plan_D said:
Jesus christ, this is going to be a lot to answer.
Evan, I meant a flying wing that would have worked effectively. That US one wasn't going to be very effective, was it? The Go-229 is globally recognised (except with RG) as being an excellent design that could have cut up bomber formations along with fighters, with ease. It was far beyond anything else the world had.
This is not true. The same instablity problems found in US flying wing designs, involving the same engineers who worked on the Go-229, would have cropped up for the G-229. Flying wings were not very feasible until fly-by-wire technology came into existance. This does not mean they could not fly, but their usefullness in combat is questionable given lateral stability and center of balance issues.
plan_D said:
I also knew about the American jets from the early '40s. They were far advanced and for all of about 3 months had the most powerful jet engine in the world, even surpassing British designs. Although, we all know the Jet engine was a credit to the British in the first place. November 1941 the worlds most powerful engine, the Rolls Royce Nene engine at 5000 lbs thrust was produced. Nothing matched that for years to come, and it was used in the MiG-15.
I'm glad someone can see sense. I never said that the US was far behind in technology. They got hold of a lot of ideas and pumped a lot of money into them, that's what America could/can do with idea and nearly always get it to work. You'll probably find that most of the research teams in the US had A) British scientists B) German Jews C) British notes or D) All of the above. The Manhattan Project is proof of that.
Yes there were many European scientists involved in the Manhattan project. However, of the key scientists in the project, only two were actually German's who'd fled the Nazis, James Franck and Rudolph Peierls, and three more who'd fled German control, Leo Szilard (Hungarian), Edward Teller (Austria-Hungarian), Otto Frisch (Austrian).
Albert Einstien (German) was living in the USA (California) since before Nazi's came to power in 1933 and officially immigrated in 1934. Paul Wigner (Hungarian) - immigrated to USA in 1930 and John von Neumann (Hungarian) in 1929.
Robert Oppenheimer, David Bohm, Arthur Compton, Ernest Lawrence,
Eric Jette, and many other Americans were also involved, as well as many British and a few French, Irish, and even New Zealand scientists. Of all the team, probably Robert Oppenhiemer was the most significant, followed closely by Leo Szilard.
To argue that "German" scientists were the key to the Manahattan project is silly - if anything it would be legitimate to say that Hungarian Jewish scientists were key to the project, but they arn't Germans! No actual German (or Austrian) born scientist was crutial to the project.
However, this all misses the point I'm trying to make. Without the base technologies available in the USA, it would have been nearly impossible to actually develop the Atomic bomb.
Here's a very telling comment on the status of the German A-Bomb:
Towards the end of World War II, many of Germany's nuclear scientists were captured and brought to Farm Hall in England. Recently declassified documents suggest that under a wiretapped environment, much was learned about the German's effort to build the bomb, including new evidence that Heisenberg tried his hardest to develop nuclear weapons and failed. The largest piece of evidence was that Heisenberg had miscalculated the critical mass needed to achieve an atomic bomb, and thus still believed that tons of U-235 was necessary to create the bomb. When hearing from Farm Hall the news of a fission bomb being dropped in Hiroshima,
Heisenberg was quoted as saying "Some dilettante in America who knows very little about it has bluffed them. I don't believe it has anything to do with uranium." [4] Among other things, the Farm Hall transcripts establish that the Germans on August 6, 1945 did not believe the Allies had exploded an atomic bomb over Hiroshima that day;
they never succeeded in constructing a self-sustaining nuclear reactor; they were confused by the differences between an atomic bomb and a reactor; they did not know how to correctly calculate the critical mass of a bomb; and they thought plutonium was probably element 91.
http://www.eas.asu.edu/~holbert/eee460/anv/Why the Germans Failed.html
plan_D said:
RG, how is the RADAR comment wrong? Don't bring the British into this, it's German technology against US technology pure and simple. I've already said in the past that Britain advanced beyond Germany in the RADAR war. Although it did take the capture of the RADAR at Bruneval to get that far.
And it took the US until 1943, and I'm sure British notes, to get beyond Germany. Not until late in the war, when Germany was dying did the US get the upper hand.
The USA started {wartime development} later than Britian and Germany. The main radar program was already quite advanced before that point, and even thougn the USA was not putting much focus on it US radar technology was every bit as good as British radar technology in 1940.
You seem to think it was a one way street, with technology flowing only from Britain to the USA. This is hardly the case. Arthur Samual of Bell labs made critical contributions to British and US long band radar in the mid 30's through his invention of the high-frequancy triod vacuum tube. This technology was shared with the British and was key to most of their early (Battle of Britain) radar systems. While the British did discover/create the magnetron, the USA discovered/created the much more significant "klystron" (Sigurd and Russell Varian at Stanford University). Again the US invention was shared with the British, allowing Randel and Boot created the "cavity magnetron", largly by accident in their research on detection of microwaves.
The fact is the British did not "give their radar technology to the USA" as you claim. Instead, they turned to the USA for help in developing it, under the recommendations of Sir Henry Tizard after he'd heard there were many American scientists who wanted to help defeat Hitler. In 1940 he got the go-ahead from Churchill and in Sept. they shared the cavity magnetron with the US scientists at "Rad-Lab" (MIT). All core short wave radar technology advances for both the British and the US came out of Rad-Lab, which mostly involved American scientists but was fully shared. By 1942, the USA was far ahead of anyone in radar technology, with the introduction of the Centimetric ASV system developed for ASW purposes. By the end of 1942 the USA was far ahead.
In the meantime, Bell labs had continued the development of long-wave and short-wave radars, almost totally independant of British "help", and by 1942 these too were "best in the world", for USN use. In Oct. 1942 the Mk. 8 Fire Control radar system was in production by Western Electric.
So you're implication that the British were essential to US radar research and development is clearly not the case. The klystron was the the key component, and this was American technology shared with the British. The "cavity magetron" had already been invented by Aurthor Samual of Bell labs years before but the British generally get the credit because they "contributed" it to the Rad-Lab team first. Had the US formed the Rad-Lab w/o the British as team members, this invention would still have been present and US radar technology would have proceeded just fine, but British radar technology would not have.
Once the USA focused its attention on radar, it was only going to take it about 18 months to take the lead because the USA was the only nation to have the indsutrial and scientific base to support its rapid development.
plan_D said:
If it's a waste of resources, why was America trying so badly to achieve a crediable rocket design? And failing, might I add. If this is a technology debate then why bring in resources? If the US had got the V-2, then you wouldn't say "It's a waste of resources". It's like if the US built the Tiger, no one would say it was complicated to build because Americas economy would still be able to churn out thousands.
America only became interested in long range missiles when it had nuclear weapons to deliver with such weapons. In WWII, the USA was not very interested in such technologies for winning WWII. The USA only became interested in the V1 when they started considering using it to deliver nerve gas and antrhax on Japan. As a conventional delivery system, it was just beyond even US technology to develop such a weapon in time for WWII, and the US knew it.
If the USA could have built a tank like the Tiger in numbers, sure. But that is not really the argument. The argument is would the US slow production of the Sherman to produce a small number of tanks like the Tiger, and the answer to that is a resounding no. The Pershing was produced in parallel to the Sherman.
You are the one trying to turn this into a "technology debate". My position all along has been that the Nazi's wasted resources pursuing non-viable technologies and this hurt their overall war effort.
plan_D said:
Techonlogically, the Germans were far advanced than anyone in rocket design. So much so that Von Braun, technology director of the Nazi party and member of the SS, had his past erased taken to America to design their rockets that led to ICBMs and Saturn-5, carrying US astronauts to the moon on the Apollo-11 mission. Remember the 1964 interview with Von Braun where they asked him if he truly thought it possible to reach the moon? Hard to believe he had a black SS uniform.
Not really. I've read Von Braun's autobiography and a couple of other bio's on him. He was a member of the Nazi party but was pretty clearly non-political. He just loved rockets and found someone who'd fund his play.
I agree, the Germans were far ahead in liquid fueled rocket technology. So what? It was not viable as a weapons delivery system in WWII. The only way the German's could have made this technology effective would have been to deliver nerve gas with it. Had they done so, within 72 hours Germany would have been a ghost land.
plan_D said:
You had no idea? That's unfortunate. Go ask whoever you are about tanks about the 'Sperber' unit - consisting of Five Panther Ausf Gs and supporting infantry equipped with night vision equipment that saw combat just after the Bulge.
Again, so what. Even before that US radar systems were advanced enough to see specific targets on the ground, and this was used in the ETO, though it was more used in the PTO.
plan_D said:
There's no probably about it. They were far advanced in missile stablisers. More importantly shipboard firing systems? No, not more importantly. The Germans fire-control systems on the Bismarck were more than adequete, it says a lot when a rookie crew manages to sink the Flagship of the Royal Navy.
Who were also "rookies". But really, are you seriously comparing the Bismark to its American counterparts? The USS North Carolina would have slaughtered the Bismark even though the Bismark outweighed her. After 1943, the North Carolina could have gone up against the Bismark and the Tirpitz and it would easily have sunk them both.
plan_D said:
That's funny, when the Germans designed the Go-229. And that the Americans used German scientists on designing planes after the war because of ideas such as swept back wings. I should just add helicopters in here seeing as they were more advanced in that area too. And the 50s, Anton Flettner was working for the US in designing helicopters...
Again, I've never said that Germany didn't have good scientists and engineers. You keep missing the point which is that German industrial science - the base which limits all else, was not nearly as advanced in Germany as it was in the USA. They could design things, but they could not produce them.
And what makes you think the German's were more advanced in Helicoptor technology in WWII? Both the USA and Germany had choppers flying in WWII, but the US choppers were more advanced. The German Flettner FL 282 Kolibri (32 produced through the whole of WWII) was clearly inferior to US designs:
Flettner FL 282 Kolibri
The Fa-223 Drache (~20 built) was much better, and had some advantages, but again I really don't think you can call it "more advanced"
Fa-223 Drache
The Sikorsky R-4, R-5, and R-6 were "state of the art" in helecopter design.
Sikorsky R-4
First unit delivered Oct. 16, 1943. At least 130 were produced during WWII, 35 going to the USAAF, 20 to the USN, and 45 to the RAF and RNAS, and the rest to the US Coast Gaurd.
http://home.att.net/~ww2aviation/USNair.html
Sikorsky R-5
This model was flying in 1943 but did not see combat related action.
Sikorsky R-6
The R-6 was the first helicopter to see action with the USAAF in May 1945. It also saw action with the USN and the by British. 225 produced in 1944 and 1945.
plan_D said:
The -262 still carried the technology. If the war had carried on to allow the P-80, then the Go-229 would have been in the sky too.
And they still wouldn't have been able to make engines for them.
plan_D said:
That was some raw Yank arrogance there, thank you. Made me laugh. Did you just forget that it was a World War and that it wasn't just the Americans fighting the Germans and Japanese? All those British, Canadian, Indian, Russian, Ukrainian, New Zealand, Australian, French, Belgian, African, Indonesian, Malayan, Burmese etc. etc laid down their lives to fight Germany and Japan, and you forget them all?
How did the Americans beat the Germans anyway? By swamping them, that's how. In fact, that's why they were beaten by being out-numbered. I have a lot of respect for ALL those on the ground that fought but lets face it, the Germans were superior in tactics and training - on top of their unbreakable spirit. They lost but took on the world for 6 years.
If they'd have been half as good as you think they'd have won WWII. Their spirt was no stronger than anyone elses. In fact, if someone is to be given recongition for "unbreakable spirt", I'd say it would have to be the Brits, not the Germans.
plan_D said:
German jets a waste of resources? Of course, these -262s didn't shoot down over 300 heavies in a few months or anything. They would have badly hurt the Allied bombing campaign if they came in earlier. What you don't realise is that the technology was there, it was flying but there were also 10 million Soviets running straight towards Germany, as well as the 2 million + Western Allies. Germany was dying, it's resources were not being eaten away by super weapons...they were being captured. If the -262 would have been left behind and -190s given priority, you think the out-come would change? We're talking technology, not war situation.
As I've shown before, total Jet kills were under 300, including fighters.
You are talking about "end technology". The whole point I'm making is that the end technology (jets for example) is totally limited by the base technology (alloys and machine capabilities). Germany had topped out around 1943, beyond that point it took tremendous effort and resources to make minimal ground. The USA still had not topped out in 1945 and had already caught or passed the German's in every area they attempted to do so.
plan_D said:
The Go-229 was far beyond anything else in the world. One of the prototypes crashed, yes. A lot of experimental aircraft have crashed - the US F-104 was crashing even when it was in service - that doesn't make it a bad design. It probably would have taken until 1946 to perfect the design but the Go-229 was being built and luckily for the Allies - US troops overran the factory to discover these things in production.
No, "One of the prototypes" did not crash - THE ONLY PROTOTYPE CRASHED! They rushed it into production anyway. Anything about the Go-229 is pure speculation, we just don't know if this plane would have been sucessful or not. But one thing we do know - the German's lacked the industrial technology to produce viable engines, and without these the Go-229 is useless.
plan_D said:
And exactly how many P-80s were within 1000 miles of Berlin in May 1945?
Four. Two in Italy and two in England.
plan_D said:
Using $50,000 to kill civilians could be seen as silly. And I didn't say 200 miles
I said 125 miles, and it was 400 metres...they got lucky, it still happened.
Well, I sure cannot find anything to document that. Can you provide a reference?
It does not matter though - the accuracy was an 11 mile radius from the target point. It would still be horribly inaccuate at 125 miles, perhaps an 8 mile radius.
plan_D said:
Fear is an effective weapon in war, everyone knows that. The V-2 was pointless in 1944 when it finally was allowed to exist. Von Braun wasn't supposed to be researching it at all, if given full funding it would have been there in 1942. Launching at Britain in 1942...I think that might have changed the war, and then launching at Stalingrad...technology put to good use.
Again, wild speculation. There is no solid evidence that had the project recieved "full funding" that it would have generated a working V2 by 1942. Often research can only progress so fast regaurdless of the level of funding, expecially for new fields like liquid rocket research. But even if it had been completed in lets say, mid-1942, it still would have been delivering a 1 ton warhead into an 108 square mile area and would have been ineffective for anything but trying to scare the enemy.
And for every V2 you can scratch off one German fighter, two V2's you can scratch one Panther or Tiger tank, for every three V1's a Henkel Bomber, etc.... And 25% of those V2's blew up before reaching the target!
plan_D said:
And then another 2 years for perfection and the A-10 ICBM launching at New York if the US got involved. German techonological supremecy...yes, of course.
And their industry would still have been in tatters.
Hmmm... given the state of their guidance systems... being generous and assuming a linear relationship between distance and accuracy... an A-10 fired at NYC would land somwhere within a 220 mile radius. Half of them would fall in the sea. The other half would be landing randomly anywhere from Maine to South Carolina. That'd be effective!
Besides, I doubt Germany could actually build the A-10. They were at the summit of their industrial capability to build the V2, materials failures and other issues would probably have made this project so difficult that it would have taken them another 10 years to accomplish it, if they focused resources on developing the base technologies to overcome the problems they encountered.
But lets say they had done so, and started hitting NYC and Washington in 1945. This would mean that Germany would not have been doing quite so badly in 1944, and the B-29 would have been deployed to Europe, and then Germany would have been in total ruins by 1945 in any case. If they had then started firing "vengance" weapons on the US civilian population, the USA would have started bombing with the intent of killing as many civilians as possible. In a month or two there'd have been nothing left. And this assumes the USA didn't drop Anthrax on them (as Churchill wanted to do in 1944 and which was totally possible by the end of that year but was veto'd by FDR).
plan_D said:
The Germans started in 1937, the British in 1935. And don't give me that crap that America started after Germany seeing as it was using British scientists and notes from 1935.
I assume your back to the Radar topic. I've already covered this. US radar technology was not nearly so dependant on British "notes and scientists" as you seem to think.
plan_D said:
If Germany didn't have any clue about nuclear weapons, why did Britain even bother blowing their plant up. Next you'll be saying US stealth technology is pure American technology...
Because the British conducting the raid didn't know the status of the German nuclear program. It was better to destroy the facility just in case they were further along that believed. Those high enough up in the Manhattan project to understand just how far behind the German's really were were not communicating any information down the chain.
plan_D said:
You still failed to mention the gryo-stabilisers on American tanks, that no one else had. (Although the 'Schmal' turret being designed for the Panther F had one) Or the worlds first computer sighted AA gun by the US...but oh well....
Tanks are not my thing. I've read a bit about the gyro stabalizers, but I'm not really convinced they were "cutting edge" technology.
Again you miss the point. It is not the end-product that determines a nations techology standing, it's the base technology available to draw on, and the USA stood far beyond Germany in this respect so its end-product developers could go further before hitting the technology cieling.
=S=
Lunatic