# If the US is neutral, how does the air war in Europe play out?



## wiking85 (Jul 5, 2014)

Assuming the US stays neutral in Europe, let's say Hitler dies of a heart attack on October 16th 1941 and Goering takes over and breaks relations with Japan after December 7th publicly over the attack to keep the US neutral and shifts the Uboat war to the Arctic Convoys and Mediterranean (Doenitz had given up on convoys in the Atlantic by December 1941 historically and wanted to expand the war to the US coast to avoid British convoy protects), meaning there is virtually no chance of a naval incident giving FDR Casus Belli, how does the air war over Europe play out?

There is the daylight war along the French/Belgian/Dutch coasts, the night bombing of Germany, the Mediterranean theater, and the Russian front (let's say the fighting there plays out the same until Summer 1942). Without the USAAF joining in on the bombing, the British winning the Battle of the Atlantic by early 1942, and no Operation Torch expanding the Mediterranean front, how can the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronautica handle the war? 

Hitler won't be around to cut off the German intruder operations over Britain after October (which he cancelled right around the time of his death in this scenario), which I believe Goering was in favor of but Hitler wasn't. Goering will have different priorities than to nix Operation Herkules in this scenario, so perhaps Malta gets invaded, rather than Rommel invading Egypt (Rommel was in favor of Malta over Egypt from what I understand, but Goering was afraid for this paras, so delayed the operation past July 1942, the planned start date, which effectively killed it). 

From what I understand the USAAF didn't have a major impact on the air war over Europe or Africa until 1943, so US absence will mainly be felt on the ground in Algeria/Tunisia rather than in the skies. How does the night bombing war play out without Germany being diverted to maintain major daylight defenses against the US from 1943 on? Or the Eastern Front without US bombing of German factories (IIRC there were over 6,000 strategic bombers operated by the USAAF in the European Theater by 1944)? How does an earlier victory in the Atlantic shape the British war effort after 1942?


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## davebender (Jul 5, 2014)

Do you mean "neutrality" as practiced by President FDR during 1939 to 1941 or will USA be truly neutral as practiced by Ireland throughout WWII?


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## wiking85 (Jul 5, 2014)

davebender said:


> Do you mean "neutrality" as practiced by President FDR during 1939 to 1941 or will USA be truly neutral as practiced by Ireland throughout WWII?



Providing Lend-Lease to the USSR and UK while escorting convoys to Iceland; the US if fighting in the Pacific from December 1941 on.


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## Juha (Jul 5, 2014)

Hello Viking
how about LL to the SU, would it have continued as historically, be more limited because SU would not be an ally (SU was neutral in Far East up to August 1945) or plentier because lesser USAAFneeds? US LL had impact to the Eastern Front air war especially because of the deliveries of P-39s, A-20s and B-25s and high octane fuel, light alloys and M-17 AA half-tracks.

Juha


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## wiking85 (Jul 5, 2014)

Juha said:


> Hello Viking
> how about LL to the SU, would it have continued as historically, be more limited because SU would not be an ally (SU was neutral in Far East up to August 1945) or plentier because lesser USAAFneeds? US LL had impact to the Eastern Front air war especially because of the deliveries of P-39s, A-20s and B-25s and high octane fuel, light alloys and M-17 AA half-tracks.
> 
> Juha


I suppose roughly the same, as the US economy wouldn't be as mobilized as it historically was, so has more consumer goods.


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## wuzak (Jul 5, 2014)

Hitler dies, maybe saner heads prevail and Germany sues for peace?


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## davebender (Jul 5, 2014)

That isn't neutral by any stretch of the imagination. War with Germany is only a matter of time in such a scenario.


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## davebender (Jul 5, 2014)

That's what happened historically during summer 1940. Britain and Soviet Union won't accept peace as long as their war effort is being bankrolled by USA.


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## wiking85 (Jul 5, 2014)

davebender said:


> That isn't neutral by any stretch of the imagination. War with Germany is only a matter of time in such a scenario.



Basically the November 1941 stasis hold; the US supplies the European powers fighting Germany, but focuses on fighting Japan; Goering does what he can to prevent war from escalating with the US, which leads to the Battle of the Atlantic basically being over by early 1942 and the navy getting less resources to fight the Arctic Convoys and in the Mediterranean; the navy instead shifts to air power, mining with surface units and uboats, special forces (K-men), and working on getting the Elektro-boote online in 1944 with less resources, so no mass production problem there.

Also I should mention that with Goering rising to power, he takes over control of the war economy, firing Fritz Todt and Albert Speer. All offices working on economy related issues get folded into the 4-year program office of his. He also purges all rivals, which means the Nazi administration of the East is ended, Himmler and the SS are forced to focus on internal security and limit the Waffen-SS, while Goering does not order the Holocaust or Wannsee conference and calls off the Einsatzgruppen. He was anti-semitic, but not genocidal like Hitler or Himmler AFAIK. Forced labor though is still in effect. The Hunger Plan is not, but there is still famine in Europe that will fall on Eastern Europe. Darre is still out for his failure to manage agriculture, as is Robert Ley for his blatant corruption and incompetence. Goering hands off the RLM to Erhard Milch upon Goering's promotion and the death of Udet. The different ordering of events here saves Werner Molders from his plane crash on the way to Udet's funeral.


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## wuzak (Jul 5, 2014)

davebender said:


> That's what happened historically during summer 1940. Britain and Soviet Union won't accept peace as long as their war effort is being bankrolled by USA.



Is it really?


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## wiking85 (Jul 5, 2014)

wuzak said:


> Is it really?



No, they never discussed terms, just tried to get into contact through back channels that never connected. Supposedly Hess brought an armistice note with his trip to Scotland, but it gave terms that were unacceptable (give Germany Europe, don't bother Germany in her conquest of the East). Officially there were no peace talks and the ones with the Soviets were political theater to pressure the West into doing something Stalin wanted.


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## Koopernic (Jul 6, 2014)

davebender said:


> Do you mean "neutrality" as practiced by President FDR during 1939 to 1941 or will USA be truly neutral as practiced by Ireland throughout WWII?



Indeed, Lend Lease was passed into law well before the US entry into war. It supplied approximately 30% of Britain's Munitions in exchange for a small fraction of their worth by my calculation In addition the so called 'neutrality patrols' were to me it seems engineered to act in Britain's favour. I doubt anyone today in all seriousness would argue as the Roosevelt administration did that they were to keep the US Neutral though they started out as seemingly fair. Neutrality patrols ended up being escorts for British convoys more than half the way across the Atlantic. To me it seems they were designed to provoke an incident with a U-boat or aircraft that would lead to a declaration of war by someone at some point. Be that as it may in general:

The direct result for Germany would be
1 No US troop assistance to the British in North Africa. Rommel might win, might even smash through via the middle east to the Caucasian oil fields.
2 No Anzio Landings or Sicilian Landings.
3 RAF Bomber command is a fraction of its size however it continues to prosecute a night bombardment war against Germany. Because the Luftwaffe fighters do not expend itself against the USAAF the German night fighter force is much better resourced while the Luftwaffe over the Soviet Union provides better support. Bomber command can not afford the huge wastage and attrition of aircrews so there is greater emphasis on higher performance Lancaster's such as the Mk V or VI which had the two stage Merlin. 
4 As a result German production expands at a much more rapid rate and some advanced aircraft of higher quality enter service.
5 A modest German bomber effort is prosecuted against Britain that modestly degrades British production.
6 Germany must defeat the Soviet Union first. Does the SU get Lend Lease aid as well?
7 No operation Overlord (D day landings)
8 German v-weapons mature in range, cost and accuracy throughout late 44 through 1945 and probably do to British cities in 1945/46 what happened to German cities in 1944.
9 Britain does not fall due to the Channel unless the USSR is defeated and then only after a year, she has the material aid of Canada, Sth Africa, Australia, New Zealand and some of her dominions such as India though all of the latter (eg Australia) will be preoccupied with the Japanese threat.
10 The advanced type XXI U-boat cuts of the bulk of slower convoys but fast Merchant ships do get through; they simply can't be intercepted.
11 Hitler was favourable to the survival of Britain and even her remaining in control of her empire. He thought it would save the Reich the cost and bother of controlling the rest of the world. No doubt he would have taken care of Britain in 1947/48 as I believe he said when she had no alternative but to accept terms when the Reich had built up its strength and manpower after the defeat of the SU. A failure to accept terms and the resultant loss of life during an operation sea lion II would have lead to measures such as the independence of Scotland, Wales and perhaps the delivery of Northern Ireland to the Republic (a split Churchill had ensure happened) as well as dismemberment of the empire. Any resistant British ruling elites would also find themselves in a trouble. Because of the inevitable disenfranchisement of the wealthy and elite and Britain's likely defeat the stakes would ensure negotiation at that point. Only a hope such as US aid or perhaps hope of an atomic bomb would keep things alive. The worst for England would be that England would just be England without great Britain.

Of course it could go the other way, the Germans start loosing against the SU and becomes desperate to sue for peace with the UK.

The original poster suggests that Hitler dies in 1941. That in itself makes possible a negotiations that otherwise couldn't happen. Hitler would have died a Hero to his nation, for reuniting the German people at that point. However without Hitlers force of will, irrespective of whether he dies in 1941 or 1961 things just would turn to normal.


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## stona (Jul 6, 2014)

davebender said:


> Do you mean "neutrality" as practiced by President FDR during 1939 to 1941 or will USA be truly neutral as practiced by Ireland throughout WWII?



The Irish Republic was not truly neutral. The 'Donegal Corridor', vital to British operations from Northern Ireland against German U-Boats in the Battle of the Atlantic, was one obvious glaring contravention of neutrality by the Irish government. 
Steve


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## swampyankee (Jul 6, 2014)

davebender said:


> That's what happened historically during summer 1940. Britain and Soviet Union won't accept peace as long as their war effort is being bankrolled by USA.



What did these peace offers look like? Some of the German offers in late WWI made Versailles look like the Marshall Plan.


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## Koopernic (Jul 6, 2014)

swampyankee said:


> What did these peace offers look like? Some of the German offers in late WWI made Versailles look like the Marshall Plan.



The Germans or rather Kaiser offered a peace in 1916 that involved everyone going back to their pre 1914 borders. Seems reasonable as the German were perhaps winning. It was rejected, Britain and France probably held out hope of still wining with US aid and in 1917 their hope came true. I take it, though, you mean the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. I'd argue as many did that it was a good treaty that liberated many from a giant tsarist and up and coming soviet prison camp and that all of those Finnish, Ukranians, Latvians, Lithuanians would be happy to be out from the control of the Tsar, Soviet Communism, various foreign nationalities that moved into their traditional lands while under soviet control and whatever Mr Putin wants for them up to to this day. And Just immagine, no holdomor. 

Versatile did something different and went a lot further.


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## wiking85 (Jul 6, 2014)

Well for one change, perhaps the Italians get more of their new fighters into combat, the Macchi 205, Fiat G.55/56, and Re. 2005:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macchi_C.205
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reggiane_Re.2005
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_G.55


> In December 1942, a technical commission of the Regia Aeronautica was invited by the Luftwaffe to test some German aircraft in Rechlin. The visit was part of a joint plan for the standardization of the Axis aircraft production. In the same time, some Luftwaffe officers visited Guidonia where they were particularly interested in the performance promised by the Serie 5 fighters. On 9 December, these impressions were discussed in a Luftwaffe staff meeting and raised the interest of Hermann Göring himself. In February 1943, a German test commission was sent in Italy to evaluate the new Italian fighters.[16] The commission was led by Oberst Petersen and was formed by Luftwaffe officers and pilots and by technical personnel, among them the Flugbaumeister Malz. The Germans also brought with them several aircraft including a Fw 190 A-5 and a Bf 109 G-4 for direct comparison tests in simulated dogfights.
> 
> The tests began 20 February 1943 with the German commission very impressed by the Italian aircraft, the G.55 in particular. In general, all the Serie 5 fighters were very good at low altitudes, but the G.55 was also competitive with its German opponents in term of speed and climb rate at high altitudes still maintaining superior handling characteristics. The definitive evaluation by the German commission was "excellent" for the G.55, "excellent" for the Re.2005 but very complicated to produce and "average" for the C.205. Oberst Petersen defined the G.55 "the best fighter in the Axis" and immediately telegraphed his impressions to Goering. After listening the recommendations of Petersen, Milch and Galland, a meeting held by Goering on 22 February 1943 voted to produce the G.55 in Germany.
> 
> ...



All used the DB605 engine, but were aerodynamically superior to the Me109 and were better even than the FW190. Perhaps the German fighter squadrons in the Mediterranean reequip with them? With no USAAF bombing of North Italy from December 1942 on they can be built in peace.

Perhaps the upgraded P.108 heavy bomber gets its upgrade to the P.133 by 1944 due to the lack of US bombing of Italian industry starting December 1942? 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piaggio_P.108#P.133


Also without the high altitude threat of the US do we even see the Ta-152 series? Does a medium altitude FW190C or D get put into development? Perhaps the Ostmark engine facility actually comes into large production by the end of 1943 without US bombing forcing it to move. Supposedly the upgraded functional version of the Jumo 222 E/F was to be put into production in 1944 without the US bombing of Dessau. How about jets, do we see them come into service by 1944 without the threat of the US? Or perhaps the Me262 night fighter comes online for Mosquito Swatting? Do we have see an earlier Ju88G without the threat of daylight bombing to counter? Perhaps the Me410 ends up purely as an intruder by 1943? How about an earlier, greater output of the Jumo 213 without USAAF bombing of Germany in 1943? Maybe the He177B can complete testing in 1944 and get produced? 

Also how do the British react to the V-1 without a Normandy invasion to shut down the launch sites? Or perhaps they come online earlier if without Hitler there is no V-2 or V-3 ordered into production, so there are more production resources available for them? Perhaps with Me262 and later Ar234 spotting they become more accurate late in 1944. 

How does the air war on Russian front play out without the major diversion fighters to the West from 1943 on? If the USAAF is not in the war the Germans don't have to expend resources defending Romania, as the British weren't able to bomb it themselves until Italy was invaded historically. Where do these resources go? 
Do intruder operations resume over Britain without Hitler ordering them cancelled, if so what impact do they have on RAF BC operations from 1942-45?


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## Jabberwocky (Jul 6, 2014)

davebender said:


> That's what happened historically during summer 1940. Britain and Soviet Union won't accept peace as long as their war effort is being bankrolled by USA.



The German "peace offers" in 1940 were never made through formal channels. No terms were given and no guarantees proposed.

Hitler's "appeal to reason" was neither appealing or reasonable.

After re-armament, the Rhineland, the Spanish Civil War, the Austrian Anschluss, the Sudetenland Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark and Norway, the British had no reason to assume that they could take Hitler and Nazi Germany at its word.

Why should the UK agree to peace, with Germany dominating the continent, but sitting impotent on the shores of the Channel, and throwing its airforce away against an opponent with a superior defensive position?

The US is hardly bankrolling the UK war effort in 1940. Britain is paying in hard currency, gold and even territory for US support. It was cash and carry until lend-lease came into effect.


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## nuuumannn (Jul 6, 2014)

> That's what happened historically during summer 1940.



Bullsh*t. Placing a gun at someone's head and saying I won't fire it if you do this for me is hardly suing for peace, and this is exactly what Germany did with Belgium during the Great War and prior to the outbreak of WW2. Ridiculous suggestion. Hitler (and Moltke) wanted peace alright, a piece of Poland, a piece of France, a piece of Russia... (it's better when spoken).


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## nuuumannn (Jul 7, 2014)

I guess I should add more to this, the Mustang, as a British aeroplane would have seen greater resources devoted to production specifically for the British; its career and development might have taken a different path. The use of Allison engined Mustangs with the RAF might not have changed much, except for larger numbers in production specifically for the RAF. In reality, Lend Lease meant that subsequent Merlin Mustang production was prioritised for the USAAF, and prior to US interest, the British suggested ideas for the Mustang to be built in Britain and powered by Rolls Royce Merlins prior to Packard producing the V-1650-3. 

In the (somewhat convoluted) alternate universe suggested here, its possible that all Merlin Mustang production goes toward fulfilling British contracts, which means Mustang IIIs and IVs instead of P-51Bs, Cs and Ds to the USAAF, are going to the RAF in large numbers. Supply of powerplant is the issue, with in reality, 60 Series Merlins were immediately earmarked for Spitfire production and Packard produced the V-1650-3 as a result to power the Mustang and P-51, so going with Rolls production means Mustangs reach squadrons later than desirable, unless RR produces a new facility specifically to supply Mustang airframes. Or, perhaps, as did traditionally, Packard steps in and Mustang production is carried out entirely in the USA.


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## parsifal (Jul 7, 2014)

Its a silly question really. The US is absolutely essential to the war outcome. And that had to be something more than just Lend Lease. Neither Britain or Russia had the strength, even with Lend Lease, to survive, let alone defeat the Axis Powers. Germany would have had time to assimialte the rest of occuapied Europe as part of their empire....the very reason Britain refused to accept Hitlers demands that they surrencer Dave (you got that more than a bit wronmg incidentally).

Now, if we are talking about a Germany contained....no occupation of France or the Low countries, then you have a real contest, provided, of course the US maintains Lend Lease aid. Its the olod alliance again, the Triple Entente. But as in the first world war, with only two powers in the fight, andf the US staying out of it, and germany able to rape and pillage half of Eurpoe to fuel their war effort, the allies will have a hard time of it.


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## wiking85 (Jul 7, 2014)

parsifal said:


> Its a silly question really. The US is absolutely essential to the war outcome. And that had to be something more than just Lend Lease. Neither Britain or Russia had the strength, even with Lend Lease, to survive, let alone defeat the Axis Powers. Germany would have had time to assimialte the rest of occuapied Europe as part of their empire....the very reason Britain refused to accept Hitlers demands that they surrencer Dave (you got that more than a bit wronmg incidentally).


That's a pretty bold statement that the Soviets and British couldn't survive without US intervention. They could survive, but not win in the context of defeating Germany totally. I think the Soviets with LL can push the Germans pretty close to the pre-war border without US intervention before petering out. The British cannot be invaded so long as the Soviets are in the war. Not having US bombing or Hitler's meddling would certainly be extremely helpful to the Axis war effort, but I doubt Germany is going to end the war in victory as Hitler wanted or even in a Brest-Litovsk situation.

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## zoomar (Jul 7, 2014)

parsifal said:


> Its a silly question really. The US is absolutely essential to the war outcome. And that had to be something more than just Lend Lease. Neither Britain or Russia had the strength, even with Lend Lease, to survive, let alone defeat the Axis Powers. Germany would have had time to assimialte the rest of occuapied Europe as part of their empire....the very reason Britain refused to accept Hitlers demands that they surrencer Dave (you got that more than a bit wronmg incidentally).



I respectfully disagree. It was ultimately US production capacity, not the direct participation of US forces in combat that made German victory impossible. Decisive Allied victory might also be problematic with the US on the sidelines, but Germany simply could not sucessfully invade and occupy Britain, especially with the US providing materiel, weapons, supplies, and food to the British through Lend-Lease. I think the situation regarding the USSR would be similar. The only way Nazi Germany could have decisively defeated the USSR would have been if they approached Ukranians, Byelorussians, etc as "liberators", not racist overlords. It would take more than a few different Nazis in charge of Germany for the basic Nazi attitudes to change.


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## wiking85 (Jul 7, 2014)

zoomar said:


> The only way Nazi Germany could have decisively defeated the USSR would have been if they approached Ukranians, Byelorussians, etc as "liberators", not racist overlords. It would take more than a few different Nazis in charge of Germany for the basic Nazi attitudes to change.



Goering was far less ideological than Hitler or Himmler; had he removed guys like Koch from Ukraine and let the German army run it there would be much more of a chance to recruit. Belarus was never going to be pro-German due to their identifying with Russia (even today), which is why it was the hub of partisan activity in the war. Had the Germans cultivated the UPA in 1941 they would have avoided the serious issues of 1942 (murdering their leadership in concentration camps) and could have set them up as a governing body in Kiev, which would yield better results than the Nazi administration did historically. The Ukrainians East of the Dnieper did not view themselves as Ukrainian however, so would be very much against any regime that worked with a foreign power, which is why the support of the UPA historically came from Galicia and West Ukraine (even today the feelings of Ukrainian-ness come from areas west of the Dnieper). Without Hitler Goering is going to have to make concessions to the army to stay in power, because Hitler was the popular one in the party with the public (Goering and everyone else was disliked or outright hated by the public), so its likely that he would have to dismantled the Nazi administration in Ukraine, especially because they opposed his 4-year program influence in the economy there; political conflicts in the party with Goering would actually more than likely have him side with the army against the party and in fact dismantled a fair bit of the party apparatuses to court the army, which would be his power base going forward, as he and Himmler were not really that close by 1941, while the rest of the party and Goering were not in touch. Letting the army run things in the East would probably go better than the historical Nazi leadership there.


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## Balljoint (Jul 7, 2014)

Without Hitler in the picture, it’s rerolling the dice. Does the Wehrmacht or SS take over? Hitler was a one-off crazy –actually a throwback to the days of Louie XIV- still playing the old war-as-an-adventure game. Without Hitler, Mussolini would have been on his own in his African and Hellenic misadventures. Had Germany limited its objective to the USSR and not frittered away the LW and other resources, they could have made it to the Urals at least –assuming that logistics and strategic planning were not deemed defeatist. But, without Hitler inciting insanity, Germany likely would have followed its better lights even during 1941. And, without Hitler, the allies would have been receptive.

The thread is essaying the war without the US. Not to the jack the thread, but perhaps the question is cleaner posing: What if Hitler hadn’t honored his treaty with Japan and not declared war on the US. That would keep both Hitler’s charisma and insanity in the picture along with FDR’s ability to get in the European action with just Japan in the US picture. Lend lease when the US is in a shooting war with its pants down militarily?


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## Juha (Jul 7, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Goering was far less ideological than Hitler or Himmler; had he removed guys like Koch from Ukraine and let the German army run it there would be much more of a chance to recruit. Belarus was never going to be pro-German due to their identifying with Russia (even today), which is why it was the hub of partisan activity in the war. Had the Germans cultivated the UPA in 1941 they would have avoided the serious issues of 1942 (murdering their leadership in concentration camps) and could have set them up as a governing body in Kiev, which would yield better results than the Nazi administration did historically. The Ukrainians East of the Dnieper did not view themselves as Ukrainian however, so would be very much against any regime that worked with a foreign power, which is why the support of the UPA historically came from Galicia and West Ukraine (even today the feelings of Ukrainian-ness come from areas west of the Dnieper). Without Hitler Goering is going to have to make concessions to the army to stay in power, because Hitler was the popular one in the party with the public (Goering and everyone else was disliked or outright hated by the public), so its likely that he would have to dismantled the Nazi administration in Ukraine, especially because they opposed his 4-year program influence in the economy there; political conflicts in the party with Goering would actually more than likely have him side with the army against the party and in fact dismantled a fair bit of the party apparatuses to court the army, which would be his power base going forward, as he and Himmler were not really that close by 1941, while the rest of the party and Goering were not in touch. Letting the army run things in the East would probably go better than the historical Nazi leadership there.



It was more complicated than that, Göring made callous comments on the treatment of Soviet PoWs and of all people Alfred Rosenberg asked/pleaded the WM high command for better treatment of the Soviet PoWs, at least to give them some means to built shelters for themselves and allow locals to give them food. In the end he went to Keitel on this but that was futile.

Juha


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## Garyt (Jul 7, 2014)

> I respectfully disagree. It was ultimately US production capacity, not the direct participation of US forces in combat that made German victory impossible. Decisive Allied victory might also be problematic with the US on the sidelines, but Germany simply could not sucessfully invade and occupy Britain, especially with the US providing materiel, weapons, supplies, and food to the British through Lend-Lease. I think the situation regarding the USSR would be similar.



One thing to think about - air superiority, for the axis or allies was a huge issue. No blitzkrieg without superiority, no D-day without it. The Luftwaffe was lost over the skys of Germany. Without US involvement, the Luftwaffe does not see the pilot attrition due to both having more fuel for training and just not losing the sheer numbers from the US bomber onslaught. The Russian front has German air superiority almost similar to 1941, and the British night bombing is more of a nuisance.

That is of course, unless the US also provides pilots via lend lease


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## Juha (Jul 8, 2014)

Garyt said:


> One thing to think about - air superiority, for the axis or allies was a huge issue. No blitzkrieg without superiority, no D-day without it. The Luftwaffe was lost over the skys of Germany. Without US involvement, the Luftwaffe does not see the pilot attrition due to both having more fuel for training and just not losing the sheer numbers from the US bomber onslaught. The Russian front has German air superiority almost similar to 1941, and the British night bombing is more of a nuisance.
> 
> That is of course, unless the US also provides pilots via lend lease



Daytime would have been a big problem to Allies but in fact Speer was more worried on RAF than USAAF attacks on oil targets because of powerful British blast bombs were much more destructive in oil installations than smaller US HE bombs and RAF was capable to hit at least most of the installations.

Without Hitler Germans might well have been able to avoid the Stalingrad catastrophe, Halder's plan for summer 42 was more conservative and safer. But it was Hitler who sacked von Bock because the latter wanted to conquer also the eastern part of Voronez beyond the river and allowed his troops to became too involved in the fierce street fighting there. So there were high ranking army commanders who were too eager to conquer big cities, too.

But without USA participation, no D-Day, at least in 1944. So British ground forces could only operate in fringes and all depended on the SU, probably dead lock there somewhere between Volga and Dnepr/Mius rivers.

Juha


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

Oil Campaign of World War II - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> Luftwaffe Field Marshal Erhard Milch, referring to the consequences of the Oil Campaign, claimed that "The British left us with deep and bleeding wounds, but the Americans stabbed us in the heart."[35]



Without the USAAF pushing the oil campaign would the British have even gone for it? Also by 1944 the Nachtjagdwaffe would be much stronger without having to build up daylight defenses against the USAAF, so its very unlikely the RAF would have been able to go after the Ruhr oil industry in the same way and wouldn't have been able to go after Romania at all without conquering North Africa and Southern Italy.


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## Juha (Jul 8, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> ...Without the USAAF pushing the oil campaign would the British have even gone for it?...



Why not, of course someone would have to push Harris to do it, but British knew that the oil was one of the Achilles heels of Germany's economy. Oil target were top priority targets for the BC early in the war but when they found out that they seldom hit them at that time, those went down the list. But when British got adeguate navigational aids and marketing tactics, why not?



wiking85 said:


> Also by 1944 the Nachtjagdwaffe would be much stronger without having to build up daylight defenses against the USAAF, so its very unlikely the RAF would have been able to go after the Ruhr oil industry in the same way and wouldn't have been able to go after Romania at all without conquering North Africa and Southern Italy.



Why, they could bomb Köningsberg/Kaliningrad from England why would they be incapable to bomb Ploesti from Cyrenaica coastal plain?

Juha


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

Juha said:


> Why not, of course someone would have to push Harris to do it, but British knew that the oil was one of the Achilles heels of Germany's economy. Oil target were top priority targets for the BC early in the war but when they found out that they seldom hit them at that time, those went down the list. But when British got adeguate navigational aids and marketing tactics, why not?


Better German defenses and far less Western airpower making it more dangerous and less profitable against a small target?

Also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_Campaign_of_World_War_II


> 1944:
> USAAF: 347 strikes
> RAF Bomber Command: 158 "strikes"
> 1945: 175 strikes (31 RAF)


The RAF contributed much less than the USAAF to the oil campaign
It was also based on the post-Normandy situation at the front, where they could now base on the continent and put in even closer navigation beacons, while moving around the established German radar network, while overrunning part of it, making the attacks more likely to succeed due to overloaded German defenses.

Bomber Command didn't start hitting German oil until after Normandy too, by which time the V-1 missile will be in service and the RAF focused on taking out the launch sites. Also it wasn't until November 1944 that the RAF dropped over 4500 tons of bombs on the oil targets.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_Campaign_of_World_War_II#Statistics



> The efficiency of the bombing was lacking. Working from German records for certain sites, the USSBS determined that on average 87% of Allied bombs fell outside the factory perimeter and that only a few percent struck plant or equipment inside the boundary. The USAAF could put 26% of their bombing within the factories in good bombing conditions, 12% when using a mix of visual and instruments but only 5% when it had to use instrument-only bombing techniques; and 80% of their tonnage was delivered under partly or fully instrument conditions. *The RAF averaged 16% inside the factory*. Bomber Command's efforts against oil were more efficient in some regards - although delivering a smaller total tonnage it did so from 2/3 base area. The USSBS believed that Bomber Command's heavy bombs - 4,000 lb "cookies" - were more effective than an equivalent weight of smaller bombs. *Both RAF and USAAF dropped a large number of bombs on oil targets that failed to explode: 19% and 12% respectively.*[37]







Juha said:


> Why, they could bomb Köningsberg/Kaliningrad from England why would they be incapable to bomb Ploesti from Cyrenaica coastal plain?
> 
> Juha



Attacking a coastal target is much easier at night due to the reflection of the moonlight off the water, plus lots of identifiable land features; that's why RAF 'gardening' missions were considered so easy and were focused on earlier in the war. Navigation by guidance system is impossible at that range (900 miles from Britain to Königsberg). Ploesti was 1100 miles from Tripoli; its just not able to be found in the dark due to being in land at a great distance with little to no identifying terrain. The RAF didn't go after it for a reason, while the USAAF only went during daylight. Later when Italy was captured they were able to mine the Danube, but that required bases in Italy and beacons set up there to navigate at night.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Königsberg_in_World_War_II


> The first RAF attack was carried out by No. 5 Group on the night of 26/27 August 1944 using 174 Avro Lancasters. The raid, which was at the extreme range for the planes, was a round trip of 1,900 miles (3,100 km) from bases in England.


Ploesti is too far from Cyrenaica to reach with any sort of viable bomb load. Also the first raids were not that successful until the raiders had gained experience operating in the area.

Also the range of British navigation systems from late war:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gee-H_(navigation)


> Gee-H was limited to distances just out of line of sight, in this case limiting it to about 300 miles.


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## Garyt (Jul 8, 2014)

> Why not, of course someone would have to push Harris to do it, but British knew that the oil was one of the Achilles heels of Germany's economy. Oil target were top priority targets for the BC early in the war but when they found out that they seldom hit them at that time, those went down the list. But when British got adeguate navigational aids and marketing tactics, why not



The other issue is that Germany will devote a lot more resources towards night fighting if that becomes an issue. Personally I would think we would see a similar effort by the British but thwarted better by the Germans.

And maybe over the next few years we may see a true 4 engine heavy from the Germans, perhaps even some fighters better equipped for long range escort duties. Perhaps even just modifications of the ME109 or FW190, I lean more towards the second being modified.

I think without the disruption of the German economy and without having to commit resources to the daylight bombing, and no Mediterreanean campaign and no invasion of Italy, Germany handles the Russian front with a lot more success.


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## zoomar (Jul 8, 2014)

If the US is not an active combatant in Europe, their would be a much less comprehensive strategic bombing campaign. The RAF would mount its urban nightime campaign, but with the exception of specific situations such as a build up to an invasion of Europe, I don't see a large daylight campaign of so-called "precision bombing". The RAF would probably attempt much the same thing with more and varied Mosquito raids. Of course with the US out, one has to wonder if anything like the Normandy invasion would be attempted by Britain alone - especialy since Churchill wasn't too keen on the idea initially anyway. Invasions of Greece, Italy, South France, and perhaps even Norway might be more likely I think this would alter the theatre mix of Luftwaffe aircraft to the detriment of the Soviets. In the absence of a sustained USAAF daylight campaign, more day fighters (Bf 109 and Fw 190) and their experienced crews would be available to the East, while more effort would be placed on nightfighters in the west. High performance/high altitude fighters like the Fw 190D/Ta-152 would be deemphasized, since the RAF bombing campaign and Soviet AF operates at lower altitudes. I suspect the development and introduction of jet fighters such as the Me 262 might be less aggressively pursued since their real forte was as high-speed daylight bomber interceptors. Perhaps the only jet aircraft that would be introduced in quantity would be the Ar 234, as a highspeed recon and intruder for hit and run attacks on coastal Britain. Since lend-lease would still be in play, the Mustang would become a major RAF fighter, and probably the P-47 might be more widely used as well. I agree with those who suggest that German transportation and industrial infrastructure might survive better without the USAAF, but I don't think this would translate into a more varied Luftwaffe. V-weapons, yes, long-range heavy bombers, no.


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## Garyt (Jul 8, 2014)

> but I don't think this would translate into a more varied Luftwaffe. V-weapons, yes, long-range heavy bombers, no.



The one difference is I don't see a push for jet fighters, because as mentioned their best use was as daylight interceptors.

That is unless something could be done to extend their range significantly, in which case a jet long range fighter is better than a prop one.

A heavy bomber on the other hand I see a push for. The Germans had these in the works, it's just the needs of the war made heavy bombers rather useless (as is most bombing if you have no chance of air superiority). But look at planes like the HE274 that would have stood a much better chance of making it to full production if there was a need for them.

A heavy 4 engine bomber would have been very useful for taking the war to the British and Russians. With the poor performance of Russian fighters at high altitudes, you would think a bomber like the HE274 would have been effective.


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

zoomar said:


> V-weapons, yes, long-range heavy bombers, no.



I don't see the V-2 or V-3 without Hitler; the V-1 I could see a lot more of. It would be a brutal blow to Britain, as they won't be able to counter them by overrunning the launch sites and the more advanced versions that were even cheaper would be available in late 1944 and early 1945. With jet recon they won't be fooled into overshooting London either. Not only that but the cost of building defenses was huge, much of which would be rendered useless once the original operating height could be reached by the V-1 (historical version operated at 2-3,000 feet, while the early versions operated at 9k feet over the Bofors 40mm guns) once the pressure gauge system could be worked out. Would the US have the 90mm radar guided AAA to send to Britain like they did historically if there is no war in Europe to justify their construction? I don't see them having a use in the Pacific, though the proximity fuse certainly would. I think the V-1 would be a much bigger problem then it was historically. Also it was in range of Leningrad from Estonia, so if and when the blockade of the city was broken, then Germany could launch V-1s at Leningrad without having to deal with the AAA as advanced as the British would have. Later versions with increased range and wooden parts were even cheaper and easier to make, but never were used against Britain because the launch sites in range were overrun. 

How does Britain react to having hundreds if not over 1000 launched per day by 1945?

Edit:
Plus no USAAF for Operation Crossbow
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Crossbow


> Sorties/bomb tonnage:
> Total: 68,913/122,133[3]
> RAF: 19,584/72,141
> USAAF: 17,211/30,350[4]


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

double post


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## Garyt (Jul 8, 2014)

> and the more advanced versions that were even cheaper would be available in late 1944 and early 1945.



What was the cost of a V-1 vs say the cost of a medium bomber, and the cost of a dumb bomb of same warhead weight?


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

Garyt said:


> What was the cost of a V-1 vs say the cost of a medium bomber, and the cost of a dumb bomb of same warhead weight?



Not counting fuel, lubricants, and anything else besides the basic airframe of each and the explosives (i.e. the warhead of the V-1) the Osprey book on the V-1 says 2% of a medium bomber without factoring in fuel, aircrew cost, training, anything the aircrews need (defensive armament, radios, gear, ammunition, service costs, ground crew, basing, pay, etc.). That's not including the dumb bomb cost (not sure what that was). The launch site probably cost about as much as a small airfield to build if not even less, especially with the temporary sites built in 1944. The construction was cheap and dirty, because it was making 1 one way trip; later they were able to introduce wooden parts, including the nose cap, the lower cost and weight, increasing range too. 

So about 50 V-1s per He-111 (not the heavier Ju-188 or Do-217 that were standard by 1944). 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Assessment


> Unlike the V-2, the V-1 was a cost-effective weapon for the Germans as it forced the Allies to spend heavily on defensive measures and divert bombers from other targets. More than 25% of Combined Bomber Offensive's bombs in July and August 1944 were used against V-weapon sites, often ineffectively.[14] In early December 1944, American General Clayton Bissell wrote a paper which argued strongly in favour of the V-1 compared to conventional bombers.[40]
> 
> Blitz (12 months) vs V-1 flying bombs (2¾ months)
> Blitz	V-1
> ...



The costlier operations later from the air launched V-1s wouldn't happen here without the launch sites being overrun by the Normandy invasion by August.


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## Juha (Jul 8, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Better German defenses and far less Western airpower making it more dangerous and less profitable against a small target?
> 
> Also:
> Oil Campaign of World War II - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> ...



Ploesti is 1400km/870mls from Cyrenaica, at least according to Google Earth so it was in range. Also H2S could see rivers and lakes, even bigger cities. H2S and low level markings, if the latter was needed, at least certain types of oil refineries are easily seen at nights, would made it possible to hit oil refineries, probably not every time, the BC missed distant targets sometimes even in 1945.

Juha

PS the attack that sunk KM Tirpitz was 2252mls round trip, bomb load was 5 000kg/12 000lb Tallboy.


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## Garyt (Jul 8, 2014)

That's interesting regarding the cost effectiveness of the V1.

Found this also:

Blitz	V-1
1. Cost to Germany 
Sorties	90,000	8,025
Weight of bombs tons	61,149	14,600
Fuel consumed tons	71,700	4,681
Aircraft lost	3,075	0
Personnel lost	7,690	0
2. Results 
Structures damaged/destroyed	1,150,000	1,127,000
Casualties	92,566	22,892
Rate casualties/bombs tons	1.6	1.6
3. Allied air effort 
Sorties	86,800	44,770
Aircraft lost	1,260	351
Personnel lost	2,233	805

Looks like the V-1 for the same amount of fuel would deliver far more bombs and casualties, without the loss of aircraft or aircrews. And if one can build 50 V-1's for a medium bomber, you are pretty cost effective. I don't think they were accurate enough though to target things like factories?


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## Juha (Jul 8, 2014)

Garyt said:


> ... I don't think they were accurate enough though to target things like factories?



Even Greater London was missed often


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## RCAFson (Jul 8, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> How does Britain react to having hundreds if not over 1000 launched per day by 1945?





Tube Alloys...


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## Juha (Jul 8, 2014)

Garyt said:


> That's interesting regarding the cost effectiveness of the V1.
> 
> Found this also:
> 
> ...



There is something odd in the table, LW lost some 70+ He 111s while air-launching V-1s and I'm pretty sure that Flak Regiment 155(W) suffered losses during the V-1 launches (premature explosions) even if we left out losses it suffered during Allied attacks on the V-1 launch sites, which is odd when the Allied losses during those attacks seems to be included.


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## Garyt (Jul 8, 2014)

> LW lost some 70+ He 111s while air-launching V-1s and I'm pretty sure that Flak Regiment 155(W) suffered losses during the V-1 launches (premature explosions)



It does mention the 70 or Heinkels lost in the notes below, which I did not get all of. Still an extremely small amount compared to losses during the blitz - at the most negligible losses. I look at it as more of a failed experiment, but it was required due to the Allies over running the launch sites in France.


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> Tube Alloys...



With no means to really deploy it without the B-29 and the Avro-Lincoln couldn't move quickly enough to get outside the blast effect. Plus there is no proof that the US would just give one or more to Britain in August 1945 (which BTW could Britain take bombing for that long?), and Tube Alloy wasn't ready until 1948. Historically the US didn't help the British with their program or give the nukes in 1945.


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## wiking85 (Jul 8, 2014)

Garyt said:


> It does mention the 70 or Heinkels lost in the notes below, which I did not get all of. Still an extremely small amount compared to losses during the blitz - at the most negligible losses. I look at it as more of a failed experiment, but it was required due to the Allies over running the launch sites in France.



They wouldn't have happened without the launch sites being overrun by Overlord and the follow up. We can write them off here then. Not only that but the inaccuracy was a function of lack of aerial recon to check the fall of the missiles, which without the USAAF making the Me262 needed for fighter defense would mean they would be used for recon work to gauge V-1 use. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_262#Variants


> Me 262 A-1a/U3
> Reconnaissance version modified in small numbers, with Reihenbildner RB 20/30 cameras mounted in the nose (sometimes one RB 20/20 and one RB 75/30). Some retained one 30 mm (1.18 in) cannon, but most were unarmed.



Plus the AR234 would be ready to go in September; arguably sooner if the recon version was adopted:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arado_Ar_234#Background


> The Ar 234 V7 prototype made history on 2 August 1944 as the first jet aircraft ever to fly a reconnaissance mission, flown by Erich Sommer.[4]


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## parsifal (Jul 8, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> That's a pretty bold statement that the Soviets and British couldn't survive without US intervention. They could survive, but not win in the context of defeating Germany totally. I think the Soviets with LL can push the Germans pretty close to the pre-war border without US intervention before petering out. The British cannot be invaded so long as the Soviets are in the war. Not having US bombing or Hitler's meddling would certainly be extremely helpful to the Axis war effort, but I doubt Germany is going to end the war in victory as Hitler wanted or even in a Brest-Litovsk situation.



They might survive, but they could not have won. Britain lacked the manpower to open a second front, and the Russians needed the distraction of a plausible second front landing in order to make headway against the heer in the East. In the air, the USAF efforts of 1943 were needed to break the back of the luftwaffe and also to ensure that the Germans followed the strategic blind alley of building more and more fighters, and investing ever greatre proportions of their spending on air defence. In 1942, the germans were spending about half what they would in 1944,. and in 1944 their air defence spending was over 50% of their entire defence budget. without the American B-17s and more importantly the P-51s ravaging germany and the occupied territories wherever and whenever they wanted, Germany's position fundamentally changes. Less threat in the air, means more effort for ground forces, greater tank production, more divisions, beter TOE levels, and the Luftwaffe does not suffer the rupturing losses in experience levels that they did. And a beefed up RAF, much as it pais me to say it, is not going to put the same pressure on the germ,ans as a full blown American effort. Lend Lease accounted for about 30% of US output, but that means that 70% of its effort are not being used.....

I am the first to admit that the British laid the groundwork that made the US victory possible. Since the end of the BOB, the luftwaffe had eaked out a semi bankrupt existence as losses whittled away their experience base. The RAF bombing efforts accounted for about 17% of germany military outputs.these are not insubstantial effects, but neither are they decisive. it took the Americans, and their massive campaigns of 1943-4 to put the luftwaffe on the canvas. even the so called defeats at Schweinfurt had long term fatal effects on the survival of the jagdwaffe.

As far as the Soviets being able to push back to the border, maybe, maybe not. Evidence suggests not. In 1943, with vast amounts of the german industrial potential already being poured into air defence, and more that 50% of german manpower forced to remain in the west, Germany still came close to breaking through at Kursk as it was. At that stage of the war, some 105 divisions were stationed in the west, in Italy (well, by September at least), or in the occupied territories. With hitler gone, the repressive policies he authorised would at least be reduced, making occupation easier and reducing demands on manpower in that sector. We know that the invasion of Italy caused the abandonement of Citadelle, just as it was poised to achieveing some real success, and italy would not have occurred without the Americans

In the west, prior to the US entry, German deployment in France was just 12 divisions, by the end of 1943, it had increased to 42 divisions. There were a further 12 divisions in the low countries, whereas prior to 1942 it has been held by just 2-3 divs. in germany itself there were over a million men serving in the flakartillerie, and 11 of the 13 flak corps were forced to remaion in Germany or the west to defend the reich. Whilst only BC was attacking, there were just 6 or seven flak units. 1942-4, in the east, there were a constant 2 flak corps deployed, whereas, without the Americans, its arguable that would increase to 6 or 7 such units. The flak units, as Richthofen points out in his despatches were critical to the AT defences in the east and with 6 or 7 of them available, Soviet tank losses would have skyrocketed. Further, of the 100 or so divisions retained on garrison in the west, we can probably assume 50 of them could could go east. The million or so flak men in the Reich could probably spare about half a million men for the east, which could pretty much restore the understrength units already fighting their. 

In economics, the difference between boom or bust is about 7% of economic activity. In military economics the balance is similar, and I can categorically say the US contributed far more than 7% of the Allied military effort. Its a lay down mezzaire...without the active participation of the US, the Allies cannot win


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## RCAFson (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> With no means to really deploy it without the B-29 and the Avro-Lincoln couldn't move quickly enough to get outside the blast effect. Plus there is no proof that the US would just give one or more to Britain in August 1945 (which BTW could Britain take bombing for that long?), and Tube Alloy wasn't ready until 1948. Historically the US didn't help the British with their program or give the nukes in 1945.



Historically the UK gave all their A-bomb technology to the USA and the Commonwealth then cut back on their A-bomb program because the USA gave it high priority. With the USA neutral then Tube Alloys goes ahead full steam to build a Commonwealth bomb if the USA won't cooperate.

A number of different aircraft could have carried a "Little Boy" A-bomb to Berlin, and time to exit the blast radius could be given by deploying a drogue or chute from the bomb as needed, although the Lancaster VI should have no problem achieving the required 8 mile distance from ground zero (Enola Gay achieved 11 miles), with a drop from 31000ft as per the historical mission, given that Little Boy was only 9600lb and the Lanc VI could carry that with ease.


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## RCAFson (Jul 9, 2014)

parsifal said:


> They might survive, but they could not have won. Britain lacked the manpower to open a second front, without the active participation of the US, the Allies cannot win



One of the unspoken assumptions here is that the USA would not defeat Japan until August 1945...yet historically the USA and Commonwealth beat Japan in August 1945 using a rather small fraction of their total industrial and economic potential. The long and short of this is that Japan is beaten much more quickly than historically if the USA uses it's full might against Japan only, which means that Commonwealth resources and Forces deployed against Japan are then freed for use against Germany. 

If the USA continues Lend Lease (and they will have a lot of spare industrial capacity if only fighting Japan) then the Commonwealth might be able to pull off D-Day and/or invade Italy and/or deploy ground forces to fight alongside the Red Army since they could field about 60-100 divisions after Japan surrenders.


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## parsifal (Jul 9, 2014)

Equipment levels are not the issue. its manpower that serves as the main constraint. Historically the British raised 32 divisions, however by the time of Normandy, manpower levels were so critical, they could only deploy a maximum of ten divisions into active combat areas of the main front where there was a likleihood of significant casualties. As it was, during Normandy, despite very modest casualty rates, the british were forced to scrap a number of units to provide replacements for other units. Britain simply lacked the manpower to undertake significant land operations and meet her wide other committments. 

Canada was the major dominion partner and fielded a total of 8 divs, but only committed a maximum of 5 to combat. the rest remained at home.

India was the major land power in the Empire, fielding some 36 divs. By 1943-4 there were still 6 divs deployed in the middle east, but these formations were needed for garrsion duty outside the ETO. Of the remainder, perhaps 10 divs were combat ready in an ETO sense, but the British were loathe to commit them to the ETO, and these formations were critical to operations in Burma anyway. Large numbers of Indian troop numbers were needed just to keep the peace. In 1942 there was a crippling famine in Bengal that killed over 2 million Bengalis alone. The region was on the verge of revolt, and this could not be ignored. 

In australias case, there were 4 AIF divisions that could serve outside Australia or its territories, but the remaining 7 divisions were restricted to Australia or its territories.

In any event, saying the US can do all the fighting in the PTO is misleading and untrue. they cant. In 1942 through to the beginning of 1944, the overwhelming majority of ground formations in the TO are firstly Chinese, then Russian (on watch) followed by the Indians, the australians, the british and lastly, the US ground formations. The US lacks the shipping capacity to commit more of its vast land army to these defensive tasks, just as the dominions lack the shipping capacity to commit much more to the ETO. For practical purposes, the brits are limited to their 10 divs they historically could spare, plus the odds and ends from Canada and the italian TO. Not nearly enough to undertake any operations of any significance in the main front of the ETO, and this enables the germans to relase formations enmasse from west to east. . Further, a large proportion of the amphibious fleet was of American origin, reflagged, but in this scenario more shipping would be needed in the PTO, not less so lift capacity would be fatally affected in this scenario. 

There is no option of fighting the war on the western front on an offensive footing without the US direct intervention. any other conclusion is kite flying. We needed them to win, if not to survive.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> Historically the UK gave all their A-bomb technology to the USA and the Commonwealth then cut back on their A-bomb program because the USA gave it high priority. With the USA neutral then Tube Alloys goes ahead full steam to build a Commonwealth bomb if the USA won't cooperate.
> 
> A number of different aircraft could have carried a "Little Boy" A-bomb to Berlin, and time to exit the blast radius could be given by deploying a drogue or chute from the bomb as needed, although the Lancaster VI should have no problem achieving the required 8 mile distance from ground zero (Enola Gay achieved 11 miles), with a drop from 31000ft as per the historical mission, given that Little Boy was only 9600lb and the Lanc VI could carry that with ease.



To the height of 31000 feet though? My understanding was that it could only carry that load to under 22,000 feet.

Also Britain did conduct its research alone historically; Britain did not have the resources to do it on their own.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project#Collaboration_with_the_United_Kingdom


> The British and Americans exchanged nuclear information but did not initially combine their efforts. Britain rebuffed attempts by Bush and Conant in 1941 to strengthen cooperation with its own project, codenamed Tube Alloys,[50] because it was reluctant to share its technological lead and help the United States develop its own atomic bomb. An American scientist who brought a personal letter from Roosevelt to Churchill offering to pay for all research and development in an Anglo-American project was poorly treated, and Churchill did not reply to the letter. The United States as a result decided as early as April 1942 that its offer was rejected, and that it should proceed alone.[51] The United Kingdom did not have the manpower or resources of the United States and despite its early and promising start, Tube Alloys soon fell behind its American counterpart.[52] On 30 July 1942, Sir John Anderson, the minister responsible for Tube Alloys, advised Churchill that: "We must face the fact that ... [our] pioneering work ... is a dwindling asset and that, unless we capitalise it quickly, we shall be outstripped. We now have a real contribution to make to a 'merger.' Soon we shall have little or none."[53] That month Churchill and Roosevelt made an informal, unwritten agreement for atomic collaboration.[54]
> 
> The opportunity for an equal partnership no longer existed, however, as shown in August 1942 when the British unsuccessfully demanded substantial control over the project while paying none of the costs. By 1943 the roles of the two countries had reversed from late 1941;[51] in January Conant notified the British that they would no longer receive atomic information except in certain areas. While the British were shocked by the abrogation of the Churchill-Roosevelt agreement, head of the Canadian National Research Council C. J. Mackenzie was less surprised, writing "I can't help feeling that the United Kingdom group [over]emphasizes the importance of their contribution as compared with the Americans."[54] As Conant and Bush told the British, the order came "from the top". The British bargaining position had worsened; the American scientists had decided that the United States no longer needed outside help, and they and others on the bomb policy committee wanted to prevent Britain from being able to build a postwar atomic weapon. The committee supported, and Roosevelt agreed to, restricting the flow of information to what Britain could use during the war—especially not bomb design—even if doing so slowed down the American project. By early 1943 the British stopped sending research and scientists to America, and as a result the Americans stopped all information sharing. The British considered ending the supply of Canadian uranium and heavy water to force the Americans to again share, but Canada needed American supplies to produce them.[55] They investigated the possibility of an independent nuclear program, but determined that it could not be ready in time to affect the outcome of the war in Europe.[56]
> 
> ...


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> One of the unspoken assumptions here is that the USA would not defeat Japan until August 1945...yet historically the USA and Commonwealth beat Japan in August 1945 using a rather small fraction of their total industrial and economic potential. The long and short of this is that Japan is beaten much more quickly than historically if the USA uses it's full might against Japan only, which means that Commonwealth resources and Forces deployed against Japan are then freed for use against Germany.
> 
> If the USA continues Lend Lease (and they will have a lot of spare industrial capacity if only fighting Japan) then the Commonwealth might be able to pull off D-Day and/or invade Italy and/or deploy ground forces to fight alongside the Red Army since they could field about 60-100 divisions after Japan surrenders.



Maybe Japan could be invaded by mid-late 1944 even with full resources considering how long it took the US to mobilize and the limited utility of B-17s in the Pacific. Also an earlier success in the Pacific means an invasion of the Japanese Home Isles, which would be a nightmare, and would require a major US occupation in mainland Asia, as Russia won't have the resources to devote to invading Manchuria and Korea, so the US then has to go from invading and occupying Japan to rounding up over 1.5 million IJA soldiers in China, assuming they peacefully surrender, which is not a given; the US will have its hands full in 1944-46. The excess US capacity could also be used to keep up their consumer economy during the war, rather than all go toward the war effort. Also how many resources were really spent in the Pacific by the British?


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## RCAFson (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Maybe Japan could be invaded by mid-late 1944 even with full resources considering how long it took the US to mobilize and the limited utility of B-17s in the Pacific. Also an earlier success in the Pacific means an invasion of the Japanese Home Isles, which would be a nightmare, and would require a major US occupation in mainland Asia, as Russia won't have the resources to devote to invading Manchuria and Korea, so the US then has to go from invading and occupying Japan to rounding up over 1.5 million IJA soldiers in China, assuming they peacefully surrender, which is not a given; the US will have its hands full in 1944-46. The excess US capacity could also be used to keep up their consumer economy during the war, rather than all go toward the war effort. Also how many resources were really spent in the Pacific by the British?



The USA only has to occupy Okinawa and Iwo Jima to effectively isolate Japan, which will bring about her capitulation or at least an armistice - no need for an invasion and with full US resources directed at Japan this will happen much sooner than historically. 

I really don't think the USA is going to deliberately lengthen the war by not fully mobilizing but we can always invent scenarios where they decide to fiddle their thumbs for some reason or another, but after Pearl Harbour this is unlikely.


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## RCAFson (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> To the height of 31000 feet though? My understanding was that it could only carry that load to under 22,000 feet.
> 
> Also Britain did conduct its research alone historically; Britain did not have the resources to do it on their own.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project#Collaboration_with_the_United_Kingdom



The Lancaster VI had a service ceiling of 28500ft @ 65000lb which equals full fuel and a 10,000lb bomb load and full armament (3 turrets and the dorsal turret). With half fuel, (@57000lb) the service ceiling is well over 30,000 ft.

Historically, the UK did not devote much effort to Tube Alloys because they didn't have to since the USA was in the war but if the USA remains neutral then Tube Alloys becomes the Commonwealth's only sure way of defeating Nazi Germany and the program would have been massively expanded. Simply reducing output of heavy bombers by ~10%, for example, would have provided the needed resources.


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> They wouldn't have happened without the launch sites being overrun by Overlord and the follow up. ..



No. they were also adopted to outflank British AA belts, it was very easy to deploy AA defences against ground launched V-1s once one knew where the launchpatches were. And British AA was much more effective against V-1s than Germans were predicted.

Juha


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The Lancaster VI had a service ceiling of 28500ft @ 65000lb which equals full fuel and a 10,000lb bomb load and full armament (3 turrets and the dorsal turret). With half fuel, (@57000lb) the service ceiling is well over 30,000 ft.


Fair enough. The problem is whether the British can make a little boy on their own.



RCAFson said:


> Historically, the UK did not devote much effort to Tube Alloys because they didn't have to since the USA was in the war but if the USA remains neutral then Tube Alloys becomes the Commonwealth's only sure way of defeating Nazi Germany and the program would have been massively expanded. Simply reducing output of heavy bombers by ~10%, for example, would have provided the needed resources.



Historically they couldn't devote those resources even with LL due the expense. Cutting heavy bombers 10% when the US isn't in the war severely curtails Bomber Command; plus did Britain have the engineering talent to spare? What cuts cut in terms of development to make gaseous diffusion uranium enrichment work on a mass scale? What's the ETA for a British bomb project if the US one took until August 1945 with Britain and the US working together? 1946 at the very earliest? 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project#Collaboration_with_the_United_Kingdom


> *They investigated the possibility of an independent nuclear program, but determined that it could not be ready in time to affect the outcome of the war in Europe.*[56]


Britain was running and independent project until 1943 until it realized its project would not be ready during the war, then begged to help the American one.



> When cooperation resumed after the Quebec agreement, the Americans' progress and expenditures amazed the British. The United States had already spent more than $1 billion ($13,600,000,000 today[1]), while in 1943, the United Kingdom had spent about £0.5 million. Chadwick thus pressed for British involvement in the Manhattan Project to the fullest extent and abandon any hopes of a British project during the war.[56]



What about the massive investments in production sites with the labor involved?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5b/Manhattan_Project_US_Canada_Map_2.svg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project#Project_sites


> By May 1945, 82,000 people were employed at the Clinton Engineer Works.
> 
> Although progress on the reactor design at Metallurgical Laboratory and DuPont was not sufficiently advanced to accurately predict the scope of the project, a start was made in April 1943 on facilities for an estimated 25,000 workers, half of whom were expected to live on-site. By July 1944, some 1,200 buildings had been erected and nearly 51,000 people were living in the construction camp. As area engineer, Matthias exercised overall control of the site.[103] At its peak, the construction camp was the third most populous town in Washington state.[104] Hanford operated a fleet of over 900 buses, more than the city of Chicago.[105] Like Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, Richland was a gated community with restricted access, but it looked more like a typical wartime American boomtown: the military profile was lower, and physical security elements like high fences, towers and guard dogs were less evident.[106]



There are two of about a dozen facilities. Where do they all get built by Britain, with what labor, and what staff?


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> No. they were also adopted to outflank British AA belts, it was very easy to deploy AA defences against ground launched V-1s once one knew where the launchpatches were. And British AA was much more effective against V-1s than Germans were predicted.
> 
> Juha


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Experimental_and_long-range_variants


> One variant of the basic Fi 103 design did see operational use. The progressive loss of French launch sites as 1944 proceeded and the area of territory under German control shrinking meant that soon the V-1 would lack the range to hit targets in England. Air-launching was one alternative utilised, but the most obvious solution was to extend the missile's range.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The USA only has to occupy Okinawa and Iwo Jima to effectively isolate Japan, which will bring about her capitulation or at least an armistice - no need for an invasion and with full US resources directed at Japan this will happen much sooner than historically.


Yet the US was about to invade when the Japanese surrendered. Why with the A-bomb, operation starvation, and B-29 raids? In 1944 the B-29 isn't ready, the B-17 cannot reach Japan even with Iwo Jima, the A-bomb isn't ready, operation starvation cannot be launched without the B-29, and the only apparent way to end the war was invasion?

Also are you sure that in 1944 Iwo and Okinawa were enough to blockade Japan from Korea and mainland Asia? Did they have enough basing facilities to handle sustaining a blockading fleet?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall


> The US Navy urged the use of blockade and airpower to bring about Japan's capitulation. They proposed operations to capture airbases in nearby Shanghai, China, and Korea, which would give the US Army Air Forces a series of forward airbases from which to bombard Japan into submission.[9] The US Army, on the other hand, argued that such a strategy could "prolong the war indefinitely" and expend lives needlessly, and therefore that an invasion was necessary. They supported mounting a large-scale thrust directly against the Japanese homeland, with none of the side operations that the Navy had suggested. Ultimately, the Army's viewpoint won.[10]









Also:


> Olympic was to be mounted with resources already present in the Pacific, including the British Pacific Fleet, a Commonwealth formation that included at least eighteen aircraft carriers (and providing 25% of the Allied air power) and four battleships. The Australian First Tactical Air Force took part in the campaign to retake the Philippines. These would likely have augmented US close air support units over Japan. The only major re-deployment for Olympic was Tiger Force, a Commonwealth long range heavy bomber unit, made up of 10 squadrons scheduled to be transferred from RAF Bomber Command control in Europe to airbases on Okinawa. This would have included 617 Squadron, the specialist 'Dam Busters' who were armed with the massive ground penetrator 'Grand Slams'. In 1944, British plans had allowed for 500–1,000 heavy bombers, this had been reduced to 22 squadrons of RAF, RCAF and other nations and by 1945 to 10 from the RAF, RCAF, RNZAF and RAAF.


Without the British its feasible for the US to do it alone, but that mobilizes even more resources that cannot be used for LL.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

BTW is there any chance Midway could play out differently due to the circumstances of 1942 being different without Germany fighting the US?


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Experimental_and_long-range_variants



Now that's just Wiki, e.g. nothing on KG 53 which did most of the launching. The first air launching of V-1s against England was on 7 Jul 44, that's before the launchpads were lost.


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Yet the US was about to invade when the Japanese surrendered. Why with the A-bomb, operation starvation, and B-29 raids? In 1944 the B-29 isn't ready, the B-17 cannot reach Japan even with Iwo Jima, the A-bomb isn't ready, operation starvation cannot be launched without the B-29, and the only apparent way to end the war was invasion?...



Why use B-17s when longer range B-24 was the main heavy bomber used in PTO before B-29 arrived?


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> Why use B-17s when longer range B-24 was the main heavy bomber used in PTO before B-29 arrived?



Did they have range before Okinawa fell? I know there were operations from China, but they were minor compared to the B-29 raids and IIRC the B-24 didn't have nearly as much defensive armament and usable payload at the ranges required even after Okinawa fell (being something like 900 miles from Tokyo, though about 400 from Kyushu).



Juha said:


> Now that's just Wiki, e.g. nothing on KG 53 which did most of the launching. The first air launching of V-1s against England was on 7 Jul 44, that's before the launchpads were lost.


Fair point; it cost Germany about 70 He111 IIRC, so that likely happens here unless they use Do217s instead, which still would be costly.


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

B-24J had a range of 2100mls/3380km with 5000lb/2268kg bomb load, so it seems to have, only just, enough range. Of course, if they had to rely on B-24s, US might have taken one of the islands N of Iwo Jima instead of IJ.

Sure, B-24 wasn't a B-29 but could have firebombed at least some of the main Japanese cities.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> B-24J had a range of 2100mls/3380km with 5000lb/2268kg bomb load, so it seems to have, only just, enough range. Of course, if they had to rely on B-24s, US might have taken one of the islands N of Iwo Jima instead of IJ.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-24_Liberator#Specifications_.28B-24J.29


> Bombs:
> Short range (˜400 mi): 8,000 lb (3,600 kg)
> Long range (˜800 mi): 5,000 lb (2,300 kg)
> Very long range (˜1,200 mi): 2,700 lb (1,200 kg)





Juha said:


> Sure, B-24 wasn't a B-29 but could have firebombed at least some of the main Japanese cities.


Starting when? It was tried from China, but the results were underwhelming. Until Okinawa falls the B-24 cannot raid Japan and then it has a fraction of the payload at that range of the B-29 and much less defensive armament, so would be very vulnerable; for night attacks it lacks the excess fuel capacity to give it the reserve capacity to make it home in case of navigational errors. Plus how much extra would the radar navigation weight? If they're lucky they could manage 1000kg during daylight or less like Operation Tidewave, which would be insanely vulnerable to Japanese fighter defenses. They could raid Kyushu fine from Okinawa (B-17s too), but going after mainland Japan is too far, even for P-38 escorts.

Air raids on Japan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Historically they didn't really start until 1944 when the B-29 came online, except for minor raids like the Dolittle one.


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## Garyt (Jul 9, 2014)

> No. they were also adopted to outflank British AA belts, it was very easy to deploy AA defences against ground launched V-1s once one knew where the launchpatches were. And British AA was much more effective against V-1s than Germans were predicted.



The end run around AA defenses was a added benefit, the primary reason for air launching was the loss of the in range launch sites. Planning for such a possibility led to the development of air launches. And it (british AA) may have been more effective than the Germans anticipated, but it was by no means anything close to a sure fire defense. Even in Mid-Late 1944, when the defenses were at their zenith, about 30% would still make it thru.



> Yet the US was about to invade when the Japanese surrendered. Why with the A-bomb, operation starvation, and B-29 raids? In 1944 the B-29 isn't ready, the B-17 cannot reach Japan even with Iwo Jima, the A-bomb isn't ready, operation starvation cannot be launched without the B-29, and the only apparent way to end the war was invasion?



Exactly. The Capitulation of Okinawa and Iwo Jima was not going to bring Japanese surrender. Perhaps over a long haul, a "siege" of Japan might have brought about their surrender - an Embargo of everything plus constant air attacks over Japan, from B-29's to carrier based fighter bomber strikes. But this would have taken a lot of time, months at least.


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## RCAFson (Jul 9, 2014)

There's an interesting discussion of Tube Alloys here:

Tube Alloys and a British nuclear programme - Alternate History Discussion Board


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> There's an interesting discussion of Tube Alloys here:
> 
> Tube Alloys and a British nuclear programme - Alternate History Discussion Board



Sure, a bunch of unsourced opinions; historically the British didn't think they could finish the bomb in time to make a difference, so were instead focused on building other weapons for the huge cost of the A-bomb project. The Manhattan Project for instance cost about as much as the US spent on all small arms in WW2. Perhaps Britain could have made something by 1945, but getting it over Germany and not having to worry about it being shot down is an issue. Also perception matters, if the British don't think they can get it done in time, as they don't have hindsight, then they wouldn't spend the resources to get it ready.

Also there is the engineering challenges that Britain will have to overcome at the cost of other projects; if they invest in Tube Alloy what aren't they building instead?
Tube Alloys and a British nuclear programme - Page 3 - Alternate History Discussion Board


> Nevertheless enriching the Uranium to the correct proportion will be a huge technical challenge, even with gaseous diffusion. The Uranium for the Little Boy bom, was enriched by several processes, first by thermal diffusion (0,7% to 2%), then by gaseous diffusion (2% to 23%) and finally using the Oak Ridge calutrons (23% to c90%). Going all the way from 0,7% to 90% U235 using only gaseous diffusion is theoretically possible, but the engineering and scientific challenges are going to be massive for this to happen in a timely manner. While the choice of gaseous diffusion, was a lucky one on paper, there is a huge difference between science on paper, small scale science in a laboratory and then large scale industrial production. Problems will inevitably arise at some point during the process, especially as Uranium hexafluoride is a highly corrosive material, whose properties where not well understood at the time.
> Don't forget too that most gaseous diffusion plants today are only enriching urnaium to reach a 4% to 5% content of U235, which is sufficient for thermal nuclear reactors but not enough for a nuclear weapon.
> 
> It is also worth noting that gaseous diffusion requires a lot of energy, where will the energy come from in the context of a war economy where coal and electricity are rationned?
> ...


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pound_sterling#Use_in_the_Empire
During WW2 the dollar was pegged to the pound at $4.03:1
The Lancaster bomber cost about 45-50,000 pounds, or about $200,000 in WW2 dollars. There were 7,377 built in WW2.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avro_Lancaster
That's about $1.4 Billion. The Manhattan Project cost almost $2 Billion in WW2 dollars. So for Britain going for the A-bomb they would have to sacrifice all of their Lancasters and part of the rest of the strategic bombers (the Halifax cost about 42,000 pounds). 
Manhattan Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> The Manhattan Project began modestly in 1939, but grew to employ more than 130,000 people and cost nearly US$2 billion (about $26 billion in 2014[1] dollars). Over 90% of the cost was for building factories and producing the fissile materials, with less than 10% for development and production of the weapons. Research and production took place at more than 30 sites across the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.



RCAFson claimed it would have cost 10% of the strategic bomber force for Britain to run the Manhattan Project on their own, but for a similar price they would have lost the majority of their strategic bombers from 1942 on.

http://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/2123/664/2/adt-NU20050104.11440202whole.pdf

Just some context.


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## Garyt (Jul 9, 2014)

> The Manhattan Project began modestly in 1939, but grew to employ more than 130,000 people and cost nearly US$2 billion (about $26 billion in 2014[1] dollars). Over 90% of the cost was for building factories and producing the fissile materials, with less than 10% for development and production of the weapons. Research and production took place at more than 30 sites across the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.



The cost for technology R+D is amazing. I never thought it was this costly. No wonder the US was the lead country for the atomic bomb - they were the only country that could had the resources to spend this kind of money for resources while fighting a war.

Though it helped a lot that they were not fighting a war where the battlefield was their own country - enemy bombing or the takeover/moving of research installations would have certainly caused delays in the end result.


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## thedab (Jul 9, 2014)

How well would the Germans have done in the med,in 42 with out the Americans leaking information like a sieve.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

thedab said:


> How well would the Germans have done in the med,in 42 with out the Americans leaking information like a sieve.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Rommel#Role_of_Intelligence_Intercepts_in_North_Africa


> The Axis had considerable success in intelligence gathering through radio communication intercepts and monitoring unit radio traffic. The most important success came through Colonel Bonner Fellers, the U.S. military attaché in Egypt. He had been tasked by General George Marshall to provide detailed reports on the military situation in Africa.[117] Fellers talked with British military and civilian headquarters personnel, read documents and visited the battlefront. Known to the Germans as "die gute Quelle" (translated as "the good source") or with a joking play on his name as "der kleine Kerl" ("the little fellow"), he transmitted his reports back to Washington using the "Black Code" of the U.S. State Department. In September 1941 Italian agents had stolen a code book from the US embassy in Rome, photographed and returned it without being detected.[118] The Italians shared parts of their intercepts with their German allies. The "Chiffrierabteilung" (German military cipher branch) were soon able to break the code themselves. Fellers' reports were excessively detailed and played a significant role in informing the Germans of allied strength and intentions.
> In addition, the Afrika Korps had the intelligence services of the 621st Signals Battalion commanded by Hauptmann Alfred Seeböhm. The 621st Signals Battalion was a mobile monitoring intelligence unit which arrived in North Africa in late April 1941.[119] It monitored radio communications among British units.[117] Unfortunately for the Allies, the British not only failed to change their codes with any frequency, they were also prone to poor radio discipline in combat. Their officers made frequent open, uncoded transmissions of encouragement to their commands as they went into battle, allowing the Germans to more easily identify British units and deployments.[117] With these Seeböhm had painstakingly compiled code-books and enemy orders of battle. The situation changed after a raid in force by the Australian 2/24th Infantry Battalion resulted in the 621st Signals Battalion being overrun and destroyed, and a significant number of their documents captured, alerting British intelligence to the extent of the problem.[120] The British responded by instituting an improved call signal procedure, introducing radiotelephonic codes, imposing rigid wireless silence on reserve formations, padding out real messages with dummy traffic, tightening up on their radio discipline in combat and creating an entire fake signals network in the southern sector.[120]



No reason it should be too different:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonner_Fellers


> In October 1940,[4] Colonel Fellers was assigned as military attaché to the U.S. embassy in Egypt. He was tasked with the duty of monitoring and reporting on British military operations in the Mediterranean and Middle East Theatre. The British granted Fellers access to their activities and information. Fellers dutifully reported everything he learned to his superiors in the United States. His reports were read by President Roosevelt, the head of American intelligence, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Unbeknown to Fellers, Axis intelligence read the reports: within eight hours the most secret data on British “strengths, positions, losses, reinforcements, supply, situation, plans, morale etc” were under the gimlet eyes of Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel.[5]
> Fellers' concerns about security were overridden and he sent his reports by radio, encrypted in the "Black Code" of the U.S. State Department. Unbeknownst to the U.S. government, the details of this code were stolen from the U.S. embassy in Italy by Italian spies in September 1941. Around the same time it was also broken by German cryptanalysts.[6] Beginning in mid-December 1941 (coincidentally as the U.S. was entering the war) Germany was able to identify Fellers' reports. This lasted until June 29, 1942, when Fellers switched to a newly adopted U.S. code system.[7]



He was getting all that information prior to the US being in the war, so even if they don't enter in 1942 then the British would keep up with the reports with the hope of the US getting involved at some point, but also to help coordinate that theater with other joint theaters.


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## thedab (Jul 9, 2014)

all of rommel big victory's are from Dec41 to june 42 in the time of the American leek. Coincidence?

Rommel didn't do that much in 41,saying how thin Commonwealth forces were in the western desert in 41

and in 41 Commonwealth forces won two campaigns 
East African Campaign (World War II) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria-
Lebanon_campaign


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

thedab said:


> all of rommel big victory's are from Dec41 to june 42 in the time of the American leek. Coincidence?
> 
> Rommel didn't do that much in 41,saying how thin Commonwealth forces were in the western desert in 41
> 
> ...



I get your point, but can you demonstrate that without the US in the war that that leak still wouldn't continue? The Italians got the codes in September 1941 and shared it with the Germans in December. The US officer making the reports was getting full updates and filling reports since 1940 without issue, the US DoW did nothing to change the info that was released via that code. All that changed was Rommel getting access to the information about the time that the US entered the war; without US entry Fellers would still be getting all that British info and filling reports on it, as he had since the start of the Italian invasion in 1940.

As I posted above:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonner_Fellers


> In October 1940,[4] Colonel Fellers was assigned as military attaché to the U.S. embassy in Egypt. He was tasked with the duty of monitoring and reporting on British military operations in the Mediterranean and Middle East Theatre. The British granted Fellers access to their activities and information. Fellers dutifully reported everything he learned to his superiors in the United States. His reports were read by President Roosevelt, the head of American intelligence, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Unbeknown to Fellers, Axis intelligence read the reports: within eight hours the most secret data on British “strengths, positions, losses, reinforcements, supply, situation, plans, morale etc” were under the gimlet eyes of Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel.[5]
> Fellers' concerns about security were overridden and he sent his reports by radio, encrypted in the "Black Code" of the U.S. State Department. Unbeknownst to the U.S. government, the details of this code were stolen from the U.S. embassy in Italy by Italian spies in September 1941. Around the same time it was also broken by German cryptanalysts.[6] Beginning in mid-December 1941 (coincidentally as the U.S. was entering the war) Germany was able to identify Fellers' reports. This lasted until June 29, 1942, when Fellers switched to a newly adopted U.S. code system.[7]



Plus nothing changes about his access to signals intelligence via the 621st Signals Battalion. Perhaps they might even make it past July 1942 without the US in the war due to variables created by US neutrality?


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-24_Liberator#Specifications_.28B-24J.29
> 
> Starting when? It was tried from China, but the results were underwhelming. Until Okinawa falls the B-24 cannot raid Japan and then it has a fraction of the payload at that range of the B-29 and much less defensive armament, so would be very vulnerable; for night attacks it lacks the excess fuel capacity to give it the reserve capacity to make it home in case of navigational errors. Plus how much extra would the radar navigation weight? If they're lucky they could manage 1000kg during daylight or less like Operation Tidewave, which would be insanely vulnerable to Japanese fighter defenses. They could raid Kyushu fine from Okinawa (B-17s too), but going after mainland Japan is too far, even for P-38 escorts.
> 
> ...



I bet that Wiki ranges are in fact radii of action (incl. safety reserves). My figure is the distance the plane can fly in one direction. Iwo is 1200km/750mls S of Tokyo. B-24s can bomb Tokyo during darkness but arrive back at Iwo in daylight.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> I bet that Wiki ranges are in fact radii of action (incl. safety reserves). My figure is the distance the plane can fly in one direction. Iwo is 1200km/750mls S of Tokyo. B-24s can bomb Tokyo during darkness but arrive back at Iwo in daylight.



Sure, but your figure includes very different payloads at that range. Also 750 miles is a straight line and assuming no wind resistance, plus includes using a lower altitude with about 1000kg of bombs to maintain a safe reserve, especially if operating at night and thus using H2X. How many B-24s would be needed to equal one B-29? How many bombers could be stationed on Iwo? Can Iwo be captured any earlier than early/mid-1944?


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

Garyt said:


> The end run around AA defenses was a added benefit, the primary reason for air launching was the loss of the in range launch sites. Planning for such a possibility led to the development of air launches. And it (british AA) may have been more effective than the Germans anticipated, but it was by no means anything close to a sure fire defense. Even in Mid-Late 1944, when the defenses were at their zenith, about 30% would still make it thru.



As I wrote earlier, first V-1/He 111 attack happened on 7.July 44. The Allies were still inching through Bogage. And at the beginning of August 44 80% of V-1s were destroyed, that means that 20% not 30% got through.





Garyt said:


> Exactly. The Capitulation of Okinawa and Iwo Jima was not going to bring Japanese surrender. Perhaps over a long haul, a "siege" of Japan might have brought about their surrender - an Embargo of everything plus constant air attacks over Japan, from B-29's to carrier based fighter bomber strikes. But this would have taken a lot of time, months at least.



Of course, that was what happened historitically, also BBs bombarded industrial targets in Japan before A-bomb attacks.Japanese were ready to peace negoations in summer 44 but were not ready to unconditional surrender before A-bomb attacks and the SU attack into Mantsuria.


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## thedab (Jul 9, 2014)

and one more thing, how well did the 621st battalion do? as it look like they not as good as that bit on wiki make them out be

http://http://www.armchairgeneral.com/radio-kills-rommels-621st-radio-intercept-company.htm
they were good but not that good


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Sure, but your figure includes very different payloads at that range. Also 750 miles is a straight line and assuming no wind resistance, plus includes using a lower altitude with about 1000kg of bombs to maintain a safe reserve, especially if operating at night and thus using H2X. How many B-24s would be needed to equal one B-29? How many bombers could be stationed on Iwo? Can Iwo be captured any earlier than early/mid-1944?



No, the same 5000lb bomb load but right conversation to kilos, look the Wiki long range figure. 800mls is probably the USAAF radius of action figure for operational planning. So Tokyo and back was possible with adeguate reserve and with 5000lb bomb load, it was tight but possible.
At least 2 B-24s per one B-29 and still smaller bomb carrying capacity and maybe some targets out of range but the RAF Liberator GR III had a max range of 4600mls/7403km, most probably without any offensive load but radar dome or Leight light instead of the ball turret. At low level night attack that was probably ok after all many B-29s had only the tail turret installed when they switched to the low level night attack tactics IIRC.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> No, the same 5000lb bomb load but right conversation to kilos, look the Wiki long range figure. 800mls is probably the USAAF radius of action figure for operational planning. So Tokyo and back was possible with adeguate reserve and with 5000lb bomb load, it was tight but possible.
> At least 2 B-24s per one B-29 and still smaller bomb carrying capacity and maybe some targets out of range but the RAF Liberator GR III had a max range of 4600mls/7403km, most probably without any offensive load but radar dome or Leight light instead of the ball turret. At low level night attack that was probably ok after all many B-29s had only the tail turret installed when they switched to the low level night attack tactics IIRC.



Too tight for comfort, which not something that air forces were willing to risk; night time missions were totally different animal too, as they required extra fuel for navigation challenges that didn't exist during the day.


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## Garyt (Jul 9, 2014)

> As I wrote earlier, first V-1/He 111 attack happened on 7.July 44. The Allies were still inching through Bogage.



Just because the first airborne launch happened while the installations had not yet been overrun a month after D-day does not mean that the Germans were not looking at the possible or even probable eventuality of having these launch sites compromised.

Heck, this was a month after Normandy and the Allies had a very secure beachhead.

I think they were planning and testing with this eventuality very much in their thoughts.


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

War is risky business as seen e.g. during the P-51 escort missions from Iwo to Japan.


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## wiking85 (Jul 9, 2014)

Juha said:


> War is risky business as seen e.g. during the P-51 escort missions from Iwo to Japan.



According to wikipedia there were only 10 escort missions before they were dropped.

How about we get back on track and talk about the European theater?


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

Garyt said:


> Just because the first airborne launch happened while the installations had not yet been overrun a month after D-day does not mean that the Germans were not looking at the possible or even probable eventuality of having these launch sites compromised.
> 
> Heck, this was a month after Normandy and the Allies had a very secure beachhead.
> 
> I think they were planning and testing with this eventuality very much in their thoughts.



Well one didn't just on one day get the idea to put V-1 under wing of He 111 and try to it on next day and began operations a week later. Of course D-Day and the possibility of loosing the main V-1 launch areas put more haste to the project but it was also a mean to try to force British to spread their AA guns to larger area.


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## Juha (Jul 9, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> According to wikipedia there were only 10 escort missions before they were dropped.
> 
> How about we get back on track and talk about the European theater?



They began to make fighter sweeps after that, the last sweep was made on 14 Aug 45, it was four FGs (three Mustangs groups and one recently arrived P-47N group) mission, the last escort mission was flown on 10 Aug 45, so they were also flown time to time to the end.


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## parsifal (Jul 10, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> BTW is there any chance Midway could play out differently due to the circumstances of 1942 being different without Germany fighting the US?



Of course, but unlikley, and in any event a Japanese victory at Midway is really a strategic blind alley , except if they inflict a massively one sided victory over the USN. Whilst aircraft was not a significant issue for the USN, neither the supply of well trained pilots, the blue water fleet was pretty much set to pre-war acquisitions until the beginning of 1944, and didnt become a decisive impact in capital ships (carriers, heavy cruisers and Battleships) until 1945. Smaller warships were significantly reinforced from the latter part of 1942 onward, Light cruisers were similalrly well supplied from an early date. Escort Carriers began to have a significant effect from the middle of 1943, but were really a product of british experience and practice, so might be somewhat delayed as the Americans might have been slower on the uptake in appreciateing their value. Pre-war, Roosevelt was keen about the concept of mercantile conversions similar to the Junyo conversions of the IJN or naval conversions of the Shoho type, but true escort carrier conbversions were delayed until well into 1942. this might be delayed further if the USN did not receive as much advice and inclination from the RN. 

If the Japanese had succeeded in achieving an uverwhelming, one sided victory in the Pacific, they might have gained breathing space in which to restore their air crew shortages, secure access to the resourcews they had won in the initial campaigns and fortified their defensive postions better. They may have been able to achieve some better resolution in China and/or Burma, and this may well have given them less fronts to worry about. Less fronts greatly eases the strains on their ;pgisitics, frees up some seaoned ground troops and releases experienced aircrew either for trainng of simply to beef up the available forces in the shop front in the pacific. 
But the difficulty of all this is in achieving that victory, If there was any other result, say losing 100 aircrew to sink all four of the US carriers, the victory becomes a pyrhic one for them, and not worth the losses.


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## RCAFson (Jul 10, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pound_sterling#Use_in_the_Empire
> During WW2 the dollar was pegged to the pound at $4.03:1
> The Lancaster bomber cost about 45-50,000 pounds, or about $200,000 in WW2 dollars. There were 7,377 built in WW2.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avro_Lancaster
> ...



The USA spent far more than they had to because they developed 3 different methods to develop atomic weapons simultaneously, and in fact developed uranium and plutonium bombs in tandem . The UK doesn't have to replicate the USA program to get a usable bomb, and a single track development rather than a triple track program will be far cheaper.


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## wiking85 (Jul 10, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The USA spent far more than they had to because they developed 3 different methods to develop atomic weapons simultaneously, and in fact developed uranium and plutonium bombs in tandem . The UK doesn't have to replicate the USA program to get a usable bomb, and a single track development rather than a triple track program will be far cheaper.



In hindsight sure. The problem is no one knew which was the viable path at that point, so the US went for all potential ones to get a viable option by 1945.


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## stona (Jul 10, 2014)

Juha said:


> Well one didn't just on one day get the idea to put V-1 under wing of He 111 and try to it on next day and began operations a week later.



The first V-1s were dropped from aircraft as part of the initial testing programme. In June 1943 unpowered 'dummies' of the Fi 103 were dropped from a Fw 200 at Peenemunde. These tests were followed by tests on the control surfaces of the missile and two unpowered drops were made from an He 111 H-6. Between 22nd and 28th August 1943 several powered V-1s were launched from an He 111 H-6. These were tests of the V-1 systems and NOT tests to establish the viability of an offensive air launched campaign against Britain.

The first tests to establish whether an air launched campaign was viable and which might be the best carrier aircraft were started on 6th April 1944 at Karlshagen. Milch favoured the operational use of an air launched system _'for the purposes of deception'_ and that is why the initial tests started. It had nothing to do with the allied invasion of Europe.

It was determined that the venerable, and crucially available, He 111 was the best aircraft for the job. Most of the aircraft were converted from H-16 or H-20 variants and were not referred to as H-22s. Only those converted on the production line from H-21s were designated H-22s.

II/KG 3 was selected for air launch training around May 1944 and moved to Karlshagen for this purpose. They were trained by a cadre of personnel who had been involved in the testing who were formed into an experimental unit designated 'Erprobungskommando Karlshagen'. It was a short ten day course and only three one hour flights were included.
The first crews finished the course on 10th June 1944 and were posted to air fields in Northern France, Beauvais/Tille, Parmain/ L'Isle Adam and Roye/Amy. 

The first air launched attacks were carried out on 9/10 July and the target was London. Subsequently, over four nights in the second week of July, II/KG 3 targeted Southampton. Most (73%) of the V-1s landed in an area covering a narrow ellipse measuring 8 x 33 miles with its centre about 8 miles north east of Southampton. The British were unsure of the exact target and contemporary documents refer to attacks on the_ 'Portsmouth/Southampton area'. _

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 10, 2014)

How would Britain react here with the V-1s being in service over a wider area from June 1944 on? I imagine as the technology is refined it will be used against a wide swath of targets all over Southern Britain from Northern France. 



> Thus the F-1 version developed. The weapon's fuel tank was increased in size, with a corresponding reduction in the capacity of the warhead. Additionally, the nose-cones of the F-1 models were made of wood, affording a considerable weight saving. With these modifications, the V-1 could be fired at London and nearby urban centres from prospective ground sites in the Netherlands.
> 
> Frantic efforts were made to construct a sufficient number of F-1s in order to allow a large-scale bombardment campaign to coincide with the Ardennes Offensive, but numerous factors (bombing of the factories producing the missiles, shortages of steel and rail transport, the chaotic tactical situation Germany was facing at this point in the war etc.) delayed the delivery of these long-range V-1s until February/March 1945. Before the V-1 campaign ended for good at the end of the latter month, several hundred F-1s were launched at Britain from Dutch sites.



The extension of the launch sites into the Netherlands and Belgium would also add to the British headaches. How much could they handle?


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## stona (Jul 10, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> How would Britain react here with the V-1s being in service over a wider area from June 1944 on?



The problem for the V-1 is that it was hopelessly inaccurate. As a tactical weapon in a military sense it was not terribly useful. It was a poor substitute for the strategic bomber that the Germans had failed so spectacularly to produce.

The problem for the British was that the government had a responsibility to protect its population from these attacks. More than 6,000 people perished under these attacks. Compared to the numbers killed in the 1940/41 in the 'Blitz' on various British cities this number is relatively low but the British devoted considerable resources to countering the threat.
They would have done the same in your scenario. The problem for the Germans is that the British and their allies had the resources to devote to opposing the V-1 threat. I can't see the V-1 being significantly developed in the historical period. It was an unreliable weapon, particularly when air launched. 

Of the 227 V-1s launched by KG 3 against London between July and September 1944 only 56 reached London. Only 114 were recorded as reaching the coast. Precisely 5 were shot down, 3 by AA and 2 by fighters.
Of the 90 launched at Southampton none hit any strategically valuable target. Given the density of such targets along the coast in the Portsmouth and Southampton area in 1944 this demonstrates the shortcomings of the V-1 as a military rather than terror weapon.

The V-1 tended to kill civilians which forced the British to devote large resources to countering it. The British had these resources in 1944. What the V-1 couldn't be was a war winning, or even war changing, weapon.

Cheers

Steve

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## wiking85 (Jul 10, 2014)

stona said:


> The problem for the V-1 is that it was hopelessly inaccurate. As a tactical weapon in a military sense it was not terribly useful. It was a poor substitute for the strategic bomber that the Germans had failed so spectacularly to produce.


Not terribly if they had been properly directed; the radio telemetry data was ignored in favor of a double agent's reports and the lack of aerial recon to confirm; here the introduction of the Me262 could be for recon work instead of as a fighter, which would provide the aerial recon to confirm the fall of the missiles and correct accordingly. Plus further development would help make them more accurate once they understood what the actual dispersion was; historically the Germans lacked an accurate picture of what was happening so couldn't figure out what to do in the several months when in range. With the introduction of the Ar234B in September they won't lose aerial recon again for some time if ever. Of course the CEP is large initially, but with corrects it can be improved enough to reliably hit London and expand operations beyond just that city.

As it it being a war winning weapon, no not by itself, but without it being stopped coupled with war weariness it might be enough to help cause an armistice in 1945. In the meantime it will require a lot of resources to defend against, which won't be used against Germany and will be more than what Germany spends on building and deploying the weapon, with the added benefit of drawing bomber missions off of Germany and on to FLAK traps.


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## Koopernic (Jul 10, 2014)

Just some General comments:
The V1 was evolving in range and speed, variants with minor refinements reached 515mph at low altitude by Jan 1945. Guidance was coming in, its code code name Ewald II. Range was being extended, up to 400 miles, equal to the range of a 1000 mile range bomber. Cost of the V1 was so low that I suspect the two dozen or so 32 pounder proximity fused FLAK shells fired to bring down the V1 in its closing stages cost more than the V1. Had the Normandy Landings not occurred the more dispersed V1 Launch sites would have greatly diluted British AAA gun defences as well.

Air launched V1's were fired over a radio buoy dropped by a German pathfinder or laid by a U-boat, the buoys having been developed to track convoys. The V1 then preceded along its path to target using magnetic compass heading and an anemometer/odograph in the form of the nose propeller. There was the possibility of better radio guidance for the launch aircraft and even for midcourse guidance of the V1. The best German blind bombing system at the time was probably EGON-II which was similar to British Oboe in using two 'radar' transponder to triangulate the pathfinder. However I suspect the far less accurate EGON-I which used only one radar not two radars was used to provide guidance.

One would have to consider the very likely possibility of an German atomic bomb as well. Early historical literature on German atomic research tended to be disparaging and dismissive eg Goudsmit/Bernstein/Rose/Groves More recent work by Professor Mark Walker and others Including David Irving has cleared this up. In essence the Germans knew how to configure a reactor and how to control and moderate it. In 1942 they weren't behind at all. They did make the mistake of going down the path of using heavy water as a moderator, in part because they had the worlds only source and it was 'free' (a residual by-product of Norwegian electrolysis of water for hydrogen production for use in ammonia production, the heavier water tended to be left in the electrolyte).

Just to summarise, if you read Walker or the Earlier Irving you can see that the reactor experiment they conducted in Hairgerloch in 1944/45 (I've actually visited the Atom Keller Museum in Bavaira where a reproduction of their subcritical reactors exists) would have lead to criticality baring lack of materials within a short time. However if it were not for the effects of Allied Bombing which destroyed the scientists labs several times and forced moves of equipment especially from Berlin, serious disruption in timely supply of reactor rods that they would almost certainly achieved criticality by late 1943 and before mid 1944. This is assuming they don't accelerate their program or spend more money. The Germans also produced gram quantities of enriched uranium from the two devices they had developed: the ultracentrifuge and the uranium sluice. The ultra centrifuges were destroyed by bombing no less than 2 times (3 times counting the ones destroyed before they were complete) and the uranium sluice once.

One can say that if it had not have been for heavy allied bombardment the Germans would have had gram quantities of highly enriched uranium 1943/1944 as well as a functioning lab scale reactor. Certainly before 1945.
At this point it would be impossible to not have the facts clearly plain of the feasibility of an atomic weapon. (they really only had an atomic reactor research program till then). This would lead to a fieldable weapon within 2 years: say late 46 or early 1947.

It would probably be affordable as well, the Germans having less resources having had to focus on efficient methods.

Heisenberg was right, a weapon couldn't be ready before the war was over but had he had the attitude and managerial ability of Werner von Braun he would have taken Alber Speer's 500 million Reichs Marks and progressed much further along. The scale of the effort would have eliminate several oversights or miscommunications) such as the effectiveness of graphite as a moderator, something that had been worked out but not communicated to Heisenberg.

German Army Ordinance (probably Kurt Diebner) had in 1942 produced an estimate for super criticality of 10-100kg (actually better than Maude committee) and around the same time Heisenberg estimated the size (when describing it to Speer) as that of a pineapple (about 25kg of U235) though he latter said 500kg (about the size of a soccer ball) when interned at Farmhall but he then recorrected himself.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 10, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The Lancaster VI had a service ceiling of 28500ft @ 65000lb which equals full fuel and a 10,000lb bomb load and full armament (3 turrets and the dorsal turret). With half fuel, (@57000lb) the service ceiling is well over 30,000 ft.



I don't think you would have seen much more than 30K, if you even reached there, even with half fuel. The production Lincoln I had a service ceiling of just over 30,000 feet according to Wiki. To really determine this one would have to look at performance charts for the aircraft and factor in density altitude.


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## stona (Jul 10, 2014)

A German atomic bomb is a red herring. You can also forget about the Walker/Irving nonsense. (Irving is the man who published Dresden death tolls to which essentially zeros had been added, based on a forged/altered German report, when he must have known it was incorrect. I have no time for that sort of 'research')

I've looked into this in the last few years and as a chemist I have a better understanding than many. I studied Physics in higher education before switching to Chemistry.
I'm not going to enter into that debate here anyway. If someone choose to believe that the Germans could have developed a viable weapon by the 1950s, even IF they had the political will and funding, that's their right. I know they are wrong 

I will say that having a working reactor and producing viable amounts of weapons grade material are two VERY different things. Knowing something is possible in theory and achieving it are also two different things. Every High School physicist should be able to draw diagrams to illustrate how several different types of these weapons work, but without something like the Manhattan Project he won't be building one any time soon. Also, without going into all the detail, there is Heisenberg's fundamental errors in understanding the reaction in a weapon. He only realised his mistakes after the war. It's why all the German physicists were absolutely astounded that the Americans had delivered a bomb by air. They thought it would weigh many, many tons. 

The Farm Hall transcripts make it quite clear that the German scientists did not fully understand just how the Americans had done it and that they didn't believe they were close to something similar. They justified this to themselves by suggesting that they never really wanted to build a bomb in the first place. Make of that what you will.

This was the discussion just after the interned men had heard on the BBC that an atomic bomb had been dropped on Japan

_KORSCHING: "That shows at any rate that the Americans are capable of real cooperation on a tremendous scale. That would have been impossible in Germany. Each one said that the other was unimportant. 

GERLACH: You can't say that as far as the uranium group is concerned. 

KORSCHING: Not officially of course. 

GERLACH (shouting): Not unofficially either! Don't contradict me! There are far too many other people here who know. 

HAHN: Of course we were unable to work on that scale. 

HEISENBERG: One can say that the first time large funds were made available in Germany was in the spring of 1942, after our meeting with Rust [the education minister] when we convinced him that we had absolutely definite proof that it could be done. 

BAGGE: It wasn't much earlier here either.... 

HEISENBERG: On the other hand the whole heavy-water business, which I did everything I could to further, cannot produce an explosive." _


Making the V-1 go faster would certainly make it harder to intercept or shoot down. It doesn't address the fundamental problem of accuracy. We are not talking a few hundred yards as in conventional bombing we are talking miles. V-1s often missed a target the size of Greater London which even conventional bombers at the beginning of the war could usually hit once they'd found it.

Cheers

Steve

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## stona (Jul 10, 2014)

Koopernic my information about the navigation of the air launched V-1s from He 111s makes no mention of buoys.

Initially the short over sea flights were more or less parallel to the Dutch and Belgian coats. Flashing two letter coded marker beacons were placed at the coastal crossing points at Walcheren or near Blankenberge, visible for the short periods of these operations. Some crew also recall fixed search light beams and pre-arranged flak bursts being used to aid navigation.
An agent confirmed seeing a V-1 launched by an aircraft over Knocke Bains (near Blankenberge) as evidenced in a report by the British Assistant Director of Intelligence (Science) on 22nd July.

When KG 3 was forced to bases further away a different system was needed to overcome the navigational problem. This system, code named 'Zyklops' involved three transmitters on the Dutch coast at Den Helder, Zandvoort and Alkmaar. The one at Den Helder acted as both a coastal crossing marker on which to trace dead reckoning navigation to the designated launching zone and a start point for a preset air log in the aircraft.
As the aircraft passed over the beacon the radio operator would start a count down on the air log called 'Zahlwerk' which just means 'Counter'. On approaching the launch zone, indicated by the figure 1,000 appearing on the dial of the 'Zahlwerk' panel the pilot would begin to climb from 100m to his launch height. He also turned onto the course setting for the target and the bomb aimer would start the launch procedure by starting up the missile's motor. When the figure 0 appeared on the 'Zahlwerk' panel the missile was released.
'Zahlwerk', as the name suggests, was a simple mechanical system. The mechanism was driven by a small two blade propeller situated on a tube sticking out from the leading edge of the starboard wing out board of the engine. The number of revolutions of the propeller, counted by a tachometer, measured the distance flown since the system was started over the radio beacon, fixing the release point.

It didn't work very well!
British Intelligence reports show that in the first wave of attacks from the French air fields most of the air launched V-1s fell in an area north of the Thames with a radius of about 25 miles. Not accurate but compared with the longer range launches not bad. The missiles launched in the second, long range phase, after 15th September, fell in an area stretching from 40 miles south of London to 50 miles north!

Cheers

Steve


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## RCAFson (Jul 10, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> I don't think you would have seen much more than 30K, if you even reached there, even with half fuel. The production Lincoln I had a service ceiling of just over 30,000 feet according to Wiki. To really determine this one would have to look at performance charts for the aircraft and factor in density altitude.



B-17G:
at 67,850lb (max TO) the service ceiling is 28,250ft
at 64,975lb the service ceiling is 29,900ft
B-29:
at 140,000lb (full fuel and a 10,000lb bomb load or 20,000lb bomb load and reduced fuel)the service ceiling of a B-29 is 23,950ft.
at 120,000lb the service ceiling is 35650ft. (B-17, B-29 = USAF data)

Lincoln 1 (merlin 85)
at 82000lb service ceiling = 25000ft (84% fuel 10,000lb bomb)
at 69500lb service ceiling = 30,500ft (10000lb bombs 46% fuel)
at 63500lb service ceiling = 33000ft = (10,000 bomb 33% fuel)
at 51000lb Service ceiling = 38000ft = (8% fuel or increased fuel and reduced gun armament) (data from Flight Archive)

My service ceiling guesstimate for a Lanc VI at 57000lb would be about 32-33,000ft. The service ceiling of the Lanc VI was achieved at 2850rpm rather than at the 3000rpm combat rating (same for the Lincoln).

In response to another earlier post, the Lincoln was not in squadron service before VE day, but about 50 production Lincolns had been built by VE day, with production starting in Feb 1945.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 10, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> (*data from Flight Archive)*




Is this from performance charts? How can these numbers include density altitude? An 8% fuel load? You better hope you have the airfield in site....

Calculate fuel burn at takeoff, climb, then cruise - compare that to what an 8% fuel load is on a Lincoln (or a Lanc VI)

And when operating at Service ceiling you're no longer flying at a performance optimum, more than likely under Va and not able to climb more than 100' per minute as a norm.


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## parsifal (Jul 10, 2014)

ah, so some of this discussion is suggesting Germans with hoards of V1s/v2s carrying nuclear weappons. The ultimate german wet dream i see. My opinion, not a chance, at least for the likley duration of the war. The Germans were not anywhere close to developing nuclear weapons, and would have basically needed a truckload more money, and start again with their research. Who knows what might have happened with hitler out of the picture, but in the context of what we do know, and what was foreseeable, they had not the slightest chance of being nuclear armed before or immedaitely after 1945


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## RCAFson (Jul 10, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Is this from performance charts? How can these numbers include density altitude? 8% fuel load? You better hope you have the airfield in site....




8 % fuel = about 285 gallons and about 1.5 hours endurance, but in any event I just included that info to show the effect of weight on service ceiling.

All data, including the USAF data, is corrected to a standard day. The Flight Archive data is from actual aircraft testing.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 10, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> 8 % fuel = about 285 gallons and about 1.5 hours endurance, but in any event I just included that info to show the effect of weight on service ceiling.


 factor in takeoff and climb - that 8% number will be relevant at cruise, 20,000 feet, 20 miles within site of a runway. Your weight calculations are close, maybe a tad optimistic but more consideration is needed.


RCAFson said:


> All data, including the USAF data, is corrected to a standard day. The Flight Archive data is from actual aircraft testing.


Again, that data is not finite and varies with density altitude. I think you'll also find that a "standard day" is not very common....


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## wiking85 (Jul 10, 2014)

parsifal said:


> ah, so some of this discussion is suggesting Germans with hoards of V1s/v2s carrying nuclear weappons. The ultimate german wet dream i see. My opinion, not a chance, at least for the likley duration of the war. The Germans were not anywhere close to developing nuclear weapons, and would have basically needed a truckload more money, and start again with their research. Who knows what might have happened with hitler out of the picture, but in the context of what we do know, and what was foreseeable, they had not the slightest chance of being nuclear armed before or immedaitely after 1945



Who said V-weapon nukes? I'm curious about the effects of a sustained V-1 campaign's effects on Britain over a year or more from all over Northern France and the Lowlands and jet recon checking shot falls.


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## RCAFson (Jul 10, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> factor in takeoff and climb - that 8% number will be relevant at cruise, 20,000 feet, 20 miles within site of a runway. Your weight calculations are close, maybe a tad optimistic but more consideration is needed.
> Again, that data is not finite and varies with density altitude. I think you'll also find that a "standard day" is not very common....




I think the idea is that you TO at a higher weight and burn fuel until you get to 38000ft then head for the field.

A standard day is probably more common in northern Europe at night.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 10, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> I think the idea is that you TO at a higher weight and burn fuel until you get to 38000ft then head for the field.


 With 30 minutes reserve - 45 minutes at night or IFR under normal conditions? That 8% is a snapshot at the best performance and unattainable under normal operating conditions, especially during combat.


RCAFson said:


> A standard day is probably more common in northern Europe at night.


And it would be great if we only flew aircraft at night over northern Europe!


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## parsifal (Jul 10, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Who said V-weapon nukes? I'm curious about the effects of a sustained V-1 campaign's effects on Britain over a year or more from all over Northern France and the Lowlands and jet recon checking shot falls.



ah okay, no v weapons with nukes. V-weapons in the context of the 1940's technology were a strategic dead end, and an overall liability to germany more than they were any real threat to Britain. They had a cost to build, and launch and too few were able even to hit cities, let alone point targets. Cruise missiles in the modern context they were not. They absorbed resources that could have been better used on other things by far. Chiefly diversion of resources for the terror weapons should have gone into restoring training levels, and hence pilot skills, rectifying the ruptures occuring in the LW bombers, and diverting production resources to the heer to stabilise the eastern front. Jets, V weapons, and all the other bourbles the Germans wasted their time and treasure on were distractions from the main games occuring at the end of the war. They needed to take a dose of reality pills and concentrate on improvements to conventional forces as well as their numbers, not seek solutions that were years away from providing any tangible results for them. You know, do things more like the allies, and curtail outeer rim r&d and concentrate instead on what would yield results in the short term.


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## stona (Jul 11, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Who said V-weapon nukes? I'm curious about the effects of a sustained V-1 campaign's effects on Britain over a year or more from all over Northern France and the Lowlands and jet recon checking shot falls.



Thousands of civilian deaths but nothing like the level of casualties sustained by Germany. That would be the effect. The British reaction would have been to divert even more resources to the gun and balloon belts and assign more fighters, night and day, to countering the threat. They would also have committed even more resources to attacks on the launch sites and other facilities. This they could do without seriously detracting from other operations at this time.
The effect on the progress of the war against Germany? Practically zero.

As for jet recon checking 'fall of shot', how? It's not like flying over a target to make a BDA. The 'fall of shot' was dispersed over 100s of square miles. The British weren't even sure what the precise target was for the most accurate, short range attacks. The reconnaissance aircraft might well fly over the intended target and see absolutely nothing. Over flying the English countryside in the hope of seeing widely dispersed V-1 impacts is little more than a waste of fuel, engine and airframe time. What exactly was jet reconnaissance going to establish for the far more inaccurate longer range launches, both by air and ramp?
The problem for the Germans wasn't so much adjusting their aim, it was the wild inaccuracy inherent in the system.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

stona said:


> Thousands of civilian deaths but nothing like the level of casualties sustained by Germany. That would be the effect. The British reaction would have been to divert even more resources to the gun and balloon belts and assign more fighters, night and day, to countering the threat. They would also have committed even more resources to attacks on the launch sites and other facilities. This they could do without seriously detracting from other operations at this time.
> The effect on the progress of the war against Germany? Practically zero.
> 
> As for jet recon checking 'fall of shot', how? It's not like flying over a target to make a BDA. The 'fall of shot' was dispersed over 100s of square miles. The British weren't even sure what the precise target was for the most accurate, short range attacks. The reconnaissance aircraft might well fly over the intended target and see absolutely nothing. Over flying the English countryside in the hope of seeing widely dispersed V-1 impacts is little more than a waste of fuel, engine and airframe time. What exactly was jet reconnaissance going to establish for the far more inaccurate longer range launches, both by air and ramp?
> ...


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Deception


> To adjust and correct settings in the V-1 guidance system, the Germans needed to know where the V-1s were landing. Therefore, German intelligence was requested to obtain this impact data from their agents in Britain. However, most German agents in Britain had been turned, and were acting as double agents under British control.
> 
> On 16 June 1944, British double agent Garbo (Juan Pujol) was requested by his German controllers to give information on the sites and times of V-1 impacts, with similar requests made to the other German agents in Britain, Brutus (Roman Czerniawski) and Tate (Wulf Schmidt). *If given this data, the Germans would be able to adjust their aim and correct any shortfall.*
> 
> ...


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## azador1606 (Jul 11, 2014)

Well, assume that without US aircrews there will be significantly fewer German fighter crew losses. We can still assume that the UK gets P-51's with Merlin engines, but no P-47s. The UKs 3 year lead in airborne RADAR will be whittled down.

Let me put it this way, instead of hitting Summer 1944 with 500 Me-262s and 50 pilots, against 2000 P-51s and P-47's (all crewed) -- they would have 500 trained pilots for 500 Me-262s against roughly the same number of P-51s. Leave the Bf-109s, Fw-190s and Ta-152s to handle cover for the jets while climbing and landing and ... pretty much the same situation as Korea with the Mig-15 and the F-80.

It's pilots, and skilled pilots that win air battles - Germany had them, but against 20:1 odds that doesn't last long. However, 500 skilled pilots in technically superior jet fighters will wipe out everything the UK sends over, regardless of who's paying to replace the equipment - who's going to replace the pilots?

Just my opinion.




wiking85 said:


> Assuming the US stays neutral in Europe, let's say Hitler dies of a heart attack on October 16th 1941 and Goering takes over and breaks relations with Japan after December 7th publicly over the attack to keep the US neutral and shifts the Uboat war to the Arctic Convoys and Mediterranean (Doenitz had given up on convoys in the Atlantic by December 1941 historically and wanted to expand the war to the US coast to avoid British convoy protects), meaning there is virtually no chance of a naval incident giving FDR Casus Belli, how does the air war over Europe play out?
> 
> There is the daylight war along the French/Belgian/Dutch coasts, the night bombing of Germany, the Mediterranean theater, and the Russian front (let's say the fighting there plays out the same until Summer 1942). Without the USAAF joining in on the bombing, the British winning the Battle of the Atlantic by early 1942, and no Operation Torch expanding the Mediterranean front, how can the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronautica handle the war?
> 
> ...


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

parsifal said:


> ah okay, no v weapons with nukes. V-weapons in the context of the 1940's technology were a strategic dead end, and an overall liability to germany more than they were any real threat to Britain. They had a cost to build, and launch and too few were able even to hit cities, let alone point targets. Cruise missiles in the modern context they were not. They absorbed resources that could have been better used on other things by far. Chiefly diversion of resources for the terror weapons should have gone into restoring training levels, and hence pilot skills, rectifying the ruptures occuring in the LW bombers, and diverting production resources to the heer to stabilise the eastern front. Jets, V weapons, and all the other bourbles the Germans wasted their time and treasure on were distractions from the main games occuring at the end of the war. They needed to take a dose of reality pills and concentrate on improvements to conventional forces as well as their numbers, not seek solutions that were years away from providing any tangible results for them. You know, do things more like the allies, and curtail outeer rim r&d and concentrate instead on what would yield results in the short term.



What would have been worth investing the V-1 money into? I agree about the V-2 and V-3. 
Nothing would divert resources away from the bombing campaign more than defending against the V-1s, which sucked up a considerable amount of Allied resources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Assessment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Crossbow

Without the USAAF Britain has to launch Operation Crossbow all on her own; without the US Britain cannot invade Normandy and quickly shut down Northern France for launch sites; instead the entire region, plus Belgium and the Netherlands, will become launch areas making AAA placement exponentially more expensive than it historically was and bombing much more costly and ineffective due to the plethora of sites to hit. Without a V-2 or V-3 program the resources spent can go into the V-1, which was 4% as expensive as the V-2 or 2% as expensive as a He-111 airframe. With the F-1 variant it becomes even cheaper and longer range thanks to the wooden parts cutting down the weight. The masses of inaccurate shots weren't just a function of the design, but also of the lack of recon and intelligence that could see where masses were coming down (outliers of course not counting). Historically they were then over/undershooting due to lack of correction data. Here though without losing the launch sites and having jets they could see if they were seeing larger numbers of holes south or north of the city, or even where in the city of London the mass of damage was. That couples with the radio telemetry data that was ignored historically would change that mistake, as they could see the missiles were actually landing where the radio data claimed. Not ignoring that data would make the missiles more accurate. 

Having everything within the Northern France/Lowlands in range of London would make it impossible to defend against with AAA as they historically did, because the defenses were predicated on the Normandy landings overrunning most launch sites within a matter of months of the beginning of the launches, so that restricted where the shots were coming from, which allowed layered defenses; without that boon there would be no chance of having enough AAA in layers like that to defend London except from a few directions. Otherwise Britain will have to severely curtail other programs for that massive AAA building and manning. Other than that once the original design operating height was reached through perfecting the pressure gauges, the V-1s would be jumping up to 9000 feet, which is over the vast majority of British AAA defenses against the V-1s. Once that happens most of the AAA defense is now useless. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Anti-aircraft_guns


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## Koopernic (Jul 11, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> B-17G:
> at 67,850lb (max TO) the service ceiling is 28,250ft
> at 64,975lb the service ceiling is 29,900ft
> B-29:
> ...



Finding out the service ceiling of the B-29 is fraught with confusion and contradiction, personally I suspect the above data describes the aircrafts operational ceiling (climb rate at 500 feet per minute, rather than service ceiling, climb rate 100fpm).

MTOW grew to close to 168,000lbs for the B-29 as the engines became more reliable and were up rated. 

Putting the two stage Merlin into the Lancaster clearly improves its performance but it still does not match the performance of turbo supercharging. Obviously the Merlin is more powerful (at sea level) than the turbo charged R-1820/R1830 so can get more fuel of the ground while still having the nearly same absolute power although loosing more power as a percentage.

The key to avoiding Luftwaffe FLAK defences is to get above 22500-25000ft. The 15000 or so 8.8cm FLAK 37 8.8cm guns are relatively ineffective at or above that altitude. This still leaves 2000 10.5cm FLAK 38 and FLAK 39 (differences in mount) and 500-800 12.8cm FLAK 40 These guns can reach much higher altitudes though they are less common, the 12.8cm guns were particularly effective. They also had auto loaders and auto fuse setters. The replacement for the 8.8cm FLAK 37 was the much more powerful 8.8cm FLAK 41 which apart from featuring auto loader, auto fuse setter, a much higher ROF of 25 RPM had a much higher velocity and a very high altitude: it and the FLAK 40 could engage any aircraft including Oboe mosquitos and PRU aircraft. It had a long gestation and although it saw service by March 1943 did not get fully debugged till latter in 1944. Its backup the FLAK 37/41 was not needed.

The Luftwaffe fighters also fell of in performance above 6500m for the Fw 190 and 7500m for the Me 109 ie 2200ft to 25000ft. This seems to be somewhat of a production choice than a technical limitation.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 11, 2014)

Koopernic said:


> Finding out the service ceiling of the B-29 is fraught with confusion and contradiction.


It's not if you use the performance charts found in either the pilot's flight manual or the flight engineer's manual (I believe they had similar, if not the same performance charts). I also believe a special slide rule was used to calculate performance as well.

The problem with discussing aircraft performance is you have some authors who picked up numbers from a data sheet and would believe that those numbers are finite across the board - I once had an argument with a family member who believed if a P-51 has a top speed of 437 mph at 25K, it could reach the same speed at sea level.


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## RCAFson (Jul 11, 2014)

Koopernic said:


> Finding out the service ceiling of the B-29 is fraught with confusion and contradiction, personally I suspect the above data describes the aircrafts operational ceiling (climb rate at 500 feet per minute, rather than service ceiling, climb rate 100fpm).
> 
> MTOW grew to close to 168,000lbs for the B-29 as the engines became more reliable and were up rated.
> 
> ...




The above B-29 service ceiling is at a 100fpm climb rate using normal climb power. At 140,000lb the max climb rate (at SL) is ~500fpm using normal climb power. Data is from USAF Standard Aircraft Characteristics charts, dated 19 April 1950.

In any event, the point isn't to compare the B-29 with a Lanc or Lincoln but to decide whether a Lanc VI could deliver a "Little Boy" type bomb to European targets, and I think it is clear that it could.


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## stona (Jul 11, 2014)

Depending on the predictor and fuse the standard British 3.7" anti aircraft gun had an effective ceiling up to 45,000ft. I can't see V-1s operating above that. The lowest combinations had an effective ceiling well over 20,000 ft.

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

stona said:


> Depending on the predictor and fuse the standard British 3.7" anti aircraft gun had an effective ceiling up to 45,000ft. I can't see V-1s operating above that. The lowest combinations had an effective ceiling well over 20,000 ft.
> 
> Steve



I was referring to the 40mm, but it turns out that those had the range as well. You're right, they would continue to be effective, I was wrong on that, but that doesn't change the issue of the wide range of launch sites overloading defenses compared to the historical situation.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 11, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The above B-29 service ceiling is at a 100fpm climb rate using normal climb power. At 140,000lb the max climb rate (at SL) is ~500fpm using normal climb power. Data is from USAF Standard Aircraft Characteristics charts, dated 19 April 1950.
> 
> In any event, the point isn't to compare the B-29 with a Lanc or Lincoln but to decide whether a Lanc VI could deliver a "Little Boy" type bomb to European targets, and I think it is clear that it could.



Agree - however depending on how much fuel would be carried, the choice of target, where and when the weapon would be armed, I would have concerns with operating an aircraft carrying a nuke close to or at to it's service ceiling - at least you're talking about a 600 mile flight


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## Donivanp (Jul 11, 2014)

One of the original concepts was to have the Lancaster deliver the Little Boy because of the length of the bomb that was to be. The Gun type bomb was originally much longer the what the Little Boy turned out and they wanted to test it in a Lancaster. Gen Arnold put an immediate halt to that project and stated it was an American bomb and it would be delivered by an American plane. The issue was that the B-29 weapons bay was broken into two bays due tot he wing spar. But then you all knew all of this and I am just rambling on. At any rat only the B-29 could carry the Fat man. There is no way it would fit in any other save for the B-32 at the time. Would the B-36 have received a higher priority? As far as the Pacific goes, even with the stated Europe first policy, Adm King got his way and filled the Pacific with weapons and I don't think the war would have been much different. MacArthur's landings in the Philippines which happened at the shortly after as Normandy were even larger then European invasion. With out Europe America would not have had to deal with that and full force on Japan may have shortened the Pacific. It was mentioned early on in this thread that the US would not have brought it's self up to the full industrial power it was. I disagree with that. Roosevelt was still trying to get out of the depression and had already started a new fleet of BB and CA's as well as a host of other ship and the USAAC was being built up all prior to the US involvement. With Pearl Harbor it was just put into High Speed. Not having to deal with the European campaign (which we would have one way or another) would have freed all force to the Pacific and had things in this alternate history gone as they did form the start, the Atlantic feet would have been somewhat freed to go to the Pacific and with in flux of the new naval equipment (which a majority did go anyway) and all the extra man power not sent to Europe the fight would have been pushed back to the Japanese shores earlier. Had the B-32 been dropped and the B-36 been pushed up, the B-29 would have been a foot note like the B-32 and bomber offence would have been able to be flown from US, Hawaii and Alaska. I don't thin that Europe would have ended like it did, First Goering was a drug addict and it affected him greatly. He would have been about as good at running the war and Germany as he was with the Luftwaffe, and by some accounts that was pretty bad.


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Agree - however depending on how much fuel would be carried, the choice of target, where and when the weapon would be armed, I would have concerns with operating an aircraft carrying a nuke close to or at to it's service ceiling - at least you're talking about a 600 mile flight



Of course we haven't established that Britain can build a nuke on its own by the end of the war.


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

Donivanp said:


> One of the original concepts was to have the Lancaster deliver the Little Boy because of the length of the bomb that was to be. The Gun type bomb was originally much longer the what the Little Boy turned out and they wanted to test it in a Lancaster. Gen Arnold put an immediate halt to that project and stated it was an American bomb and it would be delivered by an American plane. The issue was that the B-29 weapons bay was broken into two bays due tot he wing spar. But then you all knew all of this and I am just rambling on. At any rat only the B-29 could carry the Fat man. There is no way it would fit in any other save for the B-32 at the time. Would the B-36 have received a higher priority? As far as the Pacific goes, even with the stated Europe first policy, Adm King got his way and filled the Pacific with weapons and I don't think the war would have been much different. MacArthur's landings in the Philippines which happened at the shortly after as Normandy were even larger then European invasion. With out Europe America would not have had to deal with that and full force on Japan may have shortened the Pacific. It was mentioned early on in this thread that the US would not have brought it's self up to the full industrial power it was. I disagree with that. Roosevelt was still trying to get out of the depression and had already started a new fleet of BB and CA's as well as a host of other ship and the USAAC was being built up all prior to the US involvement. With Pearl Harbor it was just put into High Speed. Not having to deal with the European campaign (which we would have one way or another) would have freed all force to the Pacific and had things in this alternate history gone as they did form the start, the Atlantic feet would have been somewhat freed to go to the Pacific and with in flux of the new naval equipment (which a majority did go anyway) and all the extra man power not sent to Europe the fight would have been pushed back to the Japanese shores earlier. Had the B-32 been dropped and the B-36 been pushed up, the B-29 would have been a foot note like the B-32 and bomber offence would have been able to be flown from US, Hawaii and Alaska. I don't thin that Europe would have ended like it did, First Goering was a drug addict and it affected him greatly. He would have been about as good at running the war and Germany as he was with the Luftwaffe, and by some accounts that was pretty bad.



How much sooner though? From what I can tell mid-1944 would be the earliest the US would have Okinawa and the bases to launch Operation Downfall, which would be required due to the lack of long range bombers to bomb Japan into submission, no nukes yet, and no Soviet entry into the war.

Also Goering wasn't an addict during WW2, he had been cured in the 1920s of his addiction according to Richard Overy's recent biography; he was popping placebo sugar pills his doctor gave him. He was more addicted to pastries. Goering was also very hands off in his leadership; basically his only big plus was his ability to unite the economy under one office (his), while letting the army run things in the East due to his lack of interest in running things and giving the LW more resources at the expense of the navy. Considering 1153 Uboats were built and 783 were sunk, those resources from 1942 on would have been better spent on building more synthetic fuel plants and air planes. Goering, given his hate for Raeder, probably would cut their resources to beef up the LW, especially if he wanted to keep the US out of the war and the Uboats had been defeated by December 1941 in the war zone around Britain, so were shifting operations elsewhere.

Plus the vast majority of uboats were built after 1942:
The Shipyards - Technical pages - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
Saving those resources for other projects would open up some options, while still giving enough material to contest the Arctic Convoys.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 11, 2014)

Donivanp said:


> One of the original concepts was to have the Lancaster deliver the Little Boy because of the length of the bomb that was to be. The Gun type bomb was originally much longer the what the Little Boy turned out and they wanted to test it in a Lancaster. Gen Arnold put an immediate halt to that project and stated it was an American bomb and it would be delivered by an American plane. The issue was that the B-29 weapons bay was broken into two bays due tot he wing spar. But then you all knew all of this and I am just rambling on. At any rat only the B-29 could carry the Fat man. There is no way it would fit in any other save for the B-32 at the time. Would the B-36 have received a higher priority? As far as the Pacific goes, even with the stated Europe first policy, Adm King got his way and filled the Pacific with weapons and I don't think the war would have been much different. MacArthur's landings in the Philippines which happened at the shortly after as Normandy were even larger then European invasion. With out Europe America would not have had to deal with that and full force on Japan may have shortened the Pacific. It was mentioned early on in this thread that the US would not have brought it's self up to the full industrial power it was. I disagree with that. Roosevelt was still trying to get out of the depression and had already started a new fleet of BB and CA's as well as a host of other ship and the USAAC was being built up all prior to the US involvement. With Pearl Harbor it was just put into High Speed. Not having to deal with the European campaign (which we would have one way or another) would have freed all force to the Pacific and had things in this alternate history gone as they did form the start, the Atlantic feet would have been somewhat freed to go to the Pacific and with in flux of the new naval equipment (which a majority did go anyway) and all the extra man power not sent to Europe the fight would have been pushed back to the Japanese shores earlier. Had the B-32 been dropped and the B-36 been pushed up, the B-29 would have been a foot note like the B-32 and bomber offence would have been able to be flown from US, Hawaii and Alaska. I don't thin that Europe would have ended like it did, First Goering was a drug addict and it affected him greatly. He would have been about as good at running the war and Germany as he was with the Luftwaffe, and by some accounts that was pretty bad.



We had a discussion about some of these points a while back - other liabilities with the Lancaster included tail wheel single pilot configuration (takeoff risk mitigation required) and ceiling limitations. The B-36 had the same bulkhead issue as the B-29 (when both aircraft were being developed no one at Boeing or Convair knew about an atomic bomb, let alone how long it was going to be). I believe the B-50 was built with a bomb bay that could accommodate the nukes of the day with minimum or no modification, as a matter of fact, the B-50 IMO was the “magic recipe” that all combatants wanted contained in a recip bomber.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 11, 2014)

The Lincoln/Lancaster IV also had a new (or at least extended) wing. It is not depending on engine power alone to make the difference.


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## stona (Jul 11, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Of course we haven't established that Britain can build a nuke on its own by the end of the war.



It couldn't, assuming that the war ended in 1945 still. Not a chance, even assuming that the many and important British scientists who contributed to the US programme had been involved in a home grown one. They might have pushed it ahead of the actual 1952 date on which an independently (though incorporating knowledge from the Manhattan Project) developed British nuclear device was exploded, but not by much. I doubt that Britain could have afforded the huge investment needed whilst still fighting a conventional war.
The Soviets, also with extensive knowledge of the Manhattan Project, managed to build one by 1949 with a massive industrial effort and huge funding.

I think a generation raised in the shadow of thousands of nuclear war heads may have forgotten just how difficult they were to make. The only other modern nations to have developed such devices have had direct and sometimes illegal help (Israel, Pakistan) from other nuclear powers

Cheers

Steve


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## thedab (Jul 11, 2014)

and south africa, they built one as well

and why a standard Lancaster, why not a special,and you got the Vickers Windsor which had a high ceiling as standard

and if need must how long will take to get some thing like a Canberra up and runing?

necessity is the monther of invention.


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## Garyt (Jul 11, 2014)

> It couldn't, assuming that the war ended in 1945 still. Not a chance, even assuming that the many and important British scientists who contributed to the US programme had been involved in a home grown one. They might have pushed it ahead of the actual 1952 date on which an independently (though incorporating knowledge from the Manhattan Project) developed British nuclear device was exploded, but not by much. I doubt that Britain could have afforded the huge investment needed whilst still fighting a conventional war.
> The Soviets, also with extensive knowledge of the Manhattan Project, managed to build one by 1949 with a massive industrial effort and huge funding.



I guess the other question - If the US were not involved in a true World War, but only a regional clash with the Japanese, would they have comitted the resources to researching and building the atomic bomb?

This is a true question I have, not a rhetorical statement.


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

Garyt said:


> I guess the other question - If the US were not involved in a true World War, but only a regional clash with the Japanese, would they have comitted the resources to researching and building the atomic bomb?
> 
> This is a true question I have, not a rhetorical statement.



Very good question; I think so given that they were reacting to the perceived need to eventually face down the Germans and they feared the Germans would have a nuclear bomb at some point; they had the money and means, but without British help in this situation it would take longer to get a usable bomb.


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## RCAFson (Jul 11, 2014)

stona said:


> It couldn't, assuming that the war ended in 1945 still. Not a chance, even assuming that the many and important British scientists who contributed to the US programme had been involved in a home grown one. They might have pushed it ahead of the actual 1952 date on which an independently (though incorporating knowledge from the Manhattan Project) developed British nuclear device was exploded, but not by much. I doubt that Britain could have afforded the huge investment needed whilst still fighting a conventional war.
> The Soviets, also with extensive knowledge of the Manhattan Project, managed to build one by 1949 with a massive industrial effort and huge funding.
> 
> I think a generation raised in the shadow of thousands of nuclear war heads may have forgotten just how difficult they were to make. The only other modern nations to have developed such devices have had direct and sometimes illegal help (Israel, Pakistan) from other nuclear powers
> ...



The UK had correctly chosen the right path to develop a bomb, but one of the complicating factors was that when the USA decided to go all out to produce the bomb they also bought up almost the entire world's supply of fissionable materials, including a monopoly on Canadian Uranium production which the Cdn government couldn't challenge because the USA was an Allied power at war with Germany. This greatly hampered the UK's ability find the needed material for weapon development. However, with the USA a neutral power against Germany, the Cdn government could have barred the USA from monopolizing uranium ore extraction.


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The UK had correctly chosen the right path to develop a bomb, but one of the complicating factors was that when the USA decided to go all out to produce the bomb they also bought up almost the entire world's supply of fissionable materials, including a monopoly on Canadian Uranium production which the Cdn government couldn't challenge because the USA was an Allied power at war with Germany. This greatly hampered the UK's ability find the needed material for weapon development. However, with the USA a neutral power against Germany, the Cdn government could have barred the USA from monopolizing uranium ore extraction.



Considering how dependent Canada was on US imports, that might be difficult. Also you are suggesting that because the British decided to focus on one development path that they would have been able to actually follow through on it by 1945 or 46 and not suffer serious impacts to other programs. They could focus on one path, but it doesn't mean they would be able to achieve a working bombing in a reasonable amount of time; in fact historically the British were convinced they couldn't, which is why they tried to piggyback on the US program.


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## RCAFson (Jul 11, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Considering how dependent Canada was on US imports, that might be difficult. Also you are suggesting that because the British decided to focus on one development path that they would have been able to actually follow through on it by 1945 or 46 and not suffer serious impacts to other programs. They could focus on one path, but it doesn't mean they would be able to achieve a working bombing in a reasonable amount of time; in fact historically the British were convinced they couldn't, which is why they tried to piggyback on the US program.



Historically, the UK asked the Cdn government to disallow the sale of the uranium but what grounds could Canada use to challenge the sale? How could Canada favour the UK when it was not giving Tube Alloys highest priority? With the USA neutral in Europe it would be pretty obvious that the Tube Alloys was a vital program for Commonwealth victory, with much of the development work to be done in Canada and the Cdn government, which was also at war with Germany, would have acted to safeguard Tube Alloys access to Cdn uranium. The UK had developed a method for enriching uranium and had also formulated the design of a uranium bomb but they never gave it high priority because they never had to.


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## wiking85 (Jul 11, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> Historically, the UK asked the Cdn government to disallow the sale of the uranium but what grounds could Canada use to challenge the sale? How could Canada favour the UK when it was not giving Tube Alloys highest priority? With the USA neutral in Europe it would be pretty obvious that the Tube Alloys was a vital program for Commonwealth victory, with much of the development work to be done in Canada and the Cdn government, which was also at war with Germany, would have acted to safeguard Tube Alloys access to Cdn uranium. The UK had developed a method for enriching uranium and had also formulated the design of a uranium bomb but they never gave it high priority because they never had to.



By when and with what resources could they develop it into a working model?


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> With the USA neutral in Europe it would be pretty obvious that the Tube Alloys was a vital program for Commonwealth victory,



Why? 

Even if it was deemed a vital programme (and I can't imagine why) the Germans will still attack the USSR, this was a fundamental requirement of the Nazi geo-political world view. Britain might well be better advised to throw her expertise behind a joint Anglo-Soviet nuclear programme. No problem of raw materials there!

Steve


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## Juha (Jul 12, 2014)

Hello Stona
thanks for the info you gave in your messages #87 and 94. All I can add without too much digging is that according to The Blitz Then and Now Vol 3 p.412 the First air launching against Britain happened on early morning 7 July 44, the target was London.


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

Juha said:


> Hello Stona
> thanks for the info you gave in your messages #87 and 94. All I can add without too much digging is that according to The Blitz Then and Now Vol 3 p.412 the First air launching against Britain happened on early morning 7 July 44, the target was London.



There is some doubt about the first air launched operation. In late June and early July British radar tracking approaching V-1s noted that some were already at operational height when first located. This suggested that they were not climbing to height from launch ramps but may have been air launched. The scant German records suggest that these may have been operational training missions for the KG 3 crews. 

On the night of 9/10 July nine air launched missiles flew up the Thames estuary, clearly launched from the east. Four of the missile tracks were back plotted to a point on the German occupied coast near Blankenberge (Netherlands). The tracks were roughly parallel showing a good directional setting. Due to the distance flown and no known launch sites existing in this area, air launching was suspected, but not confirmed until later. 
One of these V-1s fell at Colledge Farm, Ovington, Norfolk. There were no casualties and the damage was limited to broken windows. One fell at Gosfield and one at Ongar, both in Essex. One fell at Radlett in Hertfordshire. One fell at Upminster, on the northern edge of London. Three may have reached London though they cannot be distinguished from the ramp launched missiles coming from France on the same night. One is unaccounted for and did not cross the English coast.
This is generally considered KG 3's first identifiable operation, but as 'The Blitz Then and Now' shows there is some uncertainty. We are splitting hairs over a couple of days anyway. 
A quick look on Google Earth will illustrate the dispersion. Ovington, the most inaccurate, is about 100 miles from London! Upminster, the nearest miss, is still about 20 miles from central London.
This is how the British plotted the results of this raid.







The story of the subsequent Southampton attacks illustrates many of the problems the Germans faced. The agent (mentioned earlier by someone else) signalled that there was considerable damage to Southampton, a main supply port for the Allied bridgehead in Normandy. The German LXV Corps HQ staff were surprised as they had made no attempt to bombard the port. They assumed that some missiles intended for London had been misdirected or gone astray. Contrary to later mythologizing they did not assume that most missiles were falling short and adjust their aim. That was British propaganda. They were however tempted by the idea of striking at an important allied supply port. 22 ramp launched missiles were deliberately targeted on Southampton. Von Runstedt, the then C-in-C West, received a warning from Hitler's HQ ordering a cessation of this diversion from the attacks on London and complied. Shortly thereafter (early July IIRC) he was replaced by Von Kluge who approved an attack on the port but restricted it to air launched missiles. This attack took the form of four operations by KG 3 between 10 and 15 July.

Cheers

Steve

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## mhuxt (Jul 12, 2014)

FLYBOYJ said:


> It's not if you use the performance charts found in either the pilot's flight manual or the flight engineer's manual (I believe they had similar, if not the same performance charts). I also believe a special slide rule was used to calculate performance as well.




B-29 Flight Engineer's Manual pdf is here:

Item 000033 Detail

Edit - *sigh* except that the range chart is all but illegible...

Hmm, some weight / range charts for various cruise settings at the end of this document:

http://aafcollection.info/items/detail.php?key=576&pkg=lx!title!!576!2!title!up!100

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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

There is serious overestimation of the V-1 threat in this thread.

Churchill in 'Closing the Ring' and in response to the rather alarmist contentions made earlier by Eisenhower.

_"The average error of both [incl V-2] these weapons was over ten miles. Even if the Germans had been able to maintain a rate of fire of 120 a day and if none whatever had been shot down, the effect would have been the equivalent of only two or three one ton bombs to a square mile per week. However, it shows that the military commanders considered it necessary to eliminate the menace of the V weapons, not only to protect civilian life and property, but equally to prevent interference with our offensive operations." _

This didn't prevent a second large scale evacuation of London. AJP Taylor states that 1.5 million were evacuated by the end of July. Defences were also improved. 1,696 anti aircraft guns were moved to the south coast along with 60,000 tons of equipment and 23,000 personnel in a 48 hour period in the middle of July. German radar stations across the Channel were attacked in order to prevent jamming of the SCR 584 gun laying radar. 

The largest number of V-1s launched on a single day was 315 on 2/3 August. British defences were becoming formidable. R.V. Jones cites 28 August as an example. Almost all (92 or 94 depending who you cite) of the 100 or so V-1s launched were shot down. 4 reached London.

Steve

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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

How would the Luftwaffe's night fighter force have evolved after 1942 without the USAAF to worry about? Do all Bf110s end up as night fighters (Me410s as intruders)? What of Ju88Cs, do we see more of them? How about the resumption of intruder operations after Hitler's October 1941 halt order (he'd die right after making this order)? Is there a DO-217 night fighter in this situation, or would Ju88C production be high enough to prevent it? Would the Ju88G appear any sooner? How about size of the force, would there be a larger number of units by the end of 1942/1943 due to the lack of need for a major daylight defense in the West/Mediterranean? Kammhuber wanted 2100 frontline aircraft in 1942, which Goering approved, but Hitler denied; without Hitler around would Goering's historical yes have been kept and what would it mean for the LW to have 2100 front line night fighters in 1943 (not to mention intruders in the form of the Me410)?


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

stona said:


> There is serious overestimation of the V-1 threat in this thread.
> 
> Churchill in 'Closing the Ring' and in response to the rather alarmist contentions made earlier by Eisenhower.
> 
> ...


Below are the launch sites for the V-1s and the progress of the Normandy invasion. By September the launch sites have been overrun and by mid-August most were only able to come from a very narrow band of launch sites, so it was relatively easy to mass AAA defenses against the missiles.

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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

AA defences were important because, prior to being over run, the launch sites were surprisingly difficult to hit from the air, even when found. Not only were they well camouflaged but the Germans used dummy sites extensively.

The approaches to London were well covered along the south coast (where French launches might come from) and though the missiles coming from the east into the Thames estuary initially out flanked these defences a 'gun box' from Clacton to Whitstable, including guns on the seven 'Maunsell Forts' in the estuary, was soon established. The Americans contributed a total of twenty 90mm AA Batteries to this area of defence.

This defence was again out flanked by air launched V-1s from mid September and a 'gun strip' was added north of the box integrated with the existing defences of Harwich and Lowestoft.

General Pile conceded that his AA defences were sorely stretched at this time. On 6th September a planned reduction in AA Command involving the disbandment of 93 Heavy Batteries (744 guns), 31 Light Batteries (372 guns) and 15 search light batteries (360 search lights) had been approved by the Chiefs of Staff. It was only because the War Office was unable to absorb all these men into other areas immediately that they were allowed to stay active in the AAA structure until required elsewhere, lucky.

On 21st October it was decided to extend the coastal gun strip along the east coast as far as the Tees estuary. This was called the 'gun fringe' and 408 guns in 45 Batteries were provided for this.

You can see that attempts to out flank the British defences were constantly countered , and in the case of the 'gun fringe' anticipated. AA Command was also getting very good at shooting down V-1s. By the end of November 82% of targets coming in range of the AA guns were destroyed. The average number of heavy AA rounds fired for each V-1 destroyed was a mere 156.

A missed opportunity for the Germans was a failure to exploit the denuding of AA defences in the rest of Britain to provide units for the various gun belts and boxes. If you draw a line from north of the Humber to west of the Solent you will have a large area to the west which was effectively undefended! The British considered this a safe bet given the limited range of the V-1s and the virtual absence of any conventional Luftwaffe bomber force.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

Stona:
Looking at the V-1 launch site map above, how would the defenses have coped with the the Cherbourg peninsula being an active launch site (AFAIK it wasn't historically), while the launch belt remained as wide as above from June 1944-May 1945? How about without the 20 batteries of US 90mm AAA or USAAF bombing of launch sites? Or the addition of the F-1 extended range V-1 able to launch from the Netherlands and even further West in France. How about if the V-1 extended range missiles were able to hit Liverpool from Cherbourg? Would they be able to cope or would the system be overloaded?


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

Missiles headed for London and launched from Cherbourg would have to over fly the existing south coast gun belt or possibly a very short westerly extension to it. 

If the US batteries were unavailable the Chiefs of Staff would have to reconsider the decision to wind down Britain's own AA Command and maybe consider expanding it. The reason for the reduction was to make men available to support the invasion which, in your scenario, won't have happened and the vast resources that Britain committed to Overlord would be available to be used elsewhere.

If historically the gun belts/fringes were extended along the east coast almost to the Scottish border then an extension along the south and south west coasts, even into Devon or even Cornwall, could have been possible. It's a matter of priorities. With no 1944 invasion to fund, support and equip then anti-diver defences may well have risen up the list.

The V-1 was so inaccurate, even over shorter ranges that a long range attack on northern cities like Liverpool or Manchester might not achieve the results hoped for. As the missiles came down all over the northern counties I wonder if the British would be able to discern the intended target(s).
In any case, historically at least, the purpose of V weapons was not military, they were not for nothing called vengeance weapons. They were indiscriminate by reason of their inherent inaccuracy and unreliability. You'll notice that Hitler considered the attempted attack on Southampton, a vital and valid strategic target, to be a diversion from the real target, London and its population.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

As a political weapon it seems to have been quite effective at diverting disproportionate resources away from offensive action on Germany. It also did impact morale in 1944 from what I've read, but not enough to change anything due the war circumstances at that point and the limited duration of the attacks. I'm not suggesting that the actual damage would greatly impact the war economy, however it would suck up a lot of resources, especially without US presence in Europe. Without an invasion plan Britain would be able to better counter the V-1 by expanding AAA, but at the expense of what? They won't be able to invade anywhere else as a result, probably even an Aegean campaign once North Africa bogs down for good. How much would the bomber offensive be affected if it were diverted toward knocking out the launch sites, which you note wasn't that effective, but was nonetheless extensively tried. 

How long can the public take being showered by unpredicatable missiles, even if only a fraction were coming through?


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

The effect on morale was a serious concern. 
The London Evening Standard published a statement by Duncan Sandys M.P. Chairman of the 'Flying Bomb Counter-measures Committee' on it's front page on 7th September under the headline 'The Battle is Over'.
It gave the first details of the gunbelts and other defences and claimed that only 9% of V-1s got through. 

General Pile wrote a summary of UK air defence against V weapons, published as a supplement to the London Gazette in 1948.

_"In many ways it was a pity that so much public stress was laid, at the end of the first phase of the [V-1] battle, on the greatness of the triumph and on the finality of the victory....which had entailed a fearful amount of both physical and mental strain, which, coming as it did at the end of five years of war, had told upon us more than we realised." _

He also acknowledged the limitations of AA Command as it was historically at that time. Of course in a what if of this type this need not be the case. This was his reaction to air launched V-1s coming across the coast well to the north of Harwich.

_"It looked at that moment as if the Luftwaffe had got us properly on the run. As fast as we moved northward, so might the Hun each time anticipate us and from our point of view there was a limit to this northward trend. The manpower cuts had left us [AA Command] a mere shadow of our former selves. The only thing we could do was to extend our attenuated forces as far as we could and live in pious hope that there was some kind of limit to the area over which the enemy could deliver his attack, or that he would prefer to batter away at London in preference to northern England." _

Pile does seem to have been a 'glass half empty' kind of officer, though a very good one. Like many he might have been 'playing up' his role or at least emphasising the difficulties which he overcame, when writing in the immediate post war period. He wouldn't be alone in so doing.

At the end of the day the V-1 was a very poor substitute for a strategic bombing force. In fact it was no substitute at all. If the experiences of other bombed civilians in Europe and particularly Germany are anything to go by the public could take being showered with unpredictable missiles for a very long time indeed.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

Sure, if you are comparing the V-1 to Bomber Command the V-1 was a bottle rocket. Germany could not have afforded something like Bomber Command, nor the losses, so the V-1 was a much, much cheaper alternative and really did have an impact on British resources and morale, though obviously not in the way BC did on Germany. However without a strategic bombing force the V-1 was better than nothing and in fact could have allowed for a wider bombing campaign with medium bombers against BC airfields or Channel Ports in this scenario without the US in the war bombing German cities and supporting British defense efforts. My point is that the V-1 is not going to do much on its own even with the US neutral, but it would create a strain on Britain that would tie down so many resources on its own that it would allow for other operations and keep Britain on its back foots by tying down resources that could otherwise be used to attack Germany; in a sense then the V-1 offensive was the best defense against BC, as it sucked up bombing resources (IIRC over 100k tons of bombs in fact), while forcing a major application of defensive resources away from other areas and would, as you acknowledge, prevent offensive ground action in other theaters due to the need to expand AA resources. 

To me it seems like a good investment for Germany given the limited cost due to the disproportionate response, which, without the US bombing them, Germany can use its extra resources that did not historically exist by this point, to take advantage of the gaps created by the concentration of AAA around London. Say by bombing BC airfields as bombers return from missions against V-1 sites or even German cities.


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

'Somewhere in southern England'






These 3.7" anti aircraft guns were really no use for anything else. They are not comparable to the famous German 88mm gun, they weigh twice as much for a start. They could be, and I believe were, used in an anti tank role in North Africa, but I understand that they were not at all suited to such a role. I profess no expertise in artillery. In 1944 the British had more of these guns than men to man them. I'm not sure how well off they were in the systems associated with the guns. Manpower is a relatively simple fix.

I'm not sure that the V-1 was such a good investment. Being cheap does not automatically return value for money. It did tie up defensive resources in Britain, you could say it gave opportunities that the Germans could not exploit, but might the money not have been better spent elsewhere? The V programmes were politically driven, not militarily.
The supposed historical objective, incredible though it may seem today, was to force a separate peace arrangement with the Western Allies. It was always pie in the sky, and the V weapons never stood a chance of achieving such an outcome.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

Without the US in the war, Britain does not have the same resources due to lack of manpower. A separate peace is not unthinkable if just Britain and the USSR are in the war if the pressure gets to be too much. However you seem to be arguing something based on the historical situation, which I agree with in terms of the historical situation; however in the context of the alternate scenario I laid out, I think the V-1 would have a much more lasting impact and potentially a political one if it goes on long enough without being fully countered. From a military standpoint it was having a major impact due to the resources put into defending London and spent on Operation Crossbow. 

For the reaction it provoked I cannot think of anything that would be nearly as cheap and have the same impact on the war as the V-1 did and would in my scenario. If you can name some I'd be very curious to hear what that would be.


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> For the reaction it provoked I cannot think of anything that would be nearly as cheap and have the same impact on the war as the V-1 did and would in my scenario. If you can name some I'd be very curious to hear what that would be.



The V-1 didn't have a significant impact on the war. It wouldn't in your scenario. Countering any threat demands resources.
If I was running the German war in any scenario I would have spent the money wasted on V weapons, and any other number of wasteful or useless programmes and built U-Boats. I wouldn't even have built the 'commerce raiders' which were either sunk or skulked in harbour throughout the war. The best chance the Germans had of defeating Britain was to starve her into submission. Historically they never came close. We are islanders and were acutely aware of the threat. It's why Churchill and others somewhat overstated the importance of the historical Battle of the Atlantic. A different hypothetical scenario might play out very differently.
This has little to do with an air war, though the British would have invested heavily in aircraft to counter the threat which would be to the detriment of Bomber Command.
Cheers
Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

stona said:


> The V-1 didn't have a significant impact on the war. It wouldn't in your scenario. Countering any threat demands resources.
> If I was running the German war in any scenario I would have spent the money wasted on V weapons, and any other number of wasteful or useless programmes and built U-Boats. I wouldn't even have built the 'commerce raiders' which were either sunk or skulked in harbour throughout the war. The best chance the Germans had of defeating Britain was to starve her into submission. Historically they never came close. We are islanders and were acutely aware of the threat. It's why Churchill and others somewhat overstated the importance of the historical Battle of the Atlantic. A different hypothetical scenario might play out very differently.
> This has little to do with an air war, though the British would have invested heavily in aircraft to counter the threat which would be to the detriment of Bomber Command.
> Cheers
> Steve



The problem with Uboats is that politically they are too dangerous to use from 1942 on due to the risk of bringing the US into the war; they can't win in British waters beyond 1941 and by 1942 the only 'safe' waters to attack in are US coastal waters or the mid-Atlantic, which is in the US security zone and is thus too risky to fight in unless you want to risk war with the US; Uboats are still viable in the Mediterranean, South Atlantic, and Arctic, but not in the North Atlantic. Starving Britain out is not viable in 1944, though reopening harassment from the new Elektro-boats is a viable option, but it wouldn't be decisive due to lack of numbers and the actually combat quality of these things (they were not very stable when surfaced, which is the best way to spot convoys). They and the coastal variant would be good for deploying the new pressure trigger naval mines in British waters though. Ultimately there would have to be a negotiated peace because Britain cannot be Germany even with Stalin's help and LL, nor can Germany really beat Britain when they are getting LL and have to worry about bringing the US into the war, plus are tied down in the East.


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## parsifal (Jul 12, 2014)

Also, the departures from the historical model can work both ways. in fact, the most plausible means by which the US decides to concentrate on the PTO, leaving its allied partners to take care of Nazi Germany on their own is if the war had gone less well for Germany, and germany was much more contained than she had been historically. its hard to see the US not gettying involved in the ETO, if the Allies were as much on the ropes as they were in the historical situation. So what are the possible options that might lead to a greater level of containment of the Germans, and as a result a lower chance of the US getting directly involved

So what are thge plausible alternative that might lead to that situation. Here are some suggestions to consider

1) USSR reamis committed to a collective security arrangement with the weestern powers, does not purge its officers prewar, and provides direct military assistance from 1939. Germany finds herself mired in a two front war from 1939. The Poles dont overextend their frontier defences, staying out of the Danzig corridor and mobilsaing well before the outbreak of the war. By necessity the Poles and Soviets collavorate,and the opening offensive bogs down to a type of trench warfare in the east and the west. Hitler is removed, as is called for in the scenario parameters, and Germany finds herself once again fighting a two front war. 

2) Following on from above, the belgians dont withdraw from their treues with the west in 1936, and join the war with the allies in 1939. The French army adopts mandatory retirement for its senior officers at 55, opening up the way for real reforms in the army. The french aero industry reorganises iteslef in 1936, instead of 1938, and goes to war with 4000 modern aircraft instead of 1000. There is considerable technology exchange between Britain and France, so that France has an integrated radar network from 1938. There is considerable collaboration between the two countries regarding issues like aircraft design and equipment commonality. Germany finds herself at the end of 1941, at war with the Soviets, the French, the British and the Belgians all at the same time, and all providing effective resistance to the Germans.

It just seems most unlikely to me that the US would choose not to go to war in the ETO, unless it was satisfied that their help wasn't needed .


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## stona (Jul 12, 2014)

Enough U boats and Britain is starving by the end of 1940. If the US is going to remain neutral it won't be able to send it's merchant fleet across the Atlantic without getting it sunk. It's Germany's only chance of forcing Britain to terms. If the US will really remain neutral it will have to stand by and watch Britain be starved into submission. Is that really in the best interests of the USA? Otherwise, with no US participation in Europe, the war ends with the Soviets in Berlin and controlling western Europe to the Channel coast. Would the US see that as being in its best interests? It certainly saw the prospect of Soviet expansion in the Far East as undesirable. It was a factor in the decision to use the atomic bombs.
Keeping the US out of the war is going to be a huge problem in any realistic scenario. Neither Nazi nor Soviet domination of Europe was in her best interests.
Cheers
Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 12, 2014)

parsifal said:


> Also, the departures from the historical model can work both ways. in fact, the most plausible means by which the US decides to concentrate on the PTO, leaving its allied partners to take care of Nazi Germany on their own is if the war had gone less well for Germany, and germany was much more contained than she had been historically. its hard to see the US not gettying involved in the ETO, if the Allies were as much on the ropes as they were in the historical situation. So what are the possible options that might lead to a greater level of containment of the Germans, and as a result a lower chance of the US getting directly involved
> 
> So what are thge plausible alternative that might lead to that situation. Here are some suggestions to consider
> 
> ...



Germany was pretty well contained historically by December 1941; they were effectively beaten in the Atlantic without being able to move into the US security zone and shifted Uboat ops in October to around West Africa and the Arctic; it was only after the US entered the war that new, safe hunting grounds opened off the US coast. In the East by December 7th the Soviets are on the attack in front of Moscow and pushing the Germans back. By January 1942 Germany is being hammered in the East and giving ground, while the British are in no way in danger of falling to the Uboats. Without US entry the Allies aren't going to lose in Europe and it appears the Germans are going to be beaten in the East. By May 1942 things have changed in the East, but even with the Case Blue offensive, by that point its clear the Germans aren't going to knock Stalin out of the war even if they somehow take Baku and Britain is more secure than ever, in fact going on the offensive and launching 1000 bomber raids on German cities.



stona said:


> Enough U boats and Britain is starving by the end of 1940. If the US is going to remain neutral it won't be able to send it's merchant fleet across the Atlantic without getting it sunk. It's Germany's only chance of forcing Britain to terms. If the US will really remain neutral it will have to stand by and watch Britain be starved into submission. Is that really in the best interests of the USA? Otherwise, with no US participation in Europe, the war ends with the Soviets in Berlin and controlling western Europe to the Channel coast. Would the US see that as being in its best interests? It certainly saw the prospect of Soviet expansion in the Far East as undesirable. It was a factor in the decision to use the atomic bombs.
> Keeping the US out of the war is going to be a huge problem in any realistic scenario. Neither Nazi nor Soviet domination of Europe was in her best interests.
> Cheers
> Steve



Sure in 1940-41 that would be perfect to have 300 Uboats in service, but that's before this scenario starts and by 1944 is a moot point. There is the issue of getting the public to want to fight in Europe; manufacturing consent isn't exactly easy if the Germans don't declare war on the US in December 1941. By January it looks like the Germans are losing badly in the East to the Soviet counter offensive, while the Uboats had been defeated in the British security zone; the Uboats were only useful in US coastal waters from January 1942 on and then in the mid-Atlantic, which historically as in the US security zone. Without Germany trying to provoke the US to enter the war, they cannot attack in the security zone or off the US coast, so in effect the battle of the Atlantic is won by January 1942 and then the Uboats can only operate in the Arctic, South Atlantic, and Mediterranean. FDR was pretty pro-Stalin, so if the US is having a hard time manufacturing consent, if Stalin looks like he's got things handled, its not exactly in FDR's personal interest to intervene to deny Stalin control over Germany. The rest of the government had a variety of views on Europe, from wanting just to fight Japan to wanting to intervene; I don't see a way to manufacture consent for war against Germany in the US without German Uboats going on the offensive hard in the Mid-Atlantic and sinking US war ships and merchant shipping on a greater scale than heretofore. By the time of the battle of Midway Island the US public is going to want to deal with Japan first, especially as its going to be a long bloody war even with the full resources of the US dedicated to fighting the Japanese; as it was the USN didn't build up overwhelming superiority until 1944, so they have years of fighting just to get to a material overwhelming advantage, then have to spend 100s of thousands of lives to invade Japan. Getting the public and government on the same page vis-a-vis Germany is going to be much harder than you think, especially if Hitler is dead and Goering is making sure there isn't a mid-Atlantic incident to give the US Casus Belli.


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## Koopernic (Jul 13, 2014)

stona said:


> There is some doubt about the first air launched operation. In late June and early July British radar tracking approaching V-1s noted that some were already at operational height when first located. Steve



It's worth noting that V1's, shortly after their initial use, received a minor modification that allowed a single in flight direction change. This allowed a 'dog leg' course to be flown that prevented the technique of radar back tracking (unless conceivably the missile could be detected immediately upon leaving the chemical catapult launch rail.)


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## stona (Jul 13, 2014)

Casus Belli? Don't over estimate the isolationist cause by 1940. There was a concerted campaign by elements of the US government and media to whip up support for 'England'. Though various Gallup polls showed that the percentage of those polled thinking that the US should immediately enter the war to aid Britain remained relatively low, wavering between 15% and 20% there was a will to help. 

Asked whether "it was more important to keep out of the war ourselves, or to help England even at the risk of war?" 60% of the 5 million Americans polled in November 1940 thought that they should help England. That same month a staggering 90% favoured providing more aid to England.

The most support for Britain came from the Southern States, the least, unsurprisingly the 'West Central States' (as defined by Gallup) with their traditional conservatism and German communities.

As for US interests as understood by the political elite, and article by columnist Walter Lippmann, syndicated nationally, linked the Havana Conference and its implications for the security of the Western Hemisphere with the Anglo-German war.

"[the measures agreed] derive their whole significance from the struggle between Britain and the Nazi domination of continental Europe"

If the Axis was to achieve "something like naval supremacy in the Atlantic Ocean, adding the British assets of industry, shipbuilding, foreign investments and finance into the totalitarian system, the problems discussed at Havana would not exist."

He argued that British naval power was protecting the United States from having to compete on equal terms with a 'totalitarian monopoly.' Axis naval supremacy would mean that South American states 'especially of the temperate zone' would have to carry three quarters of their trade with this European monopoly.
Economic dependence he argued, would also mean 'fifth column' uprisings in South America, prejudicial to US security. 

'The Battle of Britain [not specifically the air battle] will therefore decide whether the United States must maintain a very large army and whether American industry must be regimented permanently on military lines.'

If Britain were defeated there was little prospect of the United States achieving 'parity, much less mastery in the Atlantic Ocean. Consequently the United States would be driven to maintaining a large army, introducing conscription, and changing its way of doing business.'

Now the article if florid and over dramatic but it does touch on the real reasons why the US entered the European war.

Cheers

Steve


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## RCAFson (Jul 13, 2014)

stona said:


> Why?
> 
> Even if it was deemed a vital programme (and I can't imagine why) the Germans will still attack the USSR, this was a fundamental requirement of the Nazi geo-political world view. Britain might well be better advised to throw her expertise behind a joint Anglo-Soviet nuclear programme. No problem of raw materials there!
> 
> Steve



The UK had to be prepared in case the Nazis started work on their own bomb and 2ndly, it would give the UK/Commonwealth the means to defeat Germany if the USSR collapsed. The UK's Tube Alloys program was reduced to a research program after the USA entered the war:



> The atomic partnership between
> the United States and Great Britain,
> which the allies had begun on a
> small scale in the fall of 1940 and
> ...



and, in actuality, USA entry into the war in Dec 1941 effectively killed Tube Alloys as a wartime weapons project because it was then obvious that the combined Allied industrial and manpower resources made victory almost inevitable. I'm still researching UK/Commonwealth work on Tube Alloys and it's probable progress if the program received full priority.


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## wiking85 (Jul 13, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> The UK had to be prepared in case the Nazis started work on their own bomb and 2ndly, it would give the UK/Commonwealth the means to defeat Germany if the USSR collapsed. The UK's Tube Alloys program was reduced to a research program after the USA entered the war:
> 
> 
> 
> and, in actuality, USA entry into the war in Dec 1941 effectively killed Tube Alloys as a wartime weapons project because it was then obvious that the combined Allied industrial and manpower resources made victory almost inevitable. I'm still researching UK/Commonwealth work on Tube Alloys and it's probable progress if the program received full priority.



Don't forget to figure out what they would have to give up by spending resources on Tube Alloys instead of the conventional war effort.


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## RCAFson (Jul 13, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Don't forget to figure out what they would have to give up by spending resources on Tube Alloys instead of the conventional war effort.



If the USA is not involved in Europe and lend-lease is still in effect, it means that the USA can potentially supply a lot more equipment to the UK/USSR/Commonwealth than historically. Theoretically, the UK might not have to give up anything because reduced UK weapons production can be met with greater USA aid via L-L. Additionally, the Cdn economy had some reserve capacity, as evidenced by the growing Canadian standard of living during the war, which again, was made possible by USA entry into the war. Also, changes in UK policy such as diverting more aircraft toward VLR ASW work, rather than a rather ineffectual night bombing campaign (at least until mid 1942) would have greatly reduced UK shipping losses, so again these changes in policy might have provided the needed resources for Tube Alloys to have produced usable bombs by V-E day but such things are hard to pin down with any exactitude.


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## wiking85 (Jul 13, 2014)

RCAFson said:


> If the USA is not involved in Europe and lend-lease is still in effect, it means that the USA can potentially supply a lot more equipment to the UK/USSR/Commonwealth than historically. Theoretically, the UK might not have to give up anything because reduced UK weapons production can be met with greater USA aid via L-L. Additionally, the Cdn economy had some reserve capacity, as evidenced by the growing Canadian standard of living during the war, which again, was made possible by USA entry into the war. Also, changes in UK policy such as diverting more aircraft toward VLR ASW work, rather than a rather ineffectual night bombing campaign (at least until mid 1942) would have greatly reduced UK shipping losses, so again these changes in policy might have provided the needed resources for Tube Alloys to have produced usable bombs by V-E day but such things are hard to pin down with any exactitude.


So Britain is going to opt to go into even heavier debt? Is the US going to retool to make Lancasters or is Britain going to use B-17s and Shermans?


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## stona (Jul 13, 2014)

In 1942 the Americans tried to cut Britain out of the Manhattan Project altogether. Subsequently there was an effective British 'brains boycott' of the project which certainly had a deleterious effect. To imagine that all was roses in the Anglo-American nuclear project would be very unrealistic.
It was the subsequent post war denial of Manhattan technology and information to the British, whose immense technical contribution was swept under the carpet, that led to the first independent British weapon not being tested until 1952.

More to the point of the thread, the British and their Commonwealth allies could have gone it alone and could have developed a Uranium bomb. I just doubt it would have been done by 1945. They would still have been years ahead of the Germans.

Cheers

Steve


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## parsifal (Jul 13, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Germany was pretty well contained historically by December 1941; they were effectively beaten in the Atlantic without being able to move into the US security zone and shifted Uboat ops in October to around West Africa and the Arctic; it was only after the US entered the war that new, safe hunting grounds opened off the US coast. In the East by December 7th the Soviets are on the attack in front of Moscow and pushing the Germans back. By January 1942 Germany is being hammered in the East and giving ground, while the British are in no way in danger of falling to the Uboats. Without US entry the Allies aren't going to lose in Europe and it appears the Germans are going to be beaten in the East. By May 1942 things have changed in the East, but even with the Case Blue offensive, by that point its clear the Germans aren't going to knock Stalin out of the war even if they somehow take Baku and Britain is more secure than ever, in fact going on the offensive and launching 1000 bomber raids on German cities..



In my opinion, it was alsmost a certainty the U-Boat operations would have been extended into the declared neutrality zone regardless of US neutrality, sooner or later. And this was far more likley with hitler out of the picture. In September 1941, Donitz proposed to the German High Command to deploy U-boats to American waters. This was a pre-emptive strike, as Donitz wanted to extend the area of operations into the neutrality zone to weaken the stiffening resistance he was encountering. But Hitler was concerned this might tip the US into the war, and did not believe a war with the U.S. was imminent and denied permission. Despite escalating tensions between Germany and the U.S., which by this time had led to a state of undeclared war at sea, still Hitler continued to ban any intentional sinkings of U.S. ships. With hitler removed from the4 scene, this was likley to have been a decision not likley to be sustained. 

Operations in the mid Atlantic were not curtailed, however, as only a fraction of U-Boats possesed sufficient range to operate at those ranges. 

By the close of this campaign (in June), which spanned the first six months of 1942, German U-boats had sunk over 565 allied ships totaling almost 3 million tons in the entire North Atlantic area. ive not been able to definitively pin down the tonnages sunk in the US zone of operations, but ive seen figures of about 2.6 million tons for that first six months. total Allied losses worldwide inluding the PTO for the whole of 1942 were 1322 ships, totalling 8.5 million tons, including about 3. 5 million tons sunk in the British sector (the western approaches and British coastal waters). 
In the US sector, in that first six month in US waters, the Reich had lost only six submarines. Despite the success of Operation Paukenschlag, Donitz understood that the Battle of the Atlantic wasn’t just about sinking ships; its primary purpose was to starve Britain into submission. This goal could only be achieved by severing her convoy routes, and that meant a return to the main area of operations in the midAtlantic. this he did from June, and a return to massive sinkings until the following March. Not that they ever abandoned that campaign. 

In the east, as you say, the Soviets halted the general advance in front of Moscow, however its a stretch to say German offensive capability was curtailed. In fact, had the Germans been able to strip out their west front defences, which in 1942 averaged about 80 divisions and more than a million flak personnel, they could erll have resumed the general offensive. As it was, they still resumed a major attack in the South, that came close to success, except for Hitlers obsession with the city named after Stalin. Without significant military (army) presence in the west, the Soviets will lack the strength to defeat the germans on their own, though i doubt the germans have the capacity to defeat them outright as you correctly say.


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## RCAFson (Jul 14, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> So Britain is going to opt to go into even heavier debt? Is the US going to retool to make Lancasters or is Britain going to use B-17s and Shermans?



Historically, the UK used the B-17 and B-24 in fairly large numbers, along with thousands of Shermans. Going into debt is preferable to surrender.

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## stona (Jul 14, 2014)

Nations go to war to serve their own interests. That's why the U.S. went to war with Germany, Hitler's declaration of war on her was a mere convenience. The war with Germany was coming sooner rather than later. An Atlantic and Europe dominated by the Axis powers was seen as a deadly threat to US interests, not just in those regions but worldwide. Many saw the Axis threat as a more serious threat to US interests than that posed by the Japanese Empire.
You have to look at the geopolitical situation and balances of power as they were in the 1930/40s, not as they appear later. I can't see any way the U.S. was not going to become embroiled in the European war, but would simply fight a war against Japan, a Pacific war if you like, in isolation.
This might be introducing a bit too much reality into an intriguing 'what if' but it is just as unrealistic to deny Germany's best chance of forcing Britain to terms because this might risk a war with the U.S. which was inevitable anyway.
Cheers
Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 14, 2014)

stona said:


> Nations go to war to serve their own interests. That's why the U.S. went to war with Germany, Hitler's declaration of war on her was a mere convenience. The war with Germany was coming sooner rather than later. An Atlantic and Europe dominated by the Axis powers was seen as a deadly threat to US interests, not just in those regions but worldwide. Many saw the Axis threat as a more serious threat to US interests than that posed by the Japanese Empire.
> You have to look at the geopolitical situation and balances of power as they were in the 1930/40s, not as they appear later. I can't see any way the U.S. was not going to become embroiled in the European war, but would simply fight a war against Japan, a Pacific war if you like, in isolation.
> This might be introducing a bit too much reality into an intriguing 'what if' but it is just as unrealistic to deny Germany's best chance of forcing Britain to terms because this might risk a war with the U.S. which was inevitable anyway.
> Cheers
> Steve



The US was not a dictatorship that could declare war on a whim. FDR had been pushing war in Europe since 1940 and had not managed to get the US willing to fight there. With another war on in Asia, it will prove distracting from the situation in Europe, especially once the British win the Battle of the Atlantic, which it basically had by 1942; it was only the extension of war into US coastal waters that renewed the naval war. Doenitz would have begged for it, but I cannot see anyone else that wasn't Hitler DoWing the US. Having read Ian Kershaw's book on Hitler, its pretty clear that the DoW was specifically Hitler's desire, no one else's (other than Doenitz). War was no inevitable between the US and Germany, Hitler made it possible.
SHAFR: September 2000 Newsletter: Hitler's Decision to Declare War


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## stona (Jul 14, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> War was no inevitable between the US and Germany, Hitler made it possible.



We'll agree to differ. I don't think much of that article for reasons which have no place in this thread.

Cheers

Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 14, 2014)

stona said:


> We'll agree to differ. I don't think much of that article for reasons which have no place in this thread.
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Steve



Fair enough. Still Ian Kershaws two part Bio on Hitler does really point to Hitler being the driving reason behind the German DoW and without him Germany wouldn't have initiated it. I'm not saying that the US wouldn't have gone to war later on, but rather that it as not inevitable and would actually be pretty difficult provide Germany publicly declared neutrality and Hitler was dead by this point.


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## stona (Jul 14, 2014)

That's my point. The US would have declared war on Germany eventually, if the US support for Britain didn't eventually cause a German declaration. In the mean time it would have gone to great lengths (even more than historically) to maintain British survival. Don't forget that a huge majority of Americans supported this option _even at the risk of war_.
Cheers
Steve


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## wiking85 (Jul 14, 2014)

stona said:


> That's my point. The US would have declared war on Germany eventually, if the US support for Britain didn't eventually cause a German declaration. In the mean time it would have gone to great lengths (even more than historically) to maintain British survival. Don't forget that a huge majority of Americans supported this option _even at the risk of war_.
> Cheers
> Steve



Right, the implication being the risk would be Germany DoWing the US. Germany really is out of options as far as the naval war in 1942; it can either DoW the US and hope for the best, or acknowledge defeat and try to force and end in the East, while keeping Britain at bay. The Uboats were no longer effective in the Atlantic short of extending to war to the the US coast. Had Germany acknowledged defeat in the naval realm, the US would lose all means of entering the war; as it was the only potential thing to get US entry at that point would be if a US warship were sunk after December 7th in the security zone; that would be impossible if the Germans step back and shift Uboat operations out of the North Atlantic and the increasing tempo in the Pacific would serve as a distraction once British supply lines were secure. At that point the US public would feel its obligation was fulfilled as Britain would not be able to be defeated without a Uboat campaign in the North Atlantic. The Soviets would be secure due the Pacific and Iranian supply lines, while Murmansk would be Britain's problem (they controlled that convoy on their own).


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## parsifal (Jul 14, 2014)

why are the germans out of naval options in 1942


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## wiking85 (Jul 14, 2014)

parsifal said:


> why are the germans out of naval options in 1942



The British convoy system had defeated them by late 1941. As a result Hitler shifted Uboat ops south to around North Africa. They failed there too. By December 1941 Doenitz had admitted defeat against British convoys, so pushed Hitler to expand the war so he could go after unconvoyed shipping on the US coast. Hitler obliged him, but was the only one that wanted to in the command structure (other than Doenitz who had a very narrow service perspective). So unless Germany is dead set on war with the US, which only Hitler and Doenitz were in 1941, and is willing to expand the Uboat war to the shores of the US and mid-Atlantic US security zone, the Uboats can no longer score success in the British security zone East of Iceland. Doenitz himself admitted as much, which is why he was so pro-US, because without that his service had lost its major reason for resources, which would mean the Uboat Waffe gets limited funding and stuck to fighting in the Arctic, Mediterranean, and mine laying off the British coast. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_the_Atlantic#Mediterranean_diversion


> In October 1941, Hitler ordered Dönitz to move U-boats into the Mediterranean to support German operations in that theatre. The resulting concentration near Gibraltar resulted in a series of battles around the Gibraltar and Sierra Leone convoys. In December 1941, Convoy HG 76 sailed, escorted by the 36th Escort Group of two sloops and six corvettes under Captain Frederic John Walker, reinforced by the first of the new escort carriers, HMS Audacity, and three destroyers from Gibraltar. The convoy was immediately intercepted by the waiting U-boat pack, resulting in a brutal battle. Walker was a tactical innovator, his ships' crews were highly trained and the presence of an escort carrier meant U-boats were frequently sighted and forced to dive before they could get close to the convoy. Over the next five days, five U-boats were sunk (four by Walker's group), despite the loss of Audacity after two days. The British lost Audacity, a destroyer and just two merchant ships. The battle was the first clear Allied convoy victory.
> Through dogged effort, the Allies slowly gained the upper hand until the end of 1941. Although Allied warships failed to sink U-boats in large numbers, most convoys evaded attack completely. Shipping losses were high, but manageable.


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## parsifal (Jul 14, 2014)

> The British convoy system had defeated them by late 1941.




I have 3.3 million tons of reasons and more than 800 ships sunk between June 1942 and March 1943 all of it sunk in the western approaches, that shows this to be an incorrect claim. The heaviest monthly sinkings of the war occurred at this this time, not against the Americans, and not against peripheral fronts. it was squarely in the middle of the main defensive area manned by the RN, by her most experienced convoy men. 




> As a result Hitler shifted Uboat ops south to around North Africa. They failed there too.



Hardly. If you call the redeployment of a maximum of 20 boats out of 280 a major redeployment, then you are right In the fall of 1942 there were six noats in the south Atlantic



> By December 1941 Doenitz had admitted defeat against British convoys, so pushed Hitler to expand the war so he could go after unconvoyed shipping on the US coast.



Wrong again. Dontiz never admitted defeat until after March 1943, and even then, he never gave up. he was tireless and tenacious,. and he always considered the critical battle to be the convoy battles occurring in the sea apraoches to Britain. His decision to press hitler to undertake a pre-emptive strike ointo the neutral zone was a response to the now undeclared war that was occurring between the USN and the US merchant fleet, and the German armed forces. It was inevitable thjat they clash, unless US attitudes to the freedom of movement on the seas was changed, and that was never going to happen. Donitz saw the expansion of operations into the pan-American neutral zone as a pre-emptive strike mostly and then as a means of thinning British defences. he did not extend operations into this zone because he was facing defeat. he extended it, to hurt the Americans more, and finish off the British who would be forced to spread their defences even thinner. he failed to appreciate the shipbuilding capabilities of the US, which really saved the allies from defeat. in no way can German operations at this time be seen as the last death throws of the U-Boat arm. 



> Hitler obliged him, but was the only one that wanted to in the command structure (other than Doenitz who had a very narrow service perspective).



wrong again. Donitz made his request to the German admiralty, who supported his request in September 1941. When it was put to hitler, he refused, believing the US would not go to war. It was only after the attack on pearl harbour, that hitler, in one of his more insane moments, decided that the Japanese were capable of defeating the USN, and that Germany would not follow the path the italians had, and remain neutral. giving the treaty that existed between japan and Germany a very liberal interpretation, he decided to declare war because he did not want to missout on the spoils of victory. it had nothing to do with donitzs request, or the war at sea. hilter could have care less about what was happening to the U-Boats. He once said that even looking at a naval chart made him sea sick. 



> So unless Germany is dead set on war with the US, which only Hitler and Doenitz were in 1941, and is willing to expand the Uboat war to the shores of the US and mid-Atlantic US security zone, the Uboats can no longer score success in the British security zone East of Iceland.



This is just utter fantasy. Sorry. Everything about it is utterly wrong 



> Doenitz himself admitted as much, which is why he was so pro-US, because without that his service had lost its major reason for resources, which would mean the Uboat Waffe gets limited funding and stuck to fighting in the Arctic, Mediterranean, and mine laying off the British coast.



You do know that donitz was named Hitlers successor at the end, which points to his enormous influence in the regime. he was never in any danger of being sidelined. I suggest you do a little more reading before making claims such as these. 

Wiki as a source should be treated fairly cautiously.


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## Koopernic (Jul 14, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> The British convoy system had defeated them by late 1941.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_the_Atlantic#Mediterranean_diversion



The defeat of the u-boats is generally seen as Early 1943: (March 1943 to May 1943, "Black May") this is when both convoy losses dropped and u-boat losses dramatically increased. These I would say are the two preconditions required to say they were defeated. It coincides with a combination of long range aircraft, escort carriers and improved radar as well as code breaking and radio direction finding.

The only really important factor is the prevalence of patrol aircraft. Electric submarines had a very low under water speed and endurance. They had to surface to engage a convoy since their underwater speed and endurance was way to limited to intercept a convoy let alone re-engage. An aircraft could then effectively force them underwater and prevent them from engaging while damaging or sinking a number. As Allied assets grew they could saturate an area from which a u-boat could not escape due to their low underwater speed and inability to surface (due to aircraft).

The solution to this problem was u-boats designed for continuous underwater operations. Initial German attempts were based on using Hydrogen Peroxide however the eventual solution was to build u-boats witch quadrupled range and doubled speed using batteries.

The Type XXI u-boat would again have turned the Battle in the u-boats favor: the technologies they had could not have been defeated till the early 1950s. For instance to detect a stealthy mast one must not track the mast but the shadow behind it.

here are the speeds and ranges of German u-boats:
*Conventional*
*Type VII*
max speed 8 knots, range 80 nautical miles at 4 knots. This is actually better than most allied boats.


*Type XXI* 
max speed 16.75 knots range 350 nautical miles at 5 knots. (some achieved 17.5 knots)
From Wikipedia.de the full performance.

* (With creeper drives)*
487 nautical miles at 3 knots
333 nautical miles at 5 Knots
256 nautical miles 6 Knots
*(main electric motors)*
120 nautical miles 8 Knots
79 nautical miles 10 Knots
26 nautical miles 15 Knots


Type XXI could intercept, attack, withdraw and re-engage. It had the underwater speed and range to escape any practical allied search pattern or individual escort.

It was so silent that post war USN ships had trouble passively tracking it from a stationary ship at 600 yards. It's speed was so high it could exit a sonar beam before the echo returned to the operator and thus break lock.

It had a number of other technologies that had been partially implemented on other u-boats.

1 An anechoic coating called Albrecht that absorbed sonar pulses. The Germans had been experimenting, even deploying these since 1942 and by 1944 they had perfected it (it didn't delaminate anymore). it consisted of a mesh of two different sized holes filled with a rubber like material whose resonances absorbed the sonar pulse.

2 Anti radar coatings for mast head stealth code named schonsteinfehger (chiminey sweep) consisting of Jauman absorbers for cylindrical portions and molded ferritic absorbers for multi dimensional components. Absorbed 95% at 9cm and 90% at 3cm. Combined ferrite, Jaumann absorbers under development. Used on a few conventional boats.

3 Radar detector Athos, detects allied microwave radar from 2.5cm to 20cm.
4 Infrared detector Flamingo that detected heat from aircraft engines when allied radar was switched off, mounted atop the Athos mast.
Both above saw service in the final days of the war.
5 Warning radar called "Lansing" in a single radar pulse could detect any aircraft within 30km. Due to the single pulse it couldn't be direction found with the min max direction finding of the day. This 'cleared the air' before surfacing or raising the mast.
6 Radar directed 30mm guns with full blind fire capability using the 'ballspiel' radar (based on a German night fighter radar FuG 244 and the Rettin system for the quad FLAK)
7 A microwave radar, FuMO 84, that can be used underwater.
8 A very accurate long range array sonar 
9 A new type of active sonar, the balkon geraet, that could with a chirp of 3 Doppler pulses ascertain range, direction and closing speed data and accurately blind fire torpedoes. Due to the rapid chirp it could not be direction found. 
10 kurier enigma coding system. This used burst mode transmission to minimize chance of interception, which was reasonably successful in. In its 3F form it was essentially untrackable by radio direction finding. This is because it used SSBSC single side band suppressed carrier modulation. IE when the 'dots' and 'dashes' weren't being transmitted the carrier was suppressed. In normal radio the 'silence' could still be detected and tracked. The dots and dashes were also transmitted on different random frequencies and so there was never a long enough transmission to detect let alone track, moreover one could correlate the dots and dashes unless one knew the deviation frequencies.
11 the naval enigma coding machine was the receive a 5th rotor. In addition the UKW-D (rewirable rotor reflector D) which was capable of making the allied code breaking efforts fall apart was already in deployment. If used widely enough 'ultra' would fall apart. The failure to deploy the system widely enough (it forced was used n 1943) kept the codes broken.
12 a new generation of pattern running and decoy resistant homing torpedo (even if the new jamming circuits were seduced the new torpedos simply dog legged around small decoy targets)

Type XXI was supposed to deploy early 1944 or late 43. The bombing campaign delayed them as did natural technical problems.

Without the big allied bombing campaign the Type XXI takes the initiative back from the allies by mid 1944.

These u-boats were 'modern' even by todays standards.


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## parsifal (Jul 15, 2014)

In response to the claim that the U-Boats were under control in 1941.

For 1941, the U-Boats suffered the loss of 35 Boats, the vast majority bing in the Northwestyern approaches with a significant number also lost whilst trying to break into the meditterranean, or just covering the approaches to gibraltar . In the previous year, 24 boats had been lost. .

The following map from UBoat Net shows the location of those losses.


U-boat Losses during 1941 - Fates - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net


In 1942 the U-boat fleet lost 86 boats during this year, most of them in the latter half the year. A sign of things to come ...

However, the U-Boat fleet, whilst hurting fom these losses were still adding new boats to the fleet at a rate much faster than were being lost. it wasnt until 1943 that the situation was turned around and losses began to exceed new additions 


in 1941 about 183 new boats were commission. In january 1942 Donitz had ready about 90 boats, the rest were working up, in refit, or undergoing repairs. he had started the year with just over 50 boats, with an average daily availability of about 20 boats. 


In 1942 about the same number of boats were added, most sources say 183 boats added. he had begin the year with an availability of some 90 boats and finished it with an average of about 160 boats. 

Returns per boat were dropping as the defences were thickening, but Britain was well on her way to being brought to her knees by the U-Boats. At the beginning of 1942, Britain was down to 16 million tons of undamaged shipping, not including the US fleet of some 7 million tons. The absolute minimum needed for subsistence was 7 million tones, but the minimum needed to continue effective resistance was estimated to be 12 million tons. She was 4 million tons shy of that "line of death". in 1942, British and Commonwealth shipyards were to churn out 1.5 million tons of ships, whilst the Americans constructed more than 7.6 million tons. total losses to all causes, in all TOs was just under 10 million tons. The allies were still losing, but US shipping production was increasing and U-Boat sinkings were shrinking as the winter gales set in. Both sides knew that the year of decisioin was 1943. both sides determined that they would make that year the make or break year......it was a very closely run thing, make no mistake.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 15, 2014)

AS Parsifal says, there are two aspects to the U-boat war. 
Can the allies sink the U-boats faster than the Germans can build them.
Can the Germans sink the merchant ships faster than the allies can build them. 

The shipyards were as important to the "battle" as the weapons and ships/boats.


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## wiking85 (Jul 15, 2014)

parsifal said:


> I have 3.3 million tons of reasons and more than 800 ships sunk between June 1942 and March 1943 all of it sunk in the western approaches, that shows this to be an incorrect claim. The heaviest monthly sinkings of the war occurred at this this time, not against the Americans, and not against peripheral fronts. it was squarely in the middle of the main defensive area manned by the RN, by her most experienced convoy men.


No, virtually none of it was sunk in the western approaches, most of it was off the US coast, West of Iceland or in the mid/south Atlantic. The Western Approaches were virtually shut down to Uboats by 1942. The losses occurred in the mid-Atlantic gap, which was in the US security zone, not the Western Approaches. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battl...antic_.28July_1942_.E2.80.93_February_1943.29
U-boat Losses during 1942 - Fates - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
Looking at the map many of the Uboats were lost getting to station due to the increase in Bay of Biscay aerial patrols. 

Cape Farewell - The U-boat War in Maps - uboat.net
Plus the biggest convoy battles happened here, west of Iceland, south of Greenland, square in the US zone of patrol.

Wolfpacks - German U-boat Operations - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
Check out the 1942 wolf packs and see where the convoys they hit were, they were outside of the Western Approaches.




parsifal said:


> Hardly. If you call the redeployment of a maximum of 20 boats out of 280 a major redeployment, then you are right In the fall of 1942 there were six noats in the south Atlantic


What major successes were the Uboats scoring in the Atlantic between October 1941-December 1941?




parsifal said:


> Wrong again. Dontiz never admitted defeat until after March 1943, and even then, he never gave up. he was tireless and tenacious,. and he always considered the critical battle to be the convoy battles occurring in the sea apraoches to Britain. His decision to press hitler to undertake a pre-emptive strike ointo the neutral zone was a response to the now undeclared war that was occurring between the USN and the US merchant fleet, and the German armed forces. It was inevitable thjat they clash, unless US attitudes to the freedom of movement on the seas was changed, and that was never going to happen. Donitz saw the expansion of operations into the pan-American neutral zone as a pre-emptive strike mostly and then as a means of thinning British defences. he did not extend operations into this zone because he was facing defeat. he extended it, to hurt the Americans more, and finish off the British who would be forced to spread their defences even thinner. he failed to appreciate the shipbuilding capabilities of the US, which really saved the allies from defeat. in no way can German operations at this time be seen as the last death throws of the U-Boat arm.


Sure he never admitted defeat publicly, he just kept pushing for new hunting grounds as his old ones dried up. Courting war against the US to satisfy his service's demands/priorities is very narrow minded. It was up to Hitler to reign him in and prevent the war from expanding any further, which was not Hitler's strong suit.





parsifal said:


> wrong again. Donitz made his request to the German admiralty, who supported his request in September 1941. When it was put to hitler, he refused, believing the US would not go to war. It was only after the attack on pearl harbour, that hitler, in one of his more insane moments, decided that the Japanese were capable of defeating the USN, and that Germany would not follow the path the italians had, and remain neutral. giving the treaty that existed between japan and Germany a very liberal interpretation, he decided to declare war because he did not want to missout on the spoils of victory. it had nothing to do with donitzs request, or the war at sea. hilter could have care less about what was happening to the U-Boats. He once said that even looking at a naval chart made him sea sick.


I suggest you read "Nemisis" Kershaw's bio on Hitler; Hitler was planning for war against the US for a while before December and the Japanese had been approaching him about fighting the US if they attacked and Hitler agreed to sign a new treaty saying Germany would, but Japan attacked a day before the document was finished drafting. Hitler did think war with the US was inevitable and had thought so from the 1920s on, with this unpublished 'second book'. He wanted to put it off, but by late 1941 with the Japanese finally talking about war he thought he finally had an ally strong enough to fight the US with; no one else was that enamored with the idea until Hitler gave his speech declaring war and then they wrote in their journals that they hoped the Japanese would draw American attention away from Europe. 



parsifal said:


> This is just utter fantasy. Sorry. Everything about it is utterly wrong


Care to provide some sourcing to prove your assertion?



parsifal said:


> You do know that donitz was named Hitlers successor at the end, which points to his enormous influence in the regime. he was never in any danger of being sidelined. I suggest you do a little more reading before making claims such as these.
> 
> Wiki as a source should be treated fairly cautiously.


A lot happened between 1941 and 1945; by 1945 Hitler order Goering arrested and shot for treason, the German generals tried to assassinate Hitler. Hitler really had no one else he could trust by the time he named Doenitz Führer; it shows nothing about Doenitz in 1941.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 15, 2014)

Just play nice guys...


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## wiking85 (Jul 15, 2014)

DerAdlerIstGelandet said:


> Just play nice guys...



Sure, I wasn't aware we were getting salty.

U-boat Losses during 1941 - Fates - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
From Parsifal link:
35 Uboats lost in 1941 about half from October-December 1941 in a large part in the Western Approaches. This confirms my point that in the region of British defenses it was getting too hot for the Uboats. Using the 1942 map for losses that I posted it shows that the fighting shifted west of the area of the losses in 1941 as the Uboats were forced further afield to more safely hunt:
http://uboat.net/fates/losses/1942.htm

Compare the two maps. Its clear that it became too hot in 1941 in the Western Approaches and was much safer to hunt in the US security zone


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## parsifal (Jul 15, 2014)

> No, virtually none of it was sunk in the western approaches, most of it was off the US coast, West of Iceland or in the mid/south Atlantic. The Western Approaches were virtually shut down to Uboats by 1942. The losses occurred in the mid-Atlantic gap, which was in the US security zone, not the Western Approaches.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battl...antic_.28July_1942_.E2.80.93_February_1943.29
> U-boat Losses during 1942 - Fates - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
> Looking at the map many of the Uboats were lost getting to station due to the increase in Bay of Biscay aerial patrols.
> ...




I see you are taking a very narrow view of the definition of the western approaches. Ill redfine the position then. The majority of U-Boat losses remained within the area generally bounded by the southern tip of Iceland, to a meridian east of the easternmost point of Iceland, south of ireland and north of Spain. if you look at the maps you refer to above you will see thats what they are indicating the main zone of operations. Sure, German operational areas did move away from Iceland and the western approaches proper, but they remained .in the north atlantic, and outside both the Pan American Defence Zone, and even their so called "western hemisphere defence zone" (put into place from, April 1941, and thereby allowing US escort almost all the way to Iceland). u-Boat sinkings and losses remained concentrated around this area, throughout 1941. In 1942, there was a shift to the US coast and the Gulf Of Mexico, in terms of merchant sinkings, but in terms of U-Boat losses, the main area remained that mid Atlantic area. There were some increases in deplyments around the area of Sierra Leone and off Gibraltar, but these were small change as to what was going on in the mid North Atlantic. As I said, and perhapos we will disgree on this, the midAtlantic lost more shipping that the US coast except for that opening period in 1942, overall, the US Coastal area lost 2.6 million tons, whilst in the midAtlantic losses were about 3.3 million tons for 1942. Ive got the HMSO records but ive left them at a friends house, i will get them tomorrow and maybe scan or just summarise the losses by cause, and area. They show clearly where the majority of losses were occurring. 

It wasnt that Donitz was defeated, or under control. Far from it. He kept shifting the zone of operations for two reasons....Firstly he was following the where the best targets were, and invariably that was moistly in the Atlantic. Even above sinking tonnages, his number one objective was to defeat Britain, and his best option there was in the Atlantic. That did not mean however that he would ignore opportunities when they arose, like the US coast. 

The second reason that he kept moving away from the areas around Britain....what you are referring to as the western approches, was because he was keeping out of the range of escorts, and also keeping out of range of airpower. Easier to sink ships if the escort numbers were less. There was a reeaon why the British pulled boilers out of the four stackers and put extra fuel tanks into the hull. these were the first ships to be able to cross the Atlantic in escort. For a long time, the Allies had a gap in the mid ocean area, where the smaller, more numerous escorts could not reach. Donitz attempted to exploit that by deploying his U-Boats where the majority of Allied escort could not reach him. Eventually he was forced to fight in areas where allied escorts were plentiful, as the numbewrs of allied long range escorts gradually increased, and at least some VLR aircraft werre deployed, hunter killer groups formed and the rest of it. None of this really happened until the winter of 1942-3. 



> What major successes were the Uboats scoring in the Atlantic between October 1941-December 1941?



The Germans sank 2.6 million tons of shipping in the north Atlantic, most of which was not replaced. They lost 35 U-Boats to do that, whilst adding 180 boats to their fleet. A number of very valuable skippers were lost, and they allowed a naval enigma machine to be captured, which in the longer terms cost them dearly. So, its probably more accurate to describe the year as having some wins and some setbacks, but those shipping losses were crippling the british, as well as the loss of imports, which were sending the country bankrupt. Germany was winning, because her own losses were less serious than the tonnages lost by Britain. 



> Sure he never admitted defeat publicly, he just kept pushing for new hunting grounds as his old ones dried up. Courting war against the US to satisfy his service's demands/priorities is very narrow minded. It was up to Hitler to reign him in and prevent the war from expanding any further, which was not Hitler's strong suit.



He never admitted any defeat until May 1943, and thats because ther was no defeat to admit



> I suggest you read "Nemisis" Kershaw's bio on Hitler; Hitler was planning for war against the US for a while before December and the Japanese had been approaching him about fighting the US if they attacked and Hitler agreed to sign a new treaty saying Germany would, but Japan attacked a day before the document was finished drafting. Hitler did think war with the US was inevitable and had thought so from the 1920s on, with this unpublished 'second book'. He wanted to put it off, but by late 1941 with the Japanese finally talking about war he thought he finally had an ally strong enough to fight the US with; no one else was that enamored with the idea until Hitler gave his speech declaring war and then they wrote in their journals that they hoped the Japanese would draw American attention away from Europe.



Might be worth a look, but If it is saying what you are indicating, I would not think its much good




> Care to provide some sourcing to prove your assertion?



Not really




> A lot happened between 1941 and 1945; by 1945 Hitler order Goering arrested and shot for treason, the German generals tried to assassinate Hitler. Hitler really had no one else he could trust by the time he named Doenitz Führer; it shows nothing about Doenitz in 1941.



Yes, i agree, but one of the reasons he was chosen was because he never displayed a defeatist attitude. In some ways he was very similar to Richthofen, except that by 1945 richthofen was dead. Hitler never wanted to surrendee,and he believed that Donitz was the best man to follow that to the bitter end. Hitler, as usual, miscalculated....


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 15, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Sure, I wasn't aware we were getting salty





You guys are ok.


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## Glider (Jul 15, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> Sure, I wasn't aware we were getting salty.
> 
> U-boat Losses during 1941 - Fates - German U-boats of WWII - Kriegsmarine - uboat.net
> From Parsifal link:
> ...



I don't understand your approach that because the Germans moved away from the western approaches that the U Boats were somehow on the ropes. Only a fool fights where the risk is greater when bigger losses can be inflicted at lower risk and the Germans who were many things were not fools. From an import / export position it doesn't matter a damn where the ship is lost, it sailed and it didn't arrive.

Edit - I have looked at the December losses and nearly all were in The Med which is a bad place for the U Boats and one of those was sunk by an Italian warship. Or around Gibraltar which being a huge naval base, a narrow stretch of water with strong tidal surges was exceptionally dangerous. Of the November losses two were accidents so I don't see what you are trying to prove. 

It took time to get the French and Norwegian bases fully operational and these enabled the U Boats to roam further across the Atlantic, it wasn't just because of better defences which in 1941 were still mainly on the drawing boards and slipways of the builders.

If you look at the losses in 1942 and take out the ones in the Med. The losses in the Atlantic are pretty evenly spread across the east and west Atlantic so again I don't see your point that the Germans moved west as it was to hot in the eastern approaches


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## wiking85 (Jul 15, 2014)

Glider said:


> I don't understand your approach that because the Germans moved away from the western approaches that the U Boats were somehow on the ropes. Only a fool fights where the risk is greater when bigger losses can be inflicted at lower risk and the Germans who were many things were not fools. From an import / export position it doesn't matter a damn where the ship is lost, it sailed and it didn't arrive.
> 
> It took time to get the French and Norwegian bases fully operational and these enabled the U Boats to roam further across the Atlantic, it wasn't just because of better defences which in 1941 were still mainly on the drawing boards and slipways of the builders.


You're missing my point; the shift further out was due to the danger of operating in the Western Approaches, the Uboats could only continue being effective if they moved further West. With a new government that isn't led by Hitler, Germany would not be eager to declare war, as they were already on the ropes by December 7th 1941 when the Soviets were in full counter attack mode and the army was panicking that they were going to be overrun in front of Moscow; no one was eager to expand the war other than Hitler. With Goering in charge, who didn't want to go after the USSR until Britain was conquered, he would be unenthusiastic about escalating the war further against the US, so would order the navy to stay out of the US security zone to avoid giving them Casus Belli. That effectively shuts down the Uboats, as the Western Approaches were too dangerous to operate in and successes were falling off. So Goering has two options in 1942 either expand the naval war into the US security zone and deal with the US DoWing Germany soon from a naval incident or keeping the Uboats out of the US security zone, which prevents that incident from occurring, but effectively prevents the Uboats then from attacking trade in the North Atlantic due to the defenses in the Western Approaches making convoy attacks cost prohibitive. 

It becomes a choice of calling off the Uboat offensive in the North Atlantic to prevent a war with the US or expand the naval war and deal with the US entering the war. Of the two choices the former is less damaging in the long run, even if it means losing the Battle of the Atlantic a year early, due to then preventing the US from bringing its full weight into the air war in 1943-45 and of course Operations Torch and Overlord. Even a more powerful Britain from 1942 on is less powerful than the US+Britain in Europe. It allows more concentration of limited resources against a weaker set of enemies and the lack of spending on Uboats that would then result would only strengthen armaments in other directions; considering something like >700 Uboats were completed and several hundred more partially built from 1942-45 that would mean a lot more tanks or even synthetic fuel production expansion.


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## bobbysocks (Jul 15, 2014)

how much tonnage was sunk off of the us coast prior to the us entering the war in 41? it was significant if i remember....


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## wiking85 (Jul 15, 2014)

bobbysocks said:


> how much tonnage was sunk off of the us coast prior to the us entering the war in 41? it was significant if i remember....



None, it was all sunk after December 1941. Uboats didn't have the range to do so except for the Type IXs and they were operating in other theaters prior.


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## Glider (Jul 15, 2014)

wiking85 said:


> You're missing my point; the shift further out was due to the danger of operating in the Western Approaches, the Uboats could only continue being effective if they moved further West.


There is no evidence to support that statement, none. The 1941 *and 1942 losses were evenly spread across the Atlantic, the Navwar site clearly shows this. There were no stronger defences in real terms as the new ships such as the Flower Class were only starting to be built and it takes time to complete the ship and train the crews and these were more than matched by the production of new U boats. The reason why combat shifted was because the new U Boat bases in Norway and France allowed the U boats to spend longer on patrol in the Atlantic. 



With a new government that isn't led by Hitler, Germany would not be eager to declare war, as they were already on the ropes by December 7th 1941 when the Soviets were in full counter attack mode and the army was panicking that they were going to be overrun in front of Moscow; no one was eager to expand the war other than Hitler. With Goering in charge, who didn't want to go after the USSR until Britain was conquered, he would be unenthusiastic about escalating the war further against the US, so would order the navy to stay out of the US security zone to avoid giving them Casus Belli.

Click to expand...

There is no way that Germany is going to conquer the UK the German Navy knew it as did the Luftwaffe, who by then knew it was impossible. 



That effectively shuts down the Uboats, as the Western Approaches were too dangerous to operate in and successes were falling off.

Click to expand...

As mentioned before there is no evidence to support this, please supply something.




So Goering has two options in 1942 either expand the naval war into the US security zone and deal with the US DoWing Germany soon from a naval incident or keeping the Uboats out of the US security zone, which prevents that incident from occurring, but effectively prevents the Uboats then from attacking trade in the North Atlantic due to the defenses in the Western Approaches making convoy attacks cost prohibitive.

Click to expand...

Which makes this useless without evidence. I repeat, a good chunk of the U Boat losses you are talking about occurred in the Med or around Gibraltar not repeat not in the Western approaches.*


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## parsifal (Jul 15, 2014)

bobbysocks said:


> how much tonnage was sunk off of the us coast prior to the us entering the war in 41? it was significant if i remember....



From october 2 1939 the Americans set up a zone called the Pan American neutrality zone. It was raised and approved at the Conference of Foreign Ministers of American Republics who called it the Act of Panama. U.S. Navy to patrol a neutrality zone 300 miles wide. The U.S. notified by Germany the merchant ships must submit to visit and search. At the time its legality was questioned, but the U-Boats did not enter the zone until after December 1941.

However surface raiders such as the graf Spee did not recognize the zone and continued to operate within the zone. Ships were sunk within the zone as a result. The Germans also laid mines within known concentrations of allied shipping . This effectively maintained some pressure on the British as the neutrality provisions did not protect British flagged shipping. The Germans simply did not wish to get into a fight with the US Navy. This reluctance peeled away as 1941 wore on. 

22 Dec 1939 - NEUTRALITY ZONE. JOINT PROTEST. American Republi...


The US found itself in an undeclared war with the KM because of alegal arrangement known as the Western Hemisphere Defence Zone. The Lend-Lease Act did not solve the problem of how to get American arms and supplies to Britain. German submarines patrolling the Atlantic Ocean were sinking hundreds of thousands of tons of shipping each month, and the British Navy simply did not have enough ships in the Atlantic to stop them.

Roosevelt could not simply order the US Navy to protect British cargo ships, since the US was still technically neutral. Instead, he developed the idea of a Hemispheric Defense Zone. Roosevelt declared that the entire western half of the Atlantic Ocean was part of the Western Hemisphere and therefore neutral. He then ordered the US Navy to patrol the western Atlantic and reveal the location of German submarines to the British.

This arrangement came into being from18April 1941, and was never recognized by Germany. it was anything but the act of a true neutral, and it was this that Donitz and the german admiralty wanted to ignore when they made their submission to Hitler in September

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## Juha (Jul 16, 2014)

stona said:


> 'Somewhere in southern England'
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I'm not sure on NA but at least once during late summer - autumn 1944 3.7"s were deployed to form an anti-tank screen in ETO. They were sometimes used to beef up 21st AG barrages in ETO. Being capable to fire heavy air bursting shells made them nasty to German infantry but the limitiations in their fuzes limited their use in counter-battery role.

Juha


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## parsifal (Jul 17, 2014)

Ive had the HMSO records returned and can now report as follows

The records analyse shipping losses in a number of ways, includiung cause of loss and loss by location. it defines the main areas as the north atlantic, United Kingdome 9generally within 300km of the coast), South Atlantic, Med, Indian ocean and Pacific. 

1941:

Nth Atlantic: 2,421,700 
United Kingdom 740,293
South Atlantic 133,916
Med: 501,269
Indian Ocean 73,155
Pacific: 458,131
TOTAL 4,328558

1942
Nth Atlantic: 5,471,222 
United Kingdom 214, 885
South Atlantic 464,243
Med 369,127
Indian Ocean 724,485
Pacific 556,749
TOTAL 7,790, 697

of that 5.4 million tons sunk in the North Atlantic 2.6 million was sunk in the US speere of operations, and 3.2 million tons in the mid Atlantic and United Kingdom waters. 

There is no denying that the losses off the US east Coast were catastrophic, but it is simply untrue to claim virtually no losses in the mid-Atlantic. Large tonaages continued to be lost in the british zone, even as the Us shipping was being sunk. perhaps this dispute arose because the Western Approaches is not a well defined term. but I think the inference that was made was that the losses in the british defended area were low or negligible. That simply was not the case, and Britain was in fact perilously close to having her imports reduced past the dnager zone, because of the shipping losses she was sustaining. 

As a correction, there were ships lost to U-boats within the Pan-American Zone. 6 ships were lost between January and November, though i dont know the tonnages of these losses. They were right on the edge of the zone, so may be actually outside. This is more a technical issue rather than a substantial one


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## Koopernic (Jul 17, 2014)

Juha said:


> I'm not sure on NA but at least once during late summer - autumn 1944 3.7"s were deployed to form an anti-tank screen in ETO. They were sometimes used to beef up 21st AG barrages in ETO. Being capable to fire heavy air bursting shells made them nasty to German infantry but the limitiations in their fuzes limited their use in counter-battery role.
> 
> Juha



The UK's 97mm 34 pounder was around twice the weight of the German 8.8cm FLAK 37 (keep in mind that there are two weights given for artillery: the travelling weight and demounted weight) and simply didn't have the mobility: the Germans 10.5cm FLAK 39 was about the same size and was found difficult to transport. There were other factors that made these guns unsuitable for anti tank use such as limited depression and lack of gun shield to absorb small arms fire and splinters to say nothing of the massive profile. The Germans would have loved to have these powerful high velocity guns as the could reach higher altitude than both the 8.8cm FLAK and the 10.5cm FLAK,for homeland defence since Mosquito and the USAAF was going unchallenged.

The Beauty of the FLAK 37 is that it was light enough to travel with an army, to provide defence against medium bombers and aircraft up to medium altitude. It could be used in the anti tank role; The Kommandogeräte 40 predictor computer incorporated a 3.5m base stereoscopic range finder that could occasionally get first round hits on tanks 4000m away, though it as often the earlier FLAK 36 that was used in the AT role.

Another advantage is that it was simple: no fancy servo drives, no autoloaders no automatic fuze setters and no electronic technicians required. Fairly unskilled manning could be used. The Germans used Russian POW (USSR refused to sign Geneva convention) and Children the so called FLAK-kinder (there was a machine that set the fuze, the predictor provided enough dead time to load the round and fire it): such things could be accomplished manually. 

The US 90mm M2 represents a true dual purpose allied gun, it was common from about April 1943.

The replacement for the FLAK 37 was the 8.8cm FLAK 41, it had a much higher velocity, autoloader, auto fuze setter etc and a very low profile so it could be used as both a FLAK and PAK anti tank. ZIt weighed more but still not as much as the allied guns. To keep the firing rate up and the recoil and weight down it fired on the recoil recuperation stroke. It has some problems with cartridge extraction when the cartridge was changed from brass to steel but this was solved. Problems with vibration and stability at high rates of fire took longer. It might have been a real problem for USAAF bombers, photo reconnaissance F-5 and Mosquito had its production expanded rapidly when it was first introduced. There were at most 100 in service at a time from 1943.


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## Juha (Jul 17, 2014)

Hello Koopernic
I'm well aware of the bulk and weight of 3.7" (94mm) 28pdr HAA gun



Koopernic said:


> The UK's 97mm 34 pounder was around twice the weight of the German 8.8cm FLAK 37 (keep in mind that there are two weights given for artillery: the travelling weight and demounted weight) and simply didn't have the mobility: the Germans 10.5cm FLAK 39 was about the same size and was found difficult to transport. There were other factors that made these guns unsuitable for anti tank use such as limited depression and lack of gun shield to absorb small arms fire and splinters to say nothing of the massive profile. The Germans would have loved to have these powerful high velocity guns as the could reach higher altitude than both the 8.8cm FLAK and the 10.5cm FLAK,for homeland defence since Mosquito and the USAAF was going unchallenged.



Yes, 3.7" was bulkier than 88 but in the few cases when 3.7"s fought tanks in NA (I checked that) they were well dug in as were 88s usually in NA. 88 was also bulky and if not properly dug in appr same height than 3.7". What helped enormously 88s in NA was that the 2pdr armed British tanks didn't have HE rounds contrary the German gun tanks so outside the mg range all they had against A/T guns was the 2pdr shot.



Koopernic said:


> The Beauty of the FLAK 37 is that it was light enough to travel with an army, to provide defence against medium bombers and aircraft up to medium altitude. It could be used in the anti tank role; The Kommandogeräte 40 predictor computer incorporated a 3.5m base stereoscopic range finder that could occasionally get first round hits on tanks 4000m away, though it as often the earlier FLAK 36 that was used in the AT role.



Now the use of Kommandogeräte 40 in A/T role IMHO would not have been the brightest idee, in that case the guns were bunched too tightly for comfort (the connection cables were only certain lenght) and the whole battery (4-6 guns) could engage only one target at a time. In fact only that kind of action was possible if 3.7"s on wartime Mk III mountings were used against moving tanks because the layers seated looking backwards, the mounting was so much opted for predictor use. On the pre-war Mk I mounting the layers faced forward and so could engage moving ground targets independedly.



Koopernic said:


> Another advantage is that it was simple: no fancy servo drives, no autoloaders no automatic fuze setters and no electronic technicians required. Fairly unskilled manning could be used. The Germans used Russian POW (USSR refused to sign Geneva convention) and Children the so called FLAK-kinder (there was a machine that set the fuze, the predictor provided enough dead time to load the round and fire it): such things could be accomplished manually.



Now 3.7" could be also loaded manually and be operated independently only A/T work with Mk III mounting was very problematic. At least without mods that allowed one forward facing layer/gunner to control the gun.

Juha


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## Glider (Jul 17, 2014)

IIRC a modified version of the 3.7in was mounted in the Tortoise self propelled gun so changes would have been possible had the need arisen. However the UK went down the 17pd to 20pd route instead.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 17, 2014)

The 3.7in AA gun (94mm) was a pretty good AA gun and most peoples dual purpose or 'triple' threat guns didn't really worked all that well at all three roles, at least not at the same time. 

The 3.7in threw a heaver shell, higher than the Flak 36/37 and since nothing is free, it paid for that in weight. The Germans captured some in France in 1940 (?) or other places and thought them useful enough that they made 100,000 rounds of ammo for them when the captured ammo ran low, in 1943. Which points to another advantage of the 3.7in as an AA gun. It had a longer barrel life than the later 8.8cm Flak 41. The Germans got around that, in part, by making the barrel liner in three pieces so only the most worn section/s could be replaced instead of the entire barrel liner. 

High velocity AA guns _can_ be used as field artillery (and the 3.7in was) but you better be pretty sure the enemy air strength is low because such use cuts into the barrel life and barrel life is not _just_ the number of rounds before thegun becomes unsafe but the velecity gets lower and lower as the gun wears leading to both a lower effective ceiling and worse "accuracy" as the barrel approaches the end of it's life. Accuracy not only in the conventional gun sense but in the fact that the velocity variation is harder to adjust for in the fire control predictors. If it takes 20 seconds for a new barrel to get a shell to XXX height how many seconds does it take a somewhat worn barrel or a barrel a hundred rounds from replacement? 

While the FLAK 37 didn't have "no fancy servo drives, no autoloaders no automatic fuze setters and no electronic technicians required" it did have a follow the pointer system in which pointers were moved on dials by electrical signals sent through cables from a central fire control director ( actually a part analog computer) so a battery needed a generator and at least an 'electrician' or two even if not "electronic technicians". There is also a difference between manual ramming, power ramming and autoloading. 

Guns used for anti-tank work for long periods of time tended to "loose" things like the "follow the pointer" parts, cable connections and even the "mechanical" fuse setter which made the guns rather useless for AA work except in the "spray and pray" mode. 

And guns laid out (dug in) as AT guns were seldom, if ever, laid out in the proscribed pattern the fire control calculator had been built to use ( a diamond or box around the fire control unit) let alone have the needed cables to run to dispersed gun positions. 

The 88 was a very good gun and did a number of jobs and did them well but lets not pretend it could do them at the same time/day or even on successive days. 
Neither could the British or American guns, despite press releases


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## Shortround6 (Jul 17, 2014)

Glider said:


> IIRC a modified version of the 3.7in was mounted in the Tortoise self propelled gun so changes would have been possible had the need arisen. However the UK went down the 17pd to 20pd route instead.



Well.......






........

3.7in on a RAM chassis. Early 3.7in guns had the gun 'pointer" facing backwards and no ground sight. Later versions turned him around and did give him some sort of direct fire sight. But by that time the 6pdr and 17pdr were pretty much handling the AT duties.


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