Military Historian Reviews the Best WW2 Air Combat Scenes in Movies
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- Опубліковано 31 тра 2024
- Are these the best World War Two air combat scenes in movies? War historian, NATO Advisor and presenter of History Hit’s Warfare podcast James Rogers reviews scenes from films about World War Two that show aerial combat.
You can listen to the Warfare podcast here: podfollow.com/the-world-wars/...
First up, he reviews scenes from Memphis Belle (1990) which depict the famed B-17F being attacked by a fleet of German planes, praising the film for its historical accuracy in telling the story of the iconic bomber.
Next, he rates the scene from Dunkirk (2017) where a dogfight takes place over the English Channel. While he likes the film, he points out that there are a few factual inconsistencies, including the lack of diversity in the actors chosen to portray pilots.
James then reviews the Japanese surprise attack from Pearl Harbour (2001), so important in history as it was the trigger for drawing the United States into the war. James praises the film for its accuracy in showing the level of destruction enacted on the harbour.
Next, it’s the ending scene from Saving Private Ryan (1998) where Tom Hanks faces off against a tank, with a little bit of aerial help. James explains that the decisive role that airpower shows in the film was accurate, especially during the Normandy invasion.
Finally Unbroken (2014) is reviewed, with James finding the aerial combat to be reasonably accurate and commending the depiction of the plane's landing despite having an exploded tire.
Do you agree with James Rogers’ choices? Let us know in the comments!
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00:00 Introduction
00:36 Memphis Belle (1990)
07:25 Dunkirk (2017)
11:30 Pearl Harbour (2001)
18:07 Saving Private Ryan (1998)
20:48 Unbroken (2014)
Tora Tora Tora was a much better portrayal than Pearl Harbour! Like others can't believe you missed out the Battle of Britain film, probably the most realistic air combat film of all time....
Pearl Harbor is American, so it would be appropriate to use the American English spelling.
@@cleverusername9369 Nobody cares, so it would be appropriate to shut up.
@@cleverusername9369 I'm british, so appropriate or not I choose to spell things the way we do this side of the pond! You can spell them any way you like!
@@cleverusername9369 Is American English the same as Spanish?😘
@@markbowen3638 Pear Harbor is what is called "A Proper Name" i.e. it is a specific place with a specific name so that is how it spelled on ALL maps, whether printed in the UK or the US.
I'm surprised the Battle of Britain (1969) wasn't included in this list
Exactly. Same as Squadron 303 (2018), Hurricane (2018) and Dark Blue World (2001)
Awesome film, love it...
@@jeffsmith2022 It's vintage!
I'm not.
James Roger's PHD was in American precision bombing during WWII, so I imagine they picked films more bomber-centric.
Pearl Harbour? Ooooh dear surely Tora Tora Tora would have been better
I saw TTT as a kid and was blown away by the air combat scenes. So much so that I recently bought it, just to see if I was right. Sadly, was disappointed. Was much better then Pearl Harbour though, obviously
@@johnleney9541 "TTT" get a grip
Harbor*
The biggest thing about these two, the bomb hit on Arizona.
You do know that UA-cam has a search function, right?
The best part of the spitfire scenes in Dunkirk was Micheal Caine on the radio giving a cheeky nod to the Battle of Britain movie
Ridiculous bit with the spitfire landing deadstick. They glided like a brick.
@@andrewnielsen3178 Huh? First time I hear that. Where did you get that from?
My father was a B-17 navigator stationed in Italy later in the war. I took him to see Memphis Belle when it came out and sat next to him throughout the movie. During the flying scenes he would make comments here and there about how realistic it was, that was up until the initial bombing run and it showed flak shells going off. He huffed rather loudly and said "That ain't flak!" Later he explained that the Germans knew exactly where they were going, what altitude they were at and their exact airspeed. He said it wasnt just an occasional puff going off, it was a solid black cloud they would fly into and the entire time flying over the target he said it sounded like walnuts bouncing off the hull of the plane.
My grandfather was a top turret gunner and flight engineer on a B-17. In the movie one gunner said that guy had blue eyes. My grandpa said that ain’t no joke. He saw the German fighters turn sideways so they could fly between them. He made 30 missions.
Although "Memphis Belle" is a fictionalized story, the filmmakers sought accuracy in showing what it would be like to be in a bomber crew. Having grown up in the 1960s and seeing war movies of that vintage and earlier, one of the most striking things about this 1990 movie is how young the crew members are compared to earlier portrayals.
I got to go aboard the B17 built for the movie. It had parts from the actual Memphis Belle, and you could feel the history just when sitting in the cockpit on the ground. The original was undergoing restoration at the Air Force Museum last I knew, not sure if it has been completed yet
@@briandix4633 - The original Memphis Belle is indeed on public display at the Air Force Museum since May 2018.
@@WinterHawke2007 thank you. I knew it was being restored, haven't kept up with them to see if it had been finished yet. The one they built for the movie had a plaque in the cockpit commemorating the original. I'd have taken pics, but this happened in 1994 lol
Watch out, americans love to show faker and faker actions to make america great
whats cool as well the daughter of the director of the '44 Belle doc was the director of the '90 Belle movie
He missed a lot of historical innacuracies. A big one was Mustangs as "tank busters." Aerial tank busting in WW2 was largely ineffective due to lack of precision targeting/guidance methods of the weaponry. He knows the big picture of WW2 history but doesn't know much about WW2 aerial combat. He also confused the B-24 for the B-29. The B-24 was not "brand new" at the time of the Unbroken Story, and the B-29 was the aircraft that put the most pressure on the Japanese mainland.
A lot of the commentary was captain obvious in my opinion. Also not mentioning the use of Buchons in almost every movie…
it looks that he is parroting US war propaganda
the myth of a surprise attack on Pearl harbor all the battleships were obsolete and and the aircraft carriers happend to be at sea and the myth of the nukes because the million casualties that was a made up number
But they were flying a B-24 in Unbroken and it was relatively new to service in 1943, only had about a year of service to that point. That's pretty new in the Aviation world. Also the P-51D could carry tank busting bombs, pilots would fly at extremely low altitudes and drop unguided bombs on tanks. This tactic didn't always work, but it was effective enough that German Army would not mass large Panzer divisions due to the risks on Ground Support Aircraft.
I had always heard of the P-47 being dubbed a “Tank Buster” as they were more of Fighter/Ground Support aircraft. Not until Saving Private Ryan did I ever hear anyone dub a P-51 as such.
My personal annoyance with Pearl Harbor (apart from Ben Affleck’s ludicrous career going from fighters to bombers) was the effort to film the Japanese bombs in detail which they then get wrong.
That little propeller thing on the bomb fuze is an ‘arming vane’. It’s turned by falling through the air and a certain number of turns switches the fuze from ‘safe’ to ‘armed’.
You see a bomb land on the airfield and the arming vane keeps turning. In real life, if it hadn’t armed by the time it hit the ground, then it wouldn’t arm.
I know it’s a bit of a niche thing, but they made all the effort to show the ^%#%#^ things…
Where is The Battle of Britain? seriously how can you not have a Aerial Combat scene movie reaction and not have that movie in it?
James Roger's PHD is in American precision bombing during WWII, so I imagine they picked films more bomber-centric. Not that I disagree with you.
I agree. Also his comments over the Dunkirk segment suggesting that pilots at the beginning of the war 'probably' were posh and SNCO pilots were only introduced as a result of attrition shows such a stunning lack of knowledge and understanding by this so-called (and presumably, as a blogger, self appointed) expert that I couldn't watch any more of his rubbish. I could spend half a page explaining where these comments about fighter pilots were wrong but, frankly, what's the point?
I Dunkirk, the scene where they lose their flight leader is spot on. One moment he’s there, the next he’s gone, and no one saw what happened.
My Grandfather William flew Spitfires during the Battle of Britain, so I liked "Dunkirk" as it was a nice reminder of what he did.
There was a quote from an interview with a WWII German fighter pilot. He said that fighter other fighters, even if outnumbered, could be exhilerating and even fun, but rolling in on a tight bomber formation could make your life flash before your eyes.
Yup, that from a letter written by Hans Phillip==he was a VERY successful Eastern Front group commander, who was brought West and put in charge of JG-1, the wing guarding North Germany and Netherlands. He ended up getting shot down and killed shortly after he wrote that letter.
@@nickmitsialis To keep in formation was important so the bombers would not bump into each other. But how did they avoid that they would shoot each other? Are there statistics about which was more effective or lethal: a fighter escor or the board weapons against attacking German Messerschmitts?
@@gunnarkaestle I don't know about any stats RE: friendly fire in the bomber stream, but by golly I'm sure it took place. Heck, the fighter escorts learned to keep their distance from the Heavies as well. as when things got 'heated', the gunners tended to shoot at ANYTHING with a single engine;
Good Formation was very important; 'hard luck' units like the 100th BG often had a problem with their formation flying. German ground controllers and fighter unit leaders would scope out poor formation keepers very quickly---and then there were the B24s: they could not fly as high as a 'fort' and was much harder to keep in formation--German units loved to run into them.
Dunkirk: Every pilot knows that if you're ditching, particularly at sea you open the canopy so that what happens in the movie doesn't happen. During private pilot training in the you're told to stick a shoe in the door so that it doesn't jam shut.
Unbroken: With respect to the landing sequence. The B-24 manual had a procedure in it in which the crew would attach their parachutes to the airframe and then deploy them out the window in order to slow the aircraft down.
Do they ever wear their Oxygen masks in Unbroken or just too cool for hypoxia
B-17F 41-24577 “Hells Angels” was the first (edited) B-17 to complete 25 missions in the UK, earlier than the much more publicized “Memphis Belle” reached the same status.
Edit: As Crediblesport said. B-24 41-23728 "Hot Stuff" was the first heavy bomber to complete 25 missions on February 7, 1943 while B-17F 41-24577 “Hells Angels” was the first _B-17_ to complete 25 missions on May 13th 1943. Memphis Belle did it's 25th on May 17, 1943 but might have been the first to return to the United States after doing so.
No b 24 hot stuff was the 1st to complete 25 missions.
@@Crediblesport You are absolutely right. I stand corrected. 👍The B-24s deserve more love.
Why not Battle of Britain??!
Exactly. Maybe there were copyright issues regarding showing clips. BoB is my favourite World War 2 aviation film. One inaccuracy in it is that none of the combat footage was shot at altitudes above 20,000 feet (for filming purposes) and that is where quite a bit of combat actually took place. One of the main features of the real battle were the masses of contrails weaving all over the sky. They are completely missing from the movie.
The oldest movie on this list is from 1990. I feel it's a strong recency bias in the editorial selection. Battle of Britan & Tora! Tora! Tora! had no chance. The old Midway movie too.
Ah fear of critiquing the absolute gem and saying something negative maybe?
I think they should of but also keep in mind it's old it should get a break from highly accurate depictions as that was not the main driving factor.
The dire situation is no1
But I think it's excellent for it's time as is Bridge too Far.
Absolutely legendary films.
Bridge too far is actually quite accurate except for the British drinking tea garbage.
Now according to 1 historian it is Gavin from the 82nd who buggered up and off course yes the rd and time given was highly ambitious.
But that opening armoured column move was a incredible spectacle in the movie.
And the creeping barrage from the 25pdr is amazing then the air support.
But the aircraft type escapes me.
The photo of the Green Howard's marching shows Sargent Hollis who won the VC in Normandy.
He is on the left saluting.
Please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm aware the P51D could carry rockets and bombs, but wasn't the P47D chose for the role of what we may call today "CAS"? What I mean is, from the books I've read, the P51 was busy keeping the little of the Luftwaffe that was left while the P47 was just pounding axis forces on the ground.
You are correct, and neither were notably called "tank busters."
P-51s did do low level strafing runs on their return home from fighter escort missions, but to be historically accurate that aircraft during the Normandy campaign would almost certainly have been a P-47 or a Typhoon because the P-51 was badly needed for bomber escort missions. Spielberg loves the P-51 so it's no surprise he chose one for Saving Private Ryan.
The P-47 was designed as a high altitude fighter interceptor. However, it was later adapted for low level ground attack, a role at which it was very good at. P-51s wewre also used for ground attack. There was even a bomber version of the P-51, the A-36 Invader.
@@EricIrl By the time the Normandy campaign took place, A-36s had already been replaced in service with tactical fighter bomber squadrons in the European theater by P-47s.
@@SPQRTempus Agreed.
But originally the USAAF looked on the P-51 as a low level aircraft which is why the A-36 was devised.
633 Squadron? Dam Busters?
The Memphis Belle bit made me more excited for Masters of the Air, it can't come any sooner.
Seldom have I been looking forward to a new show this much. Can't wait.
Forgot to mention, I really think Memphis Belle is a very underrated movie. Yes, the story isn't historically accurate, but the tension and immersion they were able create made it feel like you were one of the crew, absolutely give them credit for that alone. One of my favorite movies.
but the makers couldn't resist putting in the Stuka whine when the ME109 is hit....
@@denz8261no one calls them ME109 The redesignation of the Bayerische Flugzeugwerke AG (Aktiengesellschaft or Corporation) to the Messerschmitt AG in 1938 led many to call it the Me 109, although the official Luftwaffe designation of the aircraft remained the Bf 109 throughout the war.
According to a tail gunner I knew, who's B-17 can be seen landing in the Memphis Belle documentary, the movie doesn't show what happened to the Belle, but everything they showed in the movie happened to somebody. His family offered to buy him a ride on a B-17, but he declined. After surviving 25 missions, he did not want to be inside one ever again.
My Uncle is shown in that documentary .He was a mechanic on another b17 in the same squad
Thanks for recognizing Memphis belle, such an underrated film
Memphis Belle: No allied fighter pilot would follow a 109 through the box formation. You'd be shot by your own gunners. You would wait for it to clear the formation. Footage shows P-51's 50 meters off the 109's tail weaving through the formation. Nope.
yer and enoughter thing german pilots had near the end of the war had a box telling them they been up there fighting alot thought it was suicide so the bastards put a box in the plane
Dunkirk was early in the war, though. That's why the pilots were portrayed as upper class.
The portrayal of the RAF in this film is pure fantasy.
It was the Royal Navy's own aircraft that flew over the beaches doing dive bombing and spotting for naval guns. They are the ones who took terrible losses (825 NAS lost 8 out of its 12 aircraft). If you want to see a better portrayal of this event, the BBC series with Benedict Cummerbatch was 10 times better.
I do not mind artistic films making stuff up but by calling this film DUNKIRK, many will believe this is how it happened.
Remember ROOTS. How many people now believe this is how the slave trade happened. Even the author said it was a lie to bring black americans together.
It will be wrong to remember Dunkirk in this way when the army and navy lived through sheer terror and took such heavy losses in comparison to the fantasy flight of the RAF in this movie.
Pure fantasy? So no RAF flew over the beaches of Dunkirk during the evacuation?
Interesting … very famous picture of a spitfire dug into the sand at Dunkirk … wonder how it go there. Restored now to flying.
The Fleet Air Arm also wasn’t very strong in 1940, so hardly think it was flying Spits/Hurricanes.
@@richienorris6032 Which spitfire was shot down at Dunkirk?
N3200 was shot down at Calais.
Check your facts if you are going to argue.
just one FAA squadron lost 8 out of 12 aircraft in this evacuation, dive bombing German armour and spotting for ships bringing fire down on German artillery.
L7646 'G5-B crashed at Dunkirk.
The pilot later escaped in the "great escape" but was captured.
Many were shot down at gravelines whilst bombing the 17 mile german tank column.
812 and 823 naval air squadrons also suffered losses during the evacuation.
you also said
"The Fleet Air Arm also wasn’t very strong in 1940, so hardly think it was flying Spits/Hurricanes."
Did the SPITS & HURRICANES make a bigger impact than the swordfish?
I think not.
As always, unless the aircraft is a fighter people like you are blind to see them.
I have far more respect for the coastal command of the RAF than the glory boys.
Just taking off and flying over sea was incredibly dangerous without an enemy trying to kill you.
SPITS & HURRICANES did not fair well flying over the channel as they had very little fuel to do a proper job and if I am to be fair to these squadrons, we needed to keep these safe for the coming battle of Britain.
@@BikersDoItSittingDown you’re in the realms of fantasy mate….fly on fly on…..spotting for guns?🤣🤣🤣 Aye, 4 years later maybe….
@@alexwilliamson1486 who said -
"you’re in the realms of fantasy mate….fly on fly on…..spotting for guns?🤣🤣🤣 Aye, 4 years later maybe….
it saddens me when someone challenges what I say and has no idea what really happened."
Like the other RAF fans out there whom hate being corrected, I will not expect you to respond to my facts once you have checked them.
If you have no idea what your Royal Navy did, why not just say nothing instead of stating it was fantasy. OR you can use the keyboard in front of you and google it!
Here is just one example.
Fairey Swordfish Mk 1. L2829 'G5-H', of 825 naval air squadron was spotting the gunfire from the cruiser HMS Galatea on the German gun batteries at Calais on 26th May 1940
yes, 1940!
Is there enough detail here for you. Would you like the aircrew names aswell?
There were many others but there is nothing stopping you googling it yourself.
On D day the american ground attack aircraft were P47 Thunderbolts not P 51 mustangs.
For the Americans it would have been a mix of A-20s, P-51 Ds and P-47 Ds.
Famous Australian cricketer - Keith Miller who during the war flew Mosquito Fighter bombers was famously asked how do you deal with pressure on the cricket field. His response was " Pressure is having a Messerschmitt up your ar&e!, cricket is fun."
And Keith Miller actually flew how many operational missions in April-May 1945?
Charles 'Bud' Tingwell is a better example of RAAF pilots in WW2, as a photo-recon pilot and one of the Blue Orchids aka RAAF members in RAF Squadrons.
Next time you are at AWM, check out the names of the fallen 'Blue Orchids' on the bronze plaques. 15 tablets?
460 Sqn RAAF with 1018 KIA take up two tablets.
@@antonyrigby8911 the brother of my Aunt (by marriage) is one of those lost from 460Sqn. He was a Lancaster pilot.
@@antonyrigby8911was Charles Tingwell an international cricketer?
Because the point was, international sport is less stressful than having someone trying to kill you.
I always wonder what anyone who's been in a war must think when millionaire footballers are "stressed" when they take part in penalty shoot-outs.
This "expert" is just stating the obvious. Oh, and the fleet at Pearl aren't "literally" sitting ducks.
Such an amateur.
My favourite genre of youtube video is experts analysing movies and tv. Thanks for positing.
Love his commentary, his channel is great. As far as Pearl Harbor is concerned, I believe as it was early on a Sunday, all the ships in port had their ammo under lockdown which slowed down return fire. Also, the actual Japanese target was the carriers which were out to sea, and as a secondary mission they took out the battleships.
Not quite. The actual priority targets WERE the battleships. The simple reason being that the IJN was aware that the US Navy (and RN for that matter) considered their capital ships to be the primary naval weapons, with carriers in support. This is confirmed by the Japanese training rehearsals, and recollections from their crews. The 2nd wave was instructed to hit the carriers IF all the battleships were damaged/sunk.
@@grumblesa10 Yes, even the IJN were about 50/50 concerning whether carriers or battleships were more important for offensive operations at this time. Everyone was still working out the best role for naval aviation.
wonderful ocumentary of unexpectedly uplifting and redemptive, thank you
Tora Tora Tora would have been much better.
He mentioned the carrier that was used for the film, but he did not mention that the harbor was full of modern destroyers with helodecks and radars, Spruance class or Ticonderoga class
they would have made short work of the nips
@@brianthompson6721 absolutely, with all those modern guns and missiles, kabang ciao Japan
read John Birminghams alternatave histories
Good selection of films, intelligent and interesting commentary 👍
Glad you enjoyed it
Love your work 👍
I’m reading David Walliams “granddad’s great escape” about a boy and his grandfather who was a spitfire pilot to my class. I’m a lifelong aviation buff. So I showed the kids just a couple of minutes of the dogfights in Dunkirk to show my class what the grandfather did during the war.I was mindful of content. The children were totally riveted as I explained what pilots went through and how you shoot down another plane. A powerful moment.
David Walliams? Good grief, he's a talentless oik
Great stuff. You should do a piece on the pilot and actor James Stewart. A proper hero worthy of a short documentary.
As a native Memphian, I remember seeing the Memphis Belle when it was on display - before going to the museum where it is housed today. It was just amazing to walk in her shadow and to know her history. ❤
In 1994 I got to go aboard the plane that was used in the movie, and when they built it they used parts from the original. Step into the cockpit and sit in the pilots seat and you could literally feel the history. They even had a plaque with the info about that final mission and the crew members who were aboard
I'm interested to hear more about in Dunkirk at how they used a Spitfire letting it sink
Talking about how perilous the bombing campaign was, my Aunt (by marriage) lost her brother in 1943 during a raid over Berlin. He was a Pilot Officer in the RAAF flying a Lancaster. He was shot down by a night fighter. Only two of his crew survived. It was his 24th mission. He was just 23yo.
Addressing the generalised point about the strength of Allied carrier decks - which clearly refers to WWII in the Far East not Pearl Harbour - a significant difference between USN and RN carriers of that era was that the RN tended towards armoured decks while the USN didn't. Many USN carrier decks were wholly or partly of wood (with its benefits in traction for carrier aviation) the result was that their decks were more often damaged by Japanese bombs, let alone aircraft hitting them (Kamikaze or not).
It was also to save weight and carry more aircraft.
''you need a tank buster ..you need a P-51 Mustang '' yes the words of an expert ....
Would've loved to see Sky Crawlers in this list.
Yes, it's a anime but I think the creators and animators did a tremendous job in creating the aerial combat scenes.
Seriously, check it out and be it only for the fight scenes
Been ages since I've seen it but isn't there a scene where the mc gets killed by teacher with him doing rings around his aircraft, like a car doing donuts?
@@EstonianShark Basically yes.
In the intro he was pulling off a Cobra and in the end that "spiraling" move while plastering the MC with bullets.
I was a little disappointed in the Memphis Belle scene that had BF109s diving with Stuka sirens. I know it’s a trope, but it seemed otherwise realistic. Once I notice it, I can’t unnotice it. It’s like having a Wilhelm scream every time someone is shot. With all the criticisms of Pearl Harbour, justified criticisms, the zeros didn’t have an invisible dive siren going off whenever they were going fast:D.
He didn’t actually review any of these films, he just talked about the war
It’s not a film review - it’s a review of the aerial combat scenes for historical faithfulness, accuracy of tactics and hardware, and realism.
Yeah and he didn't do that
@@ladyzapzap9514 he didn't do any of that either.
Good?
"Catch 22" is very much about the Norden bomb sight. I worked with a man who had been a bombardier in WWII when I was in my first job, working for the USAF. Civilian, not soldier. He had photos of the heinous wounds he suffered. It was amazing he lived.
The reason Pearl Harbor was not the "Knock Out" blow the Japanese were hoping for was not purely due to the harbor being shallow (though that did help with the collosal workload that was thrown into repairing, refitting, retrofitting all the damaged ships). What kept it from being a Knock Out blow, was that the American Carriers, (which were their primary targets) were not in port at the time. Shallow-water or not, if the Carriers had been there and taken out it would have been incredibly harder to 'get back into the fight' in the Naval area.
The Dunkirk fight was way too low and the Spitfire has 15 seconds worth of ammo.
This is more of a general history lesson than commentary on the actual accuracy of the films. Not sure that I see the point
I loved the beautiful Spitfire dogfight scenes in Dunkirk (saw it in IMAX), but I had to chuckle, because Tom Hardy had obviously set his Spitfire's ammo to "unlimited" haha. He must have fired off 4x the normal amount of ammo a Spitfire could actually carry. Beautiful dogfight cinematography otherwise.
Nice point. Tom Hardy is the only Spitfire pilot to down four planes with only.303 ammunition.
I think you missed a very very good movie called "Deep Blue World" that followed Czechoslovakian pilots that flew for the RAF in the battle of britain
Memphis Belle is my favorite war movie. Excellent movie. Yes it's not the most historically accurate in terms of actual situation, but it perfectly portrays the situation these bomber crews went through like no other movie has.
Really interesting
The Kamikaze attacks didn’t seem to happen til they started losing. The amount of hits the Japanese could make plummeted and it was basically *”Hey, if we are going to be shot down anyway we my as well make it worth if”*
In particular it was when Japan lost of their experienced pilots. After Midway and Guadalcanal, the Japanese had lost pilots faster than they could train new ones. As 9/11 showed, you don't need a lot of training for a suicide mission.
That scene in Pearl Harbor where the commentator is describing an attack on "civilians" as an embellishment, actually shows a water tower at the boundary between Pearl Harbor Naval Station and Hickam Airfield. (I lived about two blocks from that water tower for a year.) The area is currently (and I think was in 1941) an area of officers' quarters on Hickam. So not really either an embellishment or an attack on civilians.
But then the Japanese made a policy of attacking civilians and medical personnel throughout the war anyway. The only reason there weren't more civilian casualties on Oahu is that they had a sufficiency of higher-priority targets, not out of any sort of adherence to the constraints of the various Hague and Geneva conventions.
NB: There are still bullet holes from the Japanese attack in many of the military buildings on Hickam and Pearl. I think the military considers them to be a useful reminder of the consequences of failure.
Had a Great Uncle that flew 31 missions over Europe in a B-24 during WWII. He retired as an O6 (Bird Colonel) and died in the late 1990's.
I allways had the feeling (about that scene of Tom Hanks in "Save Private Ryan") that Spielberg wanted to make some kind of tribute to "Jaws". I mean, when Brody is trying to shot the shark in the last part of the picture, is very alike, ain't it?
Same amount of bullets shot as well, at the oncoming 'monster'. I was half expecting Hanks to shout "smile you son of a bitch!".
Hoping to get one thru the front vision slot
13:45 Those Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates will be valuable assets in the war to come.
The SPR scene with Tom Hanks shooting the pistol at the tank is actually true to what they taught officers at the time. A general contempt for death, in the moment Hanks failed to detonate the bridge, got shot through the chest and now a tank rolls up. At the time the officer's last stand is to pull your side arm and die fighting. Another instance of this is the scene from the Iron Giant where the giant rushes the jeep, Mansley cowers in fear while Gen Rogard pulls his pistol and fires without any regard to his own safety. It's done as a final attempt to keep morale as high as possible for the subordinates
Thank you for the explanation, I have to admit I always just thought he was hoping for a "Hail Mary" through the drivers eye slit.
@@JuleyC Those slits had thick bullet proof glass inserts protecting them and certain tanks like the Tiger I had a spot at the drivers station where spare inserts were kept.
I always thought he was pulling a Lieutenant Dan.
Source?
Ya they used the Lexington for Pearl harbor and the secondary conn (back up helm) was used for filming and to this day it still has japanese markings in it
i' wonder about the physics involved in that landing in Unbroken. I feel like there was way too much momentum for that B-24 to stop on a dime as soon as it hits the rocks.
When talking about the kamikaze runs from what I understand he’s wrong, the planes would cause a lot of damage to US carriers due to their wooden decks - however the kamikazes has less effect on British carriers as their decks were armoured
The filming of Memphis Belle had 5 real B-17s for the movie, they lost one during filming as it crashed into a tree during a take off scene.
Everything in the movie "Memphis Belle" actually happened, just never to one ship on one mission.
@ Josef Hyatt. My major issue with Memphis Belle has always been exactly that. It would have been credible to have all these incidents happen to the crew over their 25 missions. To write a script which implies that they have done 24 missions without incident only to have all this happen on the last mission lacks credibility and, frankly, is lazy writing. If you want a film which came closer to the real effects of flying daylight bombing missions watch 12 O'Clock High, made 40 years earlier but without all the spiffy CGI.
@@chriscarter5720 12 O'clock High!!!!❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️🩷
Typically Allied ground forces would be supported by Republic P-47 Thunderbolts or the British Hawker Typhoons by the time of the Normandy campaign.
And they were notoriously inaccurate at despatching tanks.
The reason the Tom Hanks character was shooting at the panzer was not to destroy it, but to penetrate a vision slot and kill or injure a crewman. A low probability attempt, but possible.
Bombers never opened up when escorts were doing their job, pretty hard for a Luftwaffe pilot to line up on a bomber when he has a P-51 on his six, add in that bomber gunners could quit easily shoot down their escorts.
Also escorts flew top cover, meaning they had the energy and speed advantage to come down on the raiders, Luftwaffe as a rule stayed away from escorted bombers, they would wait for the escort to go bingo.
16:15 re attacking nurses: at 200 miles per hour, a nurse might look like a sailor.
Surprised you didn't point out the gaff in Saving Private Ryan - the P-51 Mustang was never called a "tank buster" in WW2. That was the nickname for the P-47 Thunderbolt.
When I was in middle school one of the Rosies who'd worked on the Norden bomb site spoke to our class (NOTE: our vice-principal had been in the 8th Air Force). She told us at the time the bomb site were so secret and so high-priority they weren't even supposed to talk about them.
JAMES
When you said the cost to produce the movie about Pearl Harbor was about the same as the actual damage caused by the attack, you have to remember that the value of a $1.00 in 1941 was a hell of a lot more than a $1.00 when the movie was made.
The price to build uss Nevada in1914 dollars was close to $6,000,000 (that doesn't include modernization of thae battleship) equivalent to 180,000,000 today that one ship cost much more.
Why not Battle of Britain (1969), Squadron 303 (2018), Hurricane (2018) and Dark Blue World (2001)?
Dark Blue World has one of the best and most realistic aerial combat scenes...
12;oclock high was a great movie that shows the growing ptsd
According to a somewhat reliable source, the B-24 was not actually an aircraft, but the box the B-17s were delivered in.
The Chantal crossing took a spitfire 20 minutes. So including return flight 40 minutes. It could fly a hour and a half . It could fire a total of 18 seconds before it ran out of ammo. So there’s a lot incorrect in the spitfire scene in Dunkirk
We need HistoryHit to bring @militaryaviationhistory on to do a WW2 Aircraft movies review!
The decks on American Aircraft Carriers were made of wood and easily penetrated by Kamikaze attacks whereas the British Carriers had metal decks and mostly the Kamikaze just bounced off!!
In the Memphis belle, I liked how the escort let the attackers pass, and only then flared out to turn, to get into the attackers 6 o`clock. Would they have gone straight at them, they´d have had a maybe 0.5sec window for engagement, and then would have had to turn to pursue the attackers that would already be pummeling the bombers, so, i guess, what we see is exactly what they would have done.
The plane more likely to knock out the tank would have been a P-47. Mustangs provided air cover from German Fighters and bombers. The P-47 was the American ground support fighter at that time.
My grandfather was a navigator on a B-24. He thought the movie "Memphis Belle" was rubbish.
Damn straight! Awesome movie and representation of that fight! And it was the Canadians who penetrated further inland than any other allied force during the Normandy Offensive.
A couple of comments on points missed the B29 was actually the bomber that made the US successful in it’s strategy bombing campaign against Japan not the B24 which it replaced. I also would make the point the key failure of the Japanese at Pearl Harbor was they missed the US Aircraft Carriers.
Another reason for the Japanese Kamikaze planes was that by the time they were introduced the Japanese air force was no longer an effective weapon. By that stage they had lost pretty much every experienced pilot they had and could no longer train pilots to replace those losses. Much easier to pack a Zero or other plane with explosives and have an inexperienced young pilot just ram it into an American ship.
B-24, in the online game "Warbirds" all the planes handled pretty accurately (I was told) to the real thing. That being said i once landed a B-24 on a Carrier (was out of fuel) When a team mate in a fighter materialized in front of me I radioed him to look behind him LOL He announced what he saw on open channel- I got the chance to take a deep bow that day :-)
Disapointed you didn't mention how the Japanese didn't launch a third attack wave, failed to attack the fuel reserves they were supposed to in Hawaii and failed to destroy American aircraft carriers (that were, in all fairness, out on maneuvers). All in all, Pearl Harbor was not the military victory the Japanese planners had hoped for.
Memphis Belle was Hollywood clap trap. The film makers were pushing the enveloppe of believability. The last mission had so much harrowing stuff going on (in the movie) that it strains credibility. You also fail to talk about the more fundamental dangers inherent in flying those missions. The frost bite and cerebral hypoxia that comes from flying at 20,000 feet in an unheated depressurized aircraft.
Unbreakable: The book was nominally better. The fear of going down over the hugeness of the Pacific ocean must have been constant. Even if you survive a crash, you may drown. If you manage to get into a life boat, you'll die of thirst, starvation or exposure. The main character, Louis Zampirelli survived all of that only to be taken prisoner by the Japanese and suffer mistreatment at their hands 'til the end of the war.
It would be interesting to see him react to The Bombardment
nice
"Green Howards" my ass: it was the Canadian 3rd division that made its planned objectives on the first day. They met and defeated an armoured counterattack, and penetrated further than any other Allied unit. Read John Keegan's, 'Six Armies in Normandy'.
The ball turret wasn't the most dangerous: it was the tail gunner that died first as enemy fighters approached from behind and swept their fire up and along the plane.
Quite some time ago I watched a documentary dealing with the development of "naval air forces", in which was spoken of an air raid on a Italian Harbour that happens to have an eery similarity to the structures found at Pearl Harbour.
however none of the then major power took too great a notice, besides the Britisch as they were the ones performing the raid, but the fledgling maritime forces of the Empire of japan took notice and developed some of the groundwork for their Attack at Pearl Harbour.
Taranto? An incredible story. The battle for naval and air control of the Mediterranean is an epic all of its own.
@@sagasfromthesea4676 possible,
I, to the very best of my memory banks, can not recall the name of specified harbour
@@HrLBolle It is Taranto. You can look it up. Incredible attack by British carrier planes.
@@bwarre2884 so he the name then
@@HrLBolle Search for "Taranto WW2"
When the Spitfire ditches at 10:27 it doesn't sink at all fast and actually sits on its tail! In reality you have a really heavy engine in the nose and a buoyant tail. Look at the US combat footage of planes ditching by carriers and you will see they nose down instantly and sink in a few seconds. What sinks in the movie is likely a glider.
The older movies that use actual aircraft are so much better than newer movies using CGI for most of their scenes
Midway (2019) has most accurate historical air combat scenes I saw in last decade. I am surprised that he is not talking about this movie and he is talking about Pearl Harbor (2001) a purely romantic drama overdone by Michael Bay.
I hate to argue with you, but the 1976 version was more historically accurate. One reason the Japanese didn't use any land-based bombers during the Battle of Midway. They only carrier based aircraft ('Zero' fighters, 'Kate' torpedo bombers, and 'Val' dive bombers). Another reason it's better is it was filmed using a sound system called sensurround.
Little correction: In June 1941 US Troops replaced British occupation troops of Iceland, which was under Danish administration, Denmark occupied by Germany. That made US troops direct adversaries of German troops. The US American entry into WWII therefore was June 1941.
Please check the volume level on your videos. The sound on this is very low. I had to turn the volume up a lot to be able to hear what's being said, compared to most other videos on UA-cam.
With Memphis Belle, I'm not saying this didn't happen during their tour, however I believe yet again this is at least partially untrue, as their last mission was largely uneventful?
It all happened, but not to one aircraft on the same mission. The filmmakers used historical records of a number of aircraft to give as detailed a glimpse of being a bomber crew as possible while telling the story of the Memphis Belle
3:20 fighters' range - true of many but not the P-51. That was one of the Merlin Mustang's most admirable qualities, in a truly great fighter - the P-51D had a range of just under 1400 miles with drop tanks.
My old Art teacher told me, he never even saw the enemy a/c that shot him down? PO McPhee, RIP.
Re memphis belle landing my dad had a german pow crew of firefighters in north africa
He said they were brave and efficient it was a dangerous job .
Glad I read comments before watching. If you don't include the Battle of Britain, it's not worth watching.
Pearl Harbor:
A massive tactical success.
A monumental strategic blunder.
I always wondered how the Battle of Britan would have turned out if the Me. 109s had been equipped with drop tanks.
Interesting notion though I suspect the Battle of Britain would’ve just had higher casualty numbers for the British, but more or less the same end result I imagine. I’m not sure how much they would have helped to extend the aircraft’s range because external fuel tanks means more weight and it’s a dead weight that’s hanging off of the underside of the aircraft and would be producing more drag than lift for the aircraft putting more demand on the engine. Now if they could’ve developed some means of mid air refueling that definitely would’ve extended the range. Though the RAF would’ve likely have made the fuelers a priority target.
The crew chief of the Liberator definitely chewed the pilot and copilot out.