Slideshow: American air arsenal of 1941

Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.”

Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan had developed cutting-edge warplanes that could fly circles around the United States’ air arsenal. By 1941 the United States was clearly mobilizing for war, but it would take quite a while for our defense industry to develop planes that could hold their own against Axis fighters like the Mitsubishi A6M Zero or the Focke-Wulf Fw 190.

Below are a collection of aircraft that may have been impressive when they were introduced in the 1930s, but were quickly removed from front-line units once we began equipping significantly improved aircraft as the war progressed.

Boeing P-26 Peashooter

The Peashooter was considered revolutionary when it was introduced in 1933. Its 600-horsepower Pratt & Whitney R1340 Wasp radial engine could outperform any biplane. Although the Army’s first all-metal fighter was no match for modern fighters like the Mitsubishi A6M Zero when Japan attacked the Philippines on 8 December 1941, P-26 pilots were among the first Americans to shoot down a Japanese warplane in World War II.