Quote:
Originally Posted by Nick Beale
Yes the RAF brought in faster aircraft than the Spitfire IX but that is not the same as the Mk IX no longer being a viable type in combat - it was used in large numbers up until the end and I don't recall reading of any occasions where it was outclassed and massacred by the opposition.
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Appearantly it wasn't messarcred but ignored. Clostermann wrote about this (the situation in the 2nd TAF in late 1944):
The Spitfires were powerless. There was only one Wing of three Spitfire XIV Squadrons and the rest were equipped with Spitfire IXs or Spit XVIs (Spit IXs with Rolls-Royce engines built by Packard in the U.S.A.). In any case all the Spit IX Squadrons operated most of the time as fighter-bombers. The Huns, knowing the Spits quality in dogfight, carefully avoided taking them on, and the poor Spits had neither the speed nor the range to force the new German fighters to fight.
Clostermann's Big Show, page 214.
BTW he didn't mean the 262 but rather uprated piston engined fighters of the LW with MW-50 and other boosts (ie. G-14s, A-8s, A-9s, D-9s). These had some significant speed advantage (up to 40-70 km/h) over the Mark IX that was just introduced in service
in numbers.