I have heard conflicting accounts of the combat effectiveness of CAS in the second world war. It is often portrayed as devestating in some contemporary/popular accounts, but I have also seen historiographers suggest that this reflects the main contribution of CAS as being damaging to the enemy's morale.
Not to downplay the importance of morale damage in war, I understand that this matters a great deal. I am just curious as to how much the perceived danger by soliders subject to close-range aerial bombing was a fair reflection of the achieved damage to people and material on the ground.
Thanks in advance!
As a starting point, looking particularly at the RAF against armour in 1944, there's "How effective were aircraft in WW2 at anti-tank actions? In historically based video games like Il-2 Sturmovik, they are devastating. From some more casual sources though, they were 'meh' at best, only really good at attacking softer targets like trucks." from a couple of weeks back, and as a bit of a side note on the morale effect on friendly forces there's "In many World War Two films, such as Kelly's Heroes, the US Army Air Force is shown as completely uninformed about the positions of their own ground forces, and often ends up bombing their own side. How accurate is this portrayal?". Still plenty more that could be added for other theaters and air forces, though.