WalterM140 wrote in message ...
Also P-38 numbers grew from 302 in December 1942 to 567 in
May 1943 then declined to 372 in October 1943 before rapidly
expanding to 1,063 in April 1944. The numbers are for the USAAF
deployed against Germany and include reserves etc.

Thanks for the minutia.

Not minutia in this case, but very germane, as the lack of P-38 numbers was a
factor.

Gee, that is -my- point.

And the reason they were not there is because Eaker and Hunter didn't stress
it.

Yes folks, Eaker and Hunter are the designated Black Hat wearers
of the moment, all evil comes from them.

The Pacific theatre really wanted more P-38s, they were by far the
biggest fans, the problems of mass producing the P-38 cannot be
ignored, plus the changes made in 1943 to make the type more
combat worthy helping to limit production. How about raging against
the decision to convert 500 P-38s to unarmed photo reconnaissance
types in 1942 and 1943, versus the 3,684 completed as fighters by
the end of 1943, including the prototype. There is your "few dozen"
extra P-38s. Note by the way the first 433 or so fighters were not
really combat worthy, that is everything before the P-38F, and the
reconnaissance versions were model F and G conversions so some
25% of the available F and G airframe ended up unarmed. Presumably
Arnold will now be considered a bad captain.

The USAAF wanted more P-38s in 1943, there was little the ETO
could do to speed up the process. It also realised the need for
high performance reconnaissance types. Only the defence of
England, of all the theatres of war, had enough allied fighters at the
start of 1943. So the P-47 went to Europe and even New Guinea.

Was it beyond normal human kin in 1942 to devine the fact that the self
defending bomber was not going to work, even with the heavy armament, high
altitudes, tight formations and toughness of the B-17's and their crews?

The straight answer was it was not beyond human predictions, the
RAF told the USAAF so, but like so many bad ideas the people of
the time need to do the work to prove it was a bad idea, and this
took the first half of 1943 for most and October 1943 for all. So we
now know it was a bad idea, and it is up to us to learn from it, not
take cheap shots at those who tried it.

Maybe so. I am not necessarily blaming Eaker and Hunter, just pointing out the
fact that a strong force of P-38's (provided that the technical problems were
addressed aggressively) could have been available a year before the pioneer
Mustang group arrived.

Simply put once again Walter is wishing for his preferred solution
and ignoring any problems with it.

It takes time to ramp up production, even more time when it is clear
modifications are needed to make the aircraft perform better. Things
like better engine cooling but more cockpit heating, more internal fuel,
better dive recovery, even better roll rate, problems with the engines
at high altitudes was a big limit.

It's also true that some of the B-17 group commanders didn't care much about
escorts in the early part of the campaign. All that rendesvouzing made things
more complicated, don't you know.

But as the Germans realized the threat and acted to meet that threat, the B-17
bomber boxes met their match and were overborne.

Production was very limited at the time.

Yes, I am providing a what-if. If the guys in England had been screaming for
P-38's the production could have been ramped up.

In 1943 the answer is probably not, things like the supply of engines,
two needed, meaning the equation became was 1 P-38 worth 2 P-40s?
Given the world wide shortage of fighters and the feedback about the
P-38 performance versus the Luftwaffe in Tunisia there is no definite
answer.

England was a secondary theatre in the first half of 1943, thanks to
Torch.

Then there's the extra training
time for multi-engine, which would add some additional delay to getting units
operational/providing replacement pilots.

That doesn't seem that big an issue to me.

Yes we know wish mode will be deployed once the preferred
solution has been decided on.


(snip)

The point is that Eaker and Hunter, 8th BC and 8th FC CGs respectively
could
have stressed long range escorts and pushed P-38 enhancements, stressed
solving the technical problems, and so forth in 1942. P-38's were available
in England in 1942.

Eaker and Hunter didn't do that.

While Eaker and Hunter were doctrinally blind to the need for far too long,

Thats all I am saying, my friend.

No Walter, you are also saying they could have had a direct influence on
the production of P-38s in 1943. You are assigning them the black hat
with the predetermined criminal conviction cluster.

the
need for a long-range fighter in the ETO in 1942 was hardly obvious given the
shallow penetrations we were making at the time.

It wasn't obvious perhaps. That's why kudos go to those who see beyond the
obvious.

Meantime Walter will shoot people for not spotting the not obvious.

Arnold ordered Giles to increase
the internal fuel of the fighters around June '43 IIRR (don't have the
reference,
"To Command The Sky" by McFarland and Newton, handy), giving him
six months to
achieve it. Besides the P-38 was only in the ETO for a couple of months
before they were all sent to the Med.

Yes, Eaker could have been screaming bloody murder -- "hey, don't take my long
range escorts!" But he didn't, for whatever reason. Yes, it might to pure
hindsight to blame him for this in 1942. Definitely. But Eaker persisted in
supporting the self-defending bomber after 17 August, '43 and even after 14
Oct. '43.

In 1942 the P-38 was not a long range escort, the external fuel was
for ferry operations, large tanks with plenty of drag and no ability to
draw fuel from them above around 20,000 feet.

By the way if Eaker was still an unescorted heavy bomber fan you can
show all those sorts of missions run by the15th Air Force in 1944 when
he commanded it, correct?

Geoffrey Sinclair
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