Lockheed P-38 Lightning

One positive result of the failed British/French order was to give the aircraft its name.

Lockheed had originally dubbed the aircraft [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] in the company tradition of naming planes after mythological and celestial figures, but the RAF name won out.

Operational service


The first unit to receive P-38s was the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

After the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], the unit joined the 14th Pursuit Group in San Diego to provide West Coast defense.

Entry to the war


The first Lightning to see active service was the F-4 version, a P-38E in which the guns were replaced by
four K17 cameras.

They joined the 8th Photographic Squadron out of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] on 4 April 1942.

Three F-4s were operated by the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] in this theater for a short period beginning in September 1942.

On 29 May 1942, 25 P-38s began operating in the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] in [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

The fighter's long range made it well-suited to the campaign over the almost 1,200 mi (2,000 km)–long island
chain, and it would be flown there for the rest of the war.

The Aleutians were one of the most rugged environments available for testing the new aircraft under combat conditions.

More Lightnings were lost due to severe weather and other conditions than enemy action, and there were cases where Lightning pilots, mesmerized by flying for hours over gray seas under gray skies, simply flew into the water.

On 9 August 1942, two P-38Es of the 343rd Fighter Group, [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], at the end of a 1,000 mi (1,609 km) long-range patrol, happened upon a pair of Japanese [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] "Mavis" flying boats and destroyed them, making them the first Japanese aircraft to be shot down by Lightnings.

European theater



After the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], the USAAF began redeploying fighter groups to Britain as part of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], and
Lightnings of the 1st Fighter Group were flown across the Atlantic via [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

On 14 August, [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] Elza Shahan of the 27th Fighter Squadron, and Second Lieutenant Joseph Shaffer of the 33rd Squadron operating out of Iceland shot down a [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] Kondor over the Atlantic.

Shahan in his P-38F downed the Kondor; Shaffer, flying either a P-40C or a P-39, had already set an engine on fire.

This was the first [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] aircraft destroyed by the USAAF.

P-38 Lightnings had a number of lucky escapes, exemplified by the arrival of the 71st fighter squadron at [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] ([Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], England) in July 1942.

The official handover ceremony was scheduled for mid-August, but on the day before the ceremony, Goxhill experienced its only air raid of the war.

A single German bomber flew overhead and dropped a very well aimed bomb right on the intersection between the two newly concreted runways, but it didn’t explode and the aircraft were able to continue their mission.

(As it turned out, the bomb could not be removed and, for the duration of the war, aircraft had to pass over it every time they took off.)

After 347 sorties with no enemy contact, the 1st, 14th and 82nd Fighter Groups were transferred to the 12th Air Force in North Africa as part of the force being built up for [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

On 19 November 1942, Lightnings escorted a group of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] bombers on a raid over Tunis.

On 5 April 1943, 26 P-38Fs of the 82nd destroyed 31 enemy aircraft, helping to establish air superiority in the area, and earning it the German nickname "der Gabelschwanzteufel" – the Fork-Tailed Devil.

The P-38 remained active in the Mediterranean for the rest of the war.

It was in this theatre that the P-38 suffered its heaviest losses in the air.

On 25 August 1943, 13 P-38s were shot down in a single sortie by [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] without achieving a single kill.

On 2 September, 10 P-38s were shot down, in return for a single kill, the 67-victory ace [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] (who was also the leading "Lightning" killer in the Luftwaffe with 17 destroyed).

Kurt Buehligen, third highest scoring German pilot on Western front with 112 victories, recalled later:

“The P-38 fighter (and the B-24) were easy to burn. Once in Africa we were six and met eight P-38s and shot down seven. One sees a great distance in Africa and our observers and flak people called in sightings and we could get altitude first and they were low and slow.”

Experiences over Germany had shown a need for long-range escort fighters to protect the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]'s heavy bomber operations.

The P-38Hs of the 55th Fighter Group were transferred to the Eighth in England in September 1943, and were joined by the 20th, 364th and 479th Fighter Groups soon after.

P-38s soon joined Spitfires in escorting the early Fortress raids over Europe.

Because its distinctive shape was less prone to cases of mistaken identity and [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], Commander [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], chose to pilot a P-38 during the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] so that he could personally assess the progress of the air offensive over France.

At one point in the mission, Doolittle flick-rolled through a hole in the cloud cover but his [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], Earle E. "Pat" Partridge (later General), was looking elsewhere and failed to notice Doolittle's quick maneuver, leaving Doolittle to continue alone on his survey of the crucial battle. Of the P-38, Doolittle said that it was "the sweetest-flying plane
in the sky".^{[Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]}


A little-known role of the P-38 in the European theater was that of fighter-bomber during the invasion of Normandy and the Allied advance across France into Germany.

Assigned to the IX Tactical Air Command, the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and its P-38s initially flew missions from England,
dive-bombing radar installations, enemy armor, troop concentrations, and [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

The 370th's group commander Howard F. Nichols and a squadron of his P-38 Lightnings attacked [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] Günther
von Kluge's headquarters in July 1944; Nichols himself skipped a 500 lb (227 kg) bomb through the front door.

The 370th later operated from [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] France, flying ground attack missions against gun emplacements, troops, supply dumps and tanks near [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] in July and in the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]-[Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] area in August 1944.

The 370th participated in ground attack missions across Europe until February 1945 when the unit transitioned to the P-51 Mustang.

Italian pilots in the Mediterranean theatre started to face P-38s from late 1942 and considered it a formidable foe compared to other fighters, including the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

A small number of P-38s fell into the hands of German and Italian units and were subsequently tested and used in combat.

On 12 June 1943, a P-38G, while flying a special mission between [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], landed on the airfield of Capoterra ([Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]) , in [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], for navigation error due to a compass failure.

[Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] chief test pilot colonnello [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] Angelo Tondi flew the plane to [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] airfield where the P-38G was evaluated.

On 11 August 1943, Tondi took off to intercept a formation of about fifty B-24s, returning from the bombing of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] ([Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]).

Tondi attacked a bomber that fell off the shore of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], near [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], while six airmen were parachuting.

That was the first and last war mission for the plane, as the Italian petrol was too corrosive for the Lockheed tanks.

The Lightning was eventually acquired by Italy for postwar service.

If faced by more agile fighters at low altitudes in a constricted valley, Lightnings could suffer heavy losses.

On the morning of 10 June 1944, 96 P-38Js of the 1st and 82nd Fighter Groups took off from Italy for [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], the third-most heavily-defended target in Europe, after Berlin and Vienna.

Instead of bombing from high altitude as had been tried by the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], USAAF planning had determined that a dive-bombing surprise attack, beginning at about 7,000 feet (2,100 m) with bomb release at or below 3,000 feet (900 m), performed by 46 [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] P-38s, each carrying one 1,000-pound (500 kg) bomb, would yield more accurate results.

All of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and a few aircraft in 82nd Fighter Group were to fly cover, and all fighters were to strafe targets of opportunity on the return trip; a distance of some 1,255 miles (2,020 km), including a circuitous outward route made in an attempt to achieve surprise.

Some 85–86 fighters arrived in Romania to find enemy airfields alerted, with a wide assortment of aircraft scrambling
for safety.

P-38s shot down several enemy including heavy fighters, transports and observation aircraft.

At Ploesti, defense forces were fully alert, the target was concealed by [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], and [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] was very
heavy—seven Lightnings were lost to it at the target, and two more during strafing attacks on the return flight.

German Bf 109 fighters from I./JG 53 and 2./JG 77 fought the Americans.

One flight of 16, the 71st Fighter Squadron, was challenged by a large formation of Romanian single-seater [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] fighters. The fight took place at and below 300 feet (100 m) in a narrow valley.

Herbert Hatch saw two IAR 81Cs that he misidentified as Fw 190s hit the ground after taking fire from his guns, and his fellow pilots confirmed three more of his kills.

However, the outnumbered 71st Fighter Squadron took more damage than it dished out, losing nine aircraft.

In all, the USAAF lost 22 aircraft on the mission.

The Americans claimed 23 aerial victories, though Romanian and German fighter units admitted losing only one aircraft each.

Eleven enemy locomotives were strafed and left burning, and flak emplacements were destroyed, along with fuel
trucks and other targets.

Results of the bombing were not observed by the USAAF pilots because of the smoke.

The dive-bombing mission profile was not repeated, though the 82nd Fighter Group was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for their part.

After some disastrous raids with B-17s escorted by P-38 Lightnings (and P-47s), in 1944, Jimmy Doolittle, then head of the United States Eight Air Force went to Farnborough, asking for evaluation of the P-38 (and P-47 and Mustang).

[Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], CBE, DSC, AFC, RN, Chief Naval Test Pilot at the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] (RAE) Farnborough, in 1944-1949 and C.O. Captured Enemy Aircraft Flight in 1947-1949, recalled:

“We had found out that the Bf 109 and the Fw 190 could fight up to a Mach of 0.75, three-quarters the speed of sound.
We checked the Lightning and it couldn’t fly in combat faster than 0.68. So it was useless.
We told Doolittle that all it was good for was photo-reconnaissance and had to be withdrawn from escort duties.
And the funny thing is that the Americans had great difficulty understanding this because the Lightning had the two top aces in the Far East.”

After evaluation tests at Farnborough, the P-38 was still kept in fighting service in Europe, for a while, though the aircraft suffered regular engine failures in the first months of deployment due to overheating.

However, even if many of the aircraft's problems were fixed with the introduction of the P-38J, by September 1944, all but one of the Lightning groups in the Eighth Air Force had converted to the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien].

The Eighth AF continued to conduct reconnaissance missions using the F-5 variant.

Pacific theater



The P-38 was used most extensively and successfully in the Pacific theater, where it proved ideally suited, combining excellent performance with very long range.

The P-38 was used in a variety of roles, especially escorting bombers at altitudes between 18-25,000 ft
(5,500-7,600 m).

The P-38 was credited with destroying more Japanese aircraft than any other USAAF fighter.

Freezing cockpits were not a problem at low altitude in the tropics.

In fact, since there was no way to open a window while in flight as it caused buffeting by setting up turbulence
through the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], it was often too hot; pilots taking low altitude assignments would often fly stripped down to shorts, tennis shoes, and parachute.

While the P-38 could not out-maneuver the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and most other Japanese fighters, its speed and rate of climb gave American pilots the option of choosing to fight or run, and its focused firepower was even more deadly to lightly-armored Japanese warplanes than to the Germans'.

The concentrated, parallel stream of bullets allowed aerial victory at much longer distances than fighters carrying wing
guns.

It is therefore ironic that [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], the United States' highest-scoring World War II air ace (40 victories solely in P-38s), would fly directly at his targets to make sure he hit them (as he himself acknowledged his poor shooting
ability), in some cases flying through the debris of his target (and on one occasion colliding with an enemy aircraft which was claimed as a "probable" victory).

The twin Allison engines performed admirably in the Pacific.

On 2-4 March 1943, P-38s flew top cover for [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and Australian bombers and attack-planes during the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], a crushing defeat for the Japanese.

Two P-38 aces from the 39th Fighter Squadron were killed on the second day of the battle: Bob Faurot and
Hoyt "Curley" Eason (a veteran with five victories who had trained hundreds of pilots, including Dick Bong).

General [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], commander of the USAAF Fifth Air Force operating in [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], could not get enough P-38s, though since they were replacing serviceable but inadequate P-39s and P-40s, this might seem like guarded praise.

Lightning pilots began to compete in racking up scores against Japanese aircraft.

Isoroku Yamamoto


Main article: [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien]

The Lightning figured in one of the most significant operations in the Pacific theater: the interception, on 18 April 1943, of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien], the architect of Japan's naval strategy in the Pacific including the attack
on Pearl Harbor.

When American [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] found out that he was flying to [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] to conduct a front-line inspection, 16 P-38G Lightnings were sent on a long-range fighter-intercept mission, flying 435 mi (700 km) from [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] at heights from 10–50 ft (3–15 m) above the ocean to avoid detection.

The Lightnings met Yamamoto's two [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] "Betty" fast bomber transports and six escorting Zeros just as they arrived.

The first Betty crashed in the jungle and the second ditched near the coast.

Two Zeros were also claimed by the American fighters with the loss of one P-38. Japanese searchers found Yamamoto's body at the jungle crash site the next day.

Service record


The P-38's service record shows mixed results, but usually because of misinformation.

P-38s have been described as being harder to fly than single-engined planes, but this was because of inadequate training in the first few months of the war.

The P-38's engine troubles at high altitudes only occurred with the Eighth Air Force.

One reason for this was the inadequate cooling systems of the G and H models; the improved P-38 J and L had tremendous success flying out of Italy into Germany at all altitudes.

Up until the -J-25 variant, P-38s were easily avoided by German fighters because of the lack of dive flaps to counter compressibility in dives.

German fighter pilots not wishing to fight would perform the first half of a [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and continue into steep dives because they knew the Lightnings would be reluctant to follow.

On the positive side, having two engines was a built-in insurance policy.

Many pilots made it safely back to base after having an engine fail en route or in combat.

On 3 March 1944, the first Allied fighters reached Berlin on a frustrated escort mission. Lieutenant Colonel Jack Jenkins of [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] led the group of P-38H pilots, arriving with only half his force after flak damage and engine trouble took their toll.

On the way in to Berlin, Jenkins reported one rough-running engine and one good one, causing him to wonder if he'd ever make it back.

The B-17s he was supposed to escort never showed up, having turned back at Hamburg.

Jenkins and his wingman were able to drop tanks and outrun enemy fighters to return home with three good engines between them.

In the ETO, P-38s made 130,000 sorties with a loss of 1.3% overall, comparing favorably with ETO P-51s which posted a 1.1% loss, considering that the P-38s were vastly outnumbered and suffered from poorly thought-out tactics.

The majority of the P-38 sorties were made in the period prior to Allied air superiority in Europe when pilots fought against a very determined and skilled enemy.

Lieutenant Colonel Mark Hubbard, a vocal critic of the aircraft, rated it third best Allied fighter in Europe.

The Lightning's greatest virtues were long range, heavy payload, high speed, fast climb, and concentrated firepower.

The P-38 was a formidable interceptor and attack aircraft and, in the hands of any pilot, dangerous in air-to-air combat.

In the Pacific theater, the P-38 downed over 1,800 Japanese aircraft, with more than 100 pilots becoming aces by downing five or more enemy aircraft.

American fuel supplies contributed to a better engine performance and maintenance record, and range was increased
with leaner mixtures.

In the second half of 1944, the P-38L pilots out of Dutch New Guinea were flying 950 mi (1,530 km), fighting for 15 minutes and returning to base.

Such long legs were invaluable until the [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] and [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] entered service.