Quote:
Originally Posted by Cross
Although aircraft were more likely to target the more visible and vulnerable convoys, planes were sometimes used to attack armour with surprisingly good results.
The Stuka (Junkers 87) would, even in 1940, dive on and drop bombs on individual tanks with amazing accuracy. Later in 1943/44 when the 87D was first fitted with 37mm cannons, I read that they KO dozens of Russian tanks in a single day.
I guess in our battalion level tactical battles, we are more likely to use aircraft in their less common close support role, even though they belong in a battle of larger scope.
But I wouldn't change a thing. Air attacks - and the realistic chances of 'friendly fire' - bring another dimension to the fun.
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I cannot recall the title of the publication I picked up at Duxford a couple of years back, but it was based on the Allied operations research group reports into air effectiveness during and after Normandy. Been a couple of years since I read it, but as I recollect:
Most air strikes did not actually
destroy heavy panzers. The German crews would however tend to bail from theoretically "immune" MBT that air weapons really had no great chance on and cower in cover nearby - where they were sometimes killed by the strafing. Panzers were sometimes found unmanned, with the engines running after Allied troops overran an area that had been recently struck by air.
Although the tanks were relatively immune from air strikes (.50 and 20 mm were really ineffective vs heavy armour and bomb or rocket hits were rather unlikely), the few that were directly hit by bombs or rockets tended to be destroyed, esp by 60 pounder rockets. The crews therefore preferred to take their chances in the ditch alongside when being strafed, or would charge off the road into cover and then bail from the vehicle. They would often bail on the aircraft starting their attacks, long before the actual MG fire started. It could take a half an hour or more after the air strike before all crews were re-mounted and the surviving tanks were marshalled back into order and the column proceeded once more.
Troops did not become "blase" after suffering from several air strikes - unlike getting used to regular shelling. Rather they became more "twitchy" in response to air strikes the more that they experienced them in their careers.
The armour that was destroyed was the open-topped and thin skinned half tracks, scout cars and tank destroyers.
The real damage was done on soft transport, which air attacks reduced to bent bits of scrap metal. Abandoned panzers were often found on roads in the bocage (esp Falaise) in the midst of a sea of mangled soft-skin vehicle wreckage that they simply could not extract themselves from.
It seems that troops under air attack have a different experience from those under arty bombardment. Shelling is relatively impersonal. However troops under air attack feel that the plane is directing the fire at them
personally, so the shock to morale is much greater. Like the difference between general rifle fire and being personally sniped at with aimed rifle fire.
So - as an anti-armour weapon planes were a "terror" item. Real killing was done on the soft MT carrying the tanks bullets, bombs and beans. The AT effect of air power was therefore an indirect one over time as the "clockwork" of the armoured units wound down due to lack of logistical support from the MT. Just like the USN concentration (esp by the sub force) on tankers stopped the IJN's clockwork too.
Cheers
Andy