The Defiant was a curious design stemming from the Air Ministry's thinking in 1936 that a pack of turret-armed fighters would be more effective in dealing with bombers than regular fighters as the turret-armed aircraft could stand off to one side and pour unabated fire into the supposedly helpless bombers. Left out of this sterile thinking was what would happen to the Defiants when confronted by enemy fighters. As airplanes go, the Defiant was well designed, stable and pleasant to fly. Its modern fully-powered four-gun turret was nicely engineered, but it was also the Defiant's undoing. The drag of the turret made the Defiant slower than a Hurricane and the turret's 600 lb. weight left the aircraft severely underpowered. Because of its location on the aircraft, the turret could not fire directly to the Defiant's front or cover the vulnerable area under the tail. In combat, the bravely-flown Defiants scored some successes but were quickly cut to pieces by German fighters.
TACTICS: Don't take on enemy fighters unless you have superiority in numbers. If you must fight, attempt to cluster around enemies in a group so your gunners can combine their fire from several angles. Try to stay fast-moving and remember that you don't have to point directly at an enemy to fire your turret guns. Just stay out of his firing arc. Always keep an eye out for an opportunity to disengage. The Defiant's gun turret cannot fire at lower targets, making the aircraft vulnerable from below. It also cannot fire directly upward and it partially blocked by the tail to the rear and the cockpit to the fore. Its best shot is at targets that are slightly above the Defiant and off to the side.
STRENGTHS: Good armor protection for its day.
WEAKNESSES: Slow and underpowered, with no forward-facing guns.
