Japanese Naval Aviation Losses, 41-42

Hello,Steve here,just read your post and sighned up to reply.Am long haul trucker,so no have my aviation library with me.
There are several book's out in English,one by the desighner on the Type Zero fighter,
another 2 by former Japanese Naval air officers during the war.
First,during the 1930's,both the Japanese Army / Navy only wanted,and excepted the best students at their Air Schools,Then,while most the world was still in recession,cut back's in training,Japan was 2nd only to Germany in training/skilled pilots.Japan military were fanatical in the Samauri culture,the pilots themselves would leave their parachutes behind as sighn of bravery.They also would take radios out of their planes to save weight.
From the various orders the Army/Navy would put out for Aircraft companies.Dog Fighting and Range were almost alway's the priority.Armour and self sealing tanks and even top speed were secondary.Most planes could not meet the requirments in they had armour and all.....The Type Zero only had a little over 1000 hr,at end of war,it had just over 1100.................Fully loaded,most Japanese fighters weighed 6-8000 ld compared to our (U.S.)10,000 lb planes.Even at end of war,the lighter Jap. planes could out turn us
anytime,we used out speed,firepower,climb/dive/weave to win.
Japan,once they knew it would be a long war,were short of pilot's,turning so many away early on,for only the "best student's set them back.As war went on,their best were slowly die off in combat.The new pilots from mid 42' had a lot less training time.Japan
had some very good planes,but as time went on,shortages in skilled labor,materials,these
same planes would be of poor quality reaching front lines.On average,engines rarely reaching their desighned peak,non flush rivits/skin,many were 20-30mph slower than they
were orig. made.The Type Zero,at end war had the armour plate/min. sealing fuel tanks,2x machinegun 2x 20mm,if low,down on the deck,even our Hell cat or Mustang could not corner them if an experienced pilot were flying it.
Our planes were heavy,well armed,fast,the U.S.A.F. took a low hr P-51 back from Pacific,to America,along with a Ki-84.Comparison test showed the Ki-84 superior below
20,000 ft,but above that the P-51 was better,the higher,the better the P-51 was.At
20,000,the P-51 ran at 394 mph with the Ki-84 at 397. After the war,a Army Depot had a Ki-84,they stripped all way down,rebuilt it,smooth skinned and all,and got a top speed of 420 mph at 20,000...This was from an old artical from WING'S/AIRPOWER.
With the war shortages,Japan even used fuel made from ferminted sweet potatos,pilots
hated it,not because it did'nt work,but because it was so low grade,the planes lost average 30 mph speed..This pratice was not wide spread,but was used.One unit,on at least one time fueled their fighters with VODKA.no know how many planes tried it.
So in closing,our better trained pilots/radar/AA/greater numbers verses poorer trained pilots,well desighned,but many poorer built/slower planes with low use of radio's/not fighting as team too much simply took it's toll on the Japanese pilots,poor leadership also
proved fatal.

 

Hello; It seems that the Japanese were geared toward a quick victory while the United States prepared to fight on as long as it took to win. This can be reflected in the fact that the Japanese naval airforce committed their best pilots and planes in 1942 to defeating the United States and her allies before they were able to use their huge production to ultimately destroy the Japanese Navy.So although the aircraft losses were either even or favoring the Japanese , The losses in experienced Japanese pilots and maintanence crew were almost impossible to replace and the Allies not only replaced their losses but did so with better aircraft and higher quality aircrew then the Japanese could ever hope to compete with . The end result was defeat for Japan..

 

All three main Axis nations (Germany, Japan and Italy) needed to win quick and desiecive victories to gain and hold their conquests. Germany accepted this theory but con not make it happen. Italy had no clue what they were doing. Japan on the other hand, expected to fight a protracted war. They first planned to make their conquests, have a year or more to prepare a deep and thick defensive belt, and then wear down a American counterattack. The hope being that the US would tire and lose heart and agreeing to terms. Yet Japan's military infrastructure was in no way capable of fighting a long war. The Bushido concept was incompatable with their strategy. If you are going to fight a long war, then you must conserve your forces in every way, including trying to save every skilled pilot you can.

 

I Agree; Whereas it may be noble and courageous for a veteran officer to insist he lead an attack in a damaged airplane knowing there was no way he could make it back ( I believe something like this happened at midway ) and i'm sure his courage inspired the younger pilots, by stripping a unit of it's most expereanced and skilled leaders in this way ment that the quality of Japanese pilot the Allies faced as the war progressed past 1942 into '43 and '44 quickly began to deteroriate

 

Personally, without any referencing, i'd say the two major reason were, maintenance...the aircraft weren't maintained properly (toward the end of the war) so they had constant problems resulting in aircraft coming down before they reached the airstrip. Difficult to get reliable numbers on this for obvious reasons. Was it shot down? Damaged resulting in a forced landing? A peice or part failing? Hard to say for sure, then and now. The second reason was the distance the Japanese flew to ships to try to ensure a hit. Coming close resulted in greater number of hits but also resulted in the aircraft being tagged. The thru-put of young, inexperienced pilots (again toward the end of the war) was also a factor in the high attrition rate. OR i could just say they weren't as good as the Aliies....that works for me. Thats my two bobs' worth.

 

Your version is the "conventional wisdom" but while it may be true for 1944-45 I find it hard to believe for 1941-42 when most Japanese pilots were veterans and the mechanics are likely to be long timers as well, on the other hand committing Shoho to battle with an incomplete air wing a Coral Sea seems to point they were stretched pretty thin even then.

Still working on my JNAF carrier aviation 1941-42 losses compilation (got sidetracked by other interests including shaterred sword and the first team) but the picture I see, at least for the battles, is still than plane fragility and tactics (strikes at night and extreme range causing failure to recover) explain most of the losses for the period.

One unexplored subject is day to day non combat "attrition" losses, AFAIK the could be pretty high for carrier units, but I can't find much info about those.