How critical was Richthofen to CAS doctrine development?

  • Thread starter Deleted member 1487
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The Luftwaffe as an organization was pretty well committed to a interdiction and ground support role so I doubt Richtoffens absence would have that much of an impact. In this kind of thing, the systems at work matter more then any single individual. It's the same story in regards to strategic bombing.

Interesting point about why there are no surviving HE 177.

Well, like the Manchester, the 117 was an utter boondoggle from beginning to end.
 
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Deleted member 1487

The Luftwaffe as an organization was pretty well committed to a interdiction and ground support role so I doubt Richtoffens absence would have that much of an impact. In this kind of thing, the systems at work matter more then any single individual. It's the same story in regards to strategic bombing.
It was committed to interdiction and bombing in support of army operations, but that's different than CAS; AFAIK they had no doctrine for that before Spain. Dive bombers were meant to be precision operational bombers, capable of hitting bridges, supply dumps, and factories without collateral damage.

Nevertheless, Wever recognised the importance of strategic bombing. In newly introduced doctrine, The Conduct of the Aerial Air War in 1935, Wever rejected the theory of Douhet[24] and outlined five key points to air strategy:
1. To destroy the enemy air force by bombing its bases and aircraft factories, and defeating enemy air forces attacking German targets.
2. To prevent the movement of large enemy ground forces to the decisive areas by destroying railways and roads, particularly bridges and tunnels, which are indispensable for the movement and supply of forces
3. To support the operations of the army formations, independent of railways, i.e, armoured forces and motorised forces, by impeding the enemy advance and participating directly in ground operations.
4. To support naval operations by attacking naval bases, protecting Germany's naval bases and participating directly in naval battles
5. To paralyse the enemy armed forces by stopping production in the armaments factories.[25]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luftwaffe#cite_note-27

By the late 1930s the Luftwaffe had no clear purpose. The air force was not subordinated to the army support role, and it was not given any particular strategic mission. German doctrine fell between the two concepts. The Luftwaffe was to be an organisation capable of carrying out broad and general support tasks rather than any specific mission. Mainly, this path was chosen to encourage a more flexible use of air power and offer the ground forces the right conditions for a decisive victory. In fact, on the outbreak of war, only 15% of the Luftwaffe's aircraft was devoted to ground support operations, exposing a long-held myth that the Luftwaffe was designed for only tactical and operational missions.[29]


We'll the difference between the Manchester and the He-177 is that the Manchester actually worked decently while the 117 was an utter boondoggle from beginning to end.
In the end it worked, but far too late to matter.
 
In the end it worked,

You forgot to add "horribly". Even the final, matured design was a pilots nightmare of engine defects, aerodynamic problems, and structural failures. Eric Brown, who test flew captured planes extensively after the war and interviewed its pilots and even Heinkel himself, ultimately called it a "dismal failure" and "deadlier to its crew then the enemy". His final conclusion on was that it was a 'loser'. Which everyone he talked to agreed upon.
 

Deleted member 1487

You forgot to add "horribly". Even the final, matured design was a pilots nightmare of engine defects, aerodynamic problems, and structural failures. Eric Brown, who test flew captured planes extensively after the war and interviewed its pilots and even Heinkel himself, ultimately called it a "dismal failure" and "deadlier to its crew then the enemy". His final conclusion on was that it was a 'loser'. Which everyone he talked to agreed upon.
I have only seen Brown say that, not that everyone agreed with him. I'm not sure which type he flew and whether the functional final varieties weren't all destroyed at war's end. From what I understand the working ones didn't have issues with aerodynamics or the engines provided the proper maintenance work and 'flying in' was done, which it was not for most of the ones used in the Baby Blitz. That was a function of the state of the war effort in 1944 rather than the design. Heinkel's statements were also in the context of the political situation and his own preference for the 4 engine version.

That said I agree that the He177B with four DB605 engines or even Jumo 211s would have been the better choice probably as good as the Lancaster if not better, but the final He177A5 wasn't a dub.
 
I have only seen Brown say that, nit that everyone agreed with him.

Brown drew his conclusion about the He177 not only by flying it himself, but also interviewing the men who flew, produced, and even designed the aircraft.

So on the the one hand we have the designer and manufacturer's owner, a number of the designers and manufacturing team, the men who flew the airplane during combat, and the world's premier test pilot recounting how the plane was a dismal failure. On the other hand we have you saying how nice the thing was if it worked as advertised.

I know which opinion any serious scholar would give more weight to.
 

Deleted member 1487

Brown drew his conclusion about the He177 not only by flying it himself, but also interviewing the men who flew, produced, and even designed the aircraft.

So on the the one hand we have the designer and manufacturer's owner, a number of the designers and manufacturing team, the men who flew the airplane during combat, and the world's premier test pilot recounting how the plane was a dismal failure. On the other hand we have you saying how nice the thing was if it worked as advertised.

I know which opinion I know which opinion any serious scholar would give more weight to.
Got a source on that besides the Wikipedia entry?
 

Deleted member 1487

Brown's book Wings of the Luftwaffe.
I'm looking through it and am not seeing what you're claiming. Brown did not like the aircraft and said it had a reputation for all the issues you mentioned, not that he necessarily noticed them. Heinkel was dismissive of the design, but it also mentions that he was not involved with the design or development of the project, just getting shit for it not working. The dive bombing issue was brought up repeatedly, but the A5 was not used for that, with the requirement for it being dropped in 1942 and resulting in the A5. It sounds like a lot of what you were claiming was not what the development people said, as he did not talk with them at all, in fact he flew the design without getting any briefing from anyone at all and had to figure it out himself. The model he flew was nabbed by the French resistance, so he was flying blind and only talked to Heinkel later, which as I mentioned, he had nothing to do with the design other than owning the firm that made it, lobbying to get the twin engines made into four, and getting a ton of shit by Goering and Hitler over it. The much more authoritative Griehl book on the He177 using all sorts of German testing and combat documents on it states that it was pretty well fine by 1944.

Now when I say fine I don't mean perfect, it was still an inferior layout to the He177B and would have been more stable and handled better with that four engine layout with twin rudder tail assembly. But the He177A5 was not a dud, just too little too late.
 
I'm looking through it and am not seeing what you're claiming. Brown did not like the aircraft and said it had a reputation for all the issues you mentioned, not that he necessarily noticed them. Heinkel was dismissive of the design, but it also mentions that he was not involved with the design or development of the project, just getting shit for it not working.[/
It sounds like a lot of what you were claiming was not what the development people said, as he did not talk with them at all, in fact he flew the design without getting any briefing from anyone at all and had to figure it out himself.


The model he flew was nabbed by the French resistance, so he was flying blind and only talked to Heinkel later, which as I mentioned, he had nothing to do with the design other than owning the firm that made it, lobbying to get the twin engines made into four, and getting a ton of shit by Goering and Hitler over it.

We must not be talking about the same book. The test flights were conducted after the war.

The much more authoritative Griehl book on the He177 using all sorts of German testing and combat documents on it states that it was pretty well fine by 1944.
 

Deleted member 1487

We must not be talking about the same book. The test flights were conducted after the war.
No, same book. The flights happened in 1944-45 mostly according to what I'm reading. Brown's first flight in it was in September 1944, p.142 if you want to check. Most flights happened until November 1944 and then continued infrequently until Feburary 1945 then it went to another airfield and later the US and Brown never heard of it again. He talked to Heinkel after the war and got his opinion then; most it was in response to Brown suggesting that his firm was better at medium bombers than heavies and Heinkel got upset and blamed Udet for requiring it to dive bomb.
 
Uh... WTF? Why (and when) did the forum put up my post as it looked roughly an hour back instead of the one I actually tried to put up just a few minutes ago?
 
of course Udet did not listen to the information he was given before flying it, so tried to make it do what it wasn't designed for...which caused it to break up.
Whether the aircraft survived or not, I doubt it would win, the inability to dive at more than 50° is going to be a major limiter in its role as a dive bomber.
 
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