The Ace of Aces

Would have been nice if it was in english.
I personally think that Hans-Joachim Marseille is a greater ace.
 
Pampa14 post are always in another language. I asked this of him some time back.

The Germans had so many aces due to the fact you almost had to be one to survive since they spent so much time in the air. Erich Hartman did have > 300 kills. I believe the greatest # for any German pilot.

As with aces I think it gets subjective. Like between the tank aces Michael Wittman and Otto Carius. Carius had more enemy kills, but Wittman is usually given more credit?
 
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In the early days of the German campaign in Russia, the German Air Force was up against Soviet pilots who were inferior in training and skill and who were flying aircraft that for the most part, technically inferior to German planes. This was true of the Western Allies too, but to a lesser extent. It astounding to consider that the Luftwaffe didn't even officially exist until 1936 and was engaged in full - scale air warfare three years later! Pilots like Hartmann learned to fly in gliders that gave them excellent stick - and -rudder skills. German pilots flew for the entire war, from day one to the end, unless killed or wounded. The stress must have been staggering. IMHO, the Luftwaffe was the greatest tactical air force of all time. That was both it's strength and weakness.
 
In the early days of the German campaign in Russia, the German Air Force was up against Soviet pilots who were inferior in training and skill and who were flying aircraft that for the most part, technically inferior to German planes. This was true of the Western Allies too, but to a lesser extent. It astounding to consider that the Luftwaffe didn't even officially exist until 1936 and was engaged in full - scale air warfare three years later! Pilots like Hartmann learned to fly in gliders that gave them excellent stick - and -rudder skills. German pilots flew for the entire war, from day one to the end, unless killed or wounded. The stress must have been staggering. IMHO, the Luftwaffe was the greatest tactical air force of all time. That was both it's strength and weakness.

I agree with this post, but don't forget the thousands of allied bombers shot down as well. Until the P-51 was introduced these guys made mincemeat of our poor guys.
 
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Would have been nice if it was in english.
I personally think that Hans-Joachim Marseille is a greater ace.

If you use Firefox just use the translation option, the page always shows up in English for me.
Occasionally I get a popup at the top of the screen asking if I want to translate from Portuguese to English.

In the early days of the German campaign in Russia, the German Air Force was up against Soviet pilots who were inferior in training and skill and who were flying aircraft that for the most part, technically inferior to German planes. This was true of the Western Allies too, but to a lesser extent. It astounding to consider that the Luftwaffe didn't even officially exist until 1936 and was engaged in full - scale air warfare three years later! Pilots like Hartmann learned to fly in gliders that gave them excellent stick - and -rudder skills. German pilots flew for the entire war, from day one to the end, unless killed or wounded. The stress must have been staggering. IMHO, the Luftwaffe was the greatest tactical air force of all time. That was both it's strength and weakness.

You can not really hold German kills of the early war period against Hartmann's career though as he never reached the front lines until late 1942 by then the Soviet air force was much better.

Just for fun here is the aircraft he flew after the war, it is now at the Luftwaffen Museum in Berlin ...
LM221001310011_zps8bb98421.jpg
 
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If you use Firefox just use the translation option, the page always shows up in English for me.
Occasionally I get a popup at the top of the screen asking if I want to translate from Portuguese to English.



You can not really hold German kills of the early war period against Hartmann's career though as he never reached the front lines until late 1942 by then the Soviet air force was much better.

Just for fun here is the aircraft he flew after the war, it is now at the Luftwaffen Museum in Berlin ...
LM221001310011_zps8bb98421.jpg

It does make for a nice read in English
 
I believe that most of the air-to-air fighting on the Eastern Front was at low altitude. In fact, i don't think that most Soviet aircraft had oxygen equipment until they stating receiving Lend-Lease. That would mean that there was much less room for error in a dogfight, before you hit the ground. A pilot with only a slight edge in skill would prevail under those circumstances.
 
As with aces I think it gets subjective. Like between the tank aces Michael Wittman and Otto Carius. Carius had more enemy kills, but Wittman is usually given more credit?

Not one person ever mentions Kurt Knispel number one tank ace of WW2 and probably all time yet every post on tank aces first in line is Hauptsturmführer Wittmann which is kind of sad as of the two men Knispel is the one that should be held in greater esteem.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Knispel
 
Had the Germans went in full production in 1943 on the 262 it might have made a difference in the air war .
 
Not one person ever mentions Kurt Knispel number one tank ace of WW2 and probably all time yet every post on tank aces first in line is Hauptsturmführer Wittmann which is kind of sad as of the two men Knispel is the one that should be held in greater esteem.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Knispel

I argee Monty. I was just using Carius as an example of someone who had considerably more kills than Wittman. In fact I just saw some show on WW2 that stated Wittman was the greatest tank ace of all time. I don't understand it myself?
 
I argee Monty. I was just using Carius as an example of someone who had considerably more kills than Wittman. In fact I just saw some show on WW2 that stated Wittman was the greatest tank ace of all time. I don't understand it myself?
It's called P.R.! The U.S. 5th Air Force did some amazing things, but all anyone hears about is the 8th & to a lesser extent the 20th A.F.s.
 
Had the Germans went in full production in 1943 on the 262 it might have made a difference in the air war .

The only advantage I can see to putting the Me-262 into the air sooner is that it would have given it operation development time outside of that had the 262 taken to the skies in 1943 the British Meteor would not have been far behind as a response.

I do not believe Germany was as far ahead in the jet race as people want to believe.
 
The 262 the meteor who knows , the Germans tied themselves down with the 109 a capable plane , one big problem with Germany is they never developed a strategic bomber .
 
But would a strategic bomber have had any effect on the outcome?

I am not convinced it would have had an impact on the war in the west but maybe in the east?

Richard Overy's conclusion at the end of his book The Bombing War: Europe 1939-1945 was that “strategic bombing proved in the end to be inadequate in its own terms for carrying out its principle assignments and was morally compromised by deliberate escalation against civilian populations.” Nor has it left any real legacy. It was rapidly rendered redundant by the overwhelming but (since 1945 at least) unusable destructive power of nuclear weapons. More recently, bombing has come full circle. Precision-guided munitions now allow Western air forces to hit military targets while leaving even nearby civilians often largely unscathed—the precise opposite of what prevailed during the second world war.
 
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Well considering the Hugh Tankograd complex was just east of the Urals in Chelyabinsk. The Germans were in a position when holding the Don base to bomb such facilities if they had long range strategic bombers. I don't see any Allied targets that would require such bombers as they could and did already hit England during the Blitz.
 
The only advantage I can see to putting the Me-262 into the air sooner is that it would have given it operation development time outside of that had the 262 taken to the skies in 1943 the British Meteor would not have been far behind as a response.

I do not believe Germany was as far ahead in the jet race as people want to believe.

If the Air Ministry had listened to and backed Frank Whittle the Gloster E.28/39 could have been developed further and fought the Battle of Britain.
 
Meteor

If the Air Ministry had listened to and backed Frank Whittle the Gloster E.28/39 could have been developed further and fought the Battle of Britain.

The concept had been kicking around since the 30's. Sounds like the air ministry dragged their heals on this one. I don't believe it was quite as advanced as the ME-262, sweep wing, speed. However we will never really know since they never came into combat. Sounds like the meteor had better electronics. But had it come out in 1940 it would have blown the socks off the Luffwaff.

Another high tech WW2 weapon that saw it's greatest potential after the war.
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