Agreed all.

It isn't fair that the war criminals on the winning side don't be punished. Arthur Harris was horrid. He never did anything much constructive when he was a lad, and he just went nuts over bombing civilians. A bomb nut like Hitler

Urrm, what did LeMay do? Never heard of him...

What even was the Thach Weave? All sources of info on the net and in books tell you what these great tactics were called, but never tell you what the tactic was...



Happy flying,

Bombardier

Dccuning when I made the comment that the Japanese or our enemy has not gotten due credit for their military value. I meant it not for you.

I have agree with almost all you written so far. That comment was reserve those for of us who have just started getting interested in the subject of World war two.

You mention Hugh Dowding, he is one of my favorite Heroes of the war.

Look at how entrage the British where in their caste system of Royalty and nobles that they basically demoted him after the Battle of Britain because he disagree with one of his Surbordinate on how to conduct Battle. His rival had good connections with higher ups and they basically retire him early.

What a lost to Britain in a momment of her most need.
The critisism was meant not for Battle tatics but actual airial formation and other tatics.

For those of us love history in general and World war in particular. Its important that try to be as objective in your research and evaluation as best as human possible.

Do not take side and and try to see everything from as many different angles as possibles. Do not to change history but bee open minded for different point of views.

Know that not everything written is the absolute truth.

Offical history is not the final truth nor reputable historian have all the truth in their writing.

Reseach and research as much as possible. You also need to bee able to place your self at that period in time you are looking into and allow your self to think like they thought at the time period are you reseaching.

I also hate revisionist as much as any body who like the purity of history.

They like to change history and thus the truth of history.

But I do like the clarification of history for the purity of it.

I will write many thing that may bee historial offensive to some. But if you really think about it you might bee able to see that I might be right.

The first one I will write about is Pearl Harbor.

Do you guys know that we pushed Japan into attacking Pear Harbor.

How is that possible when we have always been told that Japan sneek attack us while we slept.

Not true. We place a Oil enbargo on Japan to encorage them to stop them from expanding  ever more into China. When they occupied Indochina, They became a threat to the Philippines. That we refuse to accept.

By impposing the Oil embargo we cut their only realable source of Oil. They only had seven month of Oil in reserve.  They decided to go to war so they could posses the Oil in the East Duth Indies.

There is no doubt that Imperial Japan was a aggressive Imperialist country with brutal habits.But we basicaly force them in to making the decision to make war on us.

Was Pear Harbor a sneek attack. I say yes and no.

Technicaly it was a sneek attack because the tradition in those days was to declare war before you attack your enemy.

The Japanese plan was to declare war before attacking Pear Harbor.

Due to a bad typist in their Enbassy thats is not what happen.

Washignton received the declararion of war after the attack already happen.

The attack on Pearl Harbor was our fault in the sence that we should have been more alert and never understimated the potential of our enemy.

We knew they where going to attack but we underestimated them because we did not expected a country like Japan to be so audaxious.

We expected them to attack the Philippines instead. But we knew that there was going to bee a war soon.

Our Goverment use that delay to declare war wisely and called the attack a cowardly military act.

I do not blame our Goverment for useing this tool for the benefit of the war effort but I do blame so call historians for not clarifying this ussues after so many years.

Did our Goverment desicion to cut their Oil  the right one.

I beleive it was. The Japanese where very aggressive and had every intent to enslave the orient.

But they did not started war we did. We force them in to that decision.

I can go on and  on in many World war two issues that simply are written and accepted that are really incorrectly recorded.

I found this the other day on Pearl Harbor. Please tell me what you guys think about it.

1.http://www.flightjournal.com/articles/lost_p-36/sterling1.asp

I will post many post on this issue later.

I hope you have enjoy this critical review of World war two.

Its only a opinion.

James007

Curtiss LeMay was the general responsible for the B29 forces out of Saipan.  He abandoned the practice of high level bombing to low lever bombing of an altitude of from 5,000 - 10,000 feet.  He also stripped the B29's of defensive armament so they could carry more bombs.  And he abandoned HE bombs for incindiary bombs.

Now, what had happened in Japan was after the factories had been getting bombed out, they disbursed their sub-assembliy manufacturing to surrounding homes.  And these homes were made out fo wood and paper.  LeMay chose to have the B29's go over cities at low level and at night and just bomb the homes.  Granted, many of the homes doubled as manufacturing facilities, but they were still homes, with families.  As a result, the fire bombings of Japanese cities killed far more Japanese *civilians* than both atomic bombs.  To me, that would constitute as a policy that would qualify as a crime against humanity.

Now, the Thatch Weave:

Two American fighters would be flying parallel, but would sissor back and forward criss crossing each other.  If an enemy plane latched on the tail of one plane, when the two American planes began crossing each other, the enemy on the tail of one plane would end up in the gunsights of the other.  Consider it mutual "I got your back" protection.

Quote:



Best advice yet.  Falling into that causes much in the way of historical revisionism.  We can especially see that in recent years surrounding the dropping of the atomic bombs.

Dcunning30 Those are all excellent points. Another point is that a lot of you read about Aviation history is pure fiction.

From the begining this war was plague by propaganda by both sides.

Of course the Japanese where better at it in the sense that their claims where so out rageous that no one in their right mind could believe them.

We where a lot more sofisticated and believable. The propaganda began right at Pearl Harbor and continue right until VE day.

This where the days when we the public believed almost everything our Goverment would tell us.

Like for example when our first ship a destroyer was sunk by the Germans before they declared war on us.

Roosevelt made speach on how the first shot was done by them but the last shot was going to be done by us hopping the public would be so outrage that they would demand a declaration of war against the Germans.

What he did not tell the public was that the destroyer had depth charched the Submarine for a long time before.

The Gorverment also claim that the Japanese had  attacked Pearl Harbor in a sneek attack while we where in a nagociating with them on a peaceful resolution to the Pacific crisis.

In truth was we where expecting them to attack us at any moment since we had broken their diplomatic codes months before and knew they preparing to attack us.

It was our lack of intellegence and  arrogance on our part that  allowed them to  catch us with our pants down more than a Japanese betrayal.

If you read the News Papers of the era at the time of Pearl Harbor. They will gave us the impression that the few planes that where able to takeoff during the attack where more than a match against the Japanese.

That mind set that we where better than the Japanese at ratio of one to Ten was impregnated in our collective mind for the duration of the war.

I was flobogusted when I read Martin Caidin book Fort-Tail Devil:The P38.

In this book he claimed that he was chosen with a group of other writers to write the history of the Fith Airforce.

He was surprise to find many records where lost during the war. He blame it on Japanese air raids on our airbases during the war.

He also wrote that sometimes they would would find bits of  pieces of report and they would put it together with make up storie.

What realy blew me away is that he found nothing wrong with that.

If I remember correctly. I saw a documentary on World  war two called the World at war by the BBC. In the Pacific war installment a saw Marine Instructor telling his new Marine recruits how much better they where than the Japanese. He told them that they where Ten times better than the Dam Japs.

That was just the mentality of those days. Being shot down by Japanese was dam embarrassing.

Being shot down by a Germem was a misfortune, beign shot down by a Japanese was almost a disgrace.

That kind of mentality has only hurt our Pacific Airmen legacy thru the years.

It degraded their effort , bravery and skill that was required of them to achieve victory in the Pacific.

Thats the main reason that now most Simulators are dedicated to the European Theater.

The public impression is that the Pacific air war was relative easy since the Japanese where poorly trained and their planes where inferior to ours.

That has bother me for years. Not for the honor of the Japanese airmen but for Honor of our Aviators.

It took courage, skill and hard work to beat this guys. It was not easy nor did we win every engagement with the enemy from 43 to 45.

The reality was that we had better pilots, leaders and planes and we did win the important Battles.

The fact is also was that we where not ten times better than they where . That mentality has only served to hurt our image of our Piciific fighter pilots.

I could write more obout it but right now I do not have the time.

I will write more on this subject that I"am passionate about at a later date.

If you read this post I want to Thank you.

If you have any comment please write them.

I love this type of Historical discussions.

This is only a Opinion.

James007

To summarize my point I would say:

It was a matter of which side planned for a lengthy campaign of attrition, and was best able to resupply parts, planes, and most importantly, skilled pilots.


* The Japanese was short sighted in their plans so they didn't plan to a long war.  The Americans prepared to go the distance.

* As a result of the short-war planning, the Japanese didn't rotate out their combat experienced pilots to train new pilots.  The Americans did.

* The Japanese sub fleet failed to appreciate the importance of going after Amercan merchantmen.  The Americans saw that importance from the outset.

* Having been caught up in "victory disease" the Japanese continued to expand southward rather than secure their vulnerable sea-lanes between the oil fields in Indo-China and the homeland.

*All this converged to make it very difficult for the Japanese to properly train replacement pilots.  And as a result, we had events such as The Great Mariannas Turkey Shoot.

I would say another major factor in the outcome of WW2,  and which also has a direct link to training pilots,  Is the US never had to worry about the enemy flying over its homeland bases.

I just watched a history Channel program on the Flying Tigers.   And near the end,  a Flying Tiger said they had a score of 290 Japense planes shot down,  to only 4 pilots killed in air combat.


Pearl Harbor always annoys me.  Not the whole attack itself, but the way the US has ALWAYS hyped up the 2 P40's that got in the air.  They shot down planes that were low on fuel, low if not out of ammo,  on there way back after they already attacked.  Still kills non the less.... BUT,  the Japs still destroyed the pacific fleet.  And dont even get me started on the pathetic Disney movie made a few years ago.  (I really hate CGI aircraft)

So why is it that the pacific figters are all radial engines pretty much,  well the European fighters are all inline/water cooled?  The top speed wasnt the reason i would assume, as the Corsair was the first to hit 400,  and could keep up with anything.  And the Jug was showing its radial speed off in Europe? 

Thats gettin to be a whole nother topic in its sefl,  best planes of the war.

As for tactics,  ill still stick with the US in the pacific.   Even if they do have propganda inflated kill ratios   8)

Anyone have the Jap numbers?   or even the US ones.   Would love to see the comparisons.