The armed half-track

[Mike Abberton]

Ed,
Regarding .50s on US HTs...in the Pacific, they were hardly ever used for that. They were used for direct fire as infantry support, whenever anyone had an M3...which was rarely.

Of course different theaters would have entirely different doctrine for the use of HT's.
In the European Theater most American HT's, that were 50 cal armed, had much less ammo on a standard basis and were used in the AA role.
Even some trucks had 50 cals mounted to provide AA defense in truck convoys.

Maybe there was less tactical strafing by the Japanese?

RR

I think by the time there was significant HT/Brens in theater in the Pacific, that the USAF, USN, USMC, RAF, RAAF, RNZAF, etc. had such convincing air superiority over the land theaters (except maybe Burma, not sure there), that strafing was not very common.

I don't know for sure, but the early land campaigns in SOPAC/SWPAC were pretty shoestring affairs. Probably not a lot of HTs around, particularly since it was mostly straight infantry divisions, not armored divisions doing the fighting for the US Army. At least, I think the HTs were concentrated in the armored divisions early on.

Certainly in the various island landings, Japanese air power was pretty much limited to hit and run raids, and they concentrated on shipping for the most part. Same thing later on in the larger land invasions (Philippines, Okinawa, etc.). The Japanese just couldn't sustain air ops.

Actually, from what I have read, I'm not sure that the Japanese put much stock in close air support in general. Attacks on shipping, ports and airfields, sure, but not really CAS. And where they did use CAS, it was more in the form of bombers and dive bombers, rather than fighter-bombers and fighters. Most Japanese fighter pilots would probably consider it beneath them to directly support the ground pounders.

So, I would guess that lack of AA use on HT's was more a case of lack of targets than lack of capability.

Mike