Ideal Kamikaze aircraft of WWII

[istvan47]

If , what if.

 

-Let's say that japines had teh KiKKA in service rougly six month before. This plane could had been effective to attack US ships? or it was not enough fast? i read that hte speed was below 700 kmh, but this was at 10,000 mt. IF this was done with a bomb, this could had enough to fool navalized US fighters (perhaps not the latest version of the Coursair).

 

-More, let's say that the germans passed the engine project of the HE 162.

 

Let's say that teh Japs built a sort of hibrid between the Okha and the He 162.

 

I rate that this could do a plane very cheap with a warhead of 600,800,1000 or 1200 kg. Speed of rougly 750-800 kmh. Range? I cannot say: prhppas 500-900 km with 800-1000 lts.

 

Perhaps that this plane could had 800 Warhead x 800 kmh x 800 km range (not at max speed).

 

If japs had this for the times of Okinawa, flyng at 6000-8000 mts at 650-700 cruise speed with the possibility to run until 750-820 kmh if needed, i rate that it can be very hardly stopped, and the warhead even if 2only" 600 kg (more likely, 800 or more) it could hit very hard every ship. I think that, differently by the Okha and the normal planes, these things could fly until they reach teh US main carriers in the inner inside of the US fleet, and devasting them with easy.

 

The relativity of these thing was, that if teh japs had the jets of the germans and used them as kamikaze and B 29 intercepting, they could make much more trouble than the germans did vs the allied in europe.

Just think if Okinawa ships was targeted by 1000 me 262 and 200 ar 234. If the japs hitten hard 20-30 ships like these capital ships, the US could had been left in very deep troubles at Okinawa than they had.

 

this not means that the US had lost the war, but that the japs, with their desperate determination, if they could couple it with tecnolgy enough good, they could had casued really much trouble to the US Navy, insthead to send their pilots with Ki-27 and 51 with 250 kg load and 250 kmh or so, just on the mouth of the hellcats and the AA bofors..

 

 

So i think that a jet kamikaze like a jet-okha or a special HE 162 (rougly) this could send the japs in a real very big trouble vs the US Navy.

 

 

 

regs.

[Cookie Monster]

I think the ideal kamikaze would be a plane with a large amount of fuel so when it crashes into the ship, the fuel would be extremely hard to put out. Furthermore, I wouldn't attack the ship in broad daylight because of optimal viewing conditions for the AA gunners. I would attack at dawn which gives me a great tactical advantage over them. they can't see me against the silhoutte but I can see them against the rising sun. (no pun intended)

[Tony Williams]

A pulse-jet engine like the V-1s would be better than a turbine - much simpler and cheaper. In fact, the manned version of the V-1 would be perfect...

 

TW

[ShotMagnet]

Something carrying a very large HEAT warhead. Or a nose full of rockets, as with the Bachem Natter.

 

Ideally, since we're fantasizing, an Ohka outfitted as a guided bomb would probably be preferable to putting a man in the 'pit. If nothing else, the size of the warhead could have been increased and the whole thing made smaller.

 

 

Shot

[UN-Interested Observer]

This may be getting a little gruesome, but what if you stopped trying to penetrate the armour? Maybe convert the kamikaze aircraft into a giant cannister muniton?

[hojutsuka]

If , what if.

 

-Let's say that japines had teh KiKKA in service rougly six month before. This plane could had been effective  to attack US ships? or it was not enough fast? i read that hte speed was below 700 kmh, but this was at 10,000 mt. IF this was done with a bomb, this could had enough to fool navalized US fighters (perhaps not the latest version of the Coursair).

 

-More, let's say that the germans passed the engine project of the HE 162.

 

Let's say that teh Japs built a sort of hibrid between the Okha and the He 162.

 

I rate that this could do a plane very cheap with a warhead of 600,800,1000 or 1200 kg. Speed of rougly 750-800 kmh. Range? I cannot say: prhppas 500-900 km with 800-1000 lts.

 

Perhaps that this plane could had 800 Warhead x 800 kmh x 800 km range (not at max speed).

 

If japs had this for the times of Okinawa, flyng at 6000-8000 mts at 650-700 cruise speed with the possibility to run until 750-820 kmh if needed, i rate that it can be very hardly stopped, and the warhead even if 2only" 600 kg (more likely, 800 or more) it could hit very hard every ship. I think that, differently by the Okha and the normal planes, these things could fly until they reach teh US main carriers in the inner inside of the US fleet, and devasting them with easy.

 

The relativity of these thing was, that if teh japs had the jets of the germans and used them as kamikaze and B 29 intercepting, they could make much more trouble than the germans did vs the allied in europe.

Just think if Okinawa ships was targeted by 1000 me 262 and 200 ar 234. If the japs hitten hard 20-30 ships like these capital ships, the US could had been left in very deep troubles at Okinawa than they had.

 

this not means that the US had lost the war, but that the japs, with their desperate determination, if they could couple it with tecnolgy enough good, they could had casued really much trouble to the US Navy, insthead to send their pilots with Ki-27 and 51 with 250 kg load and 250 kmh or so, just on the mouth of the hellcats and the AA bofors..

So i think that a jet kamikaze like a jet-okha or a special HE 162 (rougly) this could send the japs in a real very big trouble vs the US Navy.

regs.

169598[/snapback]

 

Where to begin?

 

First, The He 162A-2 had a range of 385 miles at 6000 meters, which looks just short of what is needed to reach Okinawa from Kagoshima (in Kyushu, the nearest part of "mainland Japan"). This was with the He 162A-2 at 6,184lbs, carrying maximum fuel. I estimate that removing the armament of 2 x MG151 with 120rpg will save about 150kg, so even your lightest load of 600kg of explosive would increase the weight by about 1000lbs, which is very substantial increase for a plane with a maximum weight of 6,184lbs. The increase in weight will undoubtedly decrease speed and range, making it even less likely to reach Okinawa. It's not clear that you can even fit a 600kg explosive charge on He 162, and anything heavier is totally out of the question IMHO.

 

Second, you are talking about 1000 Me 262 and 200 Ar 234. That's 2400 jet engines, and even if you stick with the single-engined He 162, you need 1200 engines for the attacks alone. But given the short life of the early jet engines, you are going to need at least two engines per plane to give minimal training to the pilots converting to the jets. That gives 2400 jet engines even for the He 162, and there is no way that the Japanese industry could have produced that many totally new engines in the time frame, especially as the Germans themselves were still in the process of developing the jet engines (whether the Jumo 004 or the BMW 003).

 

Third, the early jet aircraft needed very careful handling. The handling problems of the He 162 are well known, and the early German jet engines had to be handled very gently. Any rapid movement of the throttle would likely result in a flameout, as would radical maneuver of the aircraft. The pilots had to fly the early German jets very smoothly, avoiding rapid movements whether of the throttle or the aircraft. But a large percentage of the Japanese pilots at Okinawa were inexperienced (to put it mildly); 800 were still in training, include some who could barely fly straight and level (about 1500 Japanese aircraft were expended in "Kamikaze" or "taiatari" attacks, to give the Japanese description). There is no way that I can see of getting these inexperienced Japanese pilots trained to fly such demanding aircraft as the early German jets.

 

You can have fun speculating if you want, istvan47, but you need to have more knowledge of the technology of the period if you want to come up with something that might have been possible.

 

Hojutsuka

[hojutsuka]

I think the ideal kamikaze would be a plane with a large amount of fuel so when it crashes into the ship, the fuel would be extremely hard to put out.  Furthermore, I wouldn't attack the ship in broad daylight because of optimal viewing conditions for the AA gunners.  I would attack at dawn which gives me a great tactical advantage over them.  they can't see me against the silhoutte but I can see them against the rising sun. (no pun intended)

169604[/snapback]

The Japanese are having problems scraping up enough fuel to get the "Kamikaze" aircraft and their escorts to the target area, and you want to waste fuel just to enhance the terminal effect? No way, just load equivalent weight of HE.

 

As for attacking at dawn, this requires mass takeoffs in darkness, which would be difficult given Japanese training levels at the time. Also, when the warships are just visible as silhouette on the horizon against the rising sun, the US CAP at 10,000-15,000 feet will have a longer horizon and will have a reasonable chance of spotting the attackers.

 

Hojutsuka

[hojutsuka]

A pulse-jet engine like the V-1s would be better than a turbine - much simpler and cheaper. In fact, the manned version of the V-1 would be perfect...

 

TW

169612[/snapback]

Tony, the Japanese Navy was developing a near-clone of the manned Fieseler 103 Reichenberg IV, the Kawanishi Baika, for "special attack". It did not even get built as a prototype before the end of the war.

 

Hojutsuka

[hojutsuka]

Something carrying a very large HEAT warhead. Or a nose full of rockets, as with the Bachem Natter.

169631[/snapback]

What for? A HEAT warhead is only useful for penetrating armor, and even on a battleship, the armored area is comparatively small. And there is a lot of volume to a ship, so that even if you are attacking a battleship, it is likely that the HEAT warhead will be triggered prematurely, before hitting the main armor. Much better to go for the largest HE possible. This does more damage in general, for example if you hit a carrier on the deck.

 

As for rockets, the whole point of having a salvo of rockets is to improve hit probability. Since having the pi;ot guiding the plane into the target also improves the hit probability, there is little point to using a rocket salvo, especially as it reduces the warhead weight very substantially.

 

Ideally, since we're fantasizing, an Ohka outfitted as a guided bomb would probably be preferable to putting a man in the 'pit. If nothing else, the size of the warhead could have been increased and the whole thing made smaller.

Shot

169631[/snapback]

Since we are fantasizing, the ideal weapon for the Japanese would be a compact thermonuclear device, say 0.5 megatons. Seriously, the Germans and Americans came close to mass use of guided bombs. There was no way that Japan, with its limited electronic industry and expertise, could have done it in World War II, which is why they resorted to having pilots sacrifice themselves.

 

Hojutsuka

[hojutsuka]

This may be getting a little gruesome, but what if you stopped trying to penetrate the armour? Maybe convert the kamikaze aircraft into a giant cannister muniton?

169639[/snapback]

And what exactly is firing giant shotguns at battleships supposed to achieve?

 

Hojutsuka

[istvan47]

hey , Hotsu, calm down, this is a theorich debate, just to talk about the X-what if debatement,- not an industrial plan.

 

you can say that an H bomb was a better choice, but i rather feel that we should a bit limit the range of hte possibilities.

 

As the jets, well i am aware of the problems indeed, but you want to say that the Okha were easier to fly in a kamikaze attack than a HE 162 or Me 262?

 

As the range or other issues, if i didn't had problems with elaborate the specifics of these jets i didn't posted anithing topic here.

 

If nothing else, if Betty bombers were enough powerful to send in their belly a 2,100 kg Okhas, i'd rate well in hteir possibility also the trasportation of a sort of modiphied HE 162 or whatever else with a weight of around 2,500- 3,000 Kg maximum ( after all, the payload of a Betty was over 6 tons ).

If a jet-Okha or a "special" HE 162 was trasportable on a Betty bomber then we have a jet with a range and a payload sufficent. I don't know what was the weight of the rocket engine of the Okha, but substitute it with a BMW jet and around 800-1000 lts of fuel should not be so drastic in weight augment, even with teh original 1,200 kg bomb ( if not, there is still teh smaller 600 kg or so).

 

Insthead, i'd say to not trust very much about the pulse jet because the time of function is only 20 minutes, the power and the speed are very limited and not enough to avoid the USN fighters.

 

As the industrial issue: think like you want, but nerthless the japs were able to build around 3000 Ki 84 in the last two year of war( and over 60,000 in the WWII).

If they didn't make the mistake of all the belligerents ( to not bother of the jets for many years too long ) perhaps that they could build effectively some hundreds atleast, of jets like the Kikka or the Heinkel.

 

Insthead, perhaps it was a multi-dimentional gate to send things from Germany to Japan ( insthead to use the submarines, like happened with the MG 151s for the Ki 61 ). all here.

 

We can do this "ipothetical Kamikaze jet" like this:

 

Okha, around 1,200 kg for the payload, 2,100 total, so the cell is around 1000 Kg included the engine.

 

now if we substitute the rocket (200 Kg?) with a jet ( the same?) and around 660-700 Kg of fuel we could have a weight of less than 3,000 Kg, rougly hte same as teh HE 162. I don't see why the He 162 or the Okha could not be arranged with a different engine. Apart this, The eventual He 162 kamikaze jet of this kind not onlt loose the guns, but also the landing gear ( it can be sobstituted by the kind of hte Me 163) and this could help

Edited April 30, 2005 by istvan47

[UN-Interested Observer]

And what exactly is firing giant shotguns at battleships supposed to achieve? 

 

Hojutsuka

169682[/snapback]

 

I always imagined a lot of people on the decks, on gun ships and carriers, and vulnerable stuff that would generally be damaged.

[nitflegal]

As the jets, well i am aware of the problems indeed, but you want to say that the Okha were easier to fly in a kamikaze attack than a HE 162 or Me 262?

In one respect, it was. You basically pounded the throttle and used very simple controls to smash the plane in. Not a bad idea for pilots with minimal flying time, a -262 or -162 would have probably crashed when those same pilots tried to play with the throttle and other controls. Also, the rocket engines had the real advantage of being very cheap, very simple to build, and very simple to use. Since every first mission is also the last, you probably don't want to waste resources, time, or yen for these kamikazes that you can avoid.

 

As the range or other issues, if i didn't had problems with elaborate the specifics of these jets i didn't posted anithing topic here.

 

The range of the early jets was generally pretty poor. Hence part of the reason you saw the Betty as a carrier. The problem was that the Betty's were easy meat for any fighter screen and the Ohka range meant that the Betty's themselves had to come into range to lauch the things. The other thing was that while the payload of the Betty (or heck, go with the G8N Renzan) is good enough, the shifting of the weight by even the Ohka was apparently a problem.

 

If you really want a good kamikaze, you need to meet the following conditions;

 

A) cheap and easy to produce in large quantities

easy to fly

C) fast enough to avoid CAP when flown by inexperienced pilots whih means maneuverability is not that impoprtant for evasion, the pilot will probably just splash his plane (as happened with plenty of kamikazes)

D) With range enough to start it's flight from outside defensive fighter range coupled with the aforementioned speed or

D1) with a carrier aircraft that can survive the defensive fighters either through speed or altitude.

 

With all of that said, here's my idea. Forget long-range jets for the kamikaze; too expensive, too much fuel (which means a larger fighter with smaller payload). Even with a carrier aircraft to cut that fuel requirement, if you have a carrier aircraft that can survive the CAP, you may as well fly it in further to drop a shorter ranged kamikaze. The Okha with rockets or pulse-jets makes a viable kamikaze, perhaps up the explosive or ad fuel to spread and burn in a larger version. Then, build your carrier aircraft. While every Luft '46 advocate sucks up the stats for German uber-bombers with 74 jet engines or what have you, I'm awfully skeptical about the range proposals. All of the early jet bomber development that resulted in prototypes showed real problems with fuel consumption and I think that it's unreasonable to expect the Japanese to do vastly better while their cities are getting the crap kicked out of them by LeMay. Besides, you don't need that kind of speed. Keep in mind that carrier fighters didn't have great altitude capabilities, so you can evade the defense by just going high enough to avoid them. If the Japanese could have built a B-29 of their own, it'd be perfect. The Renzan might have done well enough, optimizing it for altitude probably would have been doable. So, now you have an ultra-high altitude carrier aircraft which flies over the CAP's and drops speedy (say, 550 mph or higher) kamikazes to fly down at top speed and crash into a warship. you'd probably need a pressuried carrier AC with the kamikaze pilot transferring to the kamikaze shortly before launch and going on oxygen.

 

The nice thing about the resultant kamikazes from an invasion perspective is that they'd be ideally suited to sortieing out of caves and the like to hit the invasion craft. Heck, if they are cheap enough, you could arm them with cannon for strafing attacks and have them fly back and crash-land on a skid. I'd plan for them to be disposable, so that you could just ditch them upon mission completion. Kikkas and Karyus would be of minimal use, because US fighters and bombers would slaughter any established landing fields.

 

Matt

[istvan47]

yesterday, i finally had discovered the plans of the japanises about the Okha model 43.

 

It seems that this Okha was meant to be launched from ramps of mountains.

 

It had, differently from the others types:

 

- longer fuselage ( around 8 m)

- larger wingspan (8-9m)

- a JET engine of 475 KGf

-800 Kg warhead.

 

 

So, if the war was continued, this could had teh ultimate Kamikaze of the japs.

Something VERY SIMILAR to what i had imagine, and, in a certain sense, a real hibrid between the Okha and the HE 162.

I don't know, however, the expected speed, nor the range, but i guess, 670-750 kmh and 500-700 Km.

 

Given the availability of eventual more powerful ( arleady in developement) jet engines, like 700-800 kg trhust, the specific i had imaged for this kamikaze plane could be matched ( 800 kmh x 800 Kg x 800 km ).

 

About the range, i don't see any reason to denied that an eventual AR 234 or even a Me 262 cannot reach Okinawa from Japan, nor that the more experinced pilots of the japanises ween't able to fly these things.

The real, only drawback was the non availability of engines of enough power:

If the japs had developed in parallel with germans accettable jet engines, then in 1945 japan fighters and kamikaze can be very different from we know now.

as example, the Kikka was delayed properly by the lack of adeguate jet engines. It was much lighter of the me 262, but it lacked power.

 

 

About the reichemberg V 1, i only see that this plane hadn't range enough to reach okinawa alone and neeeded a Betty for the launch. But, from 200 and more km away, the launch istelf was safer than the Okha. Note that the Okha was around with the range of a Kormoran or an exocet, so even i f a "modernized" Betty was available ( with Exocet, as example) it wasn't enough to not be shot down before the launch vs the US ships.

 

However, i think that the very ideal kamikaze V 1 should had a jet engine, of a power of 300, or 500, or 800 kg. The range could have been enchanched ,because the basic V 1 had 600 lts of fuel, perhpas enough to fly for well over 600 km. a bit costly, however, respect the basic.

[Samson]

I think the maned V1 was the right answer.

 

You would have to have a fleet of bombers with fighter escrot carry them into range and then lauch in mass.

 

First go for the carriers, once they got them, then attack at will with impunity.

 

300 or so maned V1s per strike, I am sure they would have no shortage of volunteers, and the destruction they would have cause would have far outweighed the cost in men and material.

 

They could save their best pilots, the bomber and fighter crews, for a better fate then the fanatical Kamikazies.

 

It probly would have realy messed the US Navy up, especialy if used early on in the war.

 

Not unfeasable IMO. Just another suicide bomber senario, all to familiar these days.

[hojutsuka]

I always imagined a lot of people on the decks, on gun ships and carriers, and vulnerable stuff that would generally be damaged.

169732[/snapback]

A light case bomb would do more damage to such unprotected stuff, and would not require special modifications.

 

Hojutsuka

[Gorka L. Martinez-Mezo]

We are forgetting the real limitation of the V-1 and Okha "missiles": RANGE

 

When the Germans lost their V-1 launch pads in France they has to resort to V-1 armed He-111 bombers. These took off from German occupied territory and flew until their tragets were in range, being easy meat for Mosquito night fighters.

 

The case with the Okha was worse: they had to be carried by lumbering and very flammable G4M and other medium bombers with inadequate scorts. Attacking a US TF with radar pickets and a developed interception control scheme, they were just dead meat for the large number of USN fighters around, timely put into interception points by fighter controllers on their carriers. And kamikaze medium bombers were jus massacrated by the USN CAPs.

 

Besides, by 1945 virtually all the front line USN combat vessels were equipped with radar control for the AA fire as well as VT fuzes for the 5in gun, which took a HUGE toll on conventional kamikazes. Of course, some of them got through but still many were shot down before they could strike.

 

So a good kamikaze was to have enough range to be able to take off from Japanese bases, be as small as possible to lower their RCS (so they were detected later by US radar) and be harder to hit, plus desiderably be fast enough to make interception difficult (around 650km/h at low altitude would have been enough). Night attack would have been a nice addition, altough still radar control and VT fuze would have taken its toll. That would have meant lots of research not probably justified by the results.

[istvan47]

nobody forgets the issue to have enough range, plus enough speed, plus enough warhead. The Fi 103R with their 240 km range x 850 kg warhead x 650 kmh were a world apart to the Okha.

I'd say that a jet powered V 1 or the type 43 Okha were effective answers to thise issues.

 

to not to talk about eventually Me 262-alike or Ar 234 used to kamikaze attacks ( just think of how many HE can be stored in the nose of a Me 262 if teh 4x30mm were removed).

[Samson]

How about something similar to the V1 with much greater fuel load even if the warhead has to be made smaller. Lauched form a bomber or maybe even a fighter bomber at low altitude, skims the waves all the way to the targets.

 

Should be under the radar and maybe much harder to hit as not all the guns can come to bear and such.

[5150]

You guys are on the wrong path.

 

If we're going to be fanciful, why not pretend Japanese industry could build Harpoons and Tomahawks. A few hundred of each would easily subdue the 1945 USN, and it would be just as possible for Japan's failing industrial base to produce them as it would be for it to produce thousands of jet engines. Sure, electronics would be as rare as fuel and complex metallurgy were in Japan in 1945, but why should that interrupt a perfectly good daydream?

[Guest phil gollin]

Every time I look at photos of Kamikaze's I wonder if any Japanese in authority ever really used their brains.

 

Whilst they were a "good" desparate last-ditch weapon, they were badly thought through.

 

The problem was the effect the weapon had.

 

They mostly carried ordinary bombs, but then didn't use the advantage these might have had of using gravity to speed them to an decent impact velocity.

 

Each picture of a kamikaze attacking a battleship is a waste, the armour was such that even if the attack was a success the most that would happen was that the blast damage might cause the ship to be pulled out for a week or so for minor repairs - the kamikazes were being tought to attack the wrong targets - cruisers and destroyers would have been more worthwhile. Many other attacks were in shallow low-speed dives which would provide little help to penetration and hence the bomb is little more than a "blast bomb".

 

Back to the "weapon" itself. The idea of using a bomb (even if only the warhead)with it's relatively heavy casing is a waste of carrying ability. The terminal speed of the aircraft won't be hugely high and unless the bomb is released just before the hit (as was intended at least by some) the structure of the aircraft hitting the ship will slow the impact of the bomb itself as the impact slows the whole down.

 

Attack profiles also matter. Medium level dives will at least put some decent velocity to the warhead, but requires decent control in dives. Low-level attacks helps against radar and flak, but makes hitting a target very difficult without hitting the sea whilst manouevring.

 

So what do you want from a kamikaze ? Some sort of penetration against lightly armoured ships strutures and good control/manoevrerability either in a medium level dive or at low-level.

 

So, starting from scratch, the warhead should be in the front (either V-1 type jet/rocket or pusher propellor, or possibly twing-engined propellor). The controls should be easy to use at low-level and/or a high-speed dive.

 

Sounds like a manned V-1 is the best bet and only attack the unarmoured bits of targets.

[Chris Werb]

We are forgetting the real limitation of the V-1 and Okha "missiles": RANGE

 

When the Germans lost their V-1 launch pads in France they has to resort to V-1 armed He-111 bombers. These took off from German occupied territory and flew until their tragets were in range, being easy meat for Mosquito night fighters.

 

They also deployed longer range ground launched V-1s:

 

Air launch was abandoned in mid-January 1945, due to the high attrition and the advance of Allied forces. However, the Germans were not quite done with this game, having developed a new version of the V-1 with a range of 400 kilometers (250 miles) by reducing the size of the warhead and increasing the size of the fuel tank. They launched about 275 of these long-range flying bombs against Britain from the Netherlands in March 1945.

 

http://www.vectorsite.net/twcruz2.html

[gewing]

Every time I look at photos of Kamikaze's I wonder if any Japanese in authority ever really used their brains.

 

Whilst they were a "good" desparate last-ditch weapon, they were badly thought through.

 

The problem was the effect the weapon had.

 

They mostly carried ordinary bombs, but then didn't use the advantage these might have had of using gravity to speed them to an decent impact velocity. 

 

Each picture of a kamikaze attacking a battleship is a waste, the armour was such that even if the attack was a success the most that would happen was that the blast damage might cause the ship to be pulled out for a week or so for minor repairs - the kamikazes were being tought to attack the wrong targets - cruisers and destroyers would have been more worthwhile.  Many other attacks were in shallow low-speed dives which would provide little help to penetration and hence the bomb is little more than a "blast bomb".

 

Back to the "weapon" itself.  The idea of using a bomb (even if only the warhead)with it's relatively heavy casing is a waste of carrying ability.  The terminal speed of the aircraft won't be hugely high and unless the bomb is released just before the hit (as was intended at least by some) the structure of the aircraft hitting the ship will slow the impact of the bomb itself as the impact slows the whole down.

 

Attack profiles also matter.  Medium level dives will at least put some decent velocity to the warhead, but requires decent control in dives.  Low-level attacks helps against radar and flak, but makes hitting a target very difficult without hitting the sea whilst manouevring.

 

So what do you want from a kamikaze ?  Some sort of penetration against lightly armoured ships strutures and good control/manoevrerability either in a medium level dive or at low-level.

 

So, starting from scratch, the warhead should be in the front (either V-1 type jet/rocket or pusher propellor, or possibly twing-engined propellor).  The controls should be easy to use at low-level and/or a high-speed dive. 

 

Sounds like a manned V-1 is the best bet and only attack the unarmoured bits of targets.

169998[/snapback]

 

 

I doubt the payloads were big enough in general, but what if they basically crashed mines/big depth charges next to the ships?

 

Against softer targets even impact fusing would be pretty effective, but submerged blasts seem to possibly have a better chance versus heavily armored ships.

[Mk 1]

I think most of this discussion misses the basic points of the real-world limitations of human-guided weapons.

 

Kamikazes missed. Often. Very often. More often than they hit.

 

Making the plane fly faster may well help it evade CAP. Making it dive faster may well help it penetrate into the ships innards. But in either case you also make it that much less likely that they will hit the ship at all.

 

This is particularly true when you get up to the speeds of jets or rockets.

 

The Japanese called it the "Okha", or cherry blossom. The Americans called it the "Baka", which is Japanese for fool. Why? Because the things were practically unstoppable, and the American sailors could do little but watch in rapt fascination as they came screaming in, pilots devoted to the point of fanatical determination, braving any and all risks, only to fly past the American ships and splash into the ocean.

 

Look, if your wings generate lift (they MUST if you want to fly), then the faster you go, the more lift they generate. So when that scared-spitless first-time-ever-flying focussed-on-nothing-but-his-target pilot pushes his fast plane into a very fast dive, he is practically stone-cold guaranteed to overshoot his target. He'll point his nose at the target, and his wings will lift him past it.

 

There was a reason that on-the-deck and low-and-slow kamikaze attacks were used so often. They gave the pilot at least some chance of hitting the target.

 

-Mark 1

[ShotMagnet]

Remembering that they were weapons employed in desperation, some mitigation can be found for their methodology of employ.

 

Certainly, flying yourself into a target isn't something that's expected to yield good results. The pilots had little training, beyond something like 'Take off, find a big ship, hit it". This is not something you do if you have a better choice. None were available; the onset of widespread employ of suicide weaponry is directly related to the lack of other viable options.

 

Desperate times, desperate measures. When the best you can do is strap a man into a plane and tell him to go hit a target, you've got bigger concerns than whether or not he might hit it.

 

 

Shot