How important were Anti-Air guns in Aerieal Warfare (Esp. WW2)? Why use them considering their poor accuracy and fight is decided by planes in skies?

SlamDunkerista said:

Whenever we hear about defending against Aerial Bombardment and just Military Aircraft in general, we always hear about how the best defensive policy was to counterattack using fighter planes in Modern Warfare esp. WW2. However I notice almost no attention is given to Anti-Air guns at all of their importance.

I'm very curious of this. I read the introductary book to the Battle of Dien Bien Phu,Hell In a Very Small Place 2 years ago and one of the most interesting things about this battle was how French Aircraft-especially the Bombers and Supply Planes-were frequently shot down during the battle and the whole flying to the area was so hazardous that VERY FEW in the French Military volunteered to go to the area and a large number of the planes sent to DBP (including Suppliers) were Americans and other foreigners.

The pilots who flew to DBP often described that there was so much Anti-Air fire that it was far more than all the Anti-Air firing they witnessed in the German Front in WW2(and a large many of them were Veteran pilots who flew multiple missions over Europe during the war) in that battle.

Now this really makes me wonder. Dien Bien Phu was proof of how Anti-Air could neutralize Air Power with Anti-Air guns.

But I never hear of how important Anti-Air guns was in World WAr 2 and Modern Warfare. The one exception being Pearl Harbor where they often portray Anti-Air Gunners as being the prime defenders of the port.

The only thing they ever portray in popular media like Documents on TV and General History books is that to counter Aerial Bombardment you simply send in planes.They portray it to the extent that a base or an Aircraft Carrier can be successfully defended WITHOUT Anti-Air guns of any sort so long as the planes are up before the base or fleet of ships gets bombed

How accurate is this?What were Anti-Air guns real use?Could a base just invest all in fighter planes to defend itself from aerial raids or an Aircraft Carrier completely just go without any AA Guns? Or do they still need Anti-Air guns of some sort?

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Flak: myth versus reality with Donald Nijboer
AA guns where extremely effective and resulted in heavy losses for the RAF and USAAF over Germany. Also AA fire forced allied bomber's to fly at high altitudes and cause more inaccurate bombing. Even if a bomber wasn't shot down it was often damaged so it would be out of service for a while plus flak killed and seriously injured many airmen.
There were allied counter measures such has dropping " chaf" small bits if aluminum to cause German radar screens to jam making it more difficult to direct AA fire especially on cloudy days or nights.
Allied fighter bomber's latter in the war when drop tanks were adopted could attack flak batteries with rockets while they were firing st allied heavy bomber's. Also allied bomber's pilots eere taught never fly in a straight line.
Leftyhunter

SlamDunkerista said:

Whenever we hear about defending against Aerial Bombardment and just Military Aircraft in general, we always hear about how the best defensive policy was to counterattack using fighter planes in Modern Warfare esp. WW2. However I notice almost no attention is given to Anti-Air guns at all of their importance.

I'm very curious of this. I read the introductary book to the Battle of Dien Bien Phu,Hell In a Very Small Place 2 years ago and one of the most interesting things about this battle was how French Aircraft-especially the Bombers and Supply Planes-were frequently shot down during the battle and the whole flying to the area was so hazardous that VERY FEW in the French Military volunteered to go to the area and a large number of the planes sent to DBP (including Suppliers) were Americans and other foreigners.

The pilots who flew to DBP often described that there was so much Anti-Air fire that it was far more than all the Anti-Air firing they witnessed in the German Front in WW2(and a large many of them were Veteran pilots who flew multiple missions over Europe during the war) in that battle.

Now this really makes me wonder. Dien Bien Phu was proof of how Anti-Air could neutralize Air Power with Anti-Air guns.

But I never hear of how important Anti-Air guns was in World WAr 2 and Modern Warfare. The one exception being Pearl Harbor where they often portray Anti-Air Gunners as being the prime defenders of the port.

The only thing they ever portray in popular media like Documents on TV and General History books is that to counter Aerial Bombardment you simply send in planes.They portray it to the extent that a base or an Aircraft Carrier can be successfully defended WITHOUT Anti-Air guns of any sort so long as the planes are up before the base or fleet of ships gets bombed

How accurate is this?What were Anti-Air guns real use?Could a base just invest all in fighter planes to defend itself from aerial raids or an Aircraft Carrier completely just go without any AA Guns? Or do they still need Anti-Air guns of some sort?

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This USAAF training film produced in 1944 goes into great detail about enemy flak particularly that of Germany and acknowledges the German flak is very dangerous but there are methods to minimize the risk. The USAAF even had flak intelligence units to warn bomber crews prior to a mission how to minimize their risk by avoiding as much as possible given areas of German flak concentration.
Leftyhunter

SlamDunkerista said:

Whenever we hear about defending against Aerial Bombardment and just Military Aircraft in general, we always hear about how the best defensive policy was to counterattack using fighter planes in Modern Warfare esp. WW2. However I notice almost no attention is given to Anti-Air guns at all of their importance.

I'm very curious of this. I read the introductary book to the Battle of Dien Bien Phu,Hell In a Very Small Place 2 years ago and one of the most interesting things about this battle was how French Aircraft-especially the Bombers and Supply Planes-were frequently shot down during the battle and the whole flying to the area was so hazardous that VERY FEW in the French Military volunteered to go to the area and a large number of the planes sent to DBP (including Suppliers) were Americans and other foreigners.

The pilots who flew to DBP often described that there was so much Anti-Air fire that it was far more than all the Anti-Air firing they witnessed in the German Front in WW2(and a large many of them were Veteran pilots who flew multiple missions over Europe during the war) in that battle.

Now this really makes me wonder. Dien Bien Phu was proof of how Anti-Air could neutralize Air Power with Anti-Air guns.

But I never hear of how important Anti-Air guns was in World WAr 2 and Modern Warfare. The one exception being Pearl Harbor where they often portray Anti-Air Gunners as being the prime defenders of the port.

The only thing they ever portray in popular media Like a Fire with Heat But No Light Documents on TV and General History books is that to counter Aerial Bombardment you simply send in planes.They portray it to the extent that a base or an Aircraft Carrier can be successfully defended WITHOUT Anti-Air guns of any sort so long as the planes are up before the base or fleet of ships gets bombed

How accurate is this?What were Anti-Air guns real use?Could a base just invest all in fighter planes to defend itself from aerial raids or an Aircraft Carrier completely just go without any AA Guns? Or do they still need Anti-Air guns of some sort?

Click to expand...

Terror in the Skies: North Vietnam’s Light Anti-Aircraft Artillery
Flak was deadly to the US Air Force during the Vietnam War accounting for 77 percent of USAF losses and 52 percent of USN aircraft lost over Vietnam. Also AA fire reduced the accuracy of American bombing and damaged aircraft and crews. The Chinese Army manned many of the flak crews so the North Vietnamese could send their army to fight.
Leftyhunter

There are multiple purpopses of AA guns, but the key one is denial of options.


Let's take the consideration of if there's no AA guns at all. Not a one.

Well, the result of that is that you need an interceptor aircraft to be able to stop a bomber doing whatever it wants. And by whatever it wants I mean - flying over, low altitude, straight and level, and dropping a bomb at very high accuracy (because it's dropped straight and level at low altitude). This means that effectively any target can be hit, and it can be hit easily; units get the crap bombed out of them. Even if there are interceptor aircraft, fighter escort can chase away interceptor aircraft.


But if you have light AA guns around a position, you can force the bombers up higher into the air (out of the range where light AA can just rip the bombers to shreds). Now the bombers are less accurate, because they're higher up and they can't see the target as well, and because there's more random dispersion around the drop point on the way down.

That said, a bomber with a good electronic bomb sight (like the Norden or the SABS) can still get a good level of accuracy if there's no disruption to the attack. The bomb sight takes a couple of minutes of straight and level flight to properly stabilize and work through the calculations, and then it drops the bomb so that it's got a good chance of getting near the target.


So that's why you have heavy AA guns. Heavy AA guns can get a "lock" on an enemy aircraft moving straight and level more quickly than the bomber's own bomb sight can do the same calculations, and a bomber that has to endure sustained shell bursts from heavy AA is very likely to be badly damaged or destroyed.

The bomber has a pretty simple way of avoiding destruction under these circumstances, though - it can jink. A small turn throws off the targeting of the AA gunnery system - but it also throws off the bomber targeting.

And that's how you get to the point where it takes hundreds of bombing sorties to hit a single target. It's because of the AA guns forcing the bombers to bomb from high altitude and to bomb using poor target locks.



As for dive bombers, they're very accurate - and they come down into the effective zone of the light AA at the bottom of the dive. This is why they suffer heavy attrition. Without the light AA you can use the dive bombers much more regularly.

I would of thought the effectiveness of the AA guns would depend on the height and speed of the planes.

I would of expected low flying aircraft to be more vulnerable.

Faramir said:

I would of thought the effectiveness of the AA guns would depend on the height and speed of the planes.

I would of expected low flying aircraft to be more vulnerable.

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Plus how many, what kinds of ammunition and the ability of radar systems to counteract jamming . Also quality of personnel. During the latter part of WWII many German AA crews consisted of Hitler Youth, housewives and Soviet POWs.
Leftyhunter

Faramir said:

I would of thought the effectiveness of the AA guns would depend on the height and speed of the planes.

I would of expected low flying aircraft to be more vulnerable.

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Well, yes. Light flak is generally faster firing and of course has a shorter time of travel from muzzle to target. But heavy flak can reach much higher and has a bigger shell - remember it's the shrapnel that's doing the damage!

Effectiveness isn't always about actual taking out aircraft but reducing their effectiveness in misison,. If AA guns make teh attacking aircraft sufficently inaccurate and deterring from pressing their attacks enough to achieve their objexctive then the AA guns have been successful in their mission. If there is no AA fire at all, well trianed aircrews are going to highly accurate.

Quite, yes.

The merit of aircraft is that they're mobile, but of course they're far more expensive; AA guns are static, but once you've put them around a given position, that position is protected by AA guns. It would obviously be superior to have interceptors available for every point in the defending country, but that's not really feasible.

So you use AA guns to protect points commensurate to their importance, and have aircraft able to manoeuvre against the attackers.

Saphroneth said:

Quite, yes.

The merit of aircraft is that they're mobile, but of course they're far more expensive; AA guns are static, but once you've put them around a given position, that position is protected by AA guns. It would obviously be superior to have interceptors available for every point in the defending country, but that's not really feasible.

So you use AA guns to protect points commensurate to their importance, and have aircraft able to manoeuvre against the attackers.

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Actually AA guns even in WW2 were quite mobile being placed on ships, submarines, trains ,and various automotive powered vehicles.
Leftyhunter

Leftyhunter said:

Actually AA guns even in WW2 were quite mobile being placed on ships, submarines, trains ,and various automotive powered vehicles.

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I mean mobile on the scale of an air battle. I'm fairly sure none of the things you mention is able to chase down a bomber.

SlamDunkerista said:

But I never hear of how important Anti-Air guns was in World WAr 2 and Modern Warfare. The one exception being Pearl Harbor where they often portray Anti-Air Gunners as being the prime defenders of the port.

The only thing they ever portray in popular media like Documents on TV and General History books is that to counter Aerial Bombardment you simply send in planes.They portray it to the extent that a base or an Aircraft Carrier can be successfully defended WITHOUT Anti-Air guns of any sort so long as the planes are up before the base or fleet of ships gets bombed

How accurate is this?What were Anti-Air guns real use?Could a base just invest all in fighter planes to defend itself from aerial raids or an Aircraft Carrier completely just go without any AA Guns? Or do they still need Anti-Air guns of some sort?

Click to expand...

You should research the causaulty rates of Japanese air crews in 1943-1945 to USN and US Army antiaircraft, especially mid 1943 on. Its striking.

zincwarrior said:

You should research the causaulty rates of Japanese air crews in 1943-1945 to USN and US Army antiaircraft, especially mid 1943 on. Its striking.

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Not to mention the introduction of the VT fused AA rounds into the equation

Interception of bombers by fighter aircraft was difficult or impossible until the development of radar and fighter direction techniques. Until radar was developed, approaching bombers could not be detected in time for fighter planes to scramble, launch and reach the altitude to intercept attacking planes, which is why the strategic bombing advocates said "the bombers will always get through."
I
Also, as "R Leonard" says, the development and deployment of the "VT" or proximity fuse (at sea in Jan '43) VASTLY increased the lethality of heavy AA guns.