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Originally Posted by LLN
Is there any evidence that the US, in WWII, had its hands on any IL-2 Shturmoviks. If so, did we use them?
I am sure by American standards the IL-2 was primitive and hubris, being what it is, we would have looked down on it.
However, the more you learn about the eastern front, the greater the appreciation of the IL-2. Those guys killed a lot of panzers. Any ideas?
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There is no evidence of the US or any western ally having possession of an Il-2. However, they would certainly have been familiar with it. There are some pictures floating around from Operation Frantic that show US and Soviet aircrews swapping stories and talking about their planes. There are B17's, P51's, Yaks and Il-2's in the pictures, so it is obvious the US knew what they were and at least "kicked the tires" a couple times.
For those that don't know, Operation Frantic, was an American operation that conducted "shuttle bombing" over deep targets held by the Nazi's. The planes would take off from Britain or Italy, but would end their flights at Soviet airbases in the Ukraine. Three bases were established that supported B17's and B24's as well as long range escorts like P51's and P38's. The operation wasn't very succesful, but lasted from June 1944 to September 1944 with the last US crews and planes leaving the Ukraine in June 1945.
In terms of the Il-2, it certainly has gained a heck of a reputation given its contributions on the eastern front, but in practical terms, it wasn't as good as planes the western allies had for the same role like the P47 or Typhoon. The western planes were more accurate, carried a larger payload and were better air-to-air fighters. The advantage the Il-2 had was the fact that it was used in massive numbers. They also benefitted greatly from the development of anti-tank "cluster bombs" that allowed them to carpet an area with 192 bomblets, which more than made up for their lack of accuracy.
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Originally Posted by Fontucky
I'll bet that armored shell protecting the crew didn't look so primitive.
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It wasn't primitive, but the western planes like the P47 (designed by expatriate Russians who fled from the Bolsheviks) had similar protection, albeit not as rugged. The interesting piece with the Il-2 is that the armor body design was inspired by the German WW1 era Junkers J.1, which used similar constuction. The engine, while being a total Russian design, borrowed many elements from the BMW V1. The V1 was built under license as the Mikulin M-17, which became the M-34, then M-35 and finally the M-38 that was used in the Il-2.
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Originally Posted by JordanJP
I'm not aware of the US having its hands on any, though I'm sure they probably had a good idea of what its capabilities were. Would have been interesting to see an IL2 and a P51D go at it.
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The fact of the matter is that the P51D would have ripped an Il-2 to shreds in air-to-air combat. The Il-2 was a good ground attack aircraft, especially in numbers, but it was pretty much a sitting duck in a dogfight. They scored the occasional BF109 kill, but over half of Il-2 losses were to enemy fighters, the remainder being losses to AA fire, especially once the AA crews realized that the Il-2's lack of accuracy meant they could stay in position and fire with little risk of being hit.
The German pilots referred to it as the "concrete bomber", since it could absorb so much punishment and was difficult to shoot down, but in air combat the Il-2 was really only a threat to heavy bombers and transport planes.
I think the Il-2 is an example of a weapon whose reputation exceeds its actual capabilities. Yes, it performed great in the role it was intended to fill and the Soviets adapted their tactics to make great use of it, but compared to other aircraft it wasn't all that fantastic. Contrast that with the Soviet T34 tank that deserves every bit of the reputation it earned during the war.
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