The lost lesson of WWII: Quantity is a quality of its own.
We didn’t beat Japan’s Zero by having a better aircraft. We beat it by having more aircraft.
We didn’t beat the German tanks by having a superior tank. We beat them by having more tanks.
We didn’t beat Japan’s navy by having superior ships. We beat them by have really good ships and many of them.
We didn’t beat Germany’s air force by having better airplanes. We beat them by having many more airplanes.
An F-35 may be good at some things, but a swarm of really good aircraft will overwhelm an F-35. It can only engage so many targets and is can only carry so many munitions to do that.
I’ll reply to this later in depth. For now, you are correct in that “Perfect is the enemy of good enough”. However, other than tanks, the US had superiority in everything else top to bottom.
We had better airplanes than the Germans. Even the Soviets had a plane that scared the wits out of the Germans.
We didn’t beat Japan’s Zero by having a better aircraft. We beat it by having more aircraft.
The Wildcat and P40 were equal to or slightly inferior to the Zero
The Hellcat, Corsair P38 and P51 took the Zero to the woodshed
My wife was just trying to explain this to a young teacher the other day.
Never forget the lessons of the past.
The Zero was better than the F4 and P-40 in the early war. However, the “Flying Tigers” developed boom and zoom tactics that helped out the F4’s once utilized. Joe Foss won his CMH in a F4 against the cream of the Japanese early war aircraft. Once the F6 and F4U came into play the Japanese were swatted out of the sky. Japanese bombers were hopelessly slow, fragile, and outdated. Meanwhile the US had the B-24, B-25, B-17, and B-29. The B-29 was so fast and flew at such high altitude that the Japanese couldn’t even get to them until the “George” came out near the end of the war.
Germany had good planes but they had short legs. (short range) Both the P-51 and P-47 could do long range escort and the P-51 was every bit as maneuverable and faster than anything the Germans had until the Me-262 jet which came too late. The P-47 was a fantastic CAS platform and with rockets made a great tank killer. Germany had no 4 engine long range bombers.
Most US Navy capital ships (cruisers, battleships) had radar guided targeting computers. They were vastly superior to the Japanese targeting systems. US Aircraft Carriers were better in every way. The only thing the Japanese had that was better was torpedoes.
US Tanks were reliable, easier to produce, easier to maintain, but undergunned until the E-8 Sherman. The M-18 Hellcat, M-10,and M-36 tank destroyers had good main guns but open top lightly armored turrets and/or chassis. Mostly it was doctrine in the use of tanks.
US Artillery was the best overall in WWII.
US transport trucks, jeeps, halftracks, duece and a halfs, etc were all better, easier to maintain, and easier to produce.