Transmigrated as the Crown Prince

In World War II, bombers dropped bombs in just a few ways.

The famous dive bombing, the aircraft dives downward at a steep angle, and the angle with the ground is generally more than 45 degrees, or even close to vertical. Drop the bomb while diving very close to the target, and pull up quickly at the same time.

However, dive bombing has very high requirements on aircraft performance. Because the aircraft is under great force during the dive, the body structure must be strengthened, the aerodynamic design must be different, and dive speed brakes must be used, resulting in a decrease in aircraft speed and performance. In addition, once the bomber starts to dive, it cannot change its course. At this time, it is easy to be bitten and shot down by enemy fighters.

There is also a kind of slide bombing. This bombing method is usually used by fighter-bombers, attack aircraft, or fighter jets for temporary ground bombing. The aircraft enters at a small glide angle. When approaching the target, it changes to a level flight to release the bomb, and then pulls up quickly. Soviet "IL-2" attack aircraft often bombed the ground like this.

This bombing method is not very accurate and the kinetic energy of the bomb is not high, but it does not require high aircraft strength, saves fuel, and is suitable for bombing flat targets.

There is also the most common level bombing.

Since bombers usually fly at relatively high altitudes, the bombs falling from the aircraft do not fall straight up, but in a parabola. Therefore, it is necessary to calculate the bomb delivery advance angle so that the bomb can accurately hit the target. This also involves many parameters such as aircraft airspeed, ground speed, deflection angle, wind speed, flight altitude, average bomb falling speed, etc.

There is no reliable way to drop a bomb accurately.

However, the US military does not seem to believe in evil. Their strategic bombing philosophy emphasizes high-precision strategic bombing, that is, precision bombing of a specific industry or target in the enemy country to achieve the purpose of weakening the enemy's war strength. For example, during the strategic bombing of Germany in World War II, the US military focused on destroying the German fuel industry and manufacturing industry, and the effect was immediate.

Of course, in terms of technical requirements, high-precision bombing requires bombers with high range and capacity. The US military believes that it also needs a very important thing - a bomber sight. Advanced sights can ensure that bombers can deliver high-precision bombs at an altitude that is most immune to enemy anti-aircraft gun fire, thus avoiding losses and ensuring precise bombing of targets.

In response, the United States spent $1.5 billion to develop a bomber sight - the Norton sight! This was a huge expense at the time. The total investment in the Manhattan Project that year was about 3 billion U.S. dollars, which means that the Manhattan Project could only develop two projects similar to the Norton sight. This shows that the US military attaches great importance to this equipment!

This Norton bomber sight developed by the American Norton Company is roughly divided into two parts, namely the stabilizer and the sight.

The stabilizer is a working platform that is kept horizontal by an anti-screw device. Its function is to provide a stable working platform for the sight. The stabilizer and the bomber's autopilot work together so that the sight must be calibrated with the stabilizer to ensure that the direction pointed by the sight is consistent with the direction of the aircraft's flight.

The most important part of the sight is the main working system of the entire Norton bombsight. It consists of three parts - a mechanical analog computer used to calculate the impact point, a small telescope and a system composed of motors and gyroscopes.

The use of the Norton bombsight is not very complicated. When the aircraft approaches the target area, the bombsighter needs to use the telescopic eyepiece to find the target. This process can be completed with the help of a set of reflectors. After finding the target, the bombsight hand can place the target in the center of the field of view and then turn on the power switch of the Norton bombsight. Once the switch is turned on, the telescope eyepiece servo ensures that the eyepiece is always aligned with the selected target. Since the angular rate at which the service agency rotates the telescopic eyepiece depends on the distance to the target and the aircraft's approach speed, this requires the bombardier to set the aircraft's airspeed and altitude data on the Norton bombsight based on the data displayed on the aircraft's instruments.

Once the Norton bombsight was set, the bombardier would let the Norton take over. From then on, it was no longer the pilot, but "Norton" who actually controlled the plane. It will control the aircraft to fly along the bombing route calculated by the simulation computer, and make timely corrections to the aircraft based on the final adjustments made by the bombardier. When reaching the pre-calculated bombing point, "Norton" will automatically drop the bomb, so that the hit effect of the bomb will be significantly improved. In the case of using "Norton", the bombardier can theoretically drop bombs from an altitude of about 7,000 meters to a distance of 30 meters in a circle with a marked radius.

Of course, this is just theory and cannot be done in actual combat.

Norton's theoretical calculations at the time assumed that the aircraft dropped bombs at low altitude and low speed, but bombers such as the B17 carried out bombings at high altitudes, and the Norton sight performed poorly at this time. Moreover, the bombardier must visually see the target, and cloudless weather is not always available, which also limits the capabilities of the Norton sight.

There is a very famous example. In 1944, the Allied forces bombed the chemical plant in Leuna, which covered an area of ​​757 hectares. In 22 bombing missions, the aircraft were equipped with Norton sights and dropped 85,000 bombs. However, only 10% of the bombs fell into this 757-hectare chemical plant, and 16% of these 10% bombs were duds. After several violent attacks, the factory was back in operation within a few weeks.

But even so, the technology of the "Norton" was outstanding at the time. Therefore, the US military regarded the "Norton" bomb sight as top secret and formulated a series of confidentiality regulations. For example, the "Norton" bomb sight must be covered with canvas. It can be installed on the bomber before takeoff and must be dismantled immediately after landing. The disassembly and assembly process must be carried out under the supervision of armed guards. The crew of the bomber must swear an oath to protect the confidentiality of the sight with their lives. If the aircraft is forced to land and is captured First destroy the "Norton" sights and so on.

What’s funny is that under such strict security measures, Germany got the complete design drawings. Because Norton had a group of German engineers under his command, one of them, Hermann Long, handed over the entire set of drawings to the German side.

Although Germany also has a Norton sight, it is not as easy to use as the American one. In addition, the Luftwaffe in World War II did not have hordes of strategic bombers...so it was even more useless.

Now Germany has successfully developed a 3cm wavelength navigation/bombing radar. Relying on this bombing radar, bombers can achieve the same bombing accuracy at night or in thick clouds as they do on clear days. Darkness and cloud cover also protect bombers from enemy fighter interceptions and anti-aircraft fire threats.