I enjoy watching military history documentaries, and I saw an interesting one comparing the Japanese zero and the Corsair.
Once upon a time, Russia was the source of new technology on main battle tanks, just like Japan and it’s unprecedented zero conquered the skies for several years in the pacific. No one could match its speed and turning radius in dog fights, and the kill ratio versus existing American fighters was obscenely in favor of the Japanese. Consider the zero a microcosm of Russia’s military capabilities at the start of the war in 2022.
Fast forward just two years and you have Hellcats and Corsairs in the Pacific theater destroying Japanese aviation with the same kill ratios that Japan once had: 10 to one type kill ratios in favor of American pilots. The new American fighters were 100 miles an hour faster than zeros even though they weighed twice as much, they had bulletproof canopies, heavy armor, much larger engines, and self sealing gas tanks if struck by Japanese machine gun fire.
The American fighters could climb faster, dive faster, operate at a higher ceiling, absorb more punishment, and their greater armaments could destroy a zero with a single burst. The Americans could carry more ammunition, and with drop tanks could fly farther than their Japanese counterparts.
American pilots destroyed so many zeros in such a surprising amount of time that the Japanese could not respond. Their rigid training and industrial manufacturing systems (requiring approval at many levels with a Navy and army that were constantly fighting politically) there was no way to produce better Japanese fighters in such a short period of time in enough numbers to compete with America.
America was dumping out thousands of new pilots with 600 to 700 hours airtime using loads of ammunition to hone their skills, while Japanese pilots had barely 100 hours of training. They conserved scarce ammo to the extent that they totally lacked the skills of the prior elite pilots when they went up for the first time against experienced P-51, Corsair and Hellcat aces.
And so, in just three years the fight with feared, elite, battle experienced Japanese pilots in their superior planes turned into a battle between experienced American pilots with vastly superior planes, to the point the uneven contest resulted in events like the great Marianas Turkey Shoot.
Today, although Russia started out with vastly more and better equipment than Ukraine had, and a military that was universally recognized as being far better than Ukraine, in a little over three years Ukraine has mastered drone warfare and developed its own weapons like the flamingo and it’s long flight drones that are wrecking the Russian oil and gas economy.
tl;dr Japan hit a tipping point when no matter their fanatical ideology and thirst for war, their inability to replace battle hardened troops and officers with leadership experience - when coupled with an inability to build significant numbers of modern weapons equal to their opponents - doomed Japan.
The timeframe here seems to be playing out in the same way. Three years later, the Russian economy is incapable of sustaining this expensive large scale war. Russia is so desperate for meat for the front lines that they threw in naval and other personnel with no infantry training to be fodder for useless assaults.
In that situation, Japan went to kamikaze attacks when traditional aerial combat was no longer feasible. I fear that tactical nuclear weapons might be the fallback for Russia. I think the most dangerous time is right before Russia falls and loses. like about right now.
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