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Gun Kills II
By Jim "Twitch" Tittle |
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The Dinah off Okinawa was low to the water and was a match for the F6F-5 Hellcat in speed. The two 1,500 h.p. Mitsubishi fourteen cylinder radials strained to out pull the Pratt & Whitney eighteen cylinder behind pumping out its 2,200 water-methanol injected horsepower. The pursuing Harris "Mitch" Mitchell fired too low and saw tiny splashes behind the quick moving recon plane. Then he saw the tracers above his canopy from his squadron mates. Using this as a guide he picked up the snout of the Grumman to watch his fire stream into the Ki-46. One engine blazed and the sleek plane cartwheeled into the ocean. This, his sixth kill, was taken at "somewhere over a half mile."
 Fig. 1 Harris "Mitch" Mitchell
The long running chase caused no problems for the F6F's engine and later in the same mission Mitchell scored his seventh and eighth kills downing two Ki 84 Franks. Harris had fired at long range since the lengthy pursuit allowed only very slow closing rates with the fleet-winged Japanese Army plane. This was May 4, 1945. Mitch was pretty monotone in his description to me, not making a big deal out of a long-range shot that most pilots could only dream of. But he had grown up hunting and firearms trajectory was not something new to him. This man had flown wing for the famed Eugene Valencia that tallied twenty-three by war's end. Mitchell's triple was a repeat of the famous April 17th engagement where Valencia got six enemy aircraft and Mitch got three near Kyushu. They had come across a forty plane Kamikaze force heading towards their carrier group. "I just kept shooting 'em off Gene's butt every time one would latch on," drawled the Texan, so nonchalant was his description of the huge action. Clinton Smith scored the second of his war total of six and James French knocked down four of his final total of eleven. The four men had scored fourteen kills between them! It was a similar experience to that of David McCampbell's and Roy Rushing's where they got fifteen kills against a Kamikaze formation except these guys did fight back. Harris Mitchell ended his wartime string of ten victories with two KI 61 Tonys a week later.
Those of you in PC flight simulators who have wondered how realistic it is to shoot down E/A-enemy aircraft at long range need wonder no more.
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Eight years later in MiG Alley Captain Ralph Parr began his string of ten victories with the fabled F-86E, having already flown 165 missions in the F-80 without incident. His first kill was a difficult one, he notes, but one in particular was a strong challenge.
Fifty years later we all know now that Russian pilots, who were WWII combat veterans, flew MiG 15s in Korea. Back then American pilots knew it too, but the rest of the world did not. There was too much of a difference in combat skill for it to be normal aptitude diffusion in the Red Chinese pilots. There were instances of MiG pilots ejecting upon contact with Sabers over the Alley without a shot fired. And many MiG kills were textbook easy. But that day in July 1953 proved to Ralph that the Russians were indeed piloting MiGs.
"You have to be pretty damned sure of your self to tell your squadron to back off while you alone enter combat, but that's just what he did," the Saber ace explained. "We knew those cocky guys were Russians," he continued.
The wild struggle that ensued put the two planes through every type of combat maneuver scissoring, skidding and using speed brakes. The two passed so close that Parr said he could recognize the pilot's features.
"This guy had blazing red hair and freckles. " Parr explained that the shock of hair was visible protruding from the Russian's leather flying helmet.
"We disengaged and he began climbing away." He continued, "The MiGs could out climb us at certain altitudes."
Then Ralph said something that every simulator pilot has experienced and I gave a knowing nod. "When he broke and pulled away it took me a few seconds to get set up and by then he was 1,800 feet out"
Yes Ralph, I'd done it many times! The A.I. (artificial intelligence) pilot in my flight sims break away to gain distance to re-engage me and I'm left to calm down, steady my wings, focus on the gun sight and fire. If you don't get "set up" you just squander your ammo. From that long distance astern, Ralph Parr brought down his fourth MiG with a good burst from his six nose-mounted 50s.
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