S3 Series

As the title says, how do we best cover the TBF's?
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The TBF's will be low or mid alt at best.
They are way slower than the IJN late war fighters.
They cannot turn with the IJN fighters.
Their defensive armament is limited.
They can't take nearly as much punishment as multi-engine bombers before dying.
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So pretty much if the IJN get to our strikers they will be like foxes in a henhouse with their 4x20 mm cannons. Also if we, the Corsairs, try to fly NOE or low alt when the IJN attacks then our fighters are in big trouble. Our F4U's are the boom n zoom types and not knife fighters. The enemy N1K1-J is better at turn-n-burning and packs a severe punch even when hitting you with small bursts. If we get caught low then we can expect to lose a lot of men, if not whole squads.

At what alt should we be once the IJN knows our location? We will probably have to fly NOE until target or spotted by scouts. Once the enemy finds us, I strongly suggest to power climb like madmen so that we can at least be at the same alt as incoming IJN forces or even dive down upon them if they come in low looking for TBF's. (The enemy will expect our strikers to be NOE).

Where is the best position to fly in relation to our TBF's?
In front of them? If so, by how many miles?
Mixed up?
A combination of both?

How do we cover them at target? My suggestion is ~15 000 ft alt. It's easy to dive down from that alt, you can see the TBF's and won't be sitting ducks when the IJN shows up. The questions then is if we patrol right above the base being attacked, or CAP a few miles out from the IJN field to catch the enemy as they race towards it.


<S>
/Robert
XO 4th FG

My thoughts also Robert. Big Blue needs speed and alt to be effective in air to air. Escorting NOE will not work. We will loose our bombers and most our fighters as Enemy fighters will has all the advantages.

More effective escorting would be advanced fighter sweeps with higher fighters embedded with the TBFs.

Corsairs may effective with NOE hit and run strikes, but not covering our slow and defenseless TBF friends from a low alt.

Oskar

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Best case scenario is a target time exact to the second wherein the escorts can be as high as possible and come down in flights to attack and reset.
ANY escort that is low or medium height and less than 250mph indicated will be without choices in a fighter fight.

An EXACT time and route to target is the only way to not have a very difficult time.

If there is not an exact route and time then the escorts will take certain routes to target to show no direct target choice but arrive as high as possible and and fast as possible speed to sweep north to south of initial target 173.

The bombers need to be VERY flexible to abort and wait for next opportunity to attack.

Suggested

Juice

Concur prof. I am leaning towards sending another flight towards 172 as backup and high cover. Events will dictate response...