[tcolvin]

Glider, to respond to your questions of May 15.

1. The construction of the Wesel bridges was not the problem. Nor, as Kurfuerst says in Post 140, was it lack of the right ordnance. The problem was 2TAF's lack of an accurate delivery vehicle and/or procedure to deal with Flak. Shores & Thomas state that “all types of bridges could succomb to dive-bombing (they mean glide-bombing) but it required a high degree of accuracy” which of course 2TAF lacked with its glide-bombers. 2TAF's answer was to ask for Heavies that could fly above the Flak, but the B-17s and B-24s failed.
2. “Postwar they plumped for Mediums.” This statement was misunderstood by you. What happened was that a postwar RAF audit decided 2TAF should have used its own Mediums on the Wesel bridges and not relied on the strategic Heavies. The Mediums were even less accurate than Heavies, so it was no real answer.
3. I neither rate nor overrate 2TAF's Flak suppression. 2TAF saw nor need for a Flak suppression capability, relying on aircraft speed rather than armour. Arsenal in this thread has been posting overdue correctives to the predominant RAF opinion. IMHO the RAF should have armoured and up-engined the Fairey Battle while dropping two of its three crew members, to create a British IL-2 that could have done the job of concerted Flak suppression. In the air-superiority environment that existed in NW Europe, the field would then have been clear for the Vengeance dive-bomber. Shores & Thomas would presumably agree with this conclusion, stating that “it was not considered advisable to take on Flak positions in a direct attack unless absolutely necessary as the odds favoured the gunners”. The obvious need was to create a combination of equipment and technique that would move the odds in favour of the attackers, but 2TAF never addressed the problem and thereby showed it was unfit for purpose.
4. You contradict my statement that MGs and PAKs were beyond the capability of 2TAF's RPs and glide-bombing, and you believe a fast in-and-out pass by 4 x 20mms could destroy them. Such an attack might puncture the tyres of a PAK, I suppose, if caught in the open, but entrenched MGs and PAKs needed accurate bombing. Shores & Thomas would seem to agree; “Typical targets for the Spitfires would be strongpoints, dug-in tanks or artillery, while the Mustangs and Typhoons with their ability to carry 1,000lb bombs would also take on more durable or larger targets such as bridges, HQs or communication centres”.
5. I don't need to provide examples of calls for support being declined to justify the statement that 2TAF's Spitfires and Typhoons would not press home attacks against defences heavily defended with infantry weapons. The RAF reserved the right to decide how to respond to calls for support, and losing a Typhoon to an MG42 would not be risked if the support could be delivered outside MG42 range. The ORB wrote up such missions as having been successful simply because ordnance had been carted to the map reference provided by the Army. Accuracy and effectiveness never part featured among their success criteria.
6. Therefore the Typhoon pilot downed by an MG42 was not unlucky but rather had miscalculated. (You state 2TAF's FBs were well-protected against LMGs, but you will have to provide some evidence; eg the Spitfire lacked all armour except the pilot's seat-back). The comparison is between the Typhoon and Spitfire's tentative and rapid in-and-out and no-going-back attack with the slow and methodical triple-run attack of the IL-2 described by Arsenal as being the norm.
7. Hardened defences were beyond 2TAF support. You ask for an example; how about Hillman. 2TAF's weapon of choice was a Medium and not a dive-bomber with a bunker-busting hollow-charge bomb that we discussed above.
8. You ask for specifics about Mediums, but I can't help and neither can Shores & Thomas who exclude Mediums from consideration in their Chapter 12 'Operational Techniques and Tactics”.
9. You are right in general that the Hurricane IV replaced the Hurricane IID, but wrong in implying that this occurred in Europe.
10. The relations between 2TAF and 21AG were flawed at the personal level (Coningham hated Montgomery and the feeling was mutual), at the operational level (decided at nightly meetings at Army/Group level which was far too elevated for effective cooperation at the unit/squadron level), at the relationship level (2TAF was 'in support' and not 'under command' so the Army had to accept the air's ineffectiveness and could never insist on an operation being repeated even when it could be proved to have failed) and at the equipment level since the RAF refused categorically to operate dive-bombers or armoured aircraft in spite of Army pressure to do so.
11. Slow speed in terms of vulnerability to enemy fighters was not an issue in an environment of air superiority, and nor would it have been an issue if 2TAF had taken seriously its obligation to find a way of suppressing Flak, so your objections to the Vengeance hold no water.

Tony