Petlyakov Pe-2


The Petlyakov Pe-2 was a Soviet twin-engined dive bomber used during World War II. One of the outstanding tactical attack aircraft of the war, it also proved successful as a heavy fighter, as a night fighter and as a reconnaissance aircraft. In many respects it resembled the wooden British de Havilland Mosquito. The Soviets manufactured Pe-2s in greater numbers during the war than any other twin-engined combat aircraft except for the German Junkers Ju 88 and the British Vickers Wellington. The Pe-2 was fast, maneuverable and durable. Several Communist air forces flew the type after the war, when it became known by the NATO reporting name Buck. The Germans transferred six captured Pe-2s to the Finnish Air Force during the Continuation War of 1941-1944; the Finns gave them the serial code prefix PE- and the unofficial nickname Pekka-Eemeli.

Design and development

The Pe-2 was designed in a prison design bureau ; Vladimir Petlyakov had been arrested and imprisoned in 1937 for allegedly delaying design work on the Tupolev ANT-42 bomber. In the sharashka, Petlyakov was put in charge of a team to develop a high-altitude fighter escort for the ANT-42 under the designation VI-100. The first of two prototypes flew on 22 December 1939 and was a sophisticated aircraft for its time, featuring a pressurised cabin, all-metal construction, superchargers and many electrically actuated systems. It is said that Petlyakov and his team could see the VI-100 prototype from their prison as it was put through its paces for the crowds watching the annual May Day parade in 1940.
Just as production was ready to begin, the air force ordered a re-design of the aircraft. The value of tactical bombing had just been displayed by the Luftwaffe in the Blitzkrieg, and the need for such an aircraft suddenly became much more important than the need for a high-altitude escort fighter. Petlyakov's team was given 45 days to redesign their aircraft as a dive bomber. Cabin pressurization and superchargers were deleted, dive brakes, a bombardier's position and other aerodynamic refinements were added. A fuselage bomb-bay was added, along with smaller bays in each engine nacelle. The aircraft was initially designated PB-100, but Joseph Stalin was impressed enough with Petlyakov to free him, and his name was permitted to be used in the aircraft's designation. The first aircraft flew on 15 December 1940, rushed through production without a prototype under severe threats from Stalin. Deliveries to combat units began the following spring.
While the Pe-2's flying characteristics were generally favorable once it was airborne, it took a good amount of force to pull the elevators up to rotate the plane for takeoff. Russian night bombing missions often flew with female pilots and some of the women were not strong enough to get the airplane airborne by themselves. When such a situation occurred, the procedure was to have the navigator get behind the pilot's seat and wrap her arms around the control wheel and help the pilot pull the wheel back. Once the aircraft was airborne, the navigator returned to her duties and the pilot continued to fly the plane without assistance.
Its armament was clearly insufficient, however. The dorsal ShKAS machine gun had a very high rate of fire; however, its 7.62 mm rounds proved inadequate against the armor protection of modern fighters as the war progressed. In addition, it often jammed. The mounting for the ventral Berezin UB had a very limited field of view and the gun was initially unreliable. To give more protection, another ShKAS was added that could be moved between sockets on both sides of the fuselage and, in an emergency, the gunner could fire upwards, but in this case they had to be quite strong to keep it in their arms. To improve the bomber's defences, a dorsal Berezin UBT 12,7 mm was mounted. This modification was reported to increase the life expectancy of a Pe-2 from 20 sorties to 54.

Operational service

The aircraft did not show its true potential until the end of 1941, after the Soviet Air Force had a chance to regroup after the German onslaught, during the Winter. The Pe-2 quickly proved itself to be a highly capable aircraft, able to elude the Luftwaffe's interceptors and allowing their crews to develop great accuracy with their bombing. It could give German fighters fits when it could outrun them, at times reaching over 400 mph.
The records of the 16th and 39th BAPs of the Western Front Air Force note that the Pe-2's crews had the greatest success in repelling the attacks of enemy fighters in June and July 1941. On 1 July, for example, six Pe-2s fended off attacks by four Messerschmitt Bf 109s, shooting down two of them. A week later a group of Pe-2s was attacked by four Bf 109 and again brought down two of the attackers. On both occasions the Petlyakovs suffered no losses. On the southern front, a bombing mission against Ploiesti, in Romania, by six Pe-2s, led by Capt. A. Tsurtsulin, was a great success: 552,150 lbs of petroleum were burnt in the raid. The Romanian information agency claimed that at least 100 Soviet planes had bombed Ploiesti.
The Pe-2 regiments' operations were not always successful and the service pilots complained about insufficient defensive armament and survivability: there was a great risk of fire and insufficient armour protection, especially for the navigators and gunners. German pilots soon discovered the limited sighting angles of the ventral gun mounting and its poor reliability. The Ammunition belt of the UBT machine-gun often jammed after the first burst of fire when shooting in extreme positions. The navigator and the radio operator were poorly protected. On average, ten Pe-2 gunners were wounded for every pilot, and two or three were killed for the loss of one pilot.
Throughout 1942 the design was steadily refined and improved, in direct consultation with pilots who were actually flying them in combat. Improved armour protection and a fifth ShKAS machine-gun was installed and fuel tanks modified. Despite anecdotal reports by Soviet fliers, Pe-2s were a daylight bomber, often crewed by comparative novices in the early years of the war, and took significant losses, even when well protected by fighters. In December 1942 General Turkel of the Soviet Air Force estimated the life expectancy of a Pe-2 was 30 combat flights. An example of loss rates after the Soviets gained the upper hand can be gained by the losses suffered by the 1st and 2nd BAK. The former started the month of July 1943 with 179 machines, and lost 52 that month, and 59 the next, ending August with 156 bombers after receiving replacements. The 2nd BAK started July with 122 Pe-2s, with monthly losses of 30 and 20, ending August 1943 with 114 Pe-2s after replacements arrived. Most of these losses were at the hands of the thinly stretched German fighter groups, which continued to inflict significant losses when present in strength, even in the closing months of the war. For example, in the Baltic where JG54 Grünherz were the main opposition, and greatly outnumbered, the Soviet 1st Gv BAK lost 86 Pe-2s shot down, mostly to German fighters between 23 July 1944 and 8 February 1945. Western sources use mark Pe-2FT for production series after 83, although Soviet documents do not use this identification. Final versions Pe-2K and Pe-2I were produced in small numbers, due to the unwillingness of Soviet industry to decelerate production numbers.

Finnish Air Force

In 1941, after the outbreak of the Continuation War, Finland purchased six war booty Pe-2 aircraft from Germany. These arrived at State Aircraft Factory facilities at Härmälä in January 1942, where the airframes were overhauled and given Finnish serial numbers. The seventh Pe-2 was bought from the Germans in January 1944, and it was flown to Finland at the end of the month.
It was initially planned to use these planes as dive bombers in the 1st flight of LeLv 48, which began to receive its aircraft in July 1942, but during the training it was found out that this caused too much strain for the engines. Thus, the role of Pe-2s was changed to fly long-range photographic and visual reconnaissance missions for the Army General Headquarters. These sorties began in late 1942, and were often flown with two 250 kg bombs for harassment bombing and in order to cover the true purpose of missions.
By the time the Soviet Fourth strategic offensive started in June 1944, the secondary bombing role had already ended and the surviving Pe-2s began to be used solely at Karelian Isthmus in escorted photographic reconnaissance flights in order to find out enemy troop concentrations. These vital missions were flown successfully, allowing artillery and Finnish Air Force and Luftwaffes Gefechtsverband Kuhlmey's bombers to make their strikes against the formations preparing for attack, which had an important impact on the outcome of the Battle of Tali-Ihantala, where the Soviet advance was halted.
During the Continuation War, three Pe-2s were lost in accidents or technical failures, one was destroyed in bombing of Lappeenranta airfield, one was shot down by Soviet fighters and one went missing in action. In the Lapland War the only remaining machine flew a single reconnaissance sortie in October 1944. On average, the aircraft flew some 94 hours per plane during the war.
The Finnish Air Force also operated one Petlyakov Pe-3 that had been captured in 1943.
PE-301 and PE-215 were destroyed when Soviet aircraft bombed the Lappeenranta airfield on 2 July 1944. PE-212 went down in 1943, PE-213 was destroyed in an emergency landing in 1942. PE-214 was destroyed in a failed take-off attempt at Härmälä on 21 May 1942: as Härmälä airfield was quite short, the pilot had to try to lift off with too little speed, which caused the aircraft to stall and crash, killing the crew. PE-217 managed to shoot down a Soviet fighter in 1944. PE-216 was destroyed in a forced landing in 1944. PE-211 survived the war and was removed from FAF lists in 1946. It was still standing beside the Kauhava airfield in 1952, but further information on its fate is unknown.

Variants

In total, around 11,400 Pe-2s were built; a large number of minor variants were also developed.
;PB-100
;Pe-2
;Pe-2B
;Pe-2D
;Pe-2FT
;Pe-2FZ
;Pe-2I
;Pe-2K
;Pe-2K RD-1
;Pe-2M
;Pe-2MV
;Pe-2R
;Pe-2S
;Pe-2Sh
;Pe-2VI
;Pe-2UTI
;Pe-2 Paravan
;Pe-3
;Pe-4

Operators

;World War II
;Postwar
;Norway
;Poland
;Russia