[Juha]

Hello Tony
on Hillman, with the only FOO dead, no matter what support one had, dive bombers, heavy artillery or battleship on call, there would have been great difficulties to utilize it on a specific target. Ju 87s were rather ineffective against Maginot line forts with 500kg (1100lb) bombs in 1940. I cannot say if a 1600lb AP would have been adequate against Hillman, at least on Tirpitz it was incapable to penetrate her armour deck (some splinters of a bomb that exploded on the upper deck pierced the armour deck) or main turret roofs. Of course in Tirpitz attack Barracudas dropped their bombs from rather low altitude in order to secure hits but that was a usual dilemma in divebombing, lower release height, more hits, higher release height less hits but better penetration. 500lb SAP IMHO would have been too light. German bombs would not helped British, British had some special AP bombs but those I can recall were too heavy for Vengeances. IMHO the main reasons of Hillman debacle were the lateness of tanks (because of the congestion at the beaches) and too few FOOs around, on which Vengeances would not offer any help. BTW a british 16” AP shell weighted 2048lb and 15” 1938lb, entry speed and entry angle depended on range.

Smith’s book is good but IMHO has rather strong pro-dive-bomber POV,, I’d not base my opinion on dive-bombing solely on it.

Soviet tanks losses, as you see, Il-2s were not able to give free ride to Soviet AFVs, in fact losses were very heavy.
1944

Tanks: 16900

Heavy: 900 , Medium: 13800, Light: 2200

SP guns: 6800

Heavy: 900 , Medium: 1000, Light: 4900

1945

Tanks: 8700

Heavy: 900 , Medium: 7500, Light: 300

SP guns: 5000

Heavy: 900 , Medium: 1000, Light: 3100



Juha

PS Il-2 loss info

According to Yefim Gordon's Il-2 and Il-10 book, the Il-2 suffered the following losses:
Red Army: 10759 (24% to fighters, 43% to AAA, 32% failed to return, 1% on the ground)
Naval Forces:807


Here is the statistics of Il-2 losses, according to Hans Seidl:

Year - Total Losses - To Enemy Action - % of Strength at Hand
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
1941* - 1100 - 600 - 73.3%
1942 - 2600 - 1800 - 34.2%
1943 - 7200 - 3900 - 45.0%
1944 - 8900 - 4100 - 46.6%
1945** - 3800 - 2000 - 27.3%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total: 23600 12400 70.3%
* presumably from June 22
** until May 10

Therefore, over 50% of losses [not counting the 'worn out' category] was due to enemy.