Without the Merlin the Mustang was nothing.
The laminar wing augmented by the Merlin engine is what made Goring(sp) to profess the war is lost for Germany when the Mustang was flying over Berlin.
I don’t know if I can agree with that; if the original Allison engined P-51 lacked anything, it obtained it via the Merlin.
Nevertheless, and that notwithstanding, I’m skeptical that this thread is the forum for our disagreement (nor debate in that regard). The only thing lacking would be an old fart that showed up and could qualitatively state that they flew against the P-51.
That’s not the point of this thread (nor any of my comments such as they might foment contention).