Microsoft® Combat Flight Simulator 3.0 Air Force Historical Research Agency Photo UNDERSTANDING THE TACTICAL AIR WAR handbook Subject: CONTENTS Contents o ration Phot rds Administ es and Reco onal Archiv Nati Welcome to the Tactical Air War! ... 1 Air Force Historical Research Ag ency Photo Events and People in the Tactical Air War ................. 7 Key Players in the Tactical Air War: The CFS3 Hall of Fame ............... 21 Acknowledgements...... 30 Recommended Reading... 32 Glossary.............. 36 *** ES MEN AND MACHIN REMEMBER: OUR LOT LIKE LOOK A ON THE GROUND RS. THEI A B-26 MARAUDER FLIES OVE R THE NORMANDY INVASION FLEET. Agency Photo Air Force Historical Research UNDING BY AFTER A PO RAIL CARS S. TER BOMBER ALLIED FIGH Authorized licensees of this game may print (or have printed at their expense) a single copy of this manual for their personal home use in conjunction with the play and use of the game on this CD. Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR Welcome to the Tactical Air War! So you thought you were going to be a "knight of the air," jousting high in the clean blue sky, far above the clouds and even farther from the mud and squalor of the war on the ground. Instead you find yourself in a fighter bomber, scraping over hostile territory at 200 feet with the terrain rising to meet you. You're flying down the muzzles of massed antiaircraft guns and dodging small arms fire to attack enemy airfields, trains, tanks, trucks, and troops. Performing masthead-level attacks on enemy shipping adds its own thrills and threats. Some of your targets have more and bigger guns than a whole formation of bombers. If enemy fire doesn't get you, the blast and debris from your own low-level bombing and strafing can bring you down. In this kind of war there's more danger and less glory for everyone. Welcome to the tactical air war, pal! "Schlachtfliegerei" Schlacht means slaughter. Schlachtfliegerei means ground attack, the most dangerous and least glamorous part of wartime flying. There is no room here for romantic illusion, no pretense of chivalry; one is down on the deck where the targets (people, vehicles, installations, and fortifications) may be clearly seen. The ground attack pilot is exposed to every bit of flak, every machine gun, every rifle, every pistol. Denied him is the acclaim accorded fighter pilots. The chances of winning fame as a Schlachtflieger are as slim as those of survival.... --From Jay P. Spenser, Focke-Wulf 190: Workhorse of the Luftwaffe "WE TOOK A BIT OF A BEATING ON THE GROUND BUT BOY DID WE DISH IT OUT IN THE AI R." --General Elwood "Pete" Quesada -1- Air Force Historical Research Ag ency Photo Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR on the tactical air war WHAT REALLY HAPPENED: The lowdown SETTLED BY MID-1943 THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE HAD PILOTS ON BOTH INTO A DEADLY PATTERN FOR FIGHTER EGIC AIR WAR; SIDES. MOST WERE INVOLVED IN THE STRAT THEIR PRIMARY ROLE, ESCORTING OR ATTACKING BOMBERS WAS 0 TO 30,000 AND COMBAT IN THE FRIGID SKIES AT 20,00 FEET WAS THE NORM. OF AS THE POSSIBILITY OF AN ALLIED INVASION THE TACTITHE CONTINENT TOOK ON GROWING CERTAINTY, EMPHASIZED A CAL AIR WAR IN THE WEST HEATED UP AND SUPPORT. THIS DIFFERENT PILOT ROLE--FLYING CLOSE AIR THE DECK FOR A ROLE PUT WOULD-BE HIGH FLYERS DOWN ON ROUND TEAMDIFFERENT KIND OF WARFARE BASED ON AIR-G OF THE ARMY WORK. FIGHTER-BOMBER PILOTS WERE PART T THE ADVANCE TEAM, WITH DIRECT RESPONSIBILITY TO ASSIS KEEPING ENEMY OF FRIENDLY FORCES ON THE GROUND, WHILE BULLETS, BOMBS, TROOPS AND SUPPLY LINES REELING UNDER AND ROCKETS. POWER AS THE GERMAN ARMY HAD ALWAYS VIEWED AIR D. CLOSE AIR SUBORDINATE TO THE FORCES ON THE GROUN ADVANCE OF SUPPORT, USING AIRCRAFT TO ASSIST THE D, WAS A CENTROOPS AND MOBILE FORCES ON THE GROUN E BETWEEN 1939 TRAL PART OF THE BLITZKRIEG ACROSS EUROP OF COMBAT IN AND 1940. IT WAS ALSO A BASIC FEATURE THE WAR IN THE THE CAULDRON OF THE EASTERN FRONT. AS THE ALLIED INVAWEST INTENSIFIED, ESPECIALLY AFTER THE GERMANS SION OF FRANCE COMMENCED IN JUNE 1944, TACTICAL SERPRESSED MORE AND MORE AIRCRAFT INTO IGN AGAINST VICE EVEN AS THE STRATEGIC BOMBING CAMPA FOR HIGH-ALTIGERMANY INCREASED THE LUFTWAFFE'S NEED S HAD TO TUDE INTERCEPTORS. BF 109 AND FW 190 PILOT FLOOD OF STRAFE AND DIVE BOMB TO STOP OR SLOW THE S. JU 88 MEDIUM MEN AND MATERIEL OF THE INVADING ARMIE NG ALTITUDE BOMBERS SWOOPED DOWN FROM NORMAL BOMBI DO THE MOST TO PLACE THEIR ORDNANCE WHERE IT WOULD EVEN THE NEW GOOD: RIGHT IN THE LAPS OF THE ENEMY. CAL AIR WAR. GERMAN JETS SAW SOME SERVICE IN THE TACTI THE THE ALLIES TOOK LONGER TO FULLY EMBRACE COMBAT AIRCRAFT, POTENTIAL OF A TACTICAL ROLE FOR 1943 AND 1945 BUT PERFECTED CLOSE AIR SUPPORT BETWEEN TO THE TACBY ADDING NEW TECHNOLOGICAL VARIATIONS TED BY AIR TICAL THEME. ALLIED PILOTS (BEING DIREC D TO ENEMY GROUND FORCE LIAISON OFFICERS ON THE GROUN ESCORT, TARGETS, FRIENDLY FORMATIONS IN NEED OF A BLITZKRIEG OF OR INCOMING BANDITS) CARRIED OUT IN THE ENEMY THEIR OWN AGAINST ANYTHING THAT MOVED , MUSTANGS, TYPHOONS, SECTOR. THUNDERBOLTS, LIGHTNINGS R DUTY TEMPESTS, AND SPITFIRES FLEW FIGHTER BOMBE WHILE MITCHELL, TO SUPPORT THE WAR ON THE GROUND, FORMIDABLE MARAUDER, AND MOSQUITO BOMBERS ADDED THE AND CANNON TO THE STRAFING POWER OF MULTIPLE GUNS DESTRUCTIVE FORCE OF THEIR BOMBS. LINE FOR BOTH SIDES, DETERMINING THE PRECISE A FLUID AND BETWEEN FRIENDLY AND ENEMY TERRITORY IN CULTIES TACCLOSE-FOUGHT SITUATION ADDED TO THE DIFFI TICAL PILOTS ALREADY FACED. -2- Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR Altitude is still your friend...but you've got less of it to work with! From a tactical pilot's point of view, you've got one strike against you as soon as you leave your base and head into enemy territory--you're flying close to the deck without the luxury of altitude. Altitude is life to a fighter pilot, providing the high ground from which to attack enemy aircraft, as well as room in which to dive away from attackers. Flying five or six miles above the ground provides plenty of room for maneuvering, attacking, and evading. For a fighter bomber pilot altitude is still your friend, but you've got a lot less of it to work with since most missions are flown at 12,000 feet or lower (usually much lower), right on down to the deck. "The Mission of the Tactical Air Force" MISSIONS--The mission of the tactical air force consists of three phases of operations in the following order of priority: First priority--To gain the necessary degree of air superiority. This will be accomplished by attacks against aircraft in the air and on the ground, and against those enemy installations that he requires for the application of air power. Second priority--To prevent the movement of hostile troops and supplies into the theater of operations or within the theater. Third priority--To participate in the combined effort of the air and ground forces, in the battle area, to gain objectives on the immediate front of the ground forces. --From War Department Field Manual FM 100-20: Command and Employment of Air Power (21 July 1943) USAF Museum Photo Archives DOUGLAS A-20 MEDIUM BOMBER IN LOW-LEVEL ATTACK ON CHERBOURG PENINSULA. A THUND ER PLETE G BOLT CARRIES TH RO GUNS, B UND ATTACK AR E COMSENAL: OMBS, A ND ROCK ETS. -3- ncy Photo ical Research Age Air Force Histor Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR A few additional worries In addition to reduced altitude and the hail of flak and small arms fire coming up at you as you approach targets on the ground, you have a few additional worries as a fighter-bomber pilot: - Encountering airfield defenses. If you and your buddies swoop down to beat up an enemy airfield, the guy who flies through first is the lucky one, because he might catch the antiaircraft defenses off guard. By the time the rest of you approach the target those gunners are wide awake and filling the air with flak. - Pulling up in time. Diving a heavy, powerful aircraft from low altitude makes for a thrilling pullout, if you're lucky. If you're not both attentive and lucky, you may fixate on the target until it's too late to pull out. - Identifying appropriate targets--now! While you're thinking about the target, the flak, and the need to pull out before you become part of the landscape, you also need to make sure that the target you're attacking belongs to the enemy. Skimming along at low altitude and high speed over a crowded battlefield doesn't give you a lot of time to make vital decisions. Are those enemy troops? Are you sure the squat form of a heavy tank glimpsed through foliage is an appropriate target? You may never know for sure whose cause will profit from the bombs you just dropped. - And finally, getting caught in your own explosions. When you attack surface targets from low altitude you risk getting caught in explosions of your own making. Trains and motorized transport full of fuel and ammo, the volatile contents of fuel and ordnance dumps, and even locomotives with a boiler full of high-pressure steam--all of these targets can blow up in a big way, filling a once empty piece of sky with pinwheeling chunks of shrapnel. Even the roadway beneath enemy vehicles can be hazardous, as bomb blasts can heave hunks of pavement into the same airspace you're occupying. Three Critical Factors for Fighter Bomber Pilots ...strafing passes... bring out three critical factors in a fighter bomber pilot's war.... One, any misjudgment, target fixation, or too-late attempts at aiming corrections will send the airplane into the target, ground, or nearby trees or other obstructions. Two, if the target is a load of ammunition or other explosives, it can--and very likely will--explode right in the pilot's face, sending up a fireball, truck parts, slabs of highway, stillto-explode ammo, and other debris right into the path of the airplane. Three, if a pilot is seriously hit by flak in [a] low-altitude attack, his chances of ever reaching enough altitude to allow a bailout are slim indeed.... --From Bill Colgan, World War II Fighter Bomber Pilot -4- Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR Another little problem: Enemy fighters While you're concentrating on the enemy below, don't forget the most dangerous and persistent threat any combat pilot faces: enemy fighters attacking from superior altitude. Getting bounced from above while going after ground targets is an ever-present danger, so you and your buddies have got to take turns flying combat air patrol over the target area to keep the opposition busy while the rest of the team beats up targets on the ground. Now this kind of teamwork is what you joined up to do, right? Not quite. You'll be craning your neck and straining your eyes to spot incoming bandits, mixing it up with enemy fighters as you match your skills against skilled adversaries, but remember, this is dogfighting with a difference. Even if you're flying a relatively light and nimble fighter, your plane's ordnance load makes it heavier and less responsive; you can drop like a rock in a dive. Power and gravity combine to eat up altitude in a hurry, and the ground is never very far away. If you're flying one of the heavyweights in your air force's inventory, the ground can reach up and grab you. In a P-47 Thunderbolt or a Do 335 Arrow, or even a big German jet, you've got to juggle the need to get the target in your sights against the need to pull out in time. If you cut it too fine, you can haul back on the stick to point the nose up at what appears to be the last moment and discover that your plane simply won't cooperate. With all its weight and power, it will continue to sink despite your best efforts and "mush" right into the ground. Results You Can See "There were times we could actually see our troops move forward after we had knocked out a German 88 or tank that was holding up the column. We knew we were making a difference." --Veteran fighter bomber pilot Quentin Aanenson "I don't believe in all this divebombing [stuff], it ain't natural." Many new fighter-bomber pilots longed for the classic fighterpilot role they'd read and dreamed about, in which the ground was for the ground-pounders and the sky above the clouds was reserved for dashing aviators. This made for a difficult adjustment: ...fighter pilots were slow to appreciate the value of close-support operations. One flyer aptly summarized the rank-and-file perception of the new task when he said... "I don't believe in all this dive-bombing [stuff], it ain't natural." --Thomas A. Hughes, Over Lord: General Pete Quesada and the Triumph of Tactical Air Power in World War II Agency Photo ical Research Air Force Histor ROYED IV TANK DEST A GERMAN MK TACK. BY AERIAL AT -5- Subject: TACTICAL AIR WAR The payoff: Unique satisfactions So given the catalog of dangers, why would you want to fly close air support missions? Because this job provides some unique satisfactions: - Even if you're a loner--and many fighter pilots are--there's a lot to be said for being part of a team; especially if it's a winning team. Protecting your guys on the grou ...