighter of the war.i have to say supermarine spitfire.they may have got better after the ww2 .but then they were supreme.regards bernard.85 :indexCA7C9VES:

 

We could't compare early war years fighter with late ones.

In 1940 over France and Britains Bf109E and Spitfire MkI were the best, but we should take note of Dewotine D520 And Bloch 151

In Mediterranean theater RAF Gladiators and Hurricanes were at par with MC 200, CR42 and G50.

Late in '41 and '42 in the same theater Spitfire Mk V were slightly inferior to MC 202 and Bf109F, with no match for P40 and Hurricane. Take note that there were no more than 60, 70 axis fighter for a time.

Late in Tunisia Mc205, Bf109E and Fw190A and over Italy in '43 maintained their technical superiority, but training and electronic warfare, aside whit number give allies a decisive advantage.

But P38 was the favorite prey for Axis fighter.

In the Southeast Asia Zero and Ki43 outclassed all opponents owing to experience of crew.

After 1943 Allied aircraft production and training program overwhelmed any opposition.

Late in war Spitfire and P47D lacks of range, so P51 was the best escort fighter, but was unsuited for ground attack as seen in Korea.
On the other side, Ta152 were the best.

Me262 is another thing. We must compare it with P80 and Gloster Gladiator.

 

Yes it's a bit like asking which would win in a fight, a shark or a lion?

Maybe it's more like the question "what's the tallest building" though - which is fine until you have to define exactly what's a building

Do Russian telecomunications towers count? I guess so (to Russians!)

By the way, how long is a piece of string.... now that depends....

(My favorite criteria at the mo would be which one would you most like to "own" or which one is worth the most (i.e. 2nd hand - not new!) - but I guess rarity and condition then come into play. And which country has the richest Billionaires to fork out on such things!

I think the poll comes down on the Mustang - but it's slightly self-selecting as there are one or two more Americans - still that's how democracy works - and it's good to vote ! And I'm sure a lot of Brits voted for the Mustang, just as a good few American's can like the Spitfire. You can use both though, perfectly nicely for different things.

Rm.

 

I do not think there was a single WW2 aircraft that was used in so many roles and areas of conflict, from day and night fighter, high or low level, over land or sea (even to being fitted with 57mm armaments for anti submarine work and torpedo's), light, medium or heavy bombing (max 4000lb) - all this and cost effective, being of wooden construction.

As I said earlier - need I say more against the others in the poll that are single role types

TD