The reports are what they are, the problem, as ever, is the conclusions you draw from them, which are sweeping supposedly universal truths extrapolated from a small factoid that ignores absolutely everything else.
Groundhog Thread v. 2.0 - The most important battle of WW2
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Shortround6
Major General
It is and it isn't.
and again please use the correct designations for fuel in technical discussions. There was NO 130 grade fuel, there was 100/130.
the 100 number is the rating wen running lean and the 130 is when running rich.
The German C-3 fuel changed a number of times during the war but they never changed the rating number. Pretty much because they only used the lean number even though the fuel's rich response changed.
Just changing the fuel alone does not change the power of the engine. To use the Merlin as an example on 87 octane it could only use 6lbs of boost, with early 100 octane (British, and their was no 2nd number at this time, ie BOB)allowed 12lbs boost, latter Merlin were slightly strengthened and were allowed 15lbs of boost, with 100/130 fuel they had to strengthen the supercharger drive to keep it from failing when they tried to use 18lbs of boost.
Germans had other problems, they were melting/holing pistons in the DB 605 engines in 1942 using 1.42 ATA (a bit over 6lbs boost). doesn't really matter what kind of fuel you stick in the engine, you need better pistons or improved cooling of the pistons.
The BMW 801 required C-3 fuel to make the required power, the 87 octane wasn't going to give you competitive airplanes. The Germans couldn't make enough C-3 and the DB and Junkers engines didn't get for quite some time except for some DB 601N engines in 1940-41 before the supply crunch hit.
Glider
Captain
We all know one prolific poster on the Ubisoft site who will convince people that the RAF didn't use 100 octane in the BOB, so take care when quoting from that site.
Re - Post 3 :
Toward the end of the war the quality of fuel being used by the German fighters was quite similar to that being used by the allies
A couple of points
1) Germany never had enough high octane fuel for its needs. Did you do the research I suggested over the engines used in late versions of the 109 and 190 and the fuels they need?
2) If the fuel when available was equal to the Allied fuel towards the end of the war, It says something about the rest of the war doesn't it?
Re - Post 4 :
A misconception about octane rating in fuel is that the higher the octane, the better an engine will run.
It certainly gives you the potential. I refer you to the earlier posts which showed that the power of the Merlin increased from 1,030 hp to 1,300 hp when the fuel was changed from 87 to 100 Octane.
You are allowed your own opinion but I am confident that my Octavia would have a higher performance with 195hp instead of the 150hp it currently has.
The German fighters who following you used only low octane fuel,defeated the USAAF at Schweinfurt and BC at the air battle of Berlin .
Would the outcome of the Big Week be different if the Germans had used high octane fuel ?
Bombers tend to cruise at around 200mph - 200mph so fighters don't need the extra performance to catch them, unless your trying to catch a Mosquito.
Would the USAAF have suffered more non combat losses if it did not use high octane ? In the OTL,the USAAF lost 42000 aircraft from non combat causes and a very big part of the operational losses in Europe (which were 38000 aircraft ) were caused by the Flak . Would the Flak have shot more aircraft if these used low octane fuel ?
Probably yes as they would have found it difficult or even impossible to fly at the higher altitudes and the lower you are the more vulnerable you are
That the LW used (when ? ) captured stocks of RAF 100 octane fuel does not mean that the reason was that it was 100 octane fuel .
Towards the end of the BOB the Germans used captured RAF stocks of 100 octane. You can tell as they had a marker by the fuel caps to indicate that only 100 octane fuel should be used. I think it was a red triangle.
The German fighters ,using low octane fuel,defeated allied bombers , and, as that was their main mission ( the fate of allied fighters was secondary ,as was the fate of German fighters in 1940/1941 ), is the correct conclusion not that the use of high octane fuel was not a force multiplier,not a game changer, and that the LW would also be defeated if it had used high octane fuel ?
buffnut453
Captain
How did the LW fighters defeat Allied bombers? I thought we won the war? Am I mistaken?
After 80 years, a lot of people are still talking about the loss of the ''Battle '' of the Atlantic, but no one has been able to say what was the loss of the ''Battle ''of the Atlantic and when, how this ''Battle '' would be lost : would he be lost if 50 % of the supplies that were transported,were lost ? Or 60 % ,or 40 % ? Etc.
And,it is questionable to say that the election of Lindbergh would result in the loss of the ''Battle '' of the Atlantic : his election could mean that there was no longer a ''Battle " of the Atlantic .
Much to importance is still been given to the role of the U Boats and the losses by U Boats .
In 1940 there were less than 20 operational U Boats and 2,3 million ton of MV was lost .
In 1941 there were mostly more than 40 operational U Boats and the losses were 2,2 million GRT .
It is the same for bombers : more bombers does not mean that more bombs were dropped on the targets .
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See post 1506 .
We have seen it, give us a moment, we're still laughing.
swampyankee
Chief Master Sergeant
- 4,030
- Jun 25, 2013
People are talking about the ramifications of the hypothetical loss of the Battle of the Atlantic. In any case, had Lindbergh (or someone else of that ilk) been elected, there would still have been a Battle of the Atlantic as its existence depended only on actions by the then-belligerent powers.
One thing to remember is that British actions, such as convoy, significantly reduced the effectiveness of U-boats (and Italian submarines in the Atlantic); the RN had dealt with a U-boat campaign a few years earlier, and found convoy to be quite effective[1]. A second to remember is that the Battle of the Atlantic involved more axis powers than Germany.
GrauGeist
Generalfeldmarschall zur Luftschiff Abteilung
Not sure where you're getting your numbers from, but the Kreigsmarine had far more than 20 operational U-Boats in 1940 and so on.
You may be misreading their operational status, which showed about 40 at sea when WWII staryed on 1 September 1939.
There was a slight lull by Christmas '39 where most boats were in port, but their numbers (put to sea) started increasing during winter/spring of '40, reaching about 35 at sea by April.
Then by Spring of 1941, their numbers at sea did not drop under 40 deployed until 29 April 1945.
It should also be noted that the U-Boat numbers deployed at sea do not include the Coastal type U-Boats, as they were not sea-going.
As far as tonnage is concerned, the U-Boats accounted for:
1939 (Sept - Dec): 0.6 million tons
1940: 2.3 million tons
1941: 2.2 million tons
1942: 5.8 million tons
1943: 2.3 million tons
1944: 0.6 million tons
1945 (Jan - Apr) 0.2 million tons
This totals 14 million tons.
That is a tremendous amount of valuable shipping lost.
To put tonnage in perspective, the IJN Yamato, one of the world's largest warships, weighed 71,660 tons (fully loaded, battle ready).
That's a.considerable amount of food, clothing, vehicles, ammunition, fuel, aircraft, raw materials and humans that were lost...
Glider
Captain
I certainly agree that this is only my opinion, but here is my stab at a definition.
The Battle of the Atlantic would be lost if the UK were not able to import sufficient material to feed the nation and supply the raw materials to build equipment to support the war effort.
The battle of the Atlantic would be lost if it forced the UK to give up due to fuel and material and food shortages, Churchill faced two confidence motions in 1942 and the battle of the Atlantic was part of the debate Churchill said on July 2nd "At the same time, in spite of our losses in Asia, in spite of our defeats in Libya, in spite of the increased sinkings off the American coast, I affirm with confidence that the general strength and prospects of the United Nations have greatly improved since the turn of the year, when I last visited the President in the United States."
I have never seen any discussion of the Battle of the Atlantic that only mentioned U Boat numbers and U boat sinkings, have you? All the discussion I have read involved many topics, like u boat numbers, u boat production, allied action to prevent U boat production and to sink u boats. There is code breaking, the entry of USA in the war, closing the "Atlantic gap" centimetric RADAR, advances in SONAR, hedgehog and other devices and counter devices like schnorkel and Metox receivers. Then there were the surface raiders and actions against surface raiders. The only thing that is the same for bombers is that you want to boil everything down to a statement of a few words to cover everything. Here is Wiki, a place to start Battle of the Atlantic - Wikipedia
14 million ton lost in more than 5 years is a lot , but compared to what arrived in Britain and to the importance of what arrived in Britain, it was not that much .Much more than 14 million ton arrived in Britain during the war .
About the losses of the MV (Source : U Boat net ) : 561 MV were lost in 1940,and 501 in 1941,which is 10 a week,while on the average every week more than 40 U Boats were sailing in the Atlantic . This means that an U Boat had a chance of 0,25 % to sink a MV every week and that most U Boats never sunk a MV .
The U Boats sunk 2,3 million ton in 1943,while there were in March 1943 400 U Boats ,of which 182 were stationed in the Atlantic ( Source : Hitler,s War P 190 ,by Magenheimer ) who sunk weekly 40000 ton .
And there were no 182 U Boats in the Atlantic in 1940/1941 , which proves my point that more U Boats does not result in more sinkings of MV, but maybe in more losses of U Boats .
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
Am I the only one who has the advertisement for the Groundhog Day movie popping up every time I visit this thread?
You forget "CHANCE '
Most convoys were not attacked because they were not detected and most convoys who were detected,were detected by chance .
And, I see that you are falling in the code breaking trap .
Other point : do you have an idea of how much fuel,material an d food Britain needed and how much of it was transported by sea,was arriving in Britain, and why ?
The transport losses had only a minor importance in what arrived in Britain : what arrived in Britain was mainly determined by the amount of goods that was going to Britain and on this,the U Boats had no influence at all .
If I put 14 million tons of goods and 3,500 ships in your back yard how long will it take for you to clear it up? What is the "code breaking trap" another one of your madcap fact free revelations?
Shortround6
Major General
Some people believed that the Battle of the Atlantic could be lost if the Germans could sink more shipping (tonnage) than the allies could replace. If the Germans could consistently do this the Britain, if it did not starve, could not be used as a forward base/jumping off point. The amount of cargo moved would decline over time. There already was a world wide shipping shortage and sometimes operations in the Pacific had to planned around operations in the Med or Europe as there was not enough shipping to supply both at the same time.
The Germans did achieve this level for two months I believe, But for various reasons could not keep it up. however without a Crystal ball there was no way to predict the future and the allocation of resources to fight the U-Boats had to be made accordingly. If you are loosing ships faster than you can build them you can't wave a and and say, this is just a passing exception. If we ignore it everything will return to normal.
Building ships faster than your opponent can sink them might be OK in the strategic sense but that tis an awful lot of cargo and an awful lot of sailors lost in the "tactical" view.
The Germans did achieve this level for two months I believe, But for various reasons could not keep it up. however without a Crystal ball there was no way to predict the future and the allocation of resources to fight the U-Boats had to be made accordingly. If you are loosing ships faster than you can build them you can't wave a and and say, this is just a passing exception. If we ignore it everything will return to normal.
Building ships faster than your opponent can sink them might be OK in the strategic sense but that tis an awful lot of cargo and an awful lot of sailors lost in the "tactical" view.
Building ships faster was another technological challenge, development of SAW welding and solving the problems of brittle fracture was part of the "arms race" the place that did my examinations the British welding institute grew out of that on this side of the Atlantic while the Battelle institute in USA did the same.
It is a "what if" but if the Germans had got lucky or just were a bit better and the allies a bit worse resulting in all ships of one or two convoys being sunk, the politics of it all may have changed drastically, would more convoys be mounted?
buffnut453
Captain
The problem is quantifying those things. For example, the materiel supplies from America could have been entirely cut off and yet Britain could have continued to fight. Yes, the scale of the war effort would have been reduced. Hence "support the war effort" is hard to define in terms of an absolute win/loss criteria.
The "feed the nation" is perhaps a better measure, although it would take some detailed knowledge to work out what the threshold would be. As it was, despite rationing, the actual health of the British population appears to have increased during WW2. Certainly child mortality rates dropped during the war years. To make this criteria measurable, we'd need to define what "starvation level" meant in terms of feeding the British population, and then determining how close the nation came to it with and without food coming across the Atlantic.
GrauGeist
Generalfeldmarschall zur Luftschiff Abteilung
Many (not "most) convoys made it through intact becaise the Atlantic is a large place.
Perhaps a few convoys were detected by "chance", but the German Navy and Air force were conducting specific search patterns. This is not called "chance", but "deliberate".
This statement: "And, I see that you are falling in the code breaking trap" appears to come from deep within the conspiracy zone - yes the German Enigma code was broken.
And this is a fascinating comment:
"what arrived in Britain was mainly determined by the amount of goods that was going to Britain".
This part, however, appears to be the remark of a person who desires that history changes to their liking and/or refuses to accept the historical truth:
"the U Boats had no influence at all"
