British Sturmovik?
- Thread starter plenka
- Start date
Sycamore
Banned
Perhaps the British could have sold them on to the Soviets via Lend-Lease? Or to the Poles (who ordered 100 IOTL, but too late for them to arrive before the fall of Poland became inevitable)?
Sior
Banned
1933 proposal by Fairey for a twin engined Battle
someone built a model similar.
http://airfixtributeforum.myfastfor...kel51_s_Twin_Eng_Fairy_Battle_about35208.html
Last edited:
The Vickers 40mm S gun was more powerful, and a lot heavier, about 100 pounds heavier than the M4.
The 37mm M9 was more powerful than either(3000fps), but even heavier(405 lbs vs 320) but still lighter than the 37mm used on the Stukas(650 lbs).
The German Cannon was only slightly more powerful, but carried fewer rounds
2) Actually, if you believe the defector Suvorov, the job was for penals. Do 10 missions, and you were pardoned. So after the 9th mission, if you were still alive, you were transferred to a mine clearing battalion.
This is usually my go-to example of how Mr.Rezun is basically a crazy conspiracy theorist and not a historian, funny that it's been brought up outside such a context.
1)
That cannon was so big the P-39 had to be built around it. Everybody who used it hated it, except the Soviets, who wanted every one they could get their hands on. AIUI, the recoil from that monster gun had a helluva kickback on the aircraft in flight.
What about the fact that the Germans had a huge force available to them ijn 1940? Wouldn't those Battles, armored or not, be slaughtered?
The Airacobra's cannon also wasn't particularly effective. Jammed a lot and the muzzle velocity was IIRC pretty low. It also isn't a whole lot of use if you want to knock out tanks with it. I recall an anecdotal story in a book on the Red Air Force where a flight of -39s was called to strafe a column of Panzers and the pilots reported that their guns wouldn't even pierce the top armor.
They did okay in Soviet air combat missions (about as good as Yak-1s and LL Spitfires), though. I don't really understand why the Americans disliked them so much.
Delta Force
Banned
The Soviets were the largest user of the P-39 Airacobra and the P-63 Kingcobra. The P-63 was put into production for Lend-Lease customers only, and the Soviets had extensive input on its development. If the M4 was too troublesome, they could have requested its removal and substitution with something else. Also, the Soviets mostly used the M4 equipped fighters for air to air combat, not ground attack.
Some P-63s had the M10 37mm cannon, with some improvements, more ammo, faster fire rate
This is a bit PoDish, but hey, what else is the point of alternate history-
The RAF basically got taken over by strategic bombing zealots, partly out of a desire to protect the budget by concentrating on a job only the air could do, mostly out of conviction that it could be done (and who cares about all that inconvenient evidence, anyway...)
Throw away the Smuts report, and you have an army air force, the Royal Flying Corps, who are almost entirely tactically oriented, apart from the odd deep- interdiction optimist, and very much geared to obtain and exploit air superiority over the battlefield.
Almost all the RFC scouts could and often did carry light bombs, oddly the Camel often got the trench strafing job, and there was an armoured strafing aircraft- Sopwith Salamander- in initial production at the time of the Armistice.
Out of that, well, we wouldn't be using sturmovik as the definitive handle for the type, we'd be speaking of the Il-2 as an updated salamander. Very high losses would have been quite acceptable, as the RFC tended to balance the human cost in the air against the human cost on the ground.
The RAF basically got taken over by strategic bombing zealots, partly out of a desire to protect the budget by concentrating on a job only the air could do, mostly out of conviction that it could be done (and who cares about all that inconvenient evidence, anyway...)
Throw away the Smuts report, and you have an army air force, the Royal Flying Corps, who are almost entirely tactically oriented, apart from the odd deep- interdiction optimist, and very much geared to obtain and exploit air superiority over the battlefield.
Almost all the RFC scouts could and often did carry light bombs, oddly the Camel often got the trench strafing job, and there was an armoured strafing aircraft- Sopwith Salamander- in initial production at the time of the Armistice.
Out of that, well, we wouldn't be using sturmovik as the definitive handle for the type, we'd be speaking of the Il-2 as an updated salamander. Very high losses would have been quite acceptable, as the RFC tended to balance the human cost in the air against the human cost on the ground.
They didn't ask because the gun didn't have enough velocity to make AP effective. HE rounds could penetrate aircraft aluminum, and blew up real good.
Americans didn't care for the 'Cobra because the early ones were slow at altitude. Soviets got faster ones, took out the little guns, and ignored the manual about boost pressure.
usertron2020
Donor
Didn't the L-L North Africa P-40s have AT cannon loaded with AP?
I did say "if you believe". Though I don't see that the idea of using penals for tail gunners is so completely out there for Stalin's Russia.
I remember an anecdotal story from an old Red Air Force fighter pilot who said the reasons that the Soviets loved the P-39 were two-fold:
Its combat performance at low altitudes
Any aircraft you got in front of that gun would be blown out of the skies.
Because the Americans wanted high altitude fliers for strategic bombing escort, pouncing on low ceiling flying Zeroes (the Aussies and Kiwis hated the P-39 too AIUI), running up kill numbers (which isn't so easy with a P-39), and because the P-39 is an on the deck fighter.
Fighting that low often gives the initiative to the enemy (as it did to the Japanese over New Guinea).
Plus, American fighter pilots seemed to think that their only mission was to shoot down enemy fighters, not shoot down enemy bombers, not protect their own bombers, not do (dangerous) ground support missions where even the greatest of air aces can fall prey to an enemy AA gun with a well-trained crew and good commander.
Reason #40987 why American bomber pilots hated their fighter pilot counterparts, and Reason #1 why the All Black 332nd Fighter Group never had to buy a drink during their deployment in Europe in WWII. Every American bomber squadron in Italy knew full well that the 332nd took their mission of bomber escort more seriously than any of their White counterparts. The 332nd had the lowest kill rate of enemy fighters in Europe for their experience. They also never lost a bomber to enemy action.
Probably because the Soviets always believed that the best anti-tank weapon was another tank. By the time that P-39s were arriving in large scale numbers, the defensive needs for Soviet AT guns had become less of a critical need than it had been in 1941-42.
So if you are a Soviet Air Force Marshal trying to decide what is the best way to employ the P-39 as an offensive weapon, AP = Wasted Ammunition, while HE = Excellent anti-personnel/soft target weaponry. Kill the soldiers and AT guns while the armor kills the enemy armor.
Just MVHO.
Hurricane had an S gun under each wing
This example has the Littlejohn squeezebore adapter. This was AP only. Without it, HE or AP
The Soviet NS-37 cannon had both HE and AP rounds for in LaGG-3 and Yak-9T fighters
Last edited:
Delta Force
Banned
The M80 AP shell was supposed to be capable of penetrating an inch of armor at 500 yards. The armor of a Panther or Tiger was about that thick on the top, but the M80 might be able to punch through if enough shells hit the same general area.
It would definitely be capable of taking out an armored aircraft such as the Henschel Hs 129 though.
How well did that work on an aircraft? Also, that's not really something that could be widely used, since the squeezebore rounds used strategic tungsten.
Reason #40987 why American bomber pilots hated their fighter pilot counterparts, and Reason #1 why the All Black 332nd Fighter Group never had to buy a drink during their deployment in Europe in WWII. Every American bomber squadron in Italy knew full well that the 332nd took their mission of bomber escort more seriously than any of their White counterparts. The 332nd had the lowest kill rate of enemy fighters in Europe for their experience. They also never lost a bomber to enemy action.
Myth, from a newspaper article. They lost 27, a little over half the average.
That's an inch at 90 degrees, which is pretty much impossible to do unless you're a dive bomer, and getting enough shells at the general area is difficult at best when you're firing 160 rounds per minute.