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The Bomber Will Always Get Through
Topic Started: Jan 8 2014, 12:01 PM (207 Views)
Basil Fawlty
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Post Tenebras Lux
There's something I don't fully understand about early fighter doctrine. Why were the Allies routinely able to dogfight with enemy fighters and ground attack aircraft over the Western Front in World War I, but not with heavy bombers? Why didn't the same technical difficulties of interception before radar preclude interception (at least in the air) of incoming reconnaissance and ground-support planes? On first blush one might expect them to be even harder to intercept, due to their greater speed, despite their lower operating altitude.
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Simon Darkshade
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Nefarious Swashbuckler
Heavy bombers in the WW1 sense were used differently and not present over the immediate battlefield area. By the time they were detected by observers and the news passed down to fighter squadrons, their position would be different.

In terms of strategic bombing, the case study to examine is the German bombing of Britain, which presented its own challenges.

When Baldwin made the actual remark, it was pre-radar and bombers were faster than fighters, not to mention after more than a decade of Douhetian theories being hammered into place.
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Basil Fawlty
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Post Tenebras Lux
I suppose what I am asking is, how was the situation so different that word could not be passed in time to get up to interception altitude? Obviously there is a much bigger area to cover; but given a likely target (London) why was it not possible to have regular fighter patrols in place already to intercept the incoming Gothas? And how was this different from the regular patrols over the Western Front to intercept fighters and recon planes?
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Simon Darkshade
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Nefarious Swashbuckler
The Gothas attacked at night.

Communications were slow and buggy compared to those of the 1930s and aircraft took longer to climb to altitude.
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Basil Fawlty
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Post Tenebras Lux
I think there were some daylight raids. I remember reading about one that resulted in a bomber shot down for two British fighters.

Is that it, then? Night bombing was impossible to intercept.
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Simon Darkshade
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Nefarious Swashbuckler
Until airborne radar is in service (late 1940 in @), it was very difficult indeed for a night fighter to bag a bomber. WW1 fighters shot down Zeppelins, but they were slower moving and bigger targets.
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Vonar Roberts
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Lack of radios in every aircraft probably also had something to do with it
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Simon Darkshade
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Nefarious Swashbuckler
Yes, that was a very significant factor.
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