Response to Glider and Juha.

[tcolvin]

Juha's questions;
Tony,
On Il-2 vs Typhoon. Typhoon was vulnerable to rifle calibre fire but much less vulnerable to Bf 109s and Fw 190s. Both were vulnerable to 20mm AAA. Il-2 was interesting solution to CAS problem but if you look the Soviet losses in men and material in 44-45 and compared those to losses of Western Allies in ETO in 44-45 you can see that it wasn’t a magic weapon. One could not fight a cheap war against an army like WM.On Hillman. I cannot follow your logic. If British had known how difficult object it was they could have softened it by heavy naval fire, for ex from HMS Rodney. 1 Suffolks had had easy job to reduce Morris shortly before (white flag went up before 1 Suffolk even had begun their attack on it). and it dawned to them that Hillman would be a totally different game only after their point platoon and parts of the second were inside Hillman. A bit late if one was not totally callous to the life of his own troops to deploy heavy support fire, dive bombers, BB main armament fire etc at that point.

Juha


1. On the Il-2, I would quote Walter Schwabedissen whose conclusions appear to differ from yours. I look forward in your comments;
"All German commanders describe the IL-2 as a highly useful airplane for ground-attack missions. Owing to its good armour plating, the plane could only be brought down by very well directed ground fire. It had a speed of 210 mph. General der Flakartillerie a.D Wolfgang Pickert adds that the IL-2 was impervious to light 20-mm armour-piercing or 37-mm shells. The same views are expressed by General der Infanterie von der Groben, who emphasises the nose armour and remarks that direct hits with 20-mm shells frequently had no effects on the plane. The experience of the 54th Fighter Wing also shows it was hardly possible to shoot down the IL-2 aircraft in an attack from the rear, because of its excellent armour protection." Source: Walter Schwabedissen: The Russian Air Force in the Eyes of German Commanders.


2. On Hillman, IIRC there was an attack from the air planned which was delayed and ineffective. I seem to remember it was from Heavies. I will have to check and get back to you. I can't answer about naval support.


Tony

[Bill Walker]

Tony, you are again picking and choosing quotes that suit your purposes. Here is a quote I have picked about the Il-2:

"As revealed in Rastrenin's book, it took horrendous IL-2 losses before VVS Shturmovik units developed effective ground-attack tactics. The book is replete with countless missions where poorly-trained IL-2 crews, usually without fighter escort, hurled themselves at Axis forces only to be slaughtered by flak and Luftwaffe aircrews."

From a review of the book "Il-2 Shturmovik Guards Units of World War 2" by Oleg Rastrenin.

You are also again making broad over simplified statements without any support. For example, your quote from your upcoming book "..so 2 TAF simply abandoned that most important target without mentioning their previous refusal to consider aircraft armour. It was back to 1917." I hope you realize there was no 2 TAF in 1917. I hope you realise that the Typhoon did have some armour, as did most RAF combat aircraft. Like everything else crammed into a warplane, armour must be traded off against other equipment and structure to keep the thing flyable. We can second guess the designer's decisions from our arm chairs today, but just "adding armour" to any aircraft is quite a bit more complicated than you may understand.

The questions you pose are very complex, and deserve more than the simple quotes you or I can throw at them here. I hope your upcoming book uses a wide range of sources.