Strategy and philosophy

[Pavel]

Yes, Hunter, and here we need to understand, what's point of the fighter forces in general?

In SovietAF it was quite clear - to ensure the activity of ground operations and bomber/attack planes strikes by the air superiority achievement.

It's important - main task is to provide cover, and only then to do their own business - achieve air superiority.

For me it's very logical, main war still is going on on the ground, not in the air. Even planes - it's much more easy to destroy 20-30 at once by the airfield strike, then to race them one by one in the air.

In Luftwaffe it was completely in contrary - the main task was to shot down enemy planes (to achieve air superiority). As far as I read memo books, it was never said Luftwaffe fighter pilots had any problems because of bomber losses, Luftwaffe HQ always motivated pilots on the shot down numbers.

This way normal situation was - German fighters are going ahead, cleaning air, getting into any air combat they will find. Bombers are going after, with no fighters cover at all and often are being hit by small (2-4) groups of Soviet fighters.

Main task - to make a ground bombing strike - is not completed, mission
failed, though German fighters could bring back 4-6 victories. For the global war it already means nothing.

The fighters "freedom", Adolf Galland was always complained about (give fighters freedom!) is a trick. Only HQ knows, how to plan operation, and where fighter is needed at the moment.
Who cares about additional 2-3 planes into ace score, when ground operation failed because it was no necessary bomb strike?

Free hunt, the heaven of the fighter pilot, is quite tricky thing as well. Yes, it's very annoying, keeps enemy all the time in stress. But in global case it doesn't bring any meaningful result.

So you may play this game when you have some free pilots. When it is lack of pilots (SovietAF in the beginning of the war) and you don't have air superiority, you can't spread, you have to concentrate only on extremely necessary things - to cover ground strikes, which are strategically important.

Even in Soviet AF, Kozhedub and Pokryshkin - though they were most resultative, mostly didn't solve any strategic goals. They were always on the free hunt, when wingman had to cover them, while they are increasing their scores.
Actually, this looks like very Luftwaffe style in general.

As we may see - no bombers protection task can be solved like this.

Even in case of enemy bomber group attack this tactic is bad - during the attack all the squadron should choose the target and open fire - as it was done by regular fighters units.
Kozhedub and Pokryshkin wingman had different job that time - they had to watch their leaders back, in case of enemy fighters cover attack.

So I would like to say that, maybe in case of shot down kills 5% of all the fighters did 95% of kills. But in case of general 'war' job it was regular pilots with 2-3 kills on the score, who did main job - protected Il-2 and Pe-2, prevented enemy bomber strikes (even if in all the group it was one shot down - the main task was solved, bomber group was dispatched).

While aces could do 4-5 mission flights a day maximum, which means let's say if it is 20 Kozhedubs in army - 100 flights a day totally. But when it is ground operation, it is needed 1000-2000 flights a day, to be over frontline all the time, to provide cover for the constant sturmovik strikes all the time etc. This is where 400-500 regular pilots are doing their regular job with the same 4-5 mission flights a day per pilot. And even 100 Kozhedubs can't replace 1000 general pilots, though Kozhedub had 60 kills and these regular pilots had 0-1-2.

BTW, it was nice moment, to demonstrate my idea.

When in the winter of 1945 was shot down Otto Kittel, the ace from JG 54, soldiers who was fighting in Courland that time were saying "Kittel is dead. Now we are deadman".

It is good to have aces. But aces doesn't solve strategic tasks.

[Pavel]

Only numbers.

Let's say 'Blue' has 5 fighters and 5 bombers.
And 'Red' has 20 fighters and 25 bombers.

Let's say after several air combats 'Blue' has lost 1 fighter and 5 bombers (because Red are more looking for bombers to shot down while preventing bomb strikes).
And 'Red' lost 10 fighters and 10 bombers (because Blue is more looking for single fighter groups and urgent single strikes. Besides, they are more skilled).

What does it mean in general?
It means no more bomb strikes from the Blue side.

5 Blue bombers before they were shot down were able to make 50 flights and drop 250 tons of bombs.
15 Red bombers are staying in line and were able to make 100 flights and to drop 1500 tons of bombs (not counting here 10 shot down, who drop something too).

BUT!
From the 4 Blue fighter pilots left the ace pilot H was able to increase his score on the 20 planes (keeping in mind 1:2 rate between score and real kills), and 20 planes were devided by the pilots K, B and R (7 to each).

While 10 Red fighter has to add (keeping in mind their 1:4 rate) 6 kills to the scores of the K and P aces, and left 12 devide by the 8 pilots left (1.5 to each).

We may see, during the same battle, H got 20 official kills, while K got only 6.

But after the same battle Blue can do nothing to support the ground forces, while Red continue to drop tons of bombs.

It was about quality and quantity in war.

[Unther]

In my opinion it's a question of philosophy. Both philosophies can lead to victory.

If you do it the "russian way" (provide cover and make sure the ground operations succeed), your fighters have the role of escort fighters and fighter/bombers (ground-attack fighters). They're close to the bombers and have great skills in air-to-ground combat.

If you do it the "german way" (achieve air superiority), your fighters have the role of dogfighters and interceptors. They can "clean" the sky from enemy fighters long before they can attack the bombers.

Both methods have worked. From 1939 to 1942, the German way worked to achieved air superiority (with the exception of 1940 in England, where the tactics were OK, but the aircrafts weren't suited for the task) and with this air superiority the bombers, stukas and ground-attack aircraft were able to operate freely. This was partly due to better technology and training (the Germans already had a couple of years of war experience, the soviets didn't).

The "russian way" worked after that, when the Germans lacked skilled pilots and enough planes to maintain air superiority. The trained soviet pilots were able to protect their own bombers better than the germans were able to attack them and the trained soviet fighter was able a great asset in ground operations. In fact, ground-operation fighter/bombers were introduced in the Luftwaffe only in 1943 and then only in small numbers.

Both tactics work. When fighting each other, it's the other factors that decide which side is victorious. Technology, experience, numbers - those kind of things.

[Pavel]

This is right. Almost.

The issue is, that since 22 june 1941 on the Eastern front Germans didn't have the air superiority.
Their first massive strikes harmed a lot, this is true, but didn't reach the main goal of air superiority.
In this case you can't leave bombers unprotected, while even 2 fighters can stop the whole bombers squadron from the target engagement.

In case of danger environment you can't spread you forces. But German HQ never paid attention and never forced fighters to provide bombers with protection, the main goal was to shot down planes. In any useful moment German fighters were leaving bombers and getting onto easy targets. And they weren't punished, while actually they failed their fighter mission - to provide protection to the bomb strike.

Unlike the Soviet, where it was better not to shot down anybody, but bring all the Il-2 back, then to shot down 2 and lose 1 Il-2.

Galland always was screaming that HQ doesn't give enough freedom to the fighters... I wish he would try to fight on the Soviet side, when he will be strongly tied to the bombers.

You are right, this is war philosophy. But the main idea, main approach affect results at the end.

[sicsok]

I think that one of the lesser known (and not even a literary gem, I admit) book of Fajtl, one Slovak pilot who flew in the Battle of Brittain, than on Lavochkin 5-s from hidden fields at the native country against the Luftwaffe.
My book's title was "Lions of the sky" or something really profane like this. (The original title was "Coming home", but than it was ****ed up).
About the way the flyers were used, I concur with Pavel, understood Galland too (differences are to sharpen the mind...they say). But the large formation given confidence must have been a major helper in Hartmann's Hungarian "three for breakfast": His victims were flying in large formation, loww level. So all he had to do is do dive down from the overcast on the line of targets flying straight and level about 10-20 m apart, and touch his trigger 3 times, and when the formation started to wake up-disappear back in the overcast and go home. He really was not going to hang around when dozens of opposing fighters start to hunt the airspace.

[Unther]

And they weren't punished, while actually they failed their fighter mission - to provide protection to the bomb strike.

And here enters philosophy: In the German philosophy they didn't "fail". When they lost five bombers, but shot down five enemy fighters, they didn't fail, because these five fighters wouldn't be there the next day. And that would count as a victory.
I know, the soviet philosophy would be: Better not to lose anyone than to shoot down enemies. The German philosophy was: Better to shoot down some enemies while losing a few of one's own, because tomorrow these enemies won't bother us anymore.

Also, if you can engage the enemy fighters long before they reach the bombers, the bombers can drop their bombs without being disturbed and fly home.

But let's cut to chase: The best way is to win an air war is to have a combination of good airplanes, well trained pilots, properly trained and equipped ground technicians, ground-based air defenses and luck.

[Pavel]

Originally Posted by Unther

And here enters philosophy: In the German philosophy they didn't "fail". When they lost five bombers, but shot down five enemy fighters, they didn't fail, because these five fighters wouldn't be there the next day. And that would count as a victory.
....
Also, if you can engage the enemy fighters long before they reach the bombers, the bombers can drop their bombs without being disturbed and fly home.

Yes, definitely it's philosophy
But what's the point to send bombers in this case? Freehunt missions are exactly for this - for shooting down enemy planes.
Bombers are going to drop bombs (if I'm not mistaken )

If bombers dropped bombs untargetted, over their own forces because leading bomber was shot down by two soviet fighters (while other two were in air combat with fighters cover far from the place) - it means they fail their bombing mission. And fighters failed their fighters cover mission.

You can engage fighters long before only in case you have radars and you are sure you don't have any other fighters threatening your bombers. Otherwise leaving bombers on their own - quite risky.

[Unther]

Yes, definitely it's philosophy
But what's the point to send bombers in this case? Freehunt missions are exactly for this - for shooting down enemy planes.
Bombers are going to drop bombs (if I'm not mistaken )

If bombers dropped bombs untargetted, over their own forces because leading bomber was shot down by two soviet fighters (while other two were in air combat with fighters cover far from the place) - it means they fail their bombing mission. And fighters failed their fighters cover mission.

You can engage fighters long before only in case you have radars and you are sure you don't have any other fighters threatening your bombers. Otherwise leaving bombers on their own - quite risky.

You know, sometimes that happened and worked.

I know of one event in the "Battle of Britain" (from the book of Adolf Galland) when several dozens Me 109-fighters flew on a route used by protected bombers. The british RAF expected a mixed group of bombers, fighters and destroyers as usual, but was surprised by a giant swarm of fighters and lost this engagement.

That cleared the path for several smaller bomber groups, because the RAF in that area wasn't able to defend the region for a short time.

The same tactic can be used on a small scale - send a fighter group ahead and clear the path, while the other fighters circle several thousand feet above the bombers, waiting for enemy fighters (standard Luftwaffe tactics).


Could our discussion have the reason, that this kind of tactic is applyable for "strategic bombing" (against industrial targets in the enemy homeland), while the soviet Air Force used "tactical bombing" (battlefield bombardement or infrastructure bombardement)? In that case, I agree that a very close defense should be flown.

[Pavel]

Yes, Unther.

But the same case you told about - worked against Luftwaffe quite good too, when RAF saw on radars fighters are coming - they just didn't scramble. This way they were 100% ready to meet waves of bombers (by the moment bandits had to leave already) - what was happening much more often, then successful fighters cover missions - according to the same Galland, btw.

I agree, strategic bombing of the Western Front is quite differs from the tactical bombing of the Eastern Front. It was big concentrations of fighters and bombers at once. Again - concentrations. Not the tons of fighters in the air were getting air supriority, or even some free hunters, but bombers as bait together with hard fighters cover (bombers weren't able to stop aircraft production, as we know, but they initiated hard air battles).

In this way it worked - unlike the sporadic Luftwaffe bomb strikes during the "Battle of Britain", when Me-109 just weren't able to provide any cover (because of range), and Me-110 were just sitting ducks mostly.

Well, if to summarize a little bit - bomb strikes doesn't provide the air superiority (neither on western front, no on eastern). But bomb strikes without cover can't be done too (again, neither on western no or eastern front - good link btw, I was writing about it already: http://www.ww2air.com/airfleet/usaf/...fighters-cover)

Free hunt brings nothing in terms of global air war.

So what are the ways to achieve air superiority? And what are the signs of air superiority? And why and when do you need air superiority?

[Unther]

So what are the ways to achieve air superiority? And what are the signs of air superiority? And why and when do you need air superiority?

Good questions. Let examine them.

Why and when do you need air superiority:
When: In every war situation with aircraft involved.
Why: Air superiority protects your troops and your home from airstrikes and gives you the ability to strike against enemy troops and the enemy homeland. Air superiority increases the effectiveness of your ground forces greatly, shortens the duration of a war and increases your chances of victory.

What are the signs of air superiority:
Domination of the air means that your air force can launch any mission it is capable of without any regard of the enemy air force or anti-air defense systems. Example: The USAF-air domination over Germany in late 1944 and 1945 or the USAF-air domination over Iraq in 1990/1991 and 2003.
The enemy might have some planes or anti-air systems left, but he cannot mount an effective defense against your airstrikes and he is incapable of mounting effective offensive missions. He has to hide and endure (like when the German Luftwaffe used covered airfields in 1945 to hide from USAF-fighter/bombers or the Iraqi Air Force used ancient ruins to hide their aircraft).

How to achieve air superiority:
The most effective way to achieve air superiority is (in my opinion) a combination of these methods:
- Destruction of enemy aircraft on the ground by airstrikes
- Destruction of enemy aircraft production centers
- Destruction of fuel dumps, maintenance centers, spare part centers and production sites
- Destruction of enemy infrastructure (roads, railways, airports, harbors)
- Destruction of command & control-stations (command posts, headquarters, government centers, communication systems)

All these methods have to be done by bombing runs/cruise missile hits performed by bombers/fighter-bombers. These have to be covered by escort fighters.