[tcolvin]

You tell me, Nick.

I thought the Spitfire IX (416mph) could not compete with the TA-152 (472mph), and was superseded by the Spitfire Mk XIV (439mph) and Tempest V (435mph), which had also replaced the Typhoon (412mph).

But I agree of course that it was fighters that seized command of German airspace.

Some of these same fighters when fitted with air brakes and bombs could also have turned the lights out in Germany and ended the war before D-Day by destroying the 90 large electricity generating stations on which German war production depended. This strategy would have been cheaper and more certain of success than the alternative of trying to destroy the largest 100 German cities.

Tony