But the P-47 was a real brawler. It was much bigger and heavier than most fighter planes of the era but it was still very fast. Those who flew it long enough to learn tactics which took advantage of its strengths became very effective.
When I was in Jr. High school, my best friends’ father had been a WW2 fighter pilot. Both theaters, multiple kills. Flew just about everything I ask him what the best plane was, he said the P-47, no question. Why ? He said it gave you the best chance of coming back alive, for two reasons. It had the best armor, a heavy steel plate behind the seat that stopped bullets, and because of its weight, it could out dive anything, a sure fire escape tactic if you got in trouble.
P-51 was later as was Corsair. They were absolutely better planes.
Better German comparison would be Fw 190. An excellent machine.
The Japanese never really fielded any other fighters in enough numbers to be competitive.
It’s interesting to note that the Supermarine Spitfire was competitive all through the war.
Galland didn't like the 190. Said while it had speed, it was crude in comparison to the 109 and not as maneuverable. Big radial engine upfront hurt aerodynamics and visibility. His words
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The Me-109 and the Spitfires in service at the end of the war were so different from the ones that started the war that they we’re essentially different airplanes. A little less so with the 109 but it was still pretty drastic. They both started out the war with single blade wooden propellers and engines of less than 1000 hp. By the end of the war some Spitfire versions had 2,000 hp and were over 100 mph faster than the prototypes. They were both designs that flew around 1936 and by 1945 were still, in the hands of a good pilot capable of going toe to toe with anything any other country could get into the air in significant numbers.
The Japs had lots of good designs capable of pretty good performance but they lacked the industrial capacity and the raw materials to produce as many as they needed and those that they did often had issues caused not by design but by shoddy production. Plus, the Japanese method of training pilots was so insanely difficult, that once their supply of pilots trained before the war ran out, they had no hope of replacing them with anything approaching the same quality and by the end of the war we’re throwing kids out there who could barely get off the ground. You likely could have thrown those Japanese kids in new Mustangs and Corsairs and the Americans in Japanese planes and the results would have been largely the same.
Pilot ability (natural and trained) makes a big difference. After a Zero was recovered in Alaska and repaired, Yeager and another experienced pilot had a contest - I don't remember what the American plane was.
Then they swapped planes.
Guess who won both times....
At least one Japanese general credited this captured plane with making a big difference in the Pacific, once it was studied and its characteristics analyzed up close and personal. Of course, that could just be a loser's alibi.
My personal favorite is the F4U. That twin radial engine made it the king of the prop planes.
I talked with a B24 waistgunner years ago. He said the ME262 was the most fearsome thing to ever fly in the war. He said all the bomber crews were scared [bleep] when they saw them. They were so much faster than anything else in that era that they were extremely hard to shoot down. Good thing they were such a late entry in the war and few were ever fielded.
The Japanese lost a lot of veteran pilots at the Battle of Midway. They never recovered. Our production and training capability totally out classed them.
Yep, and once the Allied pilots learned not to play up to the Zero’s strengths (maneuverability and climb) but to exploit its weaknesses (diving speed and the fact it’s controls became much heavier at higher speeds) the vaunted superiority evaporated.
Also when they got the Zero out of the Aleutian Islands and found the weakness of the carbs they could exploit it by changing their tactics.
Well, the ME-109 had a V-12 with direct fuel-injection, supercharged, 4 valves-per-cylinder - features that are valued right now in a car 75 years later.
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My favorite American plane is the Corsair, with an honorable mention going to the P-40, a plane that enabled us to take the fight to the Axis early in the war when we didn't have much else to fight with. Though outclasses, it did a good job in the hands of a good pilot.
My favorite British plane, and all around favorite is the Spitfire. Just the name alone should be enough, but the performance throughout the war was very well documented. Honorable mention goes to the Hurricane, because it was the plane that did the majority of the fighting in the 1939-41 time period, before there were sufficient numbers of Spitfires to become a factor. Though outclassed by the ME-109, it managed to hold it's own and buy time for England.
From a perspective of a plane built for nothing but being good in a dogfight, the ME-109 might have been the best of all. It was in the early years anyway, even managing to pretty well hold it's own against the Spitfire, until the later years. There is little doubt in my mind that IF the ME-262 had been brought into service earlier, and in enough numbers, it could have been a game changer. I don't believe it would have ultimately affected the outcome of the war, but it would have certainly prolonged it.
I'll take the P-47! Get one round through the cooler of a P-51 and you had two options; within 5 minutes get it on the ground or bail out! The P-47 would come home with cylinders shot off! Only reason P-51 was lauded because it had fuel capacity to make Berlin and back! Later in war...so did the P-47!
The Hellcat looked sort of fat and ugly (like a certain former first lady) and the Corsair looked neat. But corsairs were hard to land on carriers so they were mostly used from islands by the Marines.
My namesake flew P47s for the 56th Fighter Group. He was killed on August 17, 1943, when 60 B17s were also lost, after taking out two ME110s. P47s shot down more Germans than P51s.
The motto of the 56th FG was "Cave Tonitrum," beware the Thunderbolt.
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I'll take the P-47! Get one round through the cooler of a P-51 and you had two options; within 5 minutes get it on the ground or bail out! The P-47 would come home with cylinders shot off! Only reason P-51 was lauded because it had fuel capacity to make Berlin and back! Later in war...so did the P-47!
And had the USAF kept the P-47 instead of the P-51 we would have lost a whole lot less airman doing ground attack in Korea.
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Looking at the pluses and minuses of the various planes and ignoring subjective favorites (I like the Hellcat and Jug), it looks like the ME-262 was "the Best Fighter".
I''m no expert in dogfighting but from what I've read, given sufficiently skilled pilots and the firepower to get the job done, speed is the winner above pretty much all else. You can dart in and take your shot then outrun your opponent, get set up and dart in for another pass. As the war developed the major advance in aircraft was more speed, that plus range. The final marks of the Spitfire had such a huge engine and propeller in the quest for speed that it became hard to fly.
Turning dogfights end up low and slow which is where maneuverability and tactics really come into play. Different roll rates right or left due to engine torque can be taken advantage of either on the attack or to get someone off of your tail, or like a P-47 out dive your opponent to get out of danger - speed once again - although that wouldn't work as well at 1000 feet as it would at 15,000. Rate of climb can get you back above your opponent to make a diving pass at them, again a form of outracing the enemy.
Again, not an expert so those of you that have actually trained in these things, does this sound about right or not?
Obviously the best tactic is to spot the enemy before they spot you, you can get set up and shoot them down before they even know you're there. From what I understand Charles Yeager had phenomenal eyesight, IIRC he could spot enemy planes miles and miles away.
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