Billy Mitchell: Fighters Are Essential to a Daytime Bombing Mission

[KJ_Lesnick]

I'm not sure if this should be in the Alternate History forum, here or elsewhere.

Billy Mitchell, unlike many airpower advocates such as Giulio Douhet and Hugh Trenchard (who simply felt that the bomber would be able to either fly completely above enemy air defenses, or would be able to blast away fighters with a system of machine-guns) believed that fighters were essential to conduct a successful daytime bombing mission (which was generally preferable in the US).  

If the US formed an independent Air Force (either like the USAF which covered land-based aviation, or like the early RAF which covered everything), my questions are

• What kind of fighters would have been developed for bomber escort?
  
  
  
  • Would they have went for single engined fighters with higher fuel fractions and/or drop-tanks?
    
  • Would they have developed twin engined designs with or without drop-tanks along the lines of the P-38, Westland Whirlwind, and DeHavilland Hornet?
    
• Would they have given up prior to WW2 and decided to go "bombers all the way" with fighters being used solely for intercept, air-superiority, and close-air-support?
  

..

KJ

[PR19_Kit]

Why would things have developed any differently to the way they did in reality?

The USAAC proved to themselves, at the cost of many lost crews and aircraft, that daylight bombing en masse DIDN'T work without fighter escorts, thus the use of the P-38, P-47 and eventually the P-51. I can't see that it being a separate force in its own right would have changed any of that.

[KJ_Lesnick]

PR19 Kit

Why would things have developed any differently to the way they did in reality?

Because if you had a guy who realized that fighters were necessary from the get-go (Mitchell did, the rest of the bomber guys didn't -- some felt that a fighter with the range to escort a bomber would cease to be a fighter, others simply felt that the bomber would always get through)

[PR19_Kit]

I can't see things would have developed any differently, the longer range fighter designs would have just been developed earlier. By the time WWII came along they'd have been ready to escort the B-17s etc right away, and the 8th Air Force's initial losses over Germany wouldn't have been as serious perhaps.

Conversely it's possible that the Luftwaffe may also have been more advanced and had Ta-152s and Me-262s etc. earlier as well.

Alternate histories can't assume that developments on one side of a conflict only exist in isolation.

[rickshaw]

The idea that the "bomber will always get through" was correct - until the development of radar.    Until then, there was little or no means of providing an early warning.  Without that early warning you either had to keep standing patrols up and hope you could spot the bomber force before it hit its target or that you could take off fast enough and climb fast enough to engage them. Up until then, there simply was no need for escorting fighters.

[KJ_Lesnick]

PR-19 Kit

I can't see things would have developed any differently, the longer range fighter designs would have just been developed earlier. By the time WWII came along they'd have been ready to escort the B-17s etc right away, and the 8th Air Force's initial losses over Germany wouldn't have been as serious perhaps.

And that's not different?

Conversely it's possible that the Luftwaffe may also have been more advanced and had Ta-152s and Me-262s etc. earlier as well.

Better interceptors -- possible...

Alternate histories can't assume that developments on one side of a conflict only exist in isolation.

No, I already realize that.

[sequoiaranger]

>The idea that the "bomber will always get through" was correct - until the development of radar.<

Good point. Perhaps an "alternate history" might not invoke an escort fighter at all, but concentrate on radar-foxing countermeasures instead. One might assume that long range, twin-engined "transports" like the Mosquito might carry "window" or other stuff to create false bomber streams to deflect defensive efforts elsewhere and mask the main attack.

From a modeling point of view, that would not create new whiff aircraft, just "black boxes" and funny antennae.

[Hobbes]

The idea that the "bomber will always get through" was correct - until the development of radar.    Until then, there was little or no means of providing an early warning. 

In the context of WW2, I kind of doubt this. Single bombers, sure, but a double- or triple-digit daylight raid rather stands out, and the approach routes are limited in width and rather long so plenty chance of detection (Benelux, Northern France). In good weather there are plenty of ground observers (AAA) with telephones, when it's very cloudy it gets more difficult (but daylight raids without radar in bad weather were crapshoots anyway - did the Americans use radio direction finding during WW2?).

[rickshaw]

The idea that the "bomber will always get through" was correct - until the development of radar.    Until then, there was little or no means of providing an early warning. 

In the context of WW2, I kind of doubt this. Single bombers, sure, but a double- or triple-digit daylight raid rather stands out, and the approach routes are limited in width and rather long so plenty chance of detection (Benelux, Northern France). In good weather there are plenty of ground observers (AAA) with telephones, when it's very cloudy it gets more difficult (but daylight raids without radar in bad weather were crapshoots anyway - did the Americans use radio direction finding during WW2?).

Your criticisms are valid but for the UK where the approaches are all over water,  detection and reporting is substantially harder. Another problem which must be considered is that weather will interfere with observations.   While you may hear a raid approaching, fixing it and the direction it is flying is much harder when clouds obscure your view of it and Northern European weather is notoriously fickle.  One only has to read of the difficulties which occurred in WWI when aircraft flew at substantially lower altitudes when the Germans raided the UK.  Considerable confusion ensued when the observers were unable to get anything other than a general fix on the attackers from the ground.  With increased speeds, such a fix would be less useful as the bombers sweep in from the sea and across the land to attack their targets.  Radar changed all that.  Weather couldn't stop it.  It gave direction and height.   As mentioned by sequoiaranger, all you can do is employ methods of deception, not prevention (until the arrival of stealth) of detection.

[Weaver]

Wasn't the Bell Airacuda supposed to be a bomber-escorting "fighter"? Perhaps a lighter, less radical version of that would be developed, with the nacelle gunners replaced by fixed batteries and fewer crew.

 As mentioned by sequoiaranger, all you can do is employ methods of deception, not prevention (until the arrival of stealth) of detection.

Well you can always attack the radar stations with low-level fighter-bombers. It's always amazed me that the Germans didn't put more effort into this. Yes, the stations can be repaired fairly quickly, but reapeated attacks can take them off the air for enough of the time to degrade the efficiency of the network.

[rickshaw]

They didn't 'cause they didn't understand what the Chain Home stations were.   Their radars worked at sub-metre wavelengths.  The Chain Home one's worked at metre wavelengths.   They suspected they were radio location stations (at least initially) not radar ones.  Once they knew, the targeting had shifted.  If they had stuck to their original strategy, they'd have more than likely made Southern England a no-go zone for the RAF.

[skysurfer808]

Fighters are essential as escort for long range bombers, unfortunately a heavy escort fighter isn't exactly the ideal solution.  The P-38 did not fare as well against the Luftwaffe as it did in the Pacific, for a variety of reasons...ie lack of effective cockpit heating, compressibility, etc.  The best escorts during the War years were machines that had a decent internal load and external tanks.  The P-51 comes to mind, especially since it was a lightweight when compared to other escort fighter concepts.  The concept of a Heavy Escort was proved fallacious by the Germans themselves with the Bf 110 and its performance during the Battle of Britain.

Skysurfer808

[KJ_Lesnick]

Skysurfer808

Fighters are essential as escort for long range bombers

Generally the case.  The only exception is if you are either as fast or faster combined with nearly as good agility.  History has shown this sometimes works but it's not too smart to solely rely on this.

a heavy escort fighter isn't exactly the ideal solution.  The P-38 did not fare as well against the Luftwaffe as it did in the Pacific, for a variety of reasons...ie lack of effective cockpit heating, compressibility, etc.

Well, it was better than having nothing.  Admittedly, the P-38 might not have been too maneuverable up at high-altitudes with drop-tanks and everything, though at medium altitudes, it's turning performance was good was quite good.

The best escorts during the War years were machines that had a decent internal load and external tanks.  The P-51 comes to mind, especially since it was a lightweight when compared to other escort fighter concepts.

Well the P-51 was the best of all of them.  It combined small size, speed, and agility with extreme range.  If I recall the radius of the P-51 with the drop-tanks was around 1,650 nm which is even better than the P-38.

The concept of a Heavy Escort was proved fallacious by the Germans themselves with the Bf 110 and its performance during the Battle of Britain.

True enough

[Weaver]

There's heavy fighters and there's heavy fighters: the big, multi-seat ones were, obviously, little more agile than the equivalent light bombers, but I wonder about smaller, single-seaters. The Whirlwind proved quite adept in combat, and the DH Hornet amounted to a scaled-up Whirlwind. Is there much combat record for the Hornet?

Also, how good would a push-pull design like the Do-335 have been in combat? It was certainly fast due to it's high engines-per-drag-bodies ratio, and having the engines on the centreline should have made it as snappy in roll as a conventional fighter due to it's mass being centralised about the roll axis. How about in pitch though? It has heavy engines at both ends, quite long way from the CofG, and the elevators appear to be on quite a short moment arm.....

[pyro-manic]

IIRC the Hornet only saw action in the Far East, on ground attack missions. But it was very fast, and had excellent range.