WW II aircraft.

[onejayhawk]

This was going on in an almost completely unrelated thread. It seems a good time to start a new one.

Even the Wildcat was better than the Zero. The American problems early in the war had more to do with training and experience than with hardware. Once the USN developed a decent doctrine, and the cream of the Japanese fighter corps had died in combat, even numbers of F4F's and Zeroes was a mismatch--against the Japanese. Between Coral Sea and Midway the Japanese lost their entire edge in pilot experince, never to be recovered.

J

I would certainly say the Zero was technically superior to the Wildcat. First of all, in the Zeros greatest strength, its combat range, it completely outpaces the F4F. while the Zero could travel 2,000 miles, the F4F could only go 770. This was critical in the pacific theatre. During early operations, the Japanese were genuinely confused at why fighters disapeared over the East Indies once they were captured. They didn't realize that American fighters couldn't fly cover over the East Indies flying from Australia. Zeros had no trouble doing the inverse.
Now lets compare the two, even when based on the Zeros traditional weak points: Firepower, Maximum Speed, and rate of climb.
The Zeros rate of climb was 3,100 ft/min, compared to 1,950 ft/min for the F4F, The Zero is slightly faster being able to reach 331 MPH versus 320 for the F4F. Even in firepower, they Zero can match the F4F, if not best it.
I think its fair to say that when it entered service, the Zero was the best carrier based fighter in the world, if not the best fighter in the world.

I grant the combat range was very important, and should be considered.

That being said, the point of a fighter plane is to kill other aircraft, and not be killed by them. It is useless to say that the Zero was faster, had better climb, etc. When push came to shove, squadron level engagements, several planes tore the Zero up, The Flying Tigers and F4F carrier planes are the relevant ones to this discussion.

Up front, I will acknowledge that 1 on 1, an F4F is dog meat. The Zero will get behind and stay there til the Wildcat is toast. The USN quickly figured this out, and trained crews to fly wing on wing, still the current doctrine.
One plane can tail one plane. Two planes find it much harder to tail two cooperating planes. This negated a lot of the Zero's maneuverability advantage, and brought the F4F's firepower advantage to bear. In any dogfight of passing shots and angled attacks, the F4F has all the face cards, and soon, most of the Aces.

Though one Wildcat was no match for one Zero, two Wildcats, in good formation, were an evern fight for three, or even four, Zeros. See also the Marines, flying Corsairs, using the same doctrine.

It should mentioned, again, that early in the war, the Japanese had a huge experience advantage. They squandered it by not rotating veterans out of combat for rearm and retrain, or whatever you apply to the letters R&R. Within a couple of years of fighting, almost all the Pearl Harbor veterans were unavailable to train newbees.

J

 

[Evie]

But does the fact that certain tactics allowed the Wildcat to make up for its shortcomings (some of them, anyway. No tactics made up for the Wildcat's lack of range) really make it a better plane?

In other words, at what point do credits stop going to the plane for its performances and capacity, and start going to the pilots and navy for coming up with ways to make up for shortcoming or better exploit advantages?

 

[Adler17]

A plane's abilities are decisive if a plane is better than another, if in fight of two equal opponents. Thus the Zero was much better than the F4F. If you have a successful tactic how to use the F4F you plane might become more successful than the other. But that does not mean it is better. In the Korea War it is considered the MiG 15 was better than the F86 Sabre. But as the better pilots were flying the F86 this plane became much more successful. But that does not make the F86 a generally better plane than the MiG 15.

Adler

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

But what good is the best plane in the history of flight to your air force, if the enemy's pilots are much better, and they can build more of them? The Zero may have been a better plane but realistically the technology was close enough that other factors ended up being far more important.

 

[budweiser]

Many factors contribute to victory including tactics and pilot quality. But an advantage in one performance area can be nulified by a short coming in another area. If you can trun better than your opponent (Zero), but he can climb and dive better (F4F), then their is parity and other factors will decide the outcome such as pilot training and individual aggresiveness.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

The Americans put a lot of effort into finding tactics that would play to their strengths. The Japanese did not as much, which is why once they ran out of trained pilots they had a real problem.

 

[budweiser]

Now that you mention it, F-86 vs Mig-15 has a lot of similarities to F4F vs Zero. Except that the F-86 entered service just a bit later than the Mig-15 and the Zero/F4F were relative contemporaries. I wouldn'd discount those Russian pilots flying their Migs as they were probably the same pilots that flew in WWII and were thus very experienced.

 

[Adler17]

Well, I talked about mostly Chinese pilots...

Adler

 

[onejayhawk]

But does the fact that certain tactics allowed the Wildcat to make up for its shortcomings (some of them, anyway. No tactics made up for the Wildcat's lack of range) really make it a better plane?

In other words, at what point do credits stop going to the plane for its performances and capacity, and start going to the pilots and navy for coming up with ways to make up for shortcoming or better exploit advantages?

A plane's abilities are decisive if a plane is better than another, if in fight of two equal opponents. Thus the Zero was much better than the F4F. If you have a successful tactic how to use the F4F you plane might become more successful than the other. But that does not mean it is better. In the Korea War it is considered the MiG 15 was better than the F86 Sabre. But as the better pilots were flying the F86 this plane became much more successful. But that does not make the F86 a generally better plane than the MiG 15.

Adler

I must disagree. Everything has a context, and a purpose. The Zero was an all purpose fighter. It served as a pursuit plane, an air control plane, obviously a carrier plane, even a dispatch/recon plane on occasion. This IMO is its greatest strength--versatility. If you take that tack, I might agree with you. The F4F had trouble flying cover over SBDs and TBFs, which really is in its job description.

However, in the area they would go head to head, island and carrier combat, the F4F was its match, and better. Adler says that the proof is "in the fight of two equal opponents." That takes some defining, but by that standard the F4F wins hands down. Typical combat situations would involve anything from a handful to dozens of planes. In equal numbers the F4F carved Zeros up. The only exception was one against one. This is not an unrealistic situation, by any means, but neither is it the norm.

The same can be said of soldiers in the Roman gladiator revolts. If allowed to fight one opponent, the gladiators were far superior. By the scale was one of squad and groups and masses, not individuals. Equal numbers of soldiers won out consistently.

J

 

[Evie]

Yes, but in term of pure fighting prowess, the gladiator would be superior - the better fighter.

However, in the end (and that has always been true), whenever you start involving larger numbers, organization and well-executed tactics will (barring immense technical superiority, major tactical advantage, or criminal incompetence in the command unit) end up triumphing over sheer prowess or skill.

Hence, one on one, the Zero and japanesse pilots (early war) tended to outclass their opponents, BUT the moment organization, coordination and tactics came into play, the advantage flipped back to the Americans fighters.

So to sum my view up, the Zero was the better PLANE (on pure capacity), but the Wildcat benefited from being used by the better AIR FORCE (well, naval air
service).

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Now that you mention it, F-86 vs Mig-15 has a lot of similarities to F4F vs Zero. Except that the F-86 entered service just a bit later than the Mig-15 and the Zero/F4F were relative contemporaries. I wouldn'd discount those Russian pilots flying their Migs as they were probably the same pilots that flew in WWII and were thus very experienced.

The F-86 flew an entire year before the MiG-15.

 

[shortguy]

Yes, but in term of pure fighting prowess, the gladiator would be superior - the better fighter.

Not quite. A more apt comparison would be one between the equipment of the gladiator and that of the legionary. Perhaps the gladiator is better outfitted for individual combat, but the legionary is given equipment appropriate for fighting in formation. Should we assume, then, by your argument, that the gladiator's equipment is better?

 

[e350tb]

Of course, the F4U was better then the Wildcat and the Zero put together!

 

[ParkCungHee]

I must disagree. Everything has a context, and a purpose. The Zero was an all purpose fighter. It served as a pursuit plane, an air control plane, obviously a carrier plane, even a dispatch/recon plane on occasion. This IMO is its greatest strength--versatility. If you take that tack, I might agree with you. The F4F had trouble flying cover over SBDs and TBFs, which really is in its job description.

However, in the area they would go head to head, island and carrier combat, the F4F was its match, and better. Adler says that the proof is "in the fight of two equal opponents." That takes some defining, but by that standard the F4F wins hands down. Typical combat situations would involve anything from a handful to dozens of planes. In equal numbers the F4F carved Zeros up. The only exception was one against one. This is not an unrealistic situation, by any means, but neither is it the norm.

The same can be said of soldiers in the Roman gladiator revolts. If allowed to fight one opponent, the gladiators were far superior. By the scale was one of squad and groups and masses, not individuals. Equal numbers of soldiers won out consistently.

J

Well again, I think by limiting it to combat you're overlooking the strategic advantages a Zero offered, as well as leaving out all other factors that could attribute for the F4F's victories.

The first mentioned was superior tactics. Also worth mentioning, and I believe this is what started this thread, is Radar. F4Fs fought with the advantage of radar in most instances, while it was extremely rare for their counterparts to recieve the same. Theres also Pilot Rotation, quality of maintenence, etc. etc. as to why an aircraft failed. The comparison I'm trying to make is closer to the T-34 versus the various Panzers. The T-34 was without a doubt the better tank, however the Panzer had an excellent Kill ratio against the T-34, for reasons too numerous to get into.

The excellent range, and multiple functions of the Zero made it a truely marvelous aircraft, especially given the level of technology Japan had. I would say it was the aircraft that shaped carrier based warfare. One reason why the Aircraft carrier was a secondary ship in the Royal Navy was that it lacked a proper Carrier Based-Aircraft. The Zero was the first carrier based fighter in the world that could be considered a match for a ground based aircraft. Though we're making the comparison to the F4F, you could just as easily compare the Zero to the Bf-109 or the Spitfire, and that alone made it a revolutionary aircraft.

 

[Evie]

Not quite. A more apt comparison would be one between the equipment of the gladiator and that of the legionary. Perhaps the gladiator is better outfitted for individual combat, but the legionary is given equipment appropriate for fighting in formation. Should we assume, then, by your argument, that the gladiator's equipment is better?

Given the average gladiator equipment (or our common perception thereof anyway) and the average legionnaire equipment, I would tend to call bull on the notion that the gladiator is better outfitted than the legionnaire for any sort of anything.

In addition, your comparison fail to take into account a critical point. The legionnaire were given equipment to match their tactics, that is true ; but the same cannot be said of the USN pilots and the Wildcat. They were given the Wildcat as a fighter before the war started, and the tactics they employed against the zero were devised early during the war. So you cannot claim the Wildcat was built to play to the strengths of the USN pilot corps (as opposed to legion equipment).

Now the Hellcat, which made its maiden flight in June 42, you could make this claim for. It was built with (early) wartime experience in mind. But since the Hellcat (like the Corsair, which (unlike the Hellcat) made its maiden flight pre-war) was a far superior fighter to the Zero pretty much anyway you look at it, the claim is not particularly useful.

 

[shortguy]

Given the average gladiator equipment (or our common perception thereof anyway) and the average legionnaire equipment, I would tend to call bull on the notion that the gladiator is better outfitted than the legionnaire for any sort of anything.

That may be true. My point, though, is that it isn't useful to judge equipment divorced from its proper context. You shouldn't judge the Wildcat based on performance in single combat, just as you shouldn't judge the legionary's equipment similarly (though I imaginee he would fare somewhat better), because that's not how they were used.

In addition, your comparison fail to take into account a critical point. The legionnaire were given equipment to match their tactics, that is true ; but the same cannot be said of the USN pilots and the Wildcat. They were given the Wildcat as a fighter before the war started, and the tactics they employed against the zero were devised early during the war. So you cannot claim the Wildcat was built to play to the strengths of the USN pilot corps (as opposed to legion equipment).

That's a fair point, though I don't think it's quite correct to say that legionary equipment was adopted because it fit the strengths of the soldiers themselves. Still, I don't agree with the notion that the wildcat was an inferior plane because it failed to be useful in the way it was designed to be.

 

[Evie]

Ultimately, what I said - what I meant - is that the Wildcat, in terms of pure capacity and performance, was inferior to the Zero. The USN was able, via superior team tactics, to make up for that deficiency - but it was a deficiency that needed to be made up for. (However, the Wildcat had one advantage that helped here - survivability. Keeping the pilot alive would help the USN garner combat experience against the zero quicker than otherwise).

(I would also ammend one of Onejayhawk's statement. At equal numbers past one on one, the Wildcat win, true - PROVIDED the Wildcat pilots (or others on their side) are have some foreknowledge of the zero and how to fight them.)

 

[sabo]

It's funny no one mentioned the 'armor' of both planes. I have heard WWII pilots say that when they get a zero in their sites and fire away the zero just seems to evaporate, where as the American fighters were much more sturdy as to how much damage they can absorb, I don't know about the wildcats but self sealing fuel tanks were pretty much standard equipment in the US Air force.

 

[Evie]

Yes, sturdiness was certainly the one *big* advantage the Wildcat had over the Zero (and actually, essentialy the only valid argument I can see for Wildcat superiority, as one could perhaps make a case that the comparative sturdiness of the two plane types allowed the US Navy to be much quicker to learn how to counter the zero due to better survival ratios among their defeated pilots. However, other factors would probably have played in that that were not advantages of the Wildcat itself (or that were outright disadvantages of it), so...)

(Note, however ,that the sturdiness of the wildcat was not an advantage that won them fights in and of itself - the Zero had a relatively easy time of knocking a wildcat's capacity to maneuver or fight out ; but knocking the plane out of the sky and killing the pilot were entirely harder)

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

That difference in armor probably also accounts for the difference in range between Zekes and any American fighters.