Best fighter in the world in 1940? Spitfire, 109, Zero, or something else

[riacrato]

Riacrato

True but so was the RAF. Spit II had more or less replaced the Spit Ia and the Spit V was entering service from February 1941. The Hurricane II was replacing the MkI and the changes to the nightfighters were probably more extensive in the RAF with the Beaufighter being introduced. The Short Sterling entered service in the first half of 1941, I could go on. The point is that there was no excuse for the Luftwaffe to be so poorly prepared.

True but the step from MkI to MkII was not as major as the step from E to F types of the Me 109. Especially the implications on tooling and thus production. But point taken, new types were being introduced all the time by all major airforces. The more interesting data would be how large the pilot output was, something Germany struggled with throughout all the war. No pilots available -> no planes needed.

And poorly prepared for what? Barbarossa was the main offensive in 1941. The German LW had numeric superior in all important branches if you count only non-obsolete types. And they destroyed the majority of the VVS within weeks. So bad that they enjoyed air superiority much longer than the ground forces could keep their advantage. In the west they did fine, too. Things started changing mid 1942, but no 1940-1941 production would've helped with that.

 

[tomo pauk]

...

The losses incured in the other battles were small compared to the BOB. I was just didn't expect the Luftwaffe to grow by such an almost insignificant amount over such a vital 12 month period. To start the Battle for Russia with an airforce of similar size to that which started the BOB was almost criminal negligence. Can you imagine what would have happened if the Luftwaffe had an extra 1000 front line aircraft at the start of the battle for Russia? After all the Me109E may not be as good as an Me109F but would still be very effective against the Russian Airforce.
...

Now why would anyone need an extra 1000 planes to take it on the largest army country in the world*? It's much better to produce another 1000 of heavy AA pieces and 5000 light AAA, having half of million men to man them.
Oh, yeah, the 13 000 (13 thousands) of Luftwaffe's Flak were hitting hard those days (second half of 1940), destroying 4 (four) RAF planes per day

Just felt to say that, sorry for skewing the thread.

*while still at war vs. the Empire where sun never sets

 

[tomo pauk]

True but the step from MkI to MkII was not as major as the step from E to F types of the Me 109. Especially the implications on tooling and thus production. But point taken, new types were being introduced all the time by all major airforces. The more interesting data would be how large the pilot output was, something Germany struggled with throughout all the war. No pilots available -> no planes needed.

What about German allies? Italy, Romania, Hungary, Finland, Slovakia, Baltic states, Balkan sattelites? Even the largest of them, Italy, was in dire need of modern planes - eventually any good ones were those using German engines cannons. Romanians desperately wanted German engines armament for their IARs, but were turned down repeatedly. Fins were stuck with their pre-1940 hardware to 1944...
Then we have countries that would've traded stuff Germany needs for military stuff - Turkey, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, even Japan?
The lack of pilots was another German mistake; Japanese followed the suit.

And poorly prepared for what? Barbarossa was the main offensive in 1941. The German LW had numeric superior in all important branches if you count only non-obsolete types. And they destroyed the majority of the VVS within weeks. So bad that they enjoyed air superiority much longer than the ground forces could keep their advantage. In the west they did fine, too. Things started changing mid 1942, but no 1940-1941 production would've helped with that.

If they were such well prepared, then how come Russians managed to evacuate many of their factories? With more planes in the air, German land forces would've suffered much smaller casualties (250 000 killed, 500 000 wounded 2700 tanks lost within 1st 6 months, data from Wiki).
Since Russians stroke back in 1942 many times (using hardware that was produced in factories that 'escaped' Germans in 1941), I'd say that low production of 1940 1941 backfired to Germans with vengeance.

 

[riacrato]

Germany was egoistic with their hardware, we very well know that. It's a constant in this context, not a variable.

None of the German bombers was able to annihilate factories. Even the Allied 1943-44 campaign, a scale that Germany would've never been able to achieve in 1941, wasn't able to do that. If Germany had had the possibility to evacuate those sites they could've easily done so. Your assumption they would've suffered less losses with more planes is just that, an assumption. Even with the airforce as large as it was they had problems with logistics and field space.

 

[Marcel]

Fair point I admit but the losses in these actions were light compared to expectations and as far as the single engined fighters were concerned the Me109D played a fair part in the battles of Netherlands, Belgium and France. Norway was more or less a battle fought by the twin engined fighters.

Actually the D-version played a minor role in the NL, while there were mainly Bf109E's. I count 13 JG's equiped with BF109E's and only 1 (IV/JG2) equiped with Bf109D.

 

[riacrato]

D played a major role only in Poland and the sitzkrieg, if you can call the latter major.

 

[davebender]

Germany planned the war with Poland after that nation rejected a Danzig plebiscite. Germany did not plan a major war with Britain and France, not even after they drew a line in the sand concering Poland. Nor did Germany anticipate the Soviet Union being so aggressive in the Baltic States, Romania and Yugoslavia.

With the benefit of hindsight Germany should have planned for the worst and switched to total war production during 1939. But you don't get that benefit in the real world.

 

[claidemore]

I don't really care what kind of nazi-conspiracy-theory you see in this statement. It is a matter of fact. German workers worked under normal PEACETIME shifts. Women were not conscripted into factory labour force, as a matter of fact they were not even allowed to work there voluntarily. Factories producing goods irrelevant for war continued to do so. Nutrition, services and essential materials were not rationalized. Working shifts were not dictated by government authorities but individual companies... the fact that war goods were produced has little to do with PEACETIME production.

Most of these measures were in place in Britain long before. But hey it's all nazi revisionism, right?

I apologize if this seems to be getting into the political realm, that is not my intention. I do think that if a term is to be used in needs to be defined, and I believe the term Peacetime production is erroneous in this context.

riacrato: you are labelling a non-TOTAL WAR effort, as PEACETIME. There is a big difference between war, total war, and peacetime.
Germany had in in fact been ramping up for war for many years, the fact that the regime did not see a need to change production once hostilities were engaged, (which hostilities they initiated), simply shows poor logistic planning.
How do you measure PEACETIME production? Was it equal to production in the 1920's? early 1930's? Breaking the Treaty of Versailles was in fact a shift from peacetime to war. Hitler outlined his plans for world domination in 1937, and industrial production had already been built up for war. They saw no need to increase production in 1940, since they had already done so years previous.

The day that the planners said, "oh crap, we're in trouble and need to step up production" is not when war time production started. That simply indicates that the emphasis shifted towards 'total war' production, something which really only Germany and the Soviet Union did. Labelling anything an a scale less than 'total war production' as PEACETIME paints a non-aggressive picture which is simply not accurate.

On another note: It is silly to say that more planes were not produced because there were not enough pilots to fly them. There is still a need for reserves, and a need for newer and better types to replace old ones. I would love to see a single document indicating that production should be relaxed because of a lack of pilots.

 

[davebender]

Just out of curiosity.....
Niall Ferguson provides military spending information for the WWI era.

1913 Defense Spending as a Percentage of Net National Product.
5.1 %. Italy.
5.1 %. Russia.
4.8 %. France.
3.9%. Germany.
3.2%. Austria.
3.2%. Britain.

Does anyone have the same data for 1938 Europe?

 

[zoomar]

I went with the Bf109E, primarily because of its cannon armament and fuel injection, but for all intents and purposes it and the Spit run a dead heat. The A6M was certainly the best carrier fighter (although I'd argue the difference between it and the Wildcat was not as much as is commonly believed). But the A6M was too unbalanced to be in the same class as either the Spit or 109. It was underpowered and achieved its good performance and amazing range by virtue of its extremely light structure and lack of protection. However, one can wonder how the BoB might have come out if, instead of Bf-110's as long range bomber escorts, the Luftwaffe had several hundred Zeros

 

[davebender]

instead of Bf-110's as long range bomber escorts, the Luftwaffe had several hundred Zeros

September 15, 1940.
Document-49: Fighter Command Order of Battle Sept 15th 1940
It appears to me the Luftwaffe had about 90 Me-110 fighter aircraft committed to the BoB on this date. Replacing them with 3 or 4 times as many A6M2s would undoubtedly be an improvement (i.e. several hundred). Replacing the historical 90 x Me-110C fighter aircraft with several hundred Me-110Cs would have a similiar effect.

 

[Shortround6]

"The day that the planners said, "oh crap, we're in trouble and need to step up production" is not when war time production started. That simply indicates that the emphasis shifted towards 'total war' production, something which really only Germany and the Soviet Union did. Labelling anything an a scale less than 'total war production' as PEACETIME paints a non-aggressive picture which is simply not accurate. "

I am not sure how various countries compare on "Peace Time" Vs "War time" production.

For example the Russians may not have had a third shift working at the tank factories in 1938-39 but they managed to build well over 20,000 tanks during the thirties, more than the rest of the world put together and then some. A feat made possible buy the notable lack of truck or car production for a country of it's size. Even tractor manufacture may have been secondary.
How much of Russia's GDP was going to it's Military during the "Peace time" of the late thirties?

Going from Peace time to war time is more than a matter of saying "Oh, crap, time to shift" if you do that it is too late. Adding a second or third shift is easy but for the quantities of war material used in WW II you needed new factories, steel mills, ship yards and so on. You even need to establish priorities in rail traffic and shipping space.
the British "shadow" factories were planned and built before 1939-40 and small groups of experienced workmen were taken from existing factories to act as a core and to train the new workers.
the Americans had 2 years to build completely new factories and still went on to vastly increased the size of their factories and build completely new ones inland in case of bombardment or long range bomber strikes.

Some american car factories didn't convert over to war production, instead they were shuttered and the work force transfered to new, specially built factories more suited to war production. In some cases they used their tooling to make parts under sub-contract. For instance it was estimated that Allison only made about 1/3 of the engine in house. 1/3 was made by Cadillac, Buick and a few other GM divisions and the remaining 1/3 came from over 800 subcontractors.
Maytag washing machine company used their casting facilities to make aluminium castings for Packard Merlins.
that is the difference between peace time production and war production. A country might spend double or triple the amount on weapons in 1938-39 than it did in 1933 but until the civilian goods and services production or usage is stopped or limited in order to further military production you don't really have "war production".
While the US didn't resort to drafting workers into factories I would say it came pretty close to total war production. Underfed, forced labor isn't really going to give the production rates that that better treated workers will. There was also a fair amount of cottage industry going on in the US. Small 2-10 man shops in garages or basements using old machine tools to build parts under sub-contract. My Grandfather worked in a 4 man shop making gyroscope parts under subcontract to Nordon. Much of the machinery was run by over head pulleys and belts. Company owner got gas ration coupons for his Piper Cub to fly the parts out to speed delivery. Shop was located about 1/2 way up the coast of Maine or over 400miles from the Nordon factory. No they didn't fly all the way But the roads were none to good in Maine at the time and the plane helped get the 50-60 miles to a better place to ship from.

 

[parsifal]

Shortround your summation pretty accurately summarises the difficulties facing the German attempts to ramp up their production programs. There are quite a number of factors at work, all of which played their part. Here are some of my thoughts.

Germany prewar had not undertaken a behind the scenes approach to expanding support industries and factories prewar to nearly the same extent that Britain did. That explains why for the same financial outlays the Germans were pushing out 4 times as many aircraft as the british. The British were spending their money prewar getting their factories ready to churn out vast numbers of aircraft that left the Germans for dead in the latter half of 1940. The British were preparing for a long war, the Germans were not, its that simple

Germany just didnt make this decision by mistake. The so called economic myrical attributed to Hitler in his early years, was nothing of the sort. Whilst other countries were busy pouring money into economic reconstruction programs, to repair the damage of the depression over the long term, the germans frittered their resources away on rearmament programs mostly. These did provide economic stimulus of sorts, but it was a short term policy. That and the already parlous state of the German economy at the time, after their defeat in 1918 (or am I wrong on that score as well as numnuts has already suggested....did they really win, achieve all they set out to do, and just go home for this one as well????) meant that despite some inherent economic strength, the German economy leading up to the war was extremely fragile, though the Nazis were good at hiding this. This meant that germany really could not afford a long war......so they devised war making methods and geared their production for short wars. That did not particularly mean they curtailed production, they simply did not invest in the infrastructure as the Allies did. This meant that in the short term production ramped up quickly, but in the mid term meant that room for expansion of production was not there. Not until the shift to toatal war were the Nazis able to put into effect a wartime expansion program, and by then it was too late. Speer was brilliant at what he did, but his methods were brutal, extreme, and found to be illegal in the finish. By artificial pegging of Europes currencies, systematic use of slave labour, deliberate starvation of the occupied territories, the opening of the labour market to women, the adoption of strict austerity measures at home, and of course the thorough overhaul and centralisation of the procurement machine ( but the decentralisation of the manufacturing processes themselves) was Speer able to achieve what he did. In 1939-41 those conditions did not exist, along with the belief that they (the Germans ) could get by without too much more effort, meant they lost three precious years in getting their production working properly

With regard to losses, Murray says that up until the end of 1941, the Germans had lost 15000 aircraft, the equivalent of three air forces. These numbers are more or less supported by Hayward and Ellis. Whilst a significant proportion of those losses were combat related , a significant proportion were not as well. For example, the Germans even during periods of non engagement were losing about 7% per month of their force structure to attrition, that is non-combat related accidents and write offs. This includes a number of airframes damaged in combat but not written off until the end of a quarter. The Germans had a very peculiar way of reporting numberof available aircraft, which is why numnuts can make the reports from German air ministry documents that he does. The Germans would not write off an aircraft that had less than a certain percentage of damage (from memory it was 35%), the aircraft would continue to be listed on the "available" lists, despite there not being even the slightest chance of the aircraft ever flying again. They used similar tricks with their aircraft readiness rates. Hayward, Higham, Murray (I think) and SJ Harris all expose this piece of accounting trickery really well (I believe it was done mostly to deceive Hitler about the state of the LW, but has since been used by countless German apologists and revisionists to justify various points over the years).

7% of 5000 is 350 aircraft per month. If you look at the combat losses and the non-combat losses being sustained by the Luftwaffe in that period, it is not hard to deduce that they could barely keep pace with these losses on the low rates of production they maintained until December 1941

 

[Milosh]

parsifal, it was 60%, not 35%, for a write-off.

 

[VG-33]

The MiG-1 was only at operational test in late '40, and have some trouble, it's more new of a Friederich (-1) that was in fightning from october


edit we can take in consideration the H.75 as escort fighters for BoB time

Why not, at high altitude? With 111 I-200 delivered (92 of MiG-1 type, 19 MiG-3) in 1940, it works for the end of the year (december at least).

The 109 F was pretty good, but carrying 660 litres (455 kg) of fuel on internal as MiG-3 did and a "kolossal" 46 litres, 830 kg engine, i feel it would't keep it's impressive performance. So again, comparing apples and oranges...

Moreover, from my sources the first serial 109F rolled out from assembly lines in november 1940. Then occured tail vibration (aeroelasticity weakness) probmems that were not resolved before 1941. Much more grave than some MiG's Mikuline serial reliability problems. Since it was not due to airframe conception (as onthe 109 F) but mainly manufacturing defaults.

Regards

 

[davebender]

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-3 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
That "kolossal" 830kg engine produced only 1,350 hp. Such a low power to weight ratio is normally a bad thing for a lightweight fighter aircraft like the MiG-3.

 

[VG-33]

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-3 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
That "kolossal" 830kg engine produced only 1,350 hp. Such a low power to weight ratio is normally a bad thing for a lightweight fighter aircraft like the MiG-3.

Should it be 1350, what a jackpot! This is the Take Off power. At nominal 1120 hp at SL, 1200 at 6000m.

It makes a 26 hp/ cubic liter power ratio, for 48 on the Merlin! Despite on that, the MiG-3 at 3350 kg weight reached 505 km/h on SL and 640 (657 km/h with 0.732 gear) at 7600m. More a less the 109G performance in 1940!!! Symptomatical case in soviet union, high level physicists and scientists partly compensated the (hudge) industry backwards.

Some little attempts were made to use overblow, 579 km/h reached at 2220m, 603 @ 3000. Soon stopped in order to save engine TBO for the rest of the trials.

Regards

 

[Colin1]

...high level physicians...

physicists

physician = an old word for family doctor

 

[VG-33]

physicists

physician = an old word for family doctor

corrected!

 

[RCAFson]

With regard to losses, Murray says that up until the end of 1941, the Germans had lost 15000 aircraft, the equivalent of three air forces. These numbers are more or less supported by Hayward and Ellis. Whilst a significant proportion of those losses were combat related , a significant proportion were not as well. For example, the Germans even during periods of non engagement were losing about 7% per month of their force structure to attrition, that is non-combat related accidents and write offs. This includes a number of airframes damaged in combat but not written off until the end of a quarter. The Germans had a very peculiar way of reporting numberof available aircraft, which is why numnuts can make the reports from German air ministry documents that he does. The Germans would not write off an aircraft that had less than a certain percentage of damage (from memory it was 35%), the aircraft would continue to be listed on the "available" lists, despite there not being even the slightest chance of the aircraft ever flying again. They used similar tricks with their aircraft readiness rates. Hayward, Higham, Murray (I think) and SJ Harris all expose this piece of accounting trickery really well (I believe it was done mostly to deceive Hitler about the state of the LW, but has since been used by countless German apologists and revisionists to justify various points over the years).

7% of 5000 is 350 aircraft per month. If you look at the combat losses and the non-combat losses being sustained by the Luftwaffe in that period, it is not hard to deduce that they could barely keep pace with these losses on the low rates of production they maintained until December 1941

German aircraft production:

Total Production
Year 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945 Total
Total 1,928 7,829 9,422 12,822 20,599 35,076 7,052 94,622

German aircraft production during World War II - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Luftwaffe Serviceable aircraft:

Aug 17 1940: 3157

June 24 1941: 3428

Luftwaffe serviceable aircraft strengths (1940?1945) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia