KI-100

Discussions on all aspects of the Japanese Empire, from the capture of Taiwan until the end of the Second World War.
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David C. Clarke
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KI-100

#1

Post by David C. Clarke » 12 Mar 2008, 09:26

Anything new on the KI-100? Can't quite figure out why this aircraft, with its relatively slow speed, proved so much of a match against F-6Fs and even the mighty P-51. Any thoughts?

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~D
History seen in a vacuum is no history at all.

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Tim Smith
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Re: KI-100

#2

Post by Tim Smith » 12 Mar 2008, 16:09

Well, maneuverability was at least equal to the Hellcat and probably better, and speed was only 12 mph slower, not enough to make a difference in combat.

The P-51 was nearly 70 mph faster than the Ki-100 in clean condition and at high altitude, though, so I can't see why P-51 pilots would have a problem with the Ki-100 - unless the P-51 chased the Ki-100 down to the deck and tried to dogfight with it down there. That's playing to the Ki-100's strengths, and indeed the P-51 would be a lot less agile than the Ki-100 at low altitude.


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Re: KI-100

#3

Post by Phoenix9 » 12 Mar 2008, 17:07

I read this a few days ago on wikipedia. Not too sure about the accuracy, but here are some passages that might be of interest to you:

Although slow in level flight for 1945, Ki-100 could dive with P-51 Mustangs unlike most Japanese fighters and hold the speed on pullout.

The Ki-100 had its combat debut on 9 March 1945 and suffered its first loss in April 1945, however, Allied forces quickly assessed the new fighter as a first-class fighter.

On 25 July 1945, 18 Ki-100 fighters from 244 Sentai encountered ten F6F Hellcats of the Belleau Wood Air Wing in a monumental air battle where the Ki-100 pilots claimed 12 victories
(out of 10 enemy planes???) with only two losses. Claims and counterclaims regarding the "true" results center around this action but it was an indication that the Ki-100 was a deadly adversary. The real losses were two Hellcats and two Ki-100s; one Ki-100 and one F6F were lost in a collision between Major Tsutae Obara and Ensign Edwin White in which both pilots were killed.

An overall assessment of the effectiveness of the Ki-100 rated it highly in agility and a well-handled Ki-100 was able to out-maneuver any American fighter including the formidable P-51D Mustangs and the P-47N Thunderbolts which were escorting the B-29 raids over Japan by that time, and was comparable in speed especially at medium altitudes. In the hands of an experienced pilot, The Ki-100 was a deadly opponent and together with the Army's Ki-84 and the Navy's Kawanishi N1K-J the only other Japanese fighters being able to defeat the latest Allied types.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ki-100

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David C. Clarke
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Re: KI-100

#4

Post by David C. Clarke » 14 Mar 2008, 10:37

Thanks Phoenix. My entire problem with this topic is that I've always sensed a sort of disconnect between Japanese and American sources. Of course, American sources on the KI-100 are virtually nonexistent, but everything I've read in English confirms that the KI-100 was a formidable airplane, something that surprises me given the on-paper statistics about the P-51. I sense that some huge factor is missing here, yet I don't quite know what it is.

The KI-84 had a top speed of roughly 408 MPH, so my simple mind can comprehend why it would be a serious opponent to the P-51, but the KI-100's performance seems to have been much less, which leads to questions.

I was also bothered by a statement in a well-known pamphlet about the KI-61 "Tony" that, in its attacks against B-29s, KI-100s were often detailed to protect the Hein against American escort fighters. Again, on paper, this doesn't seem to make much sense, but I tend to believe it and am questioning why this would be so, if the paper specifications bore any relationship to combat reality.

This is a True puzzle.

Very Best,
David

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Re: KI-100

#5

Post by Phoenix9 » 14 Mar 2008, 11:46

Maybe it has somethng to do with the high altitude performance of the Mitsubishi Ha-112-H engine, but I really don't know anything about that...

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Re: KI-100

#6

Post by David C. Clarke » 14 Mar 2008, 12:56

An interesting idea Phoenix, I will have to get back to you tomorrow, unfortunately.

Be Well.
David

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Peter H
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Re: KI-100

#7

Post by Peter H » 14 Mar 2008, 14:37

A Blue Ki-100 of 5th Sentai

http://www.freewebs.com/gregboyington/ijaafki100.htm
5th sentai, nr.37 "blue". This color is not fictional, it seems that some japanese planes were painted in blue as a color test, or for some special operations.
Image

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Re: KI-100

#8

Post by Tim Smith » 14 Mar 2008, 18:47

Just a guess, but perhaps part of the explanation is that by 1945 some American fighter pilots were overconfident, and took their technical superiority over the Japanese for granted.

After shooting down literally thousands of slow Zeros and Ki-43 Oscars, which from mid 1944 were hopelessly outclassed by all the top American fighters, perhaps many American fighter pilots didn't really expect to have to face any truly dangerous opposition from the Japanese at all.

So that would explain why a few Ki-100s could make an great impression on the Americans out of proportion to their numbers and actual combat value.

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Re: KI-100

#9

Post by Kocur » 14 Mar 2008, 21:27

I read once on a forum (or was it linked?) a well documented analisys (Japanese data vs. US data on missions, fights, claims and losses which happened in the same time and area) of some of those famous late war aerial clashes over Japan. The answer how come Ki-100, not to mention N1K2 were so often incredibly succesful against not only not only average performer which Hellcat was but also planes far superior to Japanese ones like P-51D (@ 80'' Hg!), F4U-1D and P-47N is... they were not at all! Most of astonishing succeses of Japanese fighter never happened, they are just claims or even worse war propaganda creations, which never got enough attention from western historians to be verified against US records.That can't be surprising as Ki-100 could be found impressive in comparison to top western fighters in terms of performance and armament of no later than 1941...

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Re: KI-100

#10

Post by David C. Clarke » 15 Mar 2008, 02:58

Ah yeas and I suppose the article also "proved" that the Japanese Air Forces didn't really exist and that the 5 or 6 American airplanes lost over Japan in all of 1945 simply ran out of gas. :roll:

Best,
David

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Re: KI-100

#11

Post by JoeB » 15 Mar 2008, 21:05

"I read once on a forum (or was it linked?) a well documented analisys (Japanese data vs. US data on missions, fights, claims and losses which happened in the same time and area) of some of those famous late war aerial clashes over Japan. The answer how come Ki-100, not to mention N1K2 were so often incredibly succesful against not only not only average performer which Hellcat was but also planes far superior to Japanese ones like P-51D (@ 80'' Hg!), F4U-1D and P-47N is... they were not at all! "

Yes, actually there's truth in that. The wikipedia article quoted by Phoenix has obviously been amended to reflect the fact that the most often claimed success of the Type 5 (Ki-100) was a big overclaim. The claim was 12 victories against 2 losses by the 244th Sentai July 25. 45, often mistakenly represented as 14:0 for some reason, but the apparent actual result was 2:2 (the USN unit VF-31 also claimed more Japanese fighters than the 244th lost, as typical of most WWII fighter combat). But I don't know of any other specific large one-sided success for the Type 5. It doesn't mean it was a bad plane or didn't have its successes, but a lot of its common reputation seems to come from just that one incident as told from one side, and that's not a good way to get to the truth about WWII air combat.

Likewise the Shiden's (N1K1-J) reputation seems to rest significantly on one incident, 12 F6F's engaged by one Shiden pilot Lt. Kaneyoshi Muto downing 4. It's *based* on a real combat, February 16, 1945, but the actual line up was apparently 10 a/c of Muto's Kanoya Air Group v. 7 F6F's. And Japanese war time media did semi-invent the 1 on 12 story as a morale booster, and that's not just according to anonymous internet sources but according to Muto's wife as quoted in Henry Sakaida's "Pacific Air Combat WWII" (the Japanese side, as in a formation of a/c not one, is also told in Japanese sources). That wasn't even an actual claim by a pilot.

In another of his books, "Genda's Blade", Sakaida estimated the elite Shiden equipped 343rd Air Group (of which Muto was later a member and KIA in with F4U's) had about a 1:3 exchange ratio v. US fighters (USN, USMC, USAAF, many combats described in the book from both sides). That's better than the performance of average units equipped with older a/c in the same period, but it was very difficult situation for the Japanese in many respects, the tendency to US air superiority was not just a function of the types of planes used on both sides (but also numbers, training, fuel quantity/quality, etc, etc). Also, detailed USN stats on credits by type v USN air combat losses to each Japanese type, show the later Japanese types performed somewhat better, but not truly dramatically better. Those are credits, actual Japanese losses would naturally be lower, and opposing types were sometimes misidenitified (as can be seen comparing those stats to some of the combats Sakaida describes, some losses to 343rd AF 'Georges' appear as losses to 'Franks' in the official stats, for example). But, the relative performance can be at least roughly seen and the newer Japanese types had better results, but not day and night better.

The Japanese Army's Type 4 (aka Ki-84 'Frank') had its moments too, but comparing Japanese and US/Chinese accounts of the Type 4's early combats in China in the second half of 1944, it only about broke even in exchange ratio even against US/Chinese units still equipped with P-40N's. They'd been doing better and much better respectively previously v JAAF units with Type 2 (Ki-44 Tojo) and Type 1 (Ki-43 Oscar) but the absolute exchange ratio achieved by the Type 4 wasn't overwhelming according to each side's recorded losses, in contrast to the JAAF's claims (and again, thinks looked better still for the US/Chinese according to *their* claims). Those were usually low altitude combats where the P-40's poor altitude performance wasn't a big disadvantage.

The general tendency of simplified conventional wisdom from older books about Pacific War types and air combat is as follows, IMHO: the early successes of the Zero are briefly acknowledged, even with some tendency to credit the successes of Japanese Army types to 'Zeroes'. But, then the later failures of the Zero are quickly pointed out, tending to overstate how rapidly and completely its combat performance did deteriorate, using Allied claims as the main measure. In fact certain Zero units more than held their own in combats in 1943 and even occasionally later, there were combats won by Zeroes over Japan in 1945 (the formation of Muto's was mostly Zeroes), just not that many. Then the conventional wisdom overestimates the success of the late-war Japanese types by basing that on Japanese claims. There's a basic inconsistency in the story of using eg. US claims to build the F6F's reputation v the Zero, but then using Japanese claims to establish the reputation of Type 5, Shiden, Type 4 etc. v planes like the F6F, it overstates the difference.

Joe

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Re: KI-100

#12

Post by David C. Clarke » 16 Mar 2008, 05:38

The answer how come Ki-100, not to mention N1K2 were so often incredibly succesful against not only not only average performer which Hellcat was but also planes far superior to Japanese ones like P-51D (@ 80'' Hg!), F4U-1D and P-47N is... they were not at all! "

Well again, if one is to make such sweeping statements about American airplane losses over Japan in 1945 and their causes, perhaps like in the B-29 thread, one should post exactly what those losses were. All I'm really seeing here is some variation of the same old tired 1945 mantra that American losses were negligible and that Japanese fighters weren't responsible. Exactly how many American fighters were lost over the Japanese Home Islands in 1945? Ten, fifteen, twenty? And all by engine failure or flak? Or perhaps they shot each other down by mistake....

In the B-29 Thread, once someone really looked at it, the losses of B-29s "in theater" suddenly shot up from 74 killed in combat to 809 lost for all causes "in theater" Maybe some one of you aircraft buffs should "really look at" American fighter losses over the home islands! Don't look to me--I'm an AFV hobbyist....

Just simply curious myself. Especially so, since even the Americans after the war were impressed with certain Japanese fighter types when they tested them.

Cheers,
David

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Re: KI-100

#13

Post by JoeB » 16 Mar 2008, 19:20

All he was pointing out, and what I gave further details for, is that the combat records of those late war Japanese types, in usually *English language Western* books, is often based on just a few incidents, and as told from the Japanese side, sometimes even mistaking what the Japanese airmen actually claimed, incidents which often look quite different viewed from both sides. Now this is true about many or most WWII air combat incidents, but the remarkable thing is how many times statements of the 'combat success' of Japanese late war fighters have been repeated on so little evidence.

As also with B-29 thread, I simply disagree that toting up losses to *all causes* on one side and presenting them as if the victories of the opposing fighters does anything but distort the situation further. I wouldn't do that in either direction. Fighter operational losses on eg very long range P-51 missions from Iwo Jima (in one case IIRC something like 20 were lost in a storm on one mission, way more than the Japanese ever downed in a single day) were real, and a reflection of the cost of operating single engine/seat planes at such distances over water, but had nothing to do directly with the efforts of the opposing fighter pilots. It's not 'disrespeting heroes' to properly classify losses by cause, it's just analyzing the operations objectively.

On your suggestion that more research can be done about particular losses and their causes, yes but a problem in analyzing the 1945 campaign over Japan is incomplete records on the Japanese side. Which is to some degree filled in with personal accounts and so forth, but at the end of the day it's often difficult for a particular combat to know if the Japanese losses are complete when analyzing US claims, and whether the Japanese claims are complete for a particular combat. For example I mentioned Henry Sakaida's matching of the Japanese newspaper claim made on behalf of K Muto February 16, '45: 12 on 1 a Shiden downs 4 F6F's. Definitely not 12 on 1, Muto was flying in a formation of his Kanoya Air Group which encountered F6F's, which Sakaida matches to the account and losses of VF-82. However based on another (Japanese language) account I saw, plus the USN's official claims list the times don't seem to match on those combats, by several hours. Sakaida is a superior researcher, but again anyone trying to match things up in that period is working on limited info.

Anyway the suggestion I get from your comments that nobody has ever looked at this campaign from both sides: not so. I'd recommend the books I mentioned on the two threads and there are others. On other late war J-fighter types a new series recently out in Japan catalogs the claims and losses on both sides, in particular combats, for Type 4 (Ki-84, 'Frank') Regiments, so far those in China. Again the Japanese sources are the hardest to find, plus language barrier to the larger world, so native-speaker Japanese researchers taking the tack of comparing Japanese claims to actual Allied losses combat by combat, is a really positive development. Previously most books taking that approach were in English, though over time most books in all languages have presented one's sides claims for any given incident.

Also I think you set up and knock down a straw man by saying 'the 1945 air campaign over Japan wasn't a walkover'. I'm not familiar with any serious account of it that says it was, though it did end with the Japanese air arms staying mainly on the ground to preserve remaining strength, and Japan being pummelled with limited opposition.

As far as inherent design merit of the late war J-fighters, that's not the same issue as their actual combat effectiveness in the prevailing situation overall. It's just one, and often overrated, component of fighter combat effectiveness.

Joe

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Re: KI-100

#14

Post by Phoenix9 » 17 Mar 2008, 00:38

For this kind of discussions, I think it's important that everybody keeps an open mind. There's no point in two guys telling eachother things they don't want to hear. If that's the case, it's better to stop, forget and move on...

I've heard of a USN mission in which the greater part of the allied losses were caused by landing on carriers after dark. I forgot what mission it was exactly, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't over the Japanese home islands. Of course that, doesn't mean that it couldn't be the cause of more allied losses on other missions...

If you want, I'll look up which mission it was. :)

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Re: KI-100

#15

Post by David C. Clarke » 17 Mar 2008, 23:16

I think that Phoenix has a point here. Obviously we are simply not communicating. I am vastly more interested, perhaps solely interested, in what made the KI-100 a suuccessful fighter and will not enter into any future debates that don't concern this issue.

Best,
David

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