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The Corsair has a reputation as being the most effective US Navy fighter of the Second World War. In 1943 the newly introduced Corsair came up against the most famous Japanese fighter of the war, the Zero, in a series of intense air battles over the Solomon Islands and Rabaul. This was the only period in which the Corsair was the main US Navy fighter – later in the war the F6F Hellcat was the main carrier fighter, and the Corsair more often used as a fighter-bomber, so this is the best period to examine if you want to judge how good a pure fighter the Corsair was.
We start with a brief examination of the combat performance of the Corsair, looking at the very high ratio of victory claims made for it in many publications and suggesting that this is actually rather too high. A good case is made for the ratio of successes being rather lower in the Corsair’s first year of service, although restricting the examination to combats that only include Corsairs and Zeroes means that the figures will be somewhat distorted (and presumably the number of combats being considered rather dramatically reduced given that the US Navy and Marines operated several types of fighters, and the Zeros were often part of larger formations). The author has carried out an in-depth analysis of the major clashes beween just the Corsair and Zero, and calculated a kill ratio of one-to-one. This is an interesting piece of information, showing that in the Corsair’s first year of combat it wasn’t as dominant as is often claimed. However there are some flaws with the information we are presented with. We are given an overall figure for the number of Corsairs in service and the number of Corsairs lost in combat in this period, but no figure for the number of Corsairs lost in the battles included in the analysis, or any figures for Zero losses, even though the author states that their combat losses are reliably recorded. I would have liked to know how many combats were included in the analysis, and how many were discarded for including too many different types of aircraft. The high Corsair success rate quoted in other books includes victories over all types and for the rest of 1944 and 1945, so can’t really be compared to the lower figure presented here for purely Corsair vs Zero battles. The basic argument that the Zero could hold its own in 1943 is clearly correct, but I would have liked more of the supporting evidence.
The sections on the Corsair aircraft itself look at its good qualities but also the problems that plagued early versions, from the original ‘birdcage’ canopy with its poor view to the unsuitability for carrier operations. On the Japanese side we trace the slow decline of the Zero from a position of dominance early in the war, but with the failure to adopt new engines and of most of the aircraft meant to replace it meaning that it had to be used long after it was outclassed by American aircraft.
There are useful sections on the training of pilots on the two sides and how that changed over time. This was one of the biggest weaknesses on the Japanese side – the number of new pilots trained in 1943 was far too low, and the quality of the training scheme had to be reduced. When we look at the Combatants one surprise is that life on the main Japanese bases was actually pretty comfortable, at least until they started to come under near constant air attack. Forward bases could be pretty rough, but that was true for both sides. However the Americans had a clear advantage here, with their Seabees able to construct a new airfield in a fraction of the time it took their Japanese equivalents.
The combat section looks at a series of battles between forces made up largely of Corsairs and Zeros. I can see the advantage of this in a straight comparison of the two types and in particular of relative losses in combat. In general the author seems to mean only those types of fighters, as there are several examples of escort missions (and one or two key battles with other US fighters involved). One thing we do learn for certain from these detailed battle analyses is just how much both sides over-claimed. Indeed the official figures normally came after some effort had been made to eliminate duplications, so the actual claims after each mission must have been even higher! There are plenty of examples from both sides of pilots claiming many victories during a battle in which none of their opponents were actually shot down! The eyewitness accounts of the battles are fascinating, and tied well into the overall narrative.
The battle accounts do demonstrate that during 1943 the Japanese could still hold their own against their American opponents. A well flown Zero was still a very agile aircraft, and in 1943 the Japanese still had significant numbers of well training pilots, but they were increasingly outnumbered. By February 1944 the battle over Rabaul was over, when the Japanese admitted defeat and withdrew their surviving airmen from the base. Later in the war, as those well trained pilots disappeared and the Corsair was involved in fewer intense air battles, the victory ratio clearly shifted in the American’s favour (although clearly by nothing like the amount needed to get to that 11-to-1 figure!).
Chapters
Chronology
Design and Development
Technical Specifications
The Strategic Situation
The Combatants
Combat
Statistics and Analysis
Aftermath
Author: Michael John Claringbould
Edition: Paperback
Pages: 80
Publisher: Osprey
Year: 2022