# Aircraft production 1939-45



## R988 (Jun 8, 2006)

Found this interesting chart on aircraft production figures for all types for 1939 to 45, apparently from the WW2 Almanac or something, no idea of accuracy but they seem reasonable enough to me and seem to match what I have already heard.

The US seriously kicked into gea, going from lowest here by far in 1939, to tripling production by 1940, then tripling again from '40 to '41, then more than doubling from '41 to '42, almost doubling again from '42 to '43, finally levelling off a bit in '44 and then backing off in '45 obviosuly as the war wound down. You can see the massive industrial might they had at the time, noone else comes close.

US

1939 - 2,141
1940 - 6,086 
1941 - 19,433
1942 - 47,836
1943 - 85,898
1944 - 96,318
1945 - 46,001
Total - 303,713

Britain was already cranking them out in 1939 when the war officially started, almost doubling in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, but then only adding a bit each year until they pretty much topped out in 1943/44 at 26K per year, maybe this was their upper limit of production?

Britain

1939 - 7,940 
1940 - 15,049 
1941 - 20,094 
1942 - 23,672 
1943 - 26,263 
1944 - 26,461 
1945 - 12,070 
Total - 131,549

The USSR was obviously preparing for a war in '39, 10K per year in 1939 is easily the most aircraft of this lot, only Germany comes close at the time. They seemed to have kept up and even increased production during the early invasion years when they were shfiting production to the urals, then they shifted gear and got into it, though never really made that many compared to the US for example. their peak production in 1944 was not even as much as Germany, though I guess they didn't need so many as they were also being given lots of aircraft via lend lease

USSR

1939 - 10,382 
1940 - 10,565 
1941 - 15,737 
1942 - 25,436 
1943 - 34,900 
1944 - 40,300 
1945 - 20,900 
Total - 158,220

Germany was unsuprisingly at fairly high production (comparatively) in '39, suprisingly not increasing production all that much until the later years, you can see them creeing up quite a bit in '43 then a lot in '44, but then of course dropping off considerably in '45 for obvious reasons.

Germany

1939 - 8,295 
1940 - 10,826 
1941 - 12,401 
1942 - 15,409 
1943 - 24,807 
1944 - 40,593 
1945 - 7,540 
Total - 119,871

Suprisingly Japans output is quite low, even in the first 3 years when they were quite involved in war on all fronts, even by '42 they are still at quite low production, they start pedalling harder in '43 once they realise they are starting to lose ground, then hitting full speed in '44 like Germany when they probably realise they might in fact lose, then petering out in '45 once they did lose.

Japan

1939 - 4,467 
1940 - 4,768 
1941 - 5,088 
1942 - 8,861 
1943 - 16,693 
1944 - 28,180 
1945 - 8,263 
Total - 76,320

Quite interesting really, why didn't Germany or Japan increase production until the later years? Was it overconfidence in victory? or does it take until you are getting hammered and your homeland is under threat to realise you need to pull your finger out? Or was it due to mounting losses that production needed to be upped?


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## syscom3 (Jun 8, 2006)

Interesting subject.

One thing thats scarey about the US production totals, is it doesnt include all the wastage that was prevalent in starting up production.

In early 1945, the aircraft industry was just "warming" up and there was even more capacity available if needed.

One big reason the US could build so many aircraft is the willingness to use woman in the labor force and there was a vast cadre of managers, engineers and technicians who understood the mass production concept, and readily applied it to area's where it was never tried before.

Japans totals in 1945 were low because of the submarine blockade and B29 raids were destroying their capacity to build anything, let alone aircraft.


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## Hop (Jun 8, 2006)

> Britain was already cranking them out in 1939 when the war officially started, almost doubling in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, but then only adding a bit each year until they pretty much topped out in 1943/44 at 26K per year, maybe this was their upper limit of production?



To a certain extent it reflects a change in aircraft types. More heavy bombers in 1944 than 1943. The weight of aircraft produced increased, from 185 million pounds to 208 million. 

The production totals from the British Bombing Survey Unit, in million pounds of airframe weight:

US
1941 - 81.36
1942 - 275.83
1943 - 654.19
1944 - 961.12

UK
1941 - 87.25
1942 - 133.38
1943 - 185.25
1944 - 208.47

Germany
1941 - 64.43
1942 - 91.72
1943 - 139.90
1944 - 173.66


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## Glider (Jun 8, 2006)

This is very interesting. The one that surprised me were the figures for the USSR. I always had them down as producing vast numbers of relatively basic aircraft. To find their numbers in the same basic ballpark as the UK wasn't what I expected.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 10, 2006)

Well one thing this really shows is the capacity that the US had compared to other nations. As for Germany I would say it is because of overconfidence and also a bit of reaching there industrial capacity. I agree with syscom about the Japanese figures.


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## syscom3 (Jun 10, 2006)

Can anyone imagine the US figures if by 1945, the Willow Run production concept was used for ALL aircraft types?


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## Jabberwocky (Jun 10, 2006)

Its interesting to see just how the change in focus to single seat fighters allowed German and Japan to massively increase aircraft production.

As far as I can see, there are a few factors behind the decision:

1. Their offensive arms were now fairly impotent in the face of Allied air power,

2. They were desperately trying to regain control of thier own airspace and damage/defeat Allied bombing efforts

3. The capacity of the single seat fighter as a tactical weapon had grown immensly since 1939, particularly as a fighter-bomber.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 11, 2006)

The main reason was to try and stop the allied bombing offensive. Germany however did not completely give up the production of larger multi engine aircraft because Hitler was so damn hell bent on bombing the enemy back.


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## pbfoot (Jun 11, 2006)

I looked at those numbers and was surprised that Canada out did the Italians by a substanial amount


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 11, 2006)

They werent getting bombed and attacked day and night.


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## pbfoot (Jun 11, 2006)

DerAdlerIstGelandet said:


> They werent getting bombed and attacked day and night.


and there was only 11 million of us


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

True


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## ricardox (Jun 12, 2006)

i know this is off the subject but did the ussr outproduce the us in tank production they rally had a lot of t34's rolling around


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

The USSR only survived because of Lend Lease from the US.


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## Twitch (Jun 12, 2006)

Hmm, yeah? What are tank productions numbers for the countries? All those "Free" 1 1/2 and duece and a half trucks we sent allowed them to concentrate on T-34s instead.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

I agree and that is what I am basically getting at.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

The T-34 was the most produced Tank of WW2. I believe it is the 2nd most produced tank of all time, but I am not sure on that.

Between 1940 and 1945 there were 57,339 T-34s built in Russia. Including these tanks built during WW2 and the ones built by the Russians and other countries after WW2 until the 1950's there were about 84,070 T-34s built all together.

The Russians used the T-34s until the 1960s in there reserves and the T-34 was used in Vietnam including the attack on Lang Vei. T-34s were used in Vietnam and even the Iraqi Army had T-34s during Desert Storm.


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## syscom3 (Jun 12, 2006)

US Tank production didnt really begin untill well into 1942.

If you look at the strength of the US Army in 1941 and what it was equipped with, it was pathetic and laughable.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

The Shermans could have been produced just as quickly for the US like the T-34 was for the Russians. The Sherman was easily mass produced and because of its simplicity is the only reason I think they kept building it rather than try to build bigger and better tanks. The object was to build something that got the job done and win the war.

Anyhow this needs to get back on topic.


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## syscom3 (Jun 12, 2006)

I wonder if this was true.

Goering (or Speer maybe?) was quoted as saying that the US could build razors and washing machines, but not airplanes.


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## plan_D (Jun 12, 2006)

German production increased heavily from 1942 - 1944 because of Albert Speer. He dedicated more of the German industrial capacity to the war effort. During the early stages of the war Germany was only using a small percentage of it's IC for the war, I think it may have been lower than half. But Speer was pushing and pushing to increase it to 80 - 90% , like Britain had already done in 1940. Another thing that Speer was doing was simplfying the production, reducing the types and sub-variants being built, and aiming for more simplification of the systems that were to be built. 
A lot of people use the German production numbers as 'evidence' that the Allied bombing raids were useless on German production. But this is pathetic 'evidence' when you take the facts into consideration, the facts being that throughout the war German dedication to war production increased. For example, Britain rationed as soon as the war started to dedicate it's resources to the war. Germany didn't ration until 1943! If the Allied bombing did not exist, Germany would have out-stripped Great Britain in production. 

As for tank production, I can produce some numbers at least. 

USSR - 

1941 - 6,274
1942 - 24,690
1943 - 24,006
1944 - 28,983
1945 - 15,197

TOTAL - 99,150

I could provide numbers by type and year if that's wanted by anyone. But for 'Medium Tanks' (T-34/76, T-34/85 and T-44) the USSR production by year:

1941 - 3,014
1942 - 12,553 
1943 - 15,812
1944 - 14,773
1945 - 7,430

TOTAL T-34/76 - 34,091
TOTAL T-34/85 - 23,661
TOTAL T-44 - 200
TOTAL - 53,582

Once again, I could break that down into individual T-34/76, T-34/85 and T-44 production by year if anyone wants. I do have USSR numbers for 1939 - 1945 which includes all Soviet AFV production, so for comparison to the other numbers until I get the my other books here's the total: 105,251. 

USA - 

1940 - 331
1941 - 4,052
1942 - 24,997
1943 - 29,497
1944 - 17,565
1945 - 11,968

TOTAL - 88,410

I'll find the Sherman numbers at some point, I have them by factory and year. 

UK - 

1939 - 969
1940 - 1,399
1941 - 4,841
1942 - 8,611
1943 - 7,476
1944 - 4,600 
1945 - ? *I don't have information on this year. But I do have total UK production. 

TOTAL - 27,896

I don't have information on Canada production by year, but the total was 5,678. 

ALLIED TOTAL - 227,235 

AXIS TOTAL - approx. 52,345 *Italian and Hungarian numbers are yet to be verified. 

I could give Japanese and German AFV production numbers if anyone is interested. 

And the Lend-Lease from the Western Allies to Soviet Union included 22,800 AFVs which broke down to -

487 Matildas, Valentines and Tetrachs from Britain, and 182 M3A1 Light Tanks and M3 Medium Tanks from USA in 1941. Which rose to 2487 AFVs from Britain and 3023 AFVs from the USA in 1942. Which accounted for 16% of Soviet tank production, 12% Self-Propelled Gun production and 100% Armoured Personnel Carrier production. 

The USA also delivered 501,660 tactical wheeled and tracked vehicles (kindly mentioned by Twitch).


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

Not sure on that syscom. Would not surprise me though because those guys were an arrogant bunch of people.


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## syscom3 (Jun 12, 2006)

I also dont know if the following is also true. I think Ive read it some time ago, but one hindrence to the production expansion for the Japanese and Germans was their initial unwillingness to use woman in the factories. 

The allies used "rosie the riviteer" quickly due to the emergency conditions early in the war. When youre losing, you tend to ignore traditions and personal feelings and do whats necessary.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jun 12, 2006)

Very true my friend. I agree with you. Hitler was to obsessed with the good German woman tradition, staying at home, having babies and making little soldiers for him.


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## plan_D (Jun 13, 2006)

Germany was still using it's industry for home comforts of the German population until 1942-43. As I said, rationing hadn't even been set up in Germany until '43.


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