Ground Attack Aircraft: Myth of the Tank-Busters

[Jeremy971]

I was watching the first wednesday video when Jakob talked about dive bombing.
And I asked myself what was the efficiency of ground attack in ww2.
It seems difficult at more than 300km/h to hit a moving target. In more, if the flak is firing at you.
I read an article saying :
"[...]it took 800 rockets or 3500 bombs to hit a tank sized target in battle conditions."

What do you think ? Myth or reality ?

Ground Attack Aircraft: Myth of the Tank-Busters

A popular misconception I have noticed is that ground attack aircraft were used successfully as “tank-busters” of “tank-killers”, and that aircraft were seemingly the largest threat to tanks. I know some of you don’t think this, but I think a good portion of you might. I will focus my attention on the AT abilities of the Hawker Typhoon and the P-47 Thunderbolt against German armor. I will also quickly go over examples from the Eastern Front.

In NW Europe the Typhoon and the P-47 are regarded as an effective weapon against German Armor. CAS pilots claimed hundreds of panzers dead due to their bombs, rockets, and cannons. The problem is that this just isn’t true.

The weapons employed by these aircraft are just not good at knocking out tanks. The 20 mm cannon of the Typhoon did not have the ability to punch through German armor. Even the weak roof armor was near impenetrable due to the angle of attack and range. It is likely that some panzers were disabled by 20 mm fire, but just a handful. The .50 cals of the P-47 and other American aircraft do not have legitimate chance of killing a panzer. It has been claimed that P-47 pilots would have the .50 cal. armor-piercing bullets penetrate the underside of vehicles after ricocheting off the road. That is just BS to put it frankly.

Hitting those external fuel tanks didn’t KO tanks, but it did make them run out of fuel faster. Also how do you tell if what you’re shooting at is a Tiger and not a half-track?

These aircraft also carried rockets and bombs. Both of these were much more devastating when they hit armor. However that is the problem; they had to hit their target. Both bombs and rockets were utterly abysmal in terms of accuracy. A trial conducted by the RAF had fired 64 rockets from 4 Tiffies(2 flights) at a stationary Panther painted white. A total of 3 hits were recorded giving the rockets a 4.69% accuracy rating in the most perfect of circumstances. Near misses did no damage to the tank. In real combat the Panzers would have some some camouflage, some flak protection(which downed hundreds of Allied fighter-bombers over NW Europe and greatly reduced accuracy of bombs and rockets), and crews that would know to seek cover when they realize they are being shot at. Bombs were even worse in regards to accuracy. It had been concluded that overall it took 800 rockets or 3500 bombs to hit a tank sized target in battle conditions.

The Target Panther

Now, regardless that aircraft weaponry was near useless against tanks, the RaF and USAAC both claimed hundreds of panzers. Some documented cases show that these claims are horribly exaggerated. Near La Baleine, France Typhoons conducted 99 sorties on a German Armored Column consisting of ~50 tanks. The pilots claimed to have KO’d 17 of the tanks. The British Army’s No. 2 ORS investigated the area and found that there was a total of 9 tanks, 2 of which were actually destroyed by rockets or just 11% of the original claim. Around Mortain the US and British pilots claimed to have destroyed/probably destroyed a total of 120 tanks. The actual number of destroyed AFVs in the area is close to 45 tanks, only 9 seemed to be victims of airstrikes or 7% of the original claim. At the Falaise Gap the Fighter-Bombers claimed 3x more tanks(391) than the Germans actually lost(133). The number of tanks lost to aircraft seemed to be 15 in the Falaise area or 4% of the original claim. Things didn’t go much better in the Ardennes with air units claiming 66 tanks in an area which under inspection was found that only 1 of 101 tanks were knocked out by air and another 6 likely knocked out by air. As this has shown, these claims about tanks getting decimated by aircraft doesn’t really hold any water.

Now the fighter-bombers did take their toll on German armor. Aircraft were particularly good at destroying motor transports and disrupted the logistics of the Germans. Taking out fuel trucks, infantry, depots, etc. can not be ignored in indirectly destroying German armor. The psychological impact on fighter-bombers on German tanks seemed to be quite high as well. German crews claimed to be terrified of Typhoons and P-47s and would bail-out at the first sign of an aircraft attack. German divisional histories emphasized the role of fighter-bombers in engagements(even if they did no significant damage). There is some skepticism towards these histories as they do not accurately describe what happened to the tanks lost to aircraft or the high number of tanks found abandoned.

Now lets talk about the Luftwaffe and the VVS(Soviet Air Force) over Kursk. The German cases are usually poorly documented, but one involving IV/9th Ground Assault Wing(commanded by Bruno Meyer) on July 8th, 1943 is a well documented about the Luftwaffe claims and the actual casualties sustained by the Soviets. The Hs-129 B-2s of the Luftwaffe were the planes involved. These planes were armed with the Mk 103 which actually was potentially deadly for tanks unlike most aircraft cannons but did not have a lot of ammunition either. The Hs-129s attacked a group of tanks belonging to 26th Tank Brigade of the II Guards Tank Corps. The pilots claimed 40-50 tanks destroyed out of 60 seen, a devastating attack. The problem is that 26th Tank Brigade lost 7 to 11 tanks in total on the date in question, a further problem is that they engaged German ground units that could have done the casualties. Whatever the case may be, the German figure of 40-50 tanks destroyed is off. Now, does this apply to Rudel who claimed ~500 tanks destroyed? Likely. I have serious doubts that Rudel has even killed more tanks than Carius and Knispel to be honest.

Does this really deserve to be called a Panzerknacker?

The IL-2 Sturmovik’s performance has also been overrated as a “tank-buster”. Lets look at some examples from Kursk again. The VVS claimed to have knocked out ~270 tanks of 3rd Panzer Division within 2 hrs. 3rd Panzer Division only had 90 tanks and the division fought against Soviet AT guns and AFVs which likely caused the majority of the divisions casualties(~49 tanks) during Kursk. IL-2s also claimed to have taken out 240 German tanks of 17th Panzer Division which had a total of 67 tanks. 17th Panzer did not record any abnormal losses coming from the air during Kursk. The IL-2′s AT weapons were not that good at killing tanks much like most of these “tank-busters”. The 23 mm cannon was lucky to penetrate and the rockets used by the IL-2 lacked the power of the Western Allied rockets. the PTAB bombs likely were the most effective weapon when used in mass(280 per IL-2), but they still lack the accuracy to be efficient.

I sorta doubt the probability that even one of these will hit its intended target.

In closing, I hope that my attempt to inform/convince you has worked. The “tank-busting” aircraft of WWII didn’t “bust” enough tanks to cause a real difference. CAS aircraft from all nations proved that their roles during WWII were against soft targets and large strategic points(bridges, buildings, etc.). The tankers, AT men, and artillery men are the ones who killed enemy tanks and to say that they didn’t and that it was these planes is just wrong.
http://ftr.wot-news.com/2014/04/04/ground-attack-aircraft-myth-of-the-tank-busters/

 

[MajorHeartfire]

I've just gotta believe myth. From what we have always heard, the number was nowhere near 800 rockets.

 

[Daelyn75]

The droplet type bombs that the Sturmovik's used could punch a hole through the top of the German tanks. And they dropped a lot of them each, I think 50 at once. They were devastating to German armor. Now that that has been said, it's always the smart thing to actually look it up and do your own research. What I wrote could just be propaganda, or it could be partially correct. Regardless, this is the Russian version of it, right out of Soviet Storm WWII in the East.

 

[Axe99]

I'm going from memory here, so expect it to be "vaguely around the mark" at best, but:

- Aircraft didn't knock out a lot of armour - I've seen numbers like 5 per cent and 7 per cent and things like that in a battle. However, even if that was their only effect (which it wasn't, more on that below) if I had a battle coming up and could bring along something that's going to knock out an extra 5-7 per cent of tanks, I wouldn't sit their thinking about it. Small arms didn't kill a huge percentage of people on the battlefield, but no-one was going to tell the infantry to stop carrying guns just because they didn't have the impact artillery did .

- Just like it's harder for aircraft to hit enemy targets when they're getting fired at, same goes for tanks. If friendly airpower can disrupt enemy operations, it means better opportunities for your ground forces. Your tanks can operate more freely, which means more kills for them (and AT guns, arty, etc and less for the enemy, even if the aircraft don't knock out a single vehicle. Think of the aircraft as a way of making life easier for your troops on the ground, and harder for the enemies.

- There's evidence that a significant number of tanks being abandoned intact when under aircraft attack. The aircraft may not have destroyed the tank, but it still at the very least slows down enemy movement, and at best neutralises an enemy tank in combat.

- Tanks may not be susceptible to 20mm cannon fire, but trucks, encampments, barges and supply dumps area. CAS aircraft roaming at will over Northern France caused havoc with Germany's logistics (and injured Rommel, their commander or therabouts (can't remember if he was overall in charge, or 2IC or similar, but I think he was up there) at the time).

In-game, my barely informed opinion (ie, take with several kilos of salt ) is that CAS aircraft should act mostly as a 'force multiplier' - if you're attacking the enemy, and you've got CAS and they don't, it should help a fair bit, but if CAS attack an enemy formation unsupported (unless it's silly enough to be moving along roads in daylight, in which case it deserves what it gets), then the impact should be substantially less. That said, there's people around here who know far more, hopefully they'll chime in sooner or later .

 

[Amur_Tiger]

I've just gotta believe myth. From what we have always heard, the number was nowhere near 800 rockets.

Rockets were pretty notoriously inaccurate, there's a reason why they introduced the 6 pounder to the Mosquito so they'd have a reasonable chance of hitting a submarine sized target. Extrapolate what that means for accuracy vs a tank and it's not unimaginable that you end up with 800 rockets spent for every hit.

Why they stuck with the rockets anyways for a lot of ground attack has to do with the development of Allied aircraft previous, most 'CAS' was carried out by re-purposed fighters and mounting large cannons was challenging in that circumstance. Rockets were also more flexible in being suitable against soft targets and fortifications where big cannons were only going to be useful against hard armored targets.

Of course cannons alone don't make a tank killer extraordinaire but at least that seems likely to take care of some of the accuracy issues and put you on the road to getting through armor. There's still the issue of wing-mounted guns being really inappropriate and given our most renown CAS aircraft, the IL-2 and the Ju-87 were both wing mounted, still some accuracy issues to work out. Even the Hs 129 's BK103s were noted to be insufficient against T-34s, which prompted the 75mm version but the timing of this and the Tsetse Mosquito suggests that CAS would have lacked the weaponry to reliably destroy the newest tanks until the very end of the war. Older tanks might have found themselves more susceptible but the dynamics of needing your newest planes to destroy older tanks aren't too great. Of course there's plenty of softer targets out there so it's not like CAS was useless, just like artillery's inability to directly blow up tanks didn't make it useless.

 

[Shade205]

Not every target is moving, even units carrying out a blitzkrieg have to stop eventually. And that's when some serious damage can be inflicted for very few losses on your side.

 

[Xsio]

I think it depends on type of bomb\plane. For example: "The Il-2 was capable of carrying 280 2.5 kg bombs immediately on the bomb-bay folds, or 4x48 in four cassettes. The PTAB 2.5 was capable of penetrating 60 to 70 millimeter tank armor, sufficient at the time even for the top-armor of heavy tanks." - wikipedia (PTAB bomb)

Edit: the area of effect was aprox. 15x200 m

Spoiler

Its Yak fighter with the PTAB

 

[Gratch11]

I had a thread about this a while back. As for FB, they were useless against tanks, cant remember it all but battlefield surveys showed that 3-5 percent of the claims were accurate, so if my pilots claim 100 kills and I after the battle examine the results on site, 3 - 5 tanks were actually destroyed. A special Ju-87 and the Hs 129 were pretty successful with mounted AT guns/gun. And If I rememebr correct the USSR had a special variant of Il-2 that was ok, much better then allied FB but not as effective as the german kind.

But tanks need fuel, ammo etc so in the long run FB are good but to stop an attack or break a defender, useless.

The tanks were abandoned due to lack of fuel. But the myth of the FB wasnt only on the allied side, the german tanks also thought the FB were more effective than they were = they didnt like to move in daylight

 

[Thracian]

otto carius claims aircrafts were never real threat for them

 

[D Inqu]

The ability for aircraft to hit ground targets accurately only came with guided munitions.

 

[No idea]

800 rockets or 3500 bombs seem a lot but lets see things in perspective: how many shells or small bullets it took to make a single casualty?. I dont know the eaxct numbers, but I have read severla times that it requieres an awful lot.

That said, the main effect of air superiority has always been disruption of enemy forces, more than destroying heavy equipment or killing large numbers of the enemy. Basically, to make life far more difficult for him by attacking what is most vulnerable: the logistic pipeline.

 

[Damiani]

Not if this tank is your target...

 

[Denkt]

The psychological effect of bombing tanks must have effected tank crews quite alot.

 

[3ishop]

The 3 big issues always is, how do pilots know what enemy armour units they are fighting? Do they introduce themselves? Put up a sign? so it's probably best to compare the armour losses in an area rather than just 1 unit.

Then of course as you pointed out how can they tell if it is destroyed? They do fly rather quickly and loitering over the target is a good way to get shot down, hits or misses will kick up the ground or dust/smoke so it can obsecure the target and the target could ditch the vehicle and come back check if it's working/fixable.

Lastly you do need to know what they claimed as "tanks" was known the Allies often called German tanks Tigers due to the impact they could have so often it is all ground vehicles.

So yeah they would over estimate the number of effective kills and likely included a range of targets.

Oh also the Soviets Ptabs were intended to be used vs convoys where the odds of hitting are better plus it was the flying tank, your flak is invalid!

 

[Mjarr]

We could put it in perspective like this:
-A bomb that falls nearby may break optics, knock off wheels, tracks and alike even in armoured vehicles. Something with a soft skin or thin armour may have it worse with fragmentation and whatnot, depending on the bomb type.
-It requires massive courage to keep moving on a road when you're being strafed with something that may pierce the roof, immobilise the vehicle, cause minor damage or in general cause a major roadblock that in general halts movement even if actual casualties were just ten trucks and one tank with detached track. If the movement is halted in the middle of the column on already narrow road there will be temporary traffic issues even if they can somehow push the offending vehicle away in the scenario everyone laughs at aircraft and their peashooters like in a Monty Python sketch gone wrong, which in turn is likely to result in more of such situations.
-Overclaiming and errors of target confirmation and hitconfirm and whatnot were pretty common all over the place since it is pretty hard to see things properly in the air, let alone on ground from time to time. Most German tanks being reported as Tigers despite the closest big cat was far, far far away from their location anyone?
-Boogeyman that stalks all over the place is more (un)fondly remembered even if its actual impact was not as profound as claimed, if still obviously notable because say, having a bomb droped in very close proximity isn't something most sane people would scoff off. At the same time you would have a hard time convincing say, a Landser in 1944 with the help of a time machine that how some thing was utterly ineffective with hindsight knowledge that sounds utterly ridiculous compared to his base of knowledge and whatnot.

 

[Acaios]

http://www.allworldwars.com/Conversations-with-a-Stuka-Pilot-Paul-Werner-Hozzel.html

this is a very interesting lecture. I quote a little part:

After we had obtained some mastery in diving the JU-87, we practiced dive bombing during dives; first with cement bombs, finally with live ammunition until we found our bombing accuracy was satisfactory. This meant that our bombs had to be within the 10-meter circle. A high bombing accuracy in diving was, in fact, the criterion of the Stuka weapon as compared to bomb dropping over wider areas from level bombing. The Stukas were, therefore, predestined for fighting pinpoint targets, preferably hangars, aircraft boxes, barracks, arms and ammunition factories in the enemy's back country; also bunker lines, artillery positions, tanks on the battlefield, and the like.
[...]
But I can tell you now, it depends on how near the pilot approached the target in dropping the bomb—for example, into the belly of the tank. If we would have achieved a near hit, it could tear the tracks from the wheels, you see. This could happen and it happened several times.

 

[krieger11b]

I watched an interview with a German tanker from WW2, they debated if in an air attack when in a tank to run for cover or just stay in the tank. He would stay in the tank because when you ran out of the tank that is when the bombs, rockets and bullets were way more effective at killing the crew.

As discussed the most effective thing was to attack supply lines, a tank without fuel, spare parts or ammo is the worlds most expensive paper weight.

I read Otto Carius's autobiography years ago, I don't even recall him mentioning aircraft.

In the end it seems like a lot more was spent in trying to kill tanks than was actually lost in tanks. Plus those bombs, rockets and bullets were not attacking soft targets when attacking tanks. So the most effective way of protecting supply lines other than Flak is to have a tank be a CAS magnet?

 

[angelosnau]

Not if this tank is your target...
View attachment 148298

This is more of a fort that a tank.Tanks need high mobility(blitzkrieg tactics don't work otherwise).This one is practically immobile.

 

[angelosnau]

Hans Rudel destroyed 519 tanks by flying stukas.

 

[Jeremy971]

- Tanks may not be susceptible to 20mm cannon fire, but trucks, encampments, barges and supply dumps area. CAS aircraft roaming at will over Northern France caused havoc with Germany's logistics (and injured Rommel, their commander or therabouts (can't remember if he was overall in charge, or 2IC or similar, but I think he was up there) at the time).

So CAS would be efficient to destroy soft targets and supllies.

My previous opinion was the CAS have to be efficients against armors. It's why I used them ingame to attack ground units at the same time than my divisions. But the best way to use them is against ennemy logistic lines. Isn't it ?

And I think it's hard to show the psychological effect of CAS in HOI4. But obviously, I would be scared to be killed by a 500kg bomb in a big metal box.

Rudel flew 2,530 combat missions claiming a total of 2,000 targets destroyed; including 800 vehicles, 519 tanks, 150 artillery pieces, 70 landing craft, nine aircraft, four armored trains, several bridges, a destroyer, two cruisers, and the Soviet battleship Marat.

The article said that CAS pilots lied a lot about their victories. Sometimes they pretended to kill 100 tanks but only 50 tanks have been destroyed on the battlefield.