Yeah, the P-38 was a decent design, but it's very much a 1930's era plane with its oval pattern wings and control surfaces. The P-51, despite technically only b

Yeah, the P-38 was a decent design, but it's very much a 1930's era plane with its oval pattern wings and control surfaces. The P-51, despite technically only be a couple years newer than the P-38, incorporated a LOT of improvements, most notably those in the 1940 NACA study data. The laminar flow wing alone pushed the P-51 well beyond anything else produced previously. The P-51 was arguably the first line fighter to be designed with aerodynamics based on hard science, rather than seat of the pants "this seemed to work before" design practices.