Best French bomber of the war?

As a matter of interest -there were some dog fights between French Curtiss Hawk 75s and USN Grumman F4Fs, although the performance of these aircraft were rather similar, the Hawk 75s had been in North Africa for a couple of years an much the worse for wear. Thus out of 50 aircraft, only 6-7 were combat ready The American landings werte protected by 172 aircraft carriers launched from four carriers. Against this armada, the French could only deploy two Groupes de Chasse with Hawks. Dewoitine D.520s had been issued to GC II/5, but these were no yert operational. US naval planes neutralized all French airfields,destroying most of the Douglas DB7, Martin 167 and Aéronavale aircraft, On 8 Nov. GC ii/5 which had been placed on the alert sent up six aircraft on patrol, these ran into a large formation of Wildcats and Dauntless bombers. Soon theere wre 20 Hawk. The French were creditted with 7 Wildcats and a Curtiss SOC-3 recce aircraft, but their lown osses were heavy. Nine fighters were lost in the first encounte Further combat took place during teh day when there were only six operational Curtiss and 7 Dewoitine D.520s, On 9 Nov. a Curtiss of GC l/5 was damagedm, and on a raid against Fedala,on which 15 Hawks flew ecort.when they were pounced on by a formation of WIldcts and five Curtiss were shot down. In all of these encounters, mention is made of the superior performance (and armament) of the Wildcat vs. the Hawk, which nevertheless, cold turn inside the F4F-(here we go again)

Best Regards

Castelot,as far as Wspauldo12 's remarks, remember what we used to say in Boston: Chacun au son goût- to which a classmate from New York would add " Oui, mais il y'a d goûts qui méritent d'être battus avec des bâtons et des pierres

Trés Cordialment

 

Oui, mais noubliant pas ke cest son oncle et pas lui ki deteste les francais

 

Also please don't forget it's an international forum!! :lol:

 

Agreed - I don't mind a simple phrase or two, but conversations at the level of proper sentances...

 

My apologies

 

You can post such sentances, but do translate as well.

(Apologies accepted, of course!)

 

"Chacun a son goût" is a famous quote (was it Montesqieu?) meaning "everyone has his preferences". The classmate added "Yes, but there are certain preferences that are best beaten with sticks and stones." At which Desertwolf said "Yes, but don't forget it was his uncle, not him, who disliked the French."

 

Desertwolf! good to hear from you..those that hate the French should be greeted with the inmortal word of Cambrone at Waterloo: M....."

 

Thanks scaramouche.
Actually Cambrone's word should be told to all racists around the world, whoever they hate.

As for France, we can't be that bad, as France, is by far the most visited country in the world(75.500.000 visitors last year, more than the population of France).
Not that bad for "Cheese eating garlic smelling surrender monkeys".

 

My young wife is French Canadian, and more French that the French-as for myself I 've been to France inmumerable ocassions.. and have never found the French to be anything but hospitable-and polite-as far as those who hate cheeese and garlic, they do not know what they are missing and
that's their problem.

Trés cordialment

 

Leaving aside all xenophobia...

I tend to like the LeO 451, but I do love the Potez 63 family. A wonderful set of aircraft based around a common chunk of wing/fuselage. Light bomber, heavy fighter, nightfighter, recon, you name it, a Potez 63 version did it. And they looked beautiful...

Potez 631 fighter:


Potez 63.11 Recon:


The Potez 63 series were used by the Free French, the Vichy French and the Germans, which shows that they must have been ok...

Try http://www.luftwaffe-experten.co.uk/potez.html for info on examples used by the Germans

 

Another promising french twin-engine plane in 1940 was the Bréguet 690, used as a figther bomber:

 

Unfortunately the bulk of french bomber force in 1940 consisted of these beauties:





A Bloch 210 like this one crashed in 1940 in a wood just where I live.
Large parts of it still lie around there, including the engines.(Or what's left of them).

 

Mind you, didn't a Farman F.222 bomb Germany?


Can you provide pictures of that unfortunate Bloch - I'm interested...

 

Yes, a single F222 bombed Berlin in june 1940.
(The first allied plane to bomb Berlin??)

As for pictures, the weather here is improving, so next time when I go up there, I'll see what I can do.
But a crashed plane, over 60 years in the woods, visited by souvenir hunters....don't expect too much.

 

I'm assuming it will be a few twisted rusty bits of metal...

 

Didn't a Polish squadron bomb Berlin somewhere in 1939? Don't trust me on it but I think I heard this somewhere...

 

The Amiot 143 must rank among the ugliest aircraft ever-l remember a "TIME" magazine article about the Feench Armed Forces in 1940: ir described the Amiot 143 as " looking rather a French "pensión" and just as clumsy in the air..The Bloch 200 and the 210s (along with another "winner", the Potez 540, which was described euphemistically as a "multiplace de combat,"- and was the proverbial jack of all tades: good at none) were shot down lie flies over Spain during the Civil war..Even uglier( but, fortunately not built in numbers,liike the others) was the Breguet 460..
On the other hand, there were very effective and athetically pleasing aircraft like the eo 451 in production..
Best REgards!

 

The unfortunate Potez 540 was apparently still used by Romania in WW2.(Anyone more info?)

Another french bomber extensively used by Romania till 1944 was the Potez 63:

 

Yet another relatively unknown french bomber, the Loire-Nieuport LN 401 dive bomber:


Originally designed for use on aircraft carriers, it was also used in the 1940 campaign against the panzer spearheads:

Another bomber of the french naval airforce,used in the 1940 campaign, the US build Vought 156:
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