Liberators. Stormtroopers

After fighting nearly 800 kilometers, in the summer of 1944 parts of the Red Army began in Poland on the banks of the Vistula. They managed to capture and hold on the western bank of the river Pulavsky, Magnushevsky and Sandomirsky bridgeheads. Throughout autumn and the beginning of winter, the Red Army accumulated strength for the next throw - on the Oder. It was not possible to break the resistance of the Wehrmacht without the participation of the assault aviationthat would support the promotion tanks and infantry.

Attack aircraft are well-armored aircraft, armed with powerful cannons, machine guns, equipped with bombs and rocket projectiles. The project of such a specialized aircraft, later named IL-2, appeared in the design of Sergey Ilyushin at the end of the 30. IL-2 was destined to become the most massive attack aircraft of the Second World War and, moreover, the most massive combat aircraft in stories of humanity. The first IL-2 attack aircraft did not include an air gunner. Therefore, German fighters could attack Soviet planes from behind with complete impunity. To cover the rear and protect themselves, a group of attack aircraft lined up in a circle, when everyone was responsible for the protection of the forward aircraft. Therefore, the aircraft, in order to seat the arrow in it, had to be improved on the move, until the industry began to produce a new model. IL-2 showed extraordinary vitality - the aircraft returned to the airfield with huge holes in the planes, without half the tail, but with a live crew. The attack aircraft carried a shaped-bomb PTAB bombs.

By the beginning of the Vistula-Oder operation, the coherence of the joint actions of attack aircraft, ground forces and fighters had been brought to perfection. During the offensive, attack aircraft destroyed enemy headquarters and communication centers, artillery, mortars and enemy firing points. The series tells the story of the creation of one of the oldest orders of the USSR - the Order of the Red Banner.

Comments

[Uncle lee]

Attack aircraft are well-armored aircraft, armed with powerful cannons, machine guns, and equipped with bombs and rockets.

It's not for nothing that they were called "flying tanks" and "black death"

[Konnick]

Unlike the diving Ju-87s, our Il-2s didn't have a significant impact on the success of the combat operations. Their use, for example, in September 1941 on the Bryansk Front to stop Guderian's Group moving to encircle the Southwestern Front proved ineffective. Meanwhile, the Germans simply cleared their path with their bast shoes. Massive German air strikes greatly contributed to the defeat of entire fronts: the Bryansk Front on October 1, 1941, the Western and Reserve Fronts on October 2-3, 1941, and the Crimean and Southwestern Fronts in early May. It wasn't until June 1944 that we were able to create a powerful air force, with which we routed Army Group Center in Operation Bagration, because we had changed tactics in deploying Il-2 attack aircraft. And even then, it was because there was virtually no Luftwaffe opposition. The Il-2 proved to be greatly overestimated.

[Panin (midshipman)]

Quote: Konnick

Unlike the diving Ju-87s, our Il-2s didn't have a significant impact on the success of the combat operations. Their use, for example, in September 1941 on the Bryansk Front to stop Guderian's Group moving to encircle the Southwestern Front proved ineffective. Meanwhile, the Germans simply cleared their path with their bast shoes. Massive German air strikes greatly contributed to the defeat of entire fronts: the Bryansk Front on October 1, 1941, the Western and Reserve Fronts on October 2-3, 1941, and the Crimean and Southwestern Fronts in early May. It wasn't until June 1944 that we were able to create a powerful air force, with which we routed Army Group Center in Operation Bagration, because we had changed tactics in deploying Il-2 attack aircraft. And even then, it was because there was virtually no Luftwaffe opposition. The Il-2 proved to be greatly overestimated.

Well, what did you expect in '41? Hitting a tank with a cannon through the mud is a real challenge. And when firing at tanks at the firing range, some of the shells that hit ricocheted.
But when they developed the PTABS, that was a different matter. Dropping a hundred of them onto a column was a whole other matter.

[Konnick]

Quote: Panin (Michman)

But when they developed the PTABS, that was a different matter. Dropping a hundred of them onto a column was a whole other matter.

That's right, the convoy. The element of surprise was effective. After Kursk, the Germans simply dispersed their armored vehicles and provided good anti-aircraft coverage. The Il-2 had no bombsight or anti-aircraft gun sight, and its dive angle was only 30°, so firing 37mm cannons at tanks, especially without the ability to adjust fire due to its poor maneuverability, was useless. The cannons were effective when attacking locomotives on straight sections of track.

[Revolver]

Quote: Konnick

firing 37mm cannons at tanks

37mm is still good, but that was only for the later IL-2s. The early ones were equipped with the ShVAK, a 20mm cannon with a relatively short barrel and, most importantly, a short case, and, consequently, a low muzzle velocity. It was perfectly acceptable against lightly armored vehicles, but it couldn't take out tanks, even the early PzIII and PzIV, let alone their sides. After 1941, German armor protection only improved, so from about 1943 onward, the only thing the IL-2 could use to reach tanks was PTABs. They dropped them liberally, handfuls at a time, covering roughly the size of a football field at a time, so the theory of probability was that at least one bomblet would hit the roof of the turret or engine compartment, where the armor was much thinner than the sides.

[Konnick]

Quote: Nagan

It was perfectly adequate against lightly armored vehicles, but it couldn't take out tanks, even the early Pz III and Pz IV, head-on, let alone from the sides. And after 1941, the Germans' armor protection only improved.

The problem was that the dive was too shallow, as the upper armor of tanks was rarely 15-20 mm thick, but at such angles of up to 30 degrees, ricochets occurred. German attack aircraft, like Rudel, dived vertically, and their guns fired normally. The I-16 and I-153 needed to be improved and developed as attack aircraft. Their flight characteristics allowed for vertical dives, and their high maneuverability and sights allowed them to use their guns and rocket launchers with greater accuracy than the Il-2. Plus, they didn't need fighter cover. In the early stages of the war, these "obsolete" aircraft performed very well in ground attack missions. And their air-cooled engines made them very durable.

[tjeck91]

The Ju-87 is more of a Peshka-like aircraft, a different class of aircraft. But overall, yes, the Il-2 is a heavily mythologized machine. By focusing on armor, they went down a dead end. The Il-2 would have been good in the mid-1930s, when fighters and air defenses were limited to rifle-caliber machine guns. Adding a gunner was more of a crutch to help a crippled fighter. The Germans followed a similar path, creating the Hs-129, which turned out to be an even bigger cactus. In my opinion, the British achieved the most successful result with the Maskit, where the design's speed and survivability were the primary defense.

[Panin (midshipman)]

Quote: tjeck91

The Ju-87 is more of a Peshka-like aircraft, a different class of aircraft. But overall, yes, the Il-2 is a heavily mythologized machine. By focusing on armor, they went down a dead end. The Il-2 would have been good in the mid-1930s, when fighters and air defenses were limited to rifle-caliber machine guns. Adding a gunner was more of a crutch to help a crippled fighter. The Germans followed a similar path, creating the Hs-129, which turned out to be an even bigger cactus. In my opinion, the British achieved the most successful result with the Maskit, where the design's speed and survivability were the primary defense.

The Moskit isn't even a ground attack aircraft. The Il was protected from ground fire, not fighters, and it withstood that ground fire. After all, the German infantry called it the "Black Death" and the "concrete plane."

[Alexandra]

The Allies' best ground attack aircraft in Europe turned out to be... the P-47D Thunderbolt. Between 1944 and 1945, P-47D pilots were credited with salvaging 86,000 railcars, 9000 locomotives, 6000 armored fighting vehicles, and 68,000 trucks.

In the Pacific theater, the best attack aircraft turned out to be... the F4U Corsair. In any case, it is believed that in this theater, Corsairs dropped 70% of the total number of bombs dropped by US fighters during the war.

And they were also not the last fighter aircraft, especially the Corsair.

Remarkably, we also had a ground attack aircraft with outstanding performance characteristics. Having made its maiden flight on March 1, 1941, the Sukhoi Su-6 ground attack aircraft had already demonstrated a ground speed of 510 km/h by the end of April, higher than any domestic fighter at the time. And all this despite 15 mm of pilot armor protecting the pilot from more than just normal-caliber bullets.

Unfortunately, there were lobbyists in the Soviet aviation industry who turned Ilyushin's Il-2 into a "style icon." And for the Su-6, the eighteen-cylinder air-cooled engine, so essential for this attack aircraft (and Polikarpov's I-185 fighter), was initially refused production in May 1941. Instead, they launched the less powerful fourteen-cylinder M-82A, which no aircraft needed in 1941 and which couldn't be properly adapted for use until the summer of 1942, when it was adapted for Lavochkin's fighter. Then, throughout the war, they forced Sukhoi's Su-6 designer to redesign it. First, they demanded a thin layer of armor protection on the fuselage, "like on the Il-2." Then, a two-seater version. Then a version with a liquid-cooled AM-42 engine... As a result, the Su-6 never entered serial production. Despite, for example, the fact that the 37mm cannons on the Su-6 worked very well—the aircraft fired accurately, unlike the Il-2 with the same cannons, which was forced out of serial production.

[Konnick]

By the beginning of the Vistula-Oder Operation, the coherence of joint actions between attack aircraft, ground forces and fighters had been perfected.

When 90 percent of Germany's fighter aircraft were fighting against our allies' raids, even our fighters switched to free-flying rather than providing cover for attack aircraft and bombers. "Perfect" is a strong word. The Berlin operation was far from perfect.

[Declarant]

When designing the Il-2 (BSh-2) attack aircraft, a second crew member—a gunner—was initially planned to be placed behind the pilot (TsKB-55 prototype). However, after flight tests, it was decided to remove the gunner and replace the high-altitude AM-35 engine with a low-altitude AM-38 (TsKB-57 prototype). After the start of WWII, Il-2 pilots experienced the lack of rear protection. Improvised gunner placement devices were crafted to protect the rear hemisphere. Mechanics and armament specialists flew as gunners. Following numerous pilot complaints, in February 1942, the decision was made to return to the two-seat version of the attack aircraft. As a result, losses dropped sharply, but attack aircraft remained the most frequently shot down aircraft during the Great Patriotic War, under the influence of enemy air defenses and fighter aircraft.

[Alexandra]

Quote: Declarant

But after conducting flight tests, it was decided to remove the gunner and replace the high-altitude AM-35 engine with the low-altitude AM-38. (Prototype TsKB-57).

Moreover, the decision was made by designer Ilyushin, without the approval of representatives of the Red Army Air Forces (I think that in the Air Force in 1940, "everyone in the Air Force" understood the dangers of a single-seat configuration with a maximum speed of ~400 km/h). The single-seat variant was sanctioned by an internal order of the People's Commissariat of the Aviation Industry for experimental aircraft construction, designer Yakovlev, a friend of designer Ilyushin. Then designer Ilyushin visited Comrade Stalin and personally convinced Comrade Stalin that his single-seat attack aircraft should be immediately put into serial production (if I remember correctly, at as many as three or even four aircraft factories simultaneously). The decision to mass-produce the now Il-2 was made in the first half of December 1940, even before the sole TsKB-57 prototype made its maiden flight on December 29, 1940, with the new AM-38 engine (previously, the TsKB-57 had flown with the AM-35 engine). The Red Army Air Forces leadership was faced with the fact that in 1941, the Red Army Air Forces would receive the Il-2 en masse. Two months later, on March 1, 1941, the Sukhoi Su-6 attack aircraft, powered by an M-71 engine, made its maiden flight. By the end of April 1941, the Su-6 demonstrated a ground speed of 510 km/h, over a hundred kilometers higher than the Il-2... "but that was already spring," and the Su-6 never entered even small-scale production throughout the war, despite its outstanding flight and tactical characteristics.

[Pavel57]

The film is a good introduction to the topic. It's full of bloopers. For example, the pilot and gunner losses in the two-seat Il-2 were equal. This isn't true. Gunner losses were five to seven times greater.

[Akrid]

In July 2017, an Il-2 series 3 attack aircraft was restored in Novosibirsk (I participated as a tip), serial number 1872452. Tail number 2, blue spinner. Sold to the USA. Then they restored an Il-2, tail number 19 (I don't know where it is now). After that, two MiG-3s were restored. Tail number 65 went to the USA, but I don't know where the other one is. Before these aircraft (including replicas), four I-153 "Chaika" and two I-16 (silver, tail number 65) were restored. They fly in New Zealand. Don't we need them??? All tail numbers are 65. How do I post a photo?

[agond]

When talking about the armored Il-2, one involuntarily recalls the wooden Mosquito and the words of its designer, De Havilland, "in peacetime there are no smart people in the army"...of course, he meant the British army...

[air wolf]

The Il-2 had a payload capacity of 200 kg, if my memory serves me right. Back in 1942, we came up with a twin-engine attack aircraft at our sharashka, using two Po-2 engines and the same payload. It was armored, and it could be flown after five hours of training. Tens of thousands of them could have been built, but something went wrong. Ilyukha's reputation is unbreakable...