was the Me-262 able to turn the tide of war if introduced earlier?

hey guyz,

i was looking at the combat records for Me-262 groups and it looks like if these planes were introduced a year or so early, they would have changed the tide of war for germany, but still wanna hear wat u guyz got to say abt this, coz Me-262's equipped with R4M rockets were the first units from German Luftwaffe to inflict massive losses on Allied Air Forces, especially bomber formations, i even read the comment of a Me-262 pilot, he was saying the scene after firing R4M's into bomber formations was like someone had emptied a huge ashtray, wings broken, fueselage's shattered, engines ripped off...

gimme ur comments

 

I think some on here would take exception to the assertion that 'Me 262s.... were the first to effect massive losses on Allied Air Forces'.......there weren't too many around at Schweinfurt in '43.....and the plodding old Bf110 was able to inflict great damage at night over places such as Berlin '43 and Nuremberg / Mailly-le-Camp in early '44......

 

as Martin suggests, Hitler's so-called advanced weapons achieved nothing that couldn't have been achieved by expending similar resources on 'conventional' weapons. IIRC the number of Me 262s that saw actual combat was less than 150 for 800 odd constructed. Most of those were deployed as bombers of course, not necessarily because the leader said they should be, but because the average Luftwaffe fighter pilot wasn't necessarily trained on instruments or had any twin-engined experience... So your 'what if' needs to assume plenty of other factors linked to pilot training, engine reliability, deployment strategy et etc....

 

okay...lets assume that Me-262's:

> did not saw much combat (as my friend here says 150/800).
> were not able to inflict massive damage.

so if not at least massive, but as i have read, they were at least able to inflict significant damages wd their devastating Mk-108 30mm cannons and R4M rockets (first air-to-air) missile, still they had taken:

> The Allied fighter and bomber pilots by surprise.
> They were effective at least against bomber formations. that means if used in huge numbers, they had the capablity to put a finger on the allied bombing campaign raging over germany.

Would they have turned the tide of war?

 

Without getting into wacky 'what ifs' ( eg I'm sure the tide of war would have been turned if the Luftwaffe had vast numbers of Me262s in May 1940...) I don't think the bomber campaign would have stalled. At night, the 262 was virtually useless due its lack of low-speed capability and tendency to 'flame-out'. So RAF Bomber Command would have continued.

In daylight, they would have caused great difficulties for the USAAF. But, considerable efforts would have been used to hamper production. Also, the Allied fighter pilots would have very quickly honed the skills used later in the war ie : to catch the Me262 at its most vulnerable, approaching or leaving its own airfields. Because of their limited range, the 'huge numbers' of 262s would have had to be brought to forward airbases in the Low Countries where interdiction by Allied Tactical Airforces would have been a real problem.

Or, to put it another way, maybe the large fleets of 262s could have been decisive if the Allies had done nothing to counter them.

Which is highly unlikely.

 

The answer is simply "no". The Me-262 was introduced too late. It needed long runways which were not available at many fields. In August 1944 , test were made by Kommando Schenck at Chateaudun , but after two weeks he was forced to move to Etampes and withdraw to Germany days later because of the advancing allies. the lack of pilots was another dramatic aspect. It would take months before enough would be ready, and at the rate things were going, even if assuming the industry would have bben able to built enough kites, the amount of trained and experienced pilots being shot down exceeded those who were ready to fly the Me-262. As a result only a minority of LW pilots could actually fly it.

 

No weapons system of WWII, save the Atomic Bomb, can be considered a war winning one. ENIGMA comes close for the number of Axis forces lost and operations compremised by it, but strictly speaking it is not itself a weapon system. Any conventional weapon system however good it might be could only dominate one small portion of the battlespace, and then only if the people who used and commanded them were poperly trained to do so.

A good example of this is the Russian T-34/KV-1 tanks. at the time of start of the German invasion Russia had 800+ of these tanks available for use, with more coming off production lines every month. As this number represents about 1/3 of the total Axis tanks available, all inferior to the T-34/KV-1, and some 19,000 other Soviet tanks equal to or slightly inferior to Axis tanks.

Conventional wisdom would suggest a complete German failure, but the opposite was the case. German Panzer forces routinely shredded Soviet Tank formation in 1941 and 42.

Now if Germany deployed Squadrons of Die Glocke, manned by SS Doomtroopers and expanded their Secret Antartic underground (Ice?) bases the Allies would have been gonners for sure!

 

I recall the engine had to be changed like after some hours of flying time so that would be a major problem for the engine production factories, as quite many engines would be used for changing old engines away instead of putting them to new ones. Also the fact that several piston engine planes would be used for protecting Me-262´s taking off and landing means a big piece of Luftwaffe missing active service. And still if the pressure would be focused on Me-262 air fields I am sure not many Me 262´s would be taking off.

 

If they have more 262's which were more time consuming and costly to make with engines that used more strategic and rare materials (the engines had a life of 10-25 hours due to lack of some metals for parts) what would have to have been cut. Airframe production outstripped engine production for new aircraft without the replacement engine's required for operational and training units.

The whole German economy was a huge juggling act to try and provide all that was needed to each industry, to provide the steel for an enlarged U Boat program they cut munitions production, for a long time cuts were made in many industry's to focus on tank production including the demobbing of tank factory workers who had served less than 3 months in the forces.

 

in my studies of over 45 years on Kommando Welter the only flame out occurring was on one mission anti-Mossie by a twin seater. true engine performance lacked a large prob was ineffective long range even with twin seater external fuel tanks dropping off mileage appreciably and the extent of the four 3cm firing range and overbright conditions, in fact this was the most noteable complaint by the pilots. Tests did not arrise for the placement of four forward fring 2cm weapons which would of been ideal bringing down any Allied fighter and or bomber if engaged. the simplistic stupidity of having jets chase twin seat Mossies was bad enough and not the pursuit as number # 1 of the larger 4-engine bomber only come March of 45 in correspondence noted did K. Welter conclude that the 4 engines were the main mission and not the pursuit of Mossies coming towards and leaving Berlin.

 

i think the later (JUMO 004) engines had a flytime of something like 26hrs....reasonable for the first generation jet fighter, and the cannon prob was solved after they got R4Ms which were far more devastating than the 30mm kannone

 

the R4M just like the earlier Br 21cm types were a broadcast weapon to break up Bomber formations and create the chaos needed for the jets to close in from the rear for the coup de grace with the 3cm cannon

 

you may b right Erich here, but as we all have read records of combat pilots, and even allied fighters seem to believe the fact that just one hit from the R4M was able to take down even the most sturdy so-called B-17 "Flying Fortress". and that way, the JV44 and JG7 were using their planes and armament to full potential. The result of a hit from r4m is here:

View attachment 15678

 

The psychological aspect was just as devastating if not more. The fact that this single hit was possible, although, far from systematic was a blow to the morale of bomber crews.

 

as i think...and as I have read Adolf Galland's book, bombers got frequently hit from those rockets....and even if it was to blow morale of bomber crews, it was working gr8...coz those men knew that if they even catch a sight of a jet, they would be getting toasted

 

your jpg is not from a R4M hit but from either air to air cannon rounds or Flak. JV 44's success with R4M is quite debateable with fewere than 50 victories to their credit and the first unit III./JG 7's history explains that even not all jets from that gruppe were so equipped in march through May of 45 when they finally flew agasint Soviet A/C and ground targets. the most successful arms were the forward firing cannons.

as I stated earlier the rocket concept was to break up the consolidation of the Bomber formation and thus allow heavy fighters to close in during the chaos picking off wounded stragglers or the bombers as they tried to form up again into a box. Too much credit is given to the R4M as a weapon of destruction. bomber crews were often upset that the power turrets could not track the jet as it went through their formations as this is the re for so-called fear of jets forming up high and behind ready for a rear attack.

no doubt as pointed out earlier the jet pilots knew that only on the flat to flat ratio had they the fortitude to be almost invincable with their speed but in a tight turning situation they were dead in the air the Mustang proved with the agility able to cut the jet off and shoot the engines out and the landing approcah even with the increasing useage of 2cm Fla positions for airfield protection.

 

The B-24 in the photo posted in this thread was not hit by an R4M rocket. It was hit by flak over Blechhammer, Germany.

Midair Explosion - B-24 - Awesome Stories

 

okay...lets leave the R4M's but still Me-262 was something that scared the sh!t outta allied bomber crews and may be fighters too....and the rate they were taking on the allied aircraft, could they have made a difference if introduced earlier? coz Germans would've got more time developing the improved engines and they could may also rectify the teething problems....and once they were solved, The Me-262 would've been simply unstoppable.....

 

Some very good points...
We are talking about rockets here...something that could be strapped onto any aircraft...If more FW190s were built over the 109, things may have been different in terms of how things panned out...but the end result would be the same. The US and Britain would have ramped up rocket and jet aircraft tech...tactics...Like say a mortar positioned at the back of the 17s...firing "grit" balls, small finger nail size scraps of metal...all fired at once in a general direction could put a blanket of crap behind them...and the 004s suck in the crap...just an example of how thinking would have changed.

 

in the beginnings sure a fast zoom and climb A/C that could not be tracked or in the face of a Jug or Stang being passed up and not being able to intercept at least the first several months of late 44 till the US got wind of how to tackle the Schwalbe. the legend or shall we say myth seemed to dissolve quick enough while the bomber crews felt very content even with 262's around that US escorts would be in plenty to take on the attacking jets. after outsdie and impressive figures even in earlier 42/43 as spoken in truth the Allies would of found suitable means in A/C production types to deal with the jet issue even back in earlier war.