glenn239 wrote: ↑06 May 2020 18:58
Your right in that the MIG-15's were at more of a disadvantage, because the B-29's in Korea at least had decent jet fighter escorts. But, if you are insinuating that the Me-262 wasn't broadly comparable to the Mig-15 in attacking B-29's, I would disagree.
Yeah, you are f@#king around and not bothering to do any research.
The nine Namsi mission B-29 close escort was 55 F-84, which were completely outclassed by the Mig-15. High escort was 32 F-86, which could match it. The problem was the Soviets (not Chinese) deployed three regiments of Mig-15 against the mission. Forty Mig-15 engaged and tied up the F-86, which could not then intervene against the 20 that were easily able to evade the F-84 and shoot down three B-29 and damage three, two of the latter also suffered flak damage.
I'd estimated about 100 rockets to shoot down a single bomber (1 bomber per 4 attacks each with 24 rockets) and you estimate 144 to shoot down a bomber. So, even with your figures, if 30 Me-262's fire their R4M's, that would be 5 kills made even before they engage with cannons. Their lethality per sortie is maybe doubled with a cheap weapon.
The 30 Me 262 shot down, at most, five aircraft. They fired R4m at them. They fired 3cm at them. We don't know how many of the 40-odd other aircraft engaged or what they fired. Somehow now that becomes the R4M "would be 5 kills made even before they engage with cannons".
Either you're f@#king around or you're not thinking very clearly.
Did you bother to read what you sourced? "From October 1944 onwards, most operational Me.262s were deployed against American daylight heavy bomber raids. Swarms of USAAF escorts ensured that the jets would have little chance to engage the Fortresses and Liberators. Mustangs and Thunderbolts engaged the Me.262s from the highest altitudes right down to their landing patterns. It was estimated that one German jet was lost for every American aircraft the German jets shot down."
Over 700 American fighters swarming 70 German fighters, of which only 30 were superior, is not the same as 60 Soviet fighters engaging 87 American fighters, only 32 of which were a near match.
31 March 1945, 454 Lancasters attacked Blohm&Voss Hamburg and lost 11 aircraft. So a 7:11 ratio. Better, but still not good enough when the British could send over 600 aircraft on a mission, the Americans 1,200 the same day, and they could escort with over 1,100 fighters, while hundreds of other fighters and light and medium bombers hit the airfields the Germans were trying to fly off of.
Is a second engagement where something between 12-20 Me-262's also equipped with R4's engaged RAF Lancs and Halifaxes, with 8 bombers shot down. This account suggests maybe something more like 1 bomber shot down for every 60 or 80 missiles fired. So we're in the ballpark - 1 bomber shot down by rockets per every three to six ME-262's. This is all on top of losses to cannon fire, so, is "free money" in terms of bang per buck, kills per sortie.
What "second engagement"? It was seven versus 454. Supposedly seven lost to R4M, so four to 3cm.
Anyway, by that metric all you need to stop 2,400-odd allied bombers and 1,400-odd allied fighters and fighter bombers is a few thousand Me 262.