"Kittyhawk Fighter-Bomber Flight (BBX46)" Topic

"In British service, the lend-lease American P-40 fighter was known as the 'Kittyhawk'…."

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Amicalement
Armand

In British service, the lend-lease American P-40 fighter was known as the 'Kittyhawk'….

Sloppy. How can a company that makes it's business selling to wargamers (military history enthusiasts, in one form or another) be so casually sloppy.

No, the P-40 was not known as the 'Kittyhawk'.

SOME MODELS of the P-40 were known as the 'Kittyhawk'. Or perhaps LATER MODELS of the P-40…

The P-40B and P-40C, which were operated in some numbers by the British, particularly in the western desert campaign, were known as the 'Tomahawk'.

Not that the box art doesn't look like some nice models. Don't know, but they look pretty OK to me. And the models portrayed on the box art are indeed P-40D (or later) models, so are appropriately called Kittyhawks. I suppose that's something, at least.

But still, it's not like you need a Masters in 20th Century Military History to know there were P-40 Tomahawks in RAF service. If you don't want to hire people who know what they're writing about to do your writing, at least have them check Wikipedia first!

Sigh …

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

I think the Kittyhawk is a good choice. The RAF received 761 P-40 Tomahawks closely followed by 1,301 early model P-40 Kittyhawks I and IA. In June 1942 there was only 1 Tomahawk fighter squadron and 3 Kittyhawk fighter squadrons in RAF service in the desert, and the Tomahawk squadron was converting to Hurricane tank busters.

For more detail, there were 464 RAF Kittyhawk I (P-40D and E) of which many were sent to the Western Desert starting in late 1941 with most delivered throughout 1942. Also many of the 837 similar Kittyhawk 1A (P-40E-1) were sent to Western Desert in RAF service during 1942; an additional 673 from this latter lot were sent to RCAF, RNZAF, RAAF, Russia, and Turkey, with the Commonwealth aircraft mostly serving in the Pacific. Another 1,504 Kittyhawk II, III, and IV were delivered, but many arrived too late to serve in the RAF Desert Air Force arriving throughout 1943.