[Osium]

I don't know if it is correct to say the Japanese airforce was the most advanced in the world in 1941.

I mean, the Zero was a good plane when compared to the clunkers the Americans were using. The german me109 for all its glory is about as highly over-rated as the Zero.

Once the Americans got some planes that could climb and handle somewhat decently the advantage in manueverability the Zero enjoyed was gone, as was the aura of invincibilty of the Zero. The Zero became a death trap for its pilots who were sitting ducks for faster American planes that simply climbed away from the Zero only to turn and strafe them.

In 1941 I would say the British had the "best" fighters in the world.

The Zero was the most manueverable plane of the time, but it was like flying a card board box, no pilot protection, no armor for the tanks. When they got hit they went down.

Lets compare and contrast the Hurricane and the ME-109.

Armament, the 109 wins hands down. Manueverability, technically the ME-109 was more manueverable, however due to being a difficult plane to handle very few German pilots ever pushed the plane to its limit. This afforded the Hurricane a win in the overall manueverability due to the fact that an average British/Canadian or American pilot in a Hurricane could get more out of the plane than a German in a 109. The Hurricane also had better cockpit visibility and a higher top speed. However because it used a carborator it had a tendancy to choke out in high G dives, whereas the 109 used fuel injection which defeated that flaw in the Hurricane. The 109 also had a tiny fuel capacity and no ability to carry external drop tanks if memory serves.

In the end most people agree the Hurricane was the best early war fighter in all theaters due to a WIDE range of things.

Liken the Hurricane to a Leopard, and the Zero to a cheetah. Highly specialized versus a more well rounded package. The hurricane was around the entire war and was one of the top fighters throughout the war, the Zero on the other hand went the way of most specialists in evolution, extinction. It was replaced by faster, heavier armored better climbing planes eventually. The Zero was used throughout the war, but it was by no means the top plane in the Japanese airforce by wars end.

However, if you mean the fact that the Japanese were the first to really key on the Aircraft Carrier as the key to naval combat and aerial power projection then you are dead on and sorry for my tangent ;p