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

[RCAFson]

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.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

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.

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!

 

[parsifal]

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.

 

[stona]

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

 

[wiking85]

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

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.

While the British decided how to react, Pujol played for time. On 18 June it was decided that the double agents would report the damage caused by V-1s fairly accurately and minimise the effect they had on civilian morale. It was also decided that Pujol should avoid giving the times of impacts, and should mostly report on those which occurred in the north west of London, to give the impression to the Germans that they were overshooting the target area.[35]

While Pujol downplayed the extent of V-1 damage, trouble came from Ostro, an Abwehr agent in Lisbon who pretended to have agents reporting from London. He told the Germans that London had been devastated and had been mostly evacuated due to enormous casualties. The Germans could not perform aerial reconnaissance of London, and believed his damage reports in preference to Pujol's. They thought that the Allies would make every effort to destroy the V-1 launch sites in France. They also accepted Ostro's impact reports. Due to Ultra however, the Allies read his messages and adjusted for them.[36]

A certain number of the V-1s fired had been fitted with radio transmitters, which had clearly demonstrated a tendency for the V-1 to fall short. Oberst Max Wachtel, commander of Flak Regiment 155(W), which was responsible for the V-1 offensive, compared the data gathered by the transmitters with the reports obtained through the double agents. He concluded, when faced with the discrepancy between the two sets of data, that there must be a fault with the radio transmitters, as he had been assured that the agents were completely reliable. It was later calculated that if Wachtel had disregarded the agents' reports and relied on the radio data, he would have made the correct adjustments to the V-1's guidance, and casualties might have increased by 50% or more.[37][38]

 

[azador1606]

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.

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?



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?

 

[wiking85]

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

 

[Koopernic]

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.

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.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

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.

 

[RCAFson]

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.

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.

 

[stona]

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

 

[wiking85]

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.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

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

 

[Donivanp]

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.

 

[wiking85]

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.

 

[wiking85]

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.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

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.

 

[Shortround6]

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.

 

[stona]

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

 

[thedab]

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.