Moderators: wdolson, MOD_War-in-the-Pacific-Admirals-Edition
ORIGINAL: Puhis
I think that a CV should be able to out manuever a few big 4E bombers so easily. One steep turn should be enough.
ORIGINAL: Sardaukar
ORIGINAL: EUBanana
I thought skip bombing in AE (as presumably that is what this is) was essentially limited to attack bombers, and that was the whole reason to have the attack bomber as a new aircraft classification?
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/ ... lfboutique
Product Description
Murphy was one of a very small number of volunteer pilots who, with their flight crews, started bombing at low altitudes in B-17 flying fortresses in the Southwest Pacific. The aircraft were flown at a 200-foot altitude and at 250 miles per hour at night. One-thousand pound bombs, equipped with four-to-five second fuses, were dropped from the B-17s.
Skip bombing was invented by using B-17s.
http://books.google.com.mt/books?id=ajQ ... ng&f=false
See Chapter 3, "Ken's men".
And:
http://www.kensmen.com/skipbombing.html
http://www.kensmen.com/combatlessons6.html
ORIGINAL: Mozo
I was frustrated my 4EBs from PM weren't hitting any naval targets from 19,000 so I tried it during my first CV battle - I figured they had nothing to lose. 12 hits! Yeah they were 500lb but 12 hits from 5 planes!?! And the zeros were useless. Seems a bit strange to me but I'll take it.
the inglorious bastards!!!ORIGINAL: FAseaORIGINAL: dpstafford
I'm going to Disney World......
too late...my B-17s just bombed it to smithereens at 100ft.
Just curious as to when this was and what the Pilot experience levels were?
7. Precautionary Measures:
Skip bombing with heavy bombardment aircraft must be considered an attack of opportunity. Any attempt to skip bomb a war vessel in the light, unsupported, would probably be particularly hazardous because of lack of speed and manoeuvrability and small amount of forward fire power. Successful daylight attacks have been made on unescorted merchant vessels by heavy bombers, and light bombers heavily armed forward with .50 cal machine guns have been highly successful against war vessels. This success of light bombers was due to surprise, coordination, and heavy forward fire, none of which are likely to exist in a daylight attack on warships by heavy bombardment. Repeated skip bombing attacks in the same area would result in some form of protection designed to defeat it. It is, however, when the opportunity presents itself, an ideal surefire method of hitting the target.
ORIGINAL: Apollo11
Hi all,
The low flying 4 engine bomber is slow, poorly maneuverable and BIG juicy target for any navy man-of-war ship with serious AA on board... the attacking bombers should have been wiped out with AA...
Atacking unarmed merchants is different story though!
Leo "Apollo11"
ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
It is easy to hit targets with a 4 engine bomber from 100'. I've been in one at 200' (the minimum allowed by Navy regs) and done it. . The problem with 100' in an aircraft with a 100' wingspan, well, you do the math. [:D] All aircraft drop slightly in a turn (except for VERY high powered , high performance aircraft doing climbing turns). So what this means is that a B-17 sacrafices ALL maneveability for accuracy. (Sort of like they did in Europe-a B-17 , one minute out from IP-initial point- not only couldn't manuever, the bombardier was flying the aircraft.). So the problems are bomb fuzing (an easy fix) and crew training (a time consuming fix).
As has been mentioned before, B-17s were the 1st aircraft to do skip bombing, at the end of the PI campaign. But why endanger 10 men in a half million dollar aircraft when you can do it with 5 or less men in a much,much cheaper aircraft? I've always felt that skip bombing for heavies was a very viable tactic, if the allied side is willing to risk VERY heavy losses. I have always felt that a lot of people screaming "gamey" are confusing historical with possible. How many times was a "possible " tactic not used by a "nervous" commander afraid what would happen to him when it went wrong? Even Curtis LeMay had 2nd thoughts about low level firebombing raids over Japan with stripped down B-29's. But we don't consider it "gamey". If some commander in the South Pacific had said "set the B-17's at 100' ", we would not be having this conversation today. [:)]
ORIGINAL: Apollo11
Hi all,
ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
It is easy to hit targets with a 4 engine bomber from 100'. I've been in one at 200' (the minimum allowed by Navy regs) and done it. . The problem with 100' in an aircraft with a 100' wingspan, well, you do the math. [:D] All aircraft drop slightly in a turn (except for VERY high powered , high performance aircraft doing climbing turns). So what this means is that a B-17 sacrafices ALL maneveability for accuracy. (Sort of like they did in Europe-a B-17 , one minute out from IP-initial point- not only couldn't manuever, the bombardier was flying the aircraft.). So the problems are bomb fuzing (an easy fix) and crew training (a time consuming fix).
As has been mentioned before, B-17s were the 1st aircraft to do skip bombing, at the end of the PI campaign. But why endanger 10 men in a half million dollar aircraft when you can do it with 5 or less men in a much,much cheaper aircraft? I've always felt that skip bombing for heavies was a very viable tactic, if the allied side is willing to risk VERY heavy losses. I have always felt that a lot of people screaming "gamey" are confusing historical with possible. How many times was a "possible " tactic not used by a "nervous" commander afraid what would happen to him when it went wrong? Even Curtis LeMay had 2nd thoughts about low level firebombing raids over Japan with stripped down B-29's. But we don't consider it "gamey". If some commander in the South Pacific had said "set the B-17's at 100' ", we would not be having this conversation today. [:)]
I am 100% with you Steve on this!
If it was possible to do it in WWII - we should have it in WitP-AE - all is OK there!
But, the AA should "chew" those B-17's - the broad daylight attacks against navy man-of-war armed with AA should be suicide mission!
I was in Air Force 20+ years ago doing my army time and I was with SAMs (SA-3). But we also had manually trained 20mm AA guns. Those were more modern versions of the WWII era and they were lethal!
Thus I can almost guarantee you that on broad daylight at open sea there should not be any surprises on well maintained navy ships with lookouts searching the horizon and the skies... the big B-17's starting attack from 2000 ft (that's about 600 meters of altitude) and finalizing at 100-200 ft (that's about 30m) would have been long sighted, avoided and shot down with any properly manned navy man-of-war...
Leo "Apollo11"
ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
ORIGINAL: Apollo11
ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
It is easy to hit targets with a 4 engine bomber from 100'. I've been in one at 200' (the minimum allowed by Navy regs) and done it. . The problem with 100' in an aircraft with a 100' wingspan, well, you do the math. [:D] All aircraft drop slightly in a turn (except for VERY high powered , high performance aircraft doing climbing turns). So what this means is that a B-17 sacrafices ALL maneveability for accuracy. (Sort of like they did in Europe-a B-17 , one minute out from IP-initial point- not only couldn't manuever, the bombardier was flying the aircraft.). So the problems are bomb fuzing (an easy fix) and crew training (a time consuming fix).
As has been mentioned before, B-17s were the 1st aircraft to do skip bombing, at the end of the PI campaign. But why endanger 10 men in a half million dollar aircraft when you can do it with 5 or less men in a much,much cheaper aircraft? I've always felt that skip bombing for heavies was a very viable tactic, if the allied side is willing to risk VERY heavy losses. I have always felt that a lot of people screaming "gamey" are confusing historical with possible. How many times was a "possible " tactic not used by a "nervous" commander afraid what would happen to him when it went wrong? Even Curtis LeMay had 2nd thoughts about low level firebombing raids over Japan with stripped down B-29's. But we don't consider it "gamey". If some commander in the South Pacific had said "set the B-17's at 100' ", we would not be having this conversation today. [:)]
I am 100% with you Steve on this!
If it was possible to do it in WWII - we should have it in WitP-AE - all is OK there!
But, the AA should "chew" those B-17's - the broad daylight attacks against navy man-of-war armed with AA should be suicide mission!
I was in Air Force 20+ years ago doing my army time and I was with SAMs (SA-3). But we also had manually trained 20mm AA guns. Those were more modern versions of the WWII era and they were lethal!
Thus I can almost guarantee you that on broad daylight at open sea there should not be any surprises on well maintained navy ships with lookouts searching the horizon and the skies... the big B-17's starting attack from 2000 ft (that's about 600 meters of altitude) and finalizing at 100-200 ft (that's about 30m) would have been long sighted, avoided and shot down with any properly manned navy man-of-war...
I understand Leo, but I can attest to you that on many,many occasions , I've been in a vintage 50's P-3(a,b, and c models) using late 1940's ESM and time and time again caught warships of all nations totally by surprise ! Needless to say , we never made a second pass![:D] The 1st vessel that I couldn't pull that on were the Ticonderoga Class cruisers (tried, tried and tried again). Part of the trick is you don't start at 2,000 feet. You start lower and keep gradually decending. I'm not going to go into the tactics of RADAR evasion (because , despite being 50 years old, they still work). And of course , no crew, no matter how good , can maintain a tight general quarters (or action stations) forever. People get tired, bored and get lazy. And of course, weather is the attackers friend. Clouds, storms and haze are your best friend. Use them well, and you can be practically invisable.
As far as accurracy goes , we (my squadron) experimented in the late 1980's with trying to put a sono-bouy into a very small ploynia (about the size of a mini bus) from 200' using naked eye-ball and FLIR (I was the FLIR operator). We only missed once in over 70 tests. And that was becasue a gust of wind caught the bouy and slammed it against the canyon before dropping it into the water (breaking it). Had that been a 500 lb bomb , that wouldn't have been a factor. A really good crew can manever at the altitude, but it would be difficult (although not impossible--we had a couple of green crews with us and they did OK).
So why is it we can except the KB coming out of nowhere to bomb the daylights out of you , but can't accept a gaggle of B-17's doing the same thing? [&:]
4E bombers did indeed use skip bombing, even in the B-17, and even early in the war. It was a desperate tactic when it was realized the prewar doctrine of high altitude Anti-shipping was useless. Still, it wasn't common.ORIGINAL: juliet7bravo
"3 April 1943:
Moewe anchorage. Boeing B-17 "Flying Fortresses" of the Fifth Air Force's 43rd Bomb Group attack moored AOBA. The big bombers skip-bomb from between 75 and 250 feet with delayed-action fused 500-lb. bombs. A direct hit on AOBA explodes two Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedoes stored aboard and sets the ship afire while the B-17's .50-cal. machine guns strafe her decks. HATSUZUKI assists in fire-fighting. AOBA is flooded and has to be beached to avoid sinking. Destroyer FUMIZUKI is also damaged lightly by a near-miss. The Americans suffer no losses and the 43rd claims two 'probable cruisers' sunk."
ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
Leo, let me ask you this, how many u-boats were suprised by B-24's and other long ranged aircraft? The sea bottom was littered with their hulls. Would a U-boat lookout be more complaicent then say a IJN heavy cruiser (which felt it'self to be near invincible?). Having spent thousands of hours staring at a boring , empty sea, I can tell you it's easy even for a very experinced lookout to be distracted, fixated or simply miss a contact. The easiest way is to stare right at it. You spot distant targets with your perifial vision. You spot movement. Looking at an object coming at you head on in a steady manner is a very easy way NOT to see it. You have to constantly keep turning your head to make sure that doesn't happen. And binoculars will narrow your vision so much , that you will frequently miss a contact. [:(]
ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl
ORIGINAL: Puhis
I think that a CV should be able to out manuever a few big 4E bombers so easily. One steep turn should be enough.
Isn't this a bit counter-intuitive? I mean that by your logic a big 4-engined bomber should be able to out manuever a few nimble fighters as well? And what are the CV's choices? Be skip bombed from the side? Or allow the bomber to walk a salvo of bombs down the deck?
ORIGINAL: juliet7bravo
"3 April 1943:
Moewe anchorage. Boeing B-17 "Flying Fortresses" of the Fifth Air Force's 43rd Bomb Group attack moored AOBA. The big bombers skip-bomb from between 75 and 250 feet with delayed-action fused 500-lb. bombs. A direct hit on AOBA explodes two Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedoes stored aboard and sets the ship afire while the B-17's .50-cal. machine guns strafe her decks. HATSUZUKI assists in fire-fighting. AOBA is flooded and has to be beached to avoid sinking. Destroyer FUMIZUKI is also damaged lightly by a near-miss. The Americans suffer no losses and the 43rd claims two 'probable cruisers' sunk."
