Most Badass Plane of WW2

For me it's got to be the Stuka. The siren struck untold fear in the hearts and minds of its targets, civilians and military alike. The Stuka reached its high point at the Battle of Kursk. The ones fitted with anti tank cannons (See below) were just the sickest Luftwaffe planes ever.

Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-655-5976-04%2C_Russland%2C_Sturzkampfbomber_Junkers_Ju_87_G.jpg


This video captures the Stuka at its best angles. It's a real shame it had to be a German plane.
 
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I'm about to second this one. The signature aircraft of the Blitzkrieg.
However, for the early years the Zero is rather elegant as well.

Later, well the B-29.
 
For sheer badassery? Probably the B-17 or Sunderland for the sheer amount of punishment it could take without falling out of the air. On one occasion a Sunderland got the undivided attention of eight Ju 88Cs - six attackers got shot down and it got its' crew home.
 

trurle

Banned
If Short Sunderland, why not Japanese "Kawanishi H8K"? Less fame, more performance.

But i personally vote for "de Havilland Mosquito"
Does launching a special operations personnel from the bomb bay qualify for badassery status? :D Or should i add stopping the the public speech of Herman Goring in the mid-word? Or the fame of the safest RAF bomber? Or the distinction of being the most versatile aircraft of war?
 
For single-seat fighters that could take punishment (a lot of it) and bring the pilot home? The P-47 stands out. There's plenty of accounts of Jugs being shot up by enemy fighters, flak, or exploding ground targets, and coming back with battle damage that would've downed any other fighter. True, those Jugs never flew again, but still, they got the pilot home.

For carrier fighters, the Zero was the bogeyman in the Pacific for two years, but then the F4U and F6F came in and did the job. The F6F produced 305 USN aces.....while the Corsair was just as deadly, having the lowest loss to enemy fighters in the Pacific (only 189 lost in air-to-air combat).

Strike aircraft: three stand out. The B-25 in gunship mode in SWPA is one: eight .50s in the nose, plus locking the top turret forward, and low-level bombing tactics made the Mitchell a formidable strike platform. Especially in the anti-shipping mission. (see the Battle of the Bismarck Sea) Two USN aircraft also stand out: the SBD Dauntless sank more Japanese ships than any other aircraft, including five carriers in 1942. Then the TBF/M Avenger, either as a torpedo plane or a bomber (Twelve VT-10 TBFs at Truk Lagoon in Feb '44 on a night strike with skip bombing sank eight ships for only one loss for an example of the latter).

Don't forget the D3A Val: the JNAF's counterpart to the Stuka. Val crews sank more Allied ships in the Pacific than any other Japanese aircraft.
 
P-38 is a contender :cool:, besides being the mount of some of the USAAF highest scoring Aces, it was the instrument of the demise of Adm. Yamamoto. In one fell swoop denying the IJN of it's greatest leader.
 
If Short Sunderland, why not Japanese "Kawanishi H8K"? Less fame, more performance.

But i personally vote for "de Havilland Mosquito"
Does launching a special operations personnel from the bomb bay qualify for badassery status? :D Or should i add stopping the the public speech of Herman Goring in the mid-word? Or the fame of the safest RAF bomber? Or the distinction of being the most versatile aircraft of war?

Automatic 57mm gun is fairly badass too.;)
 
If Short Sunderland, why not Japanese "Kawanishi H8K"? Less fame, more performance.
Less survivability, only 4 survived the war. Also, they had much more powerful engines, which is where the performance comes from.

For me, the most badass of all really has to be the Mossie.
 
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Artaxerxes

Banned
IL2 Sturmovik, but probably because I played the game to death when a lad.


Also reading some of the other responses... yeah I'll go for the Mosquito, a plane made out of wood by Piano makers that was hellishly competent and versatile.
 

trurle

Banned
Less survivability, only 4 survived the war. Also, they had much more powerful engines, which is where the performance comes from.

For me, the most badass of all really has to be the Mossie.

It is difficult to compare the survivability of the planes on the winning and losing side. Also, if only survivability matters, do not forget Ilyushin Il-2. I doubt any other WWII aircraft can handle over 600 hits (according to Wikipedia) and still return home.

But i am happy we agree on De Havilland Mosquito (Mossie).;)
 
It is difficult to compare the survivability of the planes on the winning and losing side.
It depends what odds they faced. As noted one Sunderland faced off against eight Ju 88C 'heavy fighters', shot down six, and still managed to limp home. Could a H8K have gone up against 8 A-20s and achieved the same result?
 

Redbeard

Banned
When saying "Badass" it to me indicates something about perception and not necessarily capacity.

In this context I'm not in doubt that the "Price" must go to Ju87 StuKa. No other plane made as big an impression and it to a large degree has become THE symbol of WWII, even the sound of it has its own iconic status. Like if somebody in a few second has to illustrate WWII you will most likely see a clip of StuKas going into a dive and hear the sounds of their sirens.

This is IMHO not changed by the StuKa's weaknesses showing up soon, any plane or piece of equipment will reveal weaknesses as development goes on. But the StuKa before that achieved to be seen as the main contributor to Germany's stunning victories from 1939-41.

You will of course not need much knowledge to know that it was more complicated than that, but if you asked a Polish refugee, a French Poilou or a British sailor they would be very likely to elevate the StuKa into something very "Badass".

Second place would IMHO go to the Spitfire, which also had an iconic status, but so much in a "sacred" way that "badass" appear to be a little misplaced.
 
Nah, I'd rate the Mossie above the Spit. See, the Spit's a damn good fighter, but limited in what it can do, whereas a Mossie isn't, or not nearly so much, it can be a bomber, a heavy fighter, a night-fighter, a pathfinder, an attack aircraft, a PR aircraft, a torpedo bomber, etc.
 
Decent aircraft, but a little light on actual bomb capacity (normal max load of 8,000 lb, compared with 14,000 for the Lanc, ~12,000 for the Condor and 11,000 for the Pe-8).
 
Perhaps, but you could almost literally fly them into the ground. All you hand to was pound out the dents and they came back begging for more. The amount of abuse they took was pretty astonishing.
 

Redbeard

Banned
Nah, I'd rate the Mossie above the Spit. See, the Spit's a damn good fighter, but limited in what it can do, whereas a Mossie isn't, or not nearly so much, it can be a bomber, a heavy fighter, a night-fighter, a pathfinder, an attack aircraft, a PR aircraft, a torpedo bomber, etc.

You talk about specifications/capacity, I talk about perception (how much was it seen by contemporaries as "Badass").

The "Mossie" indeed was an impressive plane that even didn't use its full potential, but in perception compared to icons like the StuKa or the Spitfire it was just a shadow.

The B17 probably came closer on the perception rank - the name alone "Flying Fortress" was ingenious and compared to the British nightbombers you at least could see it on the sky (or at least its vapor trail).
 

Insider

Banned
Decent aircraft, but a little light on actual bomb capacity (normal max load of 8,000 lb, compared with 14,000 for the Lanc, ~12,000 for the Condor and 11,000 for the Pe-8).

11k of Pe-8 was heavy load with reduced range. Lancaster should be compared with B29 rather than with B17 as it was much later construction. By Condor you mean Fw200?
 
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