Gordon wrote:
O

You know, the Fairey Swordfish made the Devastator look like superplane,
but at the attack on Taranto and against the Bismarck, they didn't
exactly suck.


They were never once sent in against an enemy fleet with an active
CAP. Different war. They WERE outmoded, by any stretch or WWII
standard. If they were sent in against the IJN carrier fleet under an
umbrella of Zeroes, they would have been, well, devastated.

Now that's a fascinating idea... Bismarck AA guns couldn't even shoot at
them accurately because the were designed to take on aircraft going far
faster that that and lead them.
Think how fast a Zero would have overrun a Devastator when it's actual
airspeed in comparison to the Zero was around 40 mph.

We lost the Devastators due to the Japanese having their Zeros up and
flying at low altitude.


Yes. Going in to attack without any cover in a 100-mph straight and
level torpedo plane was suicide, with predictable results. Would the
attack have gone differently with Stringbags?


Consider this...on that day, we lost virtually all the Devastators, each
carrying a two-man crew, since they left the the radio operators behind,
and took out three Japanese fleet carriers, and most of their aircrews.
For the number of total aircrew we lost, versus what we gained, that was
one of the most lopsided victories ever.
The Japanese could only dream of such an effect with gain versus
casualties in their Kamikaze attacks.
To get this home in a more direct sense, lets flip it over.
We go up against the Japanese with four carriers.
On day one, we lose Lexington, Saratoga, and Enterprise.
Next day, we get Kaga, but lose the Hornet.
I'd like to see them put a positive spin on that in the papers.
Even FDR couldn't make that look upbeat in a fireside chat. :-)

If they hadn't been busy attacking the Devastators, those Dauntlesses
coming in from above might have had a very tough time putting their
bombs down as accurately as they did.


Sheer unadulterated luck.

Extremely strange, loopy luck, that almost looked like divine intervention.
Two carrier groups of SBDs, lost up in the clouds, run into each other
by accident, just as the clouds part below them to reveal the Japanese
fleet, directly under them, with their CAP at low altitude, their AA
crews looking flat to the water, and their crews switching bombs for
torpedoes on their decks.
You couldn't have _asked_ for anything better than that.
I mean seriously...that was _downright_ weird.

And the plan didn't call for the TBDs to
all be sacrificed - it was a busted plan and an obsolete aircraft that
resulted in nearly 100% losses of the attacking force. The SBDs were
not, at that point, even a part of the same attack, so giving them
credit for 'keeping the Zeroes busy', makes it seem like that task was
part of their job.

That wasn't the intention, but that's exactly how it worked out.
I sure hope they do a movie of that someday... with Ensign Gay hiding
under his seat cushion in the water, as he gets to see one-half of the
entire carrier fleet that attacked Pearl Harbor get turned into
fireballs inside of fifteen minutes as they head toward the horizon.
That wouldn't suck at all.
Not at all. :-)

Pat