Intruder Operations Over England

[Huck]

And how could it possibly have sped the invasion up a year? P-38s , B-17, and b-24 were the only ac we had that could self ferry to England and the P-38s were a stretch only taking the northern route and with a Bomber escort as far as I know. A tactial airforce would have had to have been transported over almost if not completly on ships.

That's not the case. P-38 demonstrated that such flights were possible if required. They were flew via Labrador, Greenland, Iceland to UK. I remember clearly reading about the preparations made for the P-47 stationed in England after the war, in order to fly home over the Atlantic. All escort fighters had this capability. Excluding the short range light fighters pretty much every other plane had this capability (to fly the route above). Besides, USAAF used in England only about 250 P-39 and 15 P-40 (short range fighters), and they were all retired more than an year and a half before the invasion.

[Huck]

Huck, Luftwaffe was defeated not because of fuel shotage, the reason Luftwaffe suffered fuel shotage was becuase Luftwaffe FAILED to protect their oil production and transportation system, besides this, I have nothing more to say.

Protect the Romanian oil from Soviet tanks? how?
Was that Luftwaffe's job?

huck, Luftwaffe failed to help German army to size Caucassu oil field in 1943,

Caucasus was not a realistic objective, German Army could not venture that deep into USSR without being cut.

they failed to prevent USAAF bombing Rumania oil field, they failed to protect from USAAF bombing the road and railway transport system.

How were they suppose to fight three airforces at the same time? they were attacked during the day by VVS and USAAF and at night by RAF's BC. Luftwaffe and ARR (Romanian) units totaled about 1000 combat aircraft in the area (all types). USAAF alone did in the area 6 large scale raids each month (about 500 bombers and 300 escorts) from April to August 1944. VVS had in the area 2000 combat airplanes that were very active, preparing the Jassy-Kishinev operation. RAF also flew 16 raids at night during the same period. The losses on both sides were severe, but what really made the difference were the Soviet ground operations, that overran the Romanian oil fields. After that Luftwaffe could not get enough fuel to defended even the synthetic oil refineries in Germany, if other combat operations were to be sustained. Their defense crumbled like a deck of cards since then on.

[Huck]

...
Of course the best time for this transformation was before the war, when USAAF made up their minds on strategic bombing. Remember, the heavy bombers (B-17 and B-24) and their long range escorts (P-38 and P-47) are prewar projects (this also shows how old were their their plans to breakup with the Army). ..

Not quite right. The USAAF was a designed as a defensive airforce.

Exactly, and Luftwaffe was a mail service.

The long range bombers were to attack shipping off the coast of the US.

Sure, that's why they planned in advance to fit them with turbosuperchargers (decision to fit B-17 with turbosuperchargers was taken at prototype stage in 1937) to level bomb ships from 35,000 feet. Probably to increase the accuracy. And regardless of altitude, the patrol bomber concept was a total nonsense. Level bombing against shipping was possible only from near sea level altitude, against defenseless ships, otherwise these large and slow bombers were ideal targets for warship's AA. Going suicidal against warships was probably going to generate a more favorable loss ratio than this plan.

The P-38 was designed as an interceptor not as an escort.

And there were plenty of bombers ready to make the trip over the Atlantic and back, get real.
P-38 was chosen because a twin engine config was the easiest way of doing a long range escort.

P-47 was hardly a good design for a long range interceptor.

I don't really know what a long range interceptor was during ww2, so I'm not going to argue.

[Huck]

...Do you have any idea how much equpiment and personel was tied up in airdefence of the Reich? You don't think the hundreds and thousands of 88's for instance might have been useful in the East?

Come on LWD, not these tired old myths again. Why would you need massive antiaircraft guns to destroy T-34?? Regular Pak 40 did the job very well. Besides, 88 complicates the logistics much more.

Tired because it's inconveniant for you? If PAK 40's worked fine great they could have had even more and more ammo for them to boot. I think your just trying to wiggle out of a corner your inane coment painted you in.

It is not me the one trying to wiggle out of the corner, using the production of 88 for antitank artillery purposes was an obvious nonsense. Now you are saying that without producing that many 88s maybe the ammunition production could increase. But who says there was a need for more ammunition to be produced in the first place? Can you give a reference for this?

...How do you move stuff around effectively when you don't have fuel? by mule? Everything was limited by fuel, there weren't more prime movers, because there wasn't more fuel allotted to them.

I don't recall reading that fuel was a major problem at the start of the Eastern campaign. The lack of a logistics support stucture hit them very hard that fall and winter. They probably would have been happy to have more mules in any case as the Wehrmacht relied more on horses than autmobiles.

That's because they move farther than they expected at the point. But always the alloted fuel was consumed to the last drop (save for the stocks they had to make). More vehicles would not help, they would have went just as far if the available fuel quantities remained the same.

....Despite that many units were moved to Reich's defense, still the units on Eastern Front did the bulk of sorties. This is not surprising considering that all units on Eastern Front flew daily, most of the time many times a day, whereas at home they flew only when raids were in their area, which wasn't as often.

That's another area where your emphasis on sorties creates a blind spot. I think you will find that a sortie vs an strategic air raid used significantly more fuel than the average Eastern front sortie.

It is obvious that an Allied bombing sortie would consume more than a Luftwaffe bombing sortie, because Luftwaffe kept the bombers close to the front line. No surprises here, it is the way Luftwaffe was trying to make the best out of the fuel quantities it had.

[Huck]

The US and British used artillery for many of these chores. It was faster more efficient and available 24/7 if you have an artillery set up like they did. Killing tanks (when they are not on trains or in ships) is a waste of air assets. There are much better things for them to be doing and in the service of the Western allies they usually were.

Really, the artillery could to the job of attack aviation??
Perhaps that's why US Army has now its own attack aviation, after decades of fighting with USAF over such a service.

There you go misconstueing what I said again. There were many tasks that attack aviation could perform and many that artillery could perform. There was considerable overlap between the two. For almost anything close to the front artillery was more efficient and faster and that's what the western allies tended to use for the most part. It also meant there was less need for armored planes. This freed attack avaiation to go after critical logistics assets as well as interdicting units moving in rear areas.

Attack aviation does not have overlapping roles with artillery, where did you get this idea? Artillery cannot cross the frontline, and this is what attack aviation does every day. They strike, behind the enemy troops, the supply lines, depots and so on. Without supplies and reinforcements troops cannot fight for more than 1 (one) engagement. This is why attack aviation is fundamental. In plus artillery cannot fight mechanized troops or armor. They cannot go as fast to follow them and artillery cannot take the risk either. And when things go bad, air support is the first to come (if it covers the area, obviously). Luftwaffe's attack units were on call in 20 minutes in a 100km radius, artillery does not have such capabilities. Otherwise, I agree, US Army had very good artillery support.

[LWD]

And how could it possibly have sped the invasion up a year? P-38s , B-17, and b-24 were the only ac we had that could self ferry to England and the P-38s were a stretch only taking the northern route and with a Bomber escort as far as I know. A tactial airforce would have had to have been transported over almost if not completly on ships.

That's not the case. P-38 demonstrated that such flights were possible if required. They were flew via Labrador, Greenland, Iceland to UK. I remember clearly reading about the preparations made for the P-47 stationed in England after the war, in order to fly home over the Atlantic. All escort fighters had this capability. Excluding the short range light fighters pretty much every other plane had this capability (to fly the route above). Besides, USAAF used in England only about 250 P-39 and 15 P-40 (short range fighters), and they were all retired more than an year and a half before the invasion.

P-38's did indeed make the flight as I mentioned but it was only done during certain times of the year and only fairly early on when it was viewed as a necessity. P-47's never did it during the war and I don't think P-51's did either. Certainly they wouldn't be doing it in 42 or probably even in 43. So not much use in an invasion in 43.

[LWD]

...
Not quite right. The USAAF was a designed as a defensive airforce.

Exactly, and Luftwaffe was a mail service.

I don't think I'll even dignify that one with an answer.

The long range bombers were to attack shipping off the coast of the US.

Sure, that's why they planned in advance to fit them with turbosuperchargers (decision to fit B-17 with turbosuperchargers was taken at prototype stage in 1937) to level bomb ships from 35,000 feet. Probably to increase the accuracy. And regardless of altitude, the patrol bomber concept was a total nonsense. Level bombing against shipping was possible only from near sea level altitude, against defenseless ships, otherwise these large and slow bombers were ideal targets for warship's AA. Going suicidal against warships was probably going to generate a more favorable loss ratio than this plan.

Check out the original documentation. Other than that you are very good at applying 20:200 hindsight.

The P-38 was designed as an interceptor not as an escort.

And there were plenty of bombers ready to make the trip over the Atlantic and back, get real.
P-38 was chosen because a twin engine config was the easiest way of doing a long range escort.

Again check the original documentation. The P-38 was not designed as an escort fighter. One clear indicator is the lack of design for mass production. The orginal purchase plan numbers were very small so mass production was not a consideration.

P-47 was hardly a good design for a long range interceptor.

I don't really know what a long range interceptor was during ww2, so I'm not going to argue.

Ok I should have said long range escort. Early P-47 didn't have the range.

[LWD]

...Do you have any idea how much equpiment and personel was tied up in airdefence of the Reich? You don't think the hundreds and thousands of 88's for instance might have been useful in the East?

Come on LWD, not these tired old myths again. Why would you need massive antiaircraft guns to destroy T-34?? Regular Pak 40 did the job very well. Besides, 88 complicates the logistics much more.

Tired because it's inconveniant for you? If PAK 40's worked fine great they could have had even more and more ammo for them to boot. I think your just trying to wiggle out of a corner your inane coment painted you in.

It is not me the one trying to wiggle out of the corner, using the production of 88 for antitank artillery purposes was an obvious nonsense. Now you are saying that without producing that many 88s maybe the ammunition production could increase. But who says there was a need for more ammunition to be produced in the first place? Can you give a reference for this?
...

Are you being willfully ignorant or are you really not comprehending what I'm saying. I'll try again. There were a hugh number of AA guns and ammo for them produced to help protect German cities. If there had been no need to do so it would have freed up considerable resouces. Now the same guns and ammo could have been produced and set East or the resouces could have been used for PAK 40's or trucks or trains or many other things but I'm certetain that they would have been well recieved by the Germans fighting in the East.

[LWD]

...

I don't recall reading that fuel was a major problem at the start of the Eastern campaign. The lack of a logistics support stucture hit them very hard that fall and winter. They probably would have been happy to have more mules in any case as the Wehrmacht relied more on horses than autmobiles.

That's because they move farther than they expected at the point. But always the alloted fuel was consumed to the last drop (save for the stocks they had to make). More vehicles would not help, they would have went just as far if the available fuel quantities remained the same.

I thought that they expected to get to Moscow. but more vehicles would have helped if they were the right vehicles. For instance if they had gotten the trains working faster and further that would have been more fuel efficient but it wasn't only fuel that they were having problems with and their was indeed fule back in Germany the problem was at the front they weren't getting the supplies they needed to maintain the offensive.

...That's another area where your emphasis on sorties creates a blind spot. I think you will find that a sortie vs an strategic air raid used significantly more fuel than the average Eastern front sortie.

It is obvious that an Allied bombing sortie would consume more than a Luftwaffe bombing sortie, because Luftwaffe kept the bombers close to the front line. No surprises here, it is the way Luftwaffe was trying to make the best out of the fuel quantities it had.

Which has nothing to do with what I said. Twist and spin twist and spin.

[LWD]

...Attack aviation does not have overlapping roles with artillery, where did you get this idea? Artillery cannot cross the frontline, and this is what attack aviation does every day. They strike, behind the enemy troops, the supply lines, depots and so on. Without supplies and reinforcements troops cannot fight for more than 1 (one) engagement. This is why attack aviation is fundamental. In plus artillery cannot fight mechanized troops or armor. They cannot go as fast to follow them and artillery cannot take the risk either. And when things go bad, air support is the first to come (if it covers the area, obviously). Luftwaffe's attack units were on call in 20 minutes in a 100km radius, artillery does not have such capabilities. Otherwise, I agree, US Army had very good artillery support.

One of the roles of attack aviation is close air support, which definitly overlaps with artillery rolls. Artillery shells can and do cross the front line also every day and many nights. Troops have fought for more than 1 engagment withoug supplies or reinforcements many time. Attack aviation is useful but hardly fundamental. Artillery can indeed fight mechanized troops and armor especially if it is supporting infantry and armor of it's own which is exactly what it's suppose to do. Motorised artillery can indeed keep up with armor and motorized infantry. When things went bad for the allies artillery could support them much faster in all weather and times of day than aircraft could. British and US artillery could be on target in 5 minutes. Unless close air support was already in the area and an FO there it was going to take an order of magnitude longer at least and if it was night or raining or snowing or foggy forget it. And of course if you were a German on the West front forget any support by the LW. Plus of course artillery is often more accurate and can correct and support of a significant period of time.

I'm really amazed that anyone on this board could make statements like you did in the paragraph above and mean it as anything other than a joke.

[NickF]

How did the Luftwaffe Intruders navigate over mainland Britain ?
Did they use Knickebein, X-Gerat or 'dead reckoning' and 'targets of opportunity' ?

[AriX]

There was a time that Luftwaffe used radiosignals of british radiostations to navigate over the skyes of GB.After brits knew about it , thay change all their civilian frequencies to one.