I would also like a source on the Stuka having the most ship kills of any aircraft, I highly doubt that once you consider USN/IJN carrier aviation. It just seems like one huge crap shoot for the Germans, with the possibility of an Atlantic Turkey Shoot looking pretty realistic. The later in the war this happens, the less chances the Germans have. Which is why the FAA used such a large number of US aircraft on their hsips. The British struggled with their Seafires later in the war and with their previous experiences, imagine the Germans trying with minimal experience?īF-109's would have trouble keeping up CAP for any decent amount of time due to their fuel capacity, just like the Seafires. Then consider how the BF-109T was becoming rapidly outdated when compared to Allied aviation and the Graf Zeppelin is looking less and less successful by the minute. German pilots would also be much less experienced than their British or American counterparts in carrier aviation. All these characteristics are not something you want in a carrier aircraft. BF-109's also had notoriously bad cockpit visibility, something you need when landing on a carrier in the Atlantic. If you modernized it for carrier operation, aka strengthened the airframe, you add more weight to an aircraft with an already low sortie range. The problem is, the BF-109 had even more issues than even the Spitfire/Wildcat with it's very lightly built airframe and narrow landing gear. The Stuka was butchered by land based aircraft, Seafires, Corsairs, Wildcats, Hellcats and excreta would not be much different. I am aware of that however, the BF-109 is not exactly a decent choice for carrier aviation either, same with the Stuka.
It'd certainly be interesting to see how they managed in the dive bomber/torpedo bomber role on a carrier. The Stuka, while venerable, did destroy more ships than any other aircraft in history. Swordfishes, Skuas, Albacores, Fireflys, Gladiators and Barracudas are not exactly the creme of the crop when it comes to carrier aviation. Not that British carrier aviation was anything to brag about either.
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