The forgotten aces of the war..aerial gunners

This footage shows fighter gun camera footage mixed in with unrelated footage of a waist gunner and a ball turret, interposed with a little snippet from Wylers " Memphis Belle", making staggering claims that bombers could destroy more fighters than they lost themselves....

What propaganda.

If B17 gunners and the 8th AF was so darned effective, WHY was the "long range" escort fighter needed AT ALL?

Do we have to Lionize EVERY aspect of American involvement? Do Americans ALWAYS "give back better than they got in return"?

What a lot of BALLS!!!

 

Furthermore.

The initial production model of the Focke Wulf 190, the A1, first appeared in June of 1941, quite a while before the 8th AF started to raid in daylight.

It's development was in response to the perceived need for a fighter aircraft that would be ahead of any possible Allied development in response to the 109.

The Focke Wulf was NOT produced in response to daylight raids!

Also, attacks from the front were carried out by both the 109 and the 190, and yes, that was in response to rear attacks becoming untenable. From the front you could aim for the cockpit, hoping to hit the pilots, or make the bombers electrical system go dead

German fighters would concentrate on the lowest squadrons of the bomber formation. The idea was to use the initial head on attack to bust apart the formation, and then pick off the stragglers.

You see it happening in Wylers documentary. The camera focussing on a fort that has dropped out of formation, with the commentary stating....

"...soon, Nazi fighters will close in like buzzards for the kill....
You can watch, but you can't go down to help."

 

Well, the long range fighters sure helped the US bombers. The bomber losses went down and German fighter losses went up-up-up. The extra fuel tanks did the trick. Previously Germans waited until the US fighter cover had to turn back. Now they could follow to Berlin and back Definitely a game changer who got the upper back.

 

It was indeed daunting! Goring accused his fighterpilots of being cowards. (A factor, but also many LW pilots had never attacked a plane as big as a B17 and had a hard time judging distance.) Many of them were breaking off their attacks before they were in range to be effective. However, if a B-17 was in range of a German fighter, the opposite was also true and a ME109 was a lot more fragile than a B-17!. The German solutions came slowly. Better ammo, the head-on mass attack and heavy armament and armor for the fighters started upping the bomber losses so that by Schweinfurt 2 the bomber losses became unsustainable in the long run.

 

Addendum to last post: The up armored/armed German fighters were dogs in fighter vs fighter combat, and often flown by very inexperienced pilots. With inferior skills and slow, sluggish planes, they were easy meat for the P-51s!

 

I am not sure how the gunners knew who they were shooting at. I know the film isn't top quality but with planes zipping around all over the place and all the noise I am sure some planes went down by friendly fire.