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Re: Allied Opinion of IJN vs. IJA Fighter Pilots
The book of Nicholas Millman "Ki-27 ´Nate´Aces" may give some light.
Millman shows that IJAAF units flying near-obsolete but still surprisingly well-doing ´Nate´ made quite well against Allied pilots in 1941-1942.
Action over the Philippines saw two Ki-27 IJAAF units participating and were able to bring down some American P-40 E´s and alone P-35. It seems that IJAAF pilots did make well against American foes who had more advanced planes. American pilots learned that the "obsolete" Nate with its fixed landing gear was still a dangerous plane in the hands of skilled pilot.
IJAAF ´Nate´pilots took further part in the Malaya, The East Indies and Burma campaigns doing rather well against the Brewster Buffalos, Hurricanes and P-40´s of RAF/USAAF/AVG.
RAF ace Barry Sutton about his IJAAF opponents over Burma in 1942 and what the real combat situation made him to think about pre-war newspaper article claiming that Japanese pilots were unable to perform aerobatics: "Many times since I have thought I would have liked to cram the man who wrote that article into the cockpit of my Hurricane as I twisted and turned, trying to dogde the front end of those slippery little 97´s (Nate) as they clawed themselves around incredibly tight corners at a couple of hundred miles a hour"
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