I beleive that the me-262 was first designed to be a pure fighter, with its crazy fast speed and whatnot. It could have made dogmeat out of even the fastest allied fighters, such as the p-38. I read that Hitler actually delayed the production of this machine about a year to have it converted to a bomber. is this true? why not have it escort heavy bombers? Hitler was just so obsessed with the idea of bombing the hell out of England i guess...

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The Me-262 was a step ahead of everyone else, however if you have no fuel or pilots or safe airports to land it does you no good in the long run.
Allied aircraft used to lurk around the landing fields the jets used and shoot them down in the pattern or on the ground. The lack of certain metals in Germany made their engines last a few hours of flight time. I forget the exact number but it was about 10. Then you needed two new engines. Combat experienced pilots were also in short supply so it does you no good to have a hot jet and a rookie pilot. Some exceptions to this were true and they took out many allied aircraft. But overall I don't think they alone could have turned the tide of the war for Germany, just prolonged the outcome. The Russian hords were on the march and jets would not have stopped them. Jets burn tons of fuel at low alitude so they would not work well as ground attack aircraft against the Russian Army.

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Hi screamingEagle the site with the best information to check out I have found about the 262 is www.wilpedia.org/wilki/Messerchmitt_Me_262
gregm

another is
www.speakeasy.org/`melfetcher/me.262.html

The Luftwaffe had no heavy bombers to escort. Hitler viewed the aircraft as a tactical bomber for use against invasion forces and some historians hold the view that in some ways he could have been right.

The myth that the entire 262 programme was thrown out of kilter by Hitler has been shown by researchers such as Smith&Creek etc to have been false - the main delays were occasioned by engine development problems and production/design difficulties due to Allied bombing.

Despite being a great aircraft, it wasn't a 'wonder-fighter', being twin-engined it was no dog-fighter and had to rely completely on 'bouncing' its opponents.

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Speaking of ME262 anyone seen this.

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Personally, I don't understand the fascination with the Me 262. It was one of a group of first generation jet aircraft that appeared roughly at the same time. It certainly was not the first of its type by any stretch.
Henkel's He 280 flew before it, as did Britain's Meteor. The US P-59 Airacomet was also contemporary.
Had the Luftwaffe or Hitler forced earlier production of the 262 (unlikely given Willy Messerschmitt's problems in getting the airframe right...ie things like abandoning the tail dragger design etc. and, Junkers problems with the 004 engine) it likely would have entered service with alot of technical baggage needing fixing. I also think if it was recognized as a substancail threat to the Allies they would have responded with their own jets (like the P-80 and Meteor III) more quickly as a counter. On the whole, the Me 262 was not going to alter the course of the war substancially on its own.

They had FW 190 fighter bomber and already were developing the Arado 234 for jet bomber.I guess Hitler could not have enough bombers then?!

Arado

http://www.vectorsite.net/avar234.html

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[quote]Originally posted by T. A. Gardner:

Quote:

Personally, I don't understand the fascination with the Me 262.

But it's true that there was an ever greater fascination at the time.

An overly-pessimistic January 1945 report on the state of the German jet fighter programme was presented by the USSTAF's Chief of Intelligence, Brig-Gen MacDonald, in which it was stated ; -

'Maintenenace of Allied Air Superiority over Europe in 1945 is confronted by a serious threat. This threat menaces both continuance of our Strategic bombardment and the superiority, bot offesnively and defensively, of the fighter-bomber cover under which our troops fight'. ( quoted by Sebastian Cox in 'Firestorm', London 2006 ).

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thats some pretty awesome stuff richard.

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Thanks, it's great to see these old planes fly again.

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Are you talking about these replicas?

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Here is a good picture of one, although Martin may differ !!

http://www.baileyprints.com/rbailey/...o-midnight.htm

I think a 30mm cannon hit would have done more damage but I guess it is artistic license.

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totally artistic license, the wooden wonder was swiss cheese .............

~ I know the German pilot as well as the radio operator that bailed out, sadly the pilot did not. this painting/the true story of the Mossie downing will be covered at length in our book and one of the happiest moments in my life was connecting up the two adversariess for a moment back in time reunion.............

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