Comments by "William Cox" (@WildBillCox13) on "The A6M Naval Carrier Fighter - Zero or Hero?" video.

  1. Ki-43. Like the Churchill tank, it was the perfect answer for problems presented by the last war.
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  2. Subbed to yours, MAH/Bismarck, and MHV/MHNV. And the Shipyard, after your referral. With that said . . . Classic WarPlanes that were effectively eviscerated due to official intransigence? Meet the Bell P39; a high altitude interceptor denied its supercharger. No supercharger? Have fun below 5000m! And Ta-154 wants to know your location. Lend a buddy a cuppa Tegofilm, willya?
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  3. Claims versus reality. WT and WoWP (et al) have extensively modeled the aerial combat environment. Even then, with full understanding, claims do not closely follow reality, as evidenced in the number of influencer gamers who complain that their kills were "stolen" or marred by "wtf" incidents. Imagine forty wildly maneuvering planes, all firing MGs and cannon, thousands of 20mm or 12.7mm rounds crisscrossing the zone; who can predict or deduct just whose random round kills or killed an enemy pilot-or a friendly? Individual pilots want to be heroes. Planners want all individual initiative squashed under the weight of the overall plan . . . unless someone's individual initiative saves the day. And, even then, acknowledgement is given grudgingly, as unity-not individuality- is always the order of the day. With that said, every enemy plane I engaged, no matter the range, or my level of inebriation, I shot down. By my memory, that amounts to about 1000 kills. Yeah-that sounds about right.
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  4. Part of the proscription against dogfighting lay in official doctrine. Go to Periscope FIlms and watch the P47, P51, and F4U familiarisation tutorials from the war. In every case pilots are warned against maneuvering/aerobatic engagements. The impression given is that :"your plane is not a toy. It has gee limits a foolish pilot can exceed."
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  5. Good job, Justin. Few folks realize that Frankenstein wasn't the monster's name. He thought of himself as "Abby Normal".
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  6. Commenting on the rabbit hole paradigm, two good, indicative, competitive, fighter aircraft stats are: what manifold pressure can it sustain through its altitude range? And what's its roll rate at combat altitudes (usually low) and speed (usually low)? After all, Zero's best roll rate came at about 150-200mph below 6000', where P40's was 350mph at the same altitude. Since combat speeds are usually far below 350mph, the P40 was not cut out for a turning fight. That's why we developed Dive and Zoom tactics. The Zero was, however. Like the Claude and the CR42 before it, that agile little plane was hard for any pilot to give up for anything else.
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