Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

All that heavy armour is not much use against the .50".

Penetration capabilities of a single .50 caliber M2 AP round fired from a 45-inch barrel.

Range > Armor Plate (homogeneous) - Armor Plate (face-hardened)
219 yd (200 m) > 1.0 in (25.4 mm) - 0.9 in (22.9 mm)
656 yd (600 m) > 0.7 in (17.8 mm) - 0.5 in (12.7 mm)
1,640 yd (1,500 m) > 0.3 in (7.6 mm) - 0.2 in (5.1 mm)

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Hello Kustcha
one must remember that usually AA hits hit at shallow angle when armour gave much more protection than when hits were at near normal angle.

Juha

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Agree Juha but even at an angle with the armor thicknesses Tony listed, the odds are the .50" will penetrate. The armor is really only good for protection from shrapnel and light AA (ie .303").

And, the armor certainly doesn't protect the rest of the a/c from damage

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Yes, you are right, Kutscha, but you do not spell out the result that this made the Il-2 but not the Typhoon immune to all German infantry weapons, which were a maximum 7.92mm (0.3inch) calibre.
Remember Eric Roberts' fate.

Russian and US infantry were much better equipped with both medium 0.3inch and heavy 0.5inch (12.7mm) MGs - the 0.5inch Browning and 12.7mm DshK.

It is therefore surprising to read this memoir;

Luftwaffe Russian-front veteran is shot down on his first attack against American troops.
On December 3, 1944, Luftwaffe planes came over 3rd Armored positions in numbers during the grind toward the Roer River. It was one of the few times that they dared to show themselves at low altitude. It was a stormy day, and the clouds offered good cover at a low ceiling. An M-16 half-track from Battery A, commanded by Cpl. Joseph Makauska, was in position on a wooded strip between two open valleys. Tec 5 Dominic Rizzo was manning the quad-.50's. The majority of the enemy planes came down the valley to the M-16's rear and out of the field of fire. Suddenly an ME-109 dropped out of the clouds and came directly toward their vehicle. Rizzo opened fire just as the plane dropped its wing bombs and banked away. The bombs caused no casualties, but the .50's had found their mark, and the 109 was smoking. The pilot made a forced landing in a field between 3rd Armored outposts and the German lines, and the infantry captured him. He told interrogators that he had made 268 missions over Russian lines without being shot down, but this was his first and last trip over American territory. Others on the M-16 crew were Tec 5 Albenie Dubay, Pfc. Thomas Skidgel, and Pfc. Abraham Schiller.


source: http://www.3ad.com/history/wwll/feat...ple.action.htm


Tony

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Don't understand what you are saying Tony.

"Il-2 suffered the following losses:
Red Army: 10759 (24% to fighters, 43% to AAA, 32% failed to return, 1% on the ground)"

From the loss list in the Thomas/Shores Typhoon-Tempest book I counted 1475 Typhoons lost to all causes. Of this number 525 had 'flak' mentioned in the reason for the loss.

This is 36% lost to flak compared to 43% for the Il-2.

Why is the loss rate, to flak, for the heavily armoured Il-2 greater than the unarmoured Typhoon?

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Hello,

Not intending to get involved in this thread, I just wanted to clarify a point Kutscha made : the figures he quoted are not comparable. The figure for Typhoon losses includes losses to all causes, whereas the Il-2 losses are including only combat losses. Comparing the proportion of these losses suffered to AAA makes no sense. And you'd have to integrate a number of factors such as the intensity of enemy fighter activity, the losses to sortie ratio, the period of the war in which these losses were suffered,...

Another interesting point : I didn't know about the Finnish use of AT rifles against aircraft, but it's an interesting fact that the Soviet troops reportedly did also occasionally use AT rifles (14,5 mm) against Luftwaffe aircraft. I would need to check my sources to give more details, but I think this use of AT rifles was mentioned during the Battle of Stalingrad.

Besides, I think this thread is going nowhere. What exactly is the question being discussed ?

May I suggest to clearly define the subject of new threads, such as "effectiveness of armor on WWII combat aircraft" or "results of air attacks against ground forces in WWII" ? Both subjects would be interesting, but such a discussion would require solid sources (such as loss reports from ground unit indicating the number of losses to air attacks, or BDA data collected after the occupation of formerly enemy-held territory).

Regards,

Kolya.

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

As far as I am concerned, the matter under discussion is how the VVS compared with the Anglo-Canadian-American TAFs in fulfilling CAS and interdiction.

IMHO the thread can go nowhere, and is futile, for two reasons;
1. There is no agreement about the obligations or the effectiveness of the Western Allies' TAFs. The data is available, but the subject is emotionally charged with tribalism. One side of the comparison is therefore in dispute.
2. An understanding of the Russian language is necessary even to know what data is available about the VVS. The other side of the comparison is therefore unknown.

Tony

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Hello Tony
I’d say that the situation isn’t so impossible. If you cannot lay your hand on Soviet operational studies or if you cannot read Russian, read several German memoirs of men who fought on both fronts in 43-45, after all the men in receiving end had the best knowledge on the effects of CAS. There are also a few good books on Il-2 in English and also a must is "Red star against the swastika" by Vasily B. Emelianenko, very good memoirs of an highly decorated Il-2 pilot.

Juha

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

As I already mentioned the Il-2 operate more over battle field and pass more then one atack(first RS rocket, then bombs, and then MG's, total sometimes up to 6 atacks) on their target. Under these circumstances the AA have more chance to shot down the attackers

Re: Response to Glider and Juha.
 

Hello Kolya
yes Soviet used sometimes their 14,5mm AT-rifles agaisnt LW planes. Also Finns sometimes used their 20mm semi-automatic AT rifle against a/c before the introducion of the automatic AA rifle version. But the low practical rate of fire, appr 15rpm, and the heavy recoil made hitting on a/c with the 20mm A/T rifle very difficult. On the other hand its ammo was effective.

Juha