Luftwaffe vs. IJA

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One vs one, LW fighters have a substantial lead in performance historically. In 1940, the 109E (350 mph) is ahead of early Zero (320-330 mph), the 109F1/F2 is at ~620 km/h (plus 10-15 km/h when over-revving the DB 601N at 2800 rpm), with 109F4 to extend this performance over 30 minutes vs. 3 min only with 109F1/F2.
The Fw-190, assumed it is ready to be deployed and used that much away from tidy bases, will bring another performance boost vs. the Japanese, something like what Marine Corsairs and USAF Lightnings were providing, but without the legs and without P-38-intristic problems; ditto the Bf-109G2 and fully rated Bf-109F4.
 
That's my point, the Condor Legion devised tactics to deal with the enemy and had excellent, experienced pilots with much superior equipment as of 1939, so when they show up in China they would have all that going for them.
 
There is little doubt that the Luftwaffe planes/pilots in 1939-42 could handle the Japanese planes/pilots (Army or Navy) on a one for one basis or even on a squadron to squadron basis. The question starts to become one of if the Germans could sustain a big enough effort inside China to make practical difference in the war. The Japanese had 27 divisions in China at the start of WW II (1941?) from the American perspective. The Chinese army was almost 10 times that size by division count but many of it's divisions were woefully under strength and ill equipped.
The Chinese infrastructure had few railroads. Few, if any, paved roads outside of cities and rather restricted river traffic, at least the type of boats/barges that could deal with Vehicles, artillery and the like.

A "China Legion" might be able to help defend one major city or province.
 
necessity is the mother of invention. the LW may and probably would have had a whole different criteria for ac specs were it facing japan. the 190 may not have even been put into production. the 109 may have been drasticly modified or even phased out. you may have seen heinkels as the main ac or complete different MEs or FWs.
 
Germany in my opinion had the advantage over both the IJAF and the IJN. The Me109e was a clear advantage over the Japanese fighters. The A6M2 was only built in very small numbers I think it was about 100 in 1940 so in practical terms it should be considered to be a 1941 fighter in which case the 109F still held the advantage. Of course in 1941 the Fw190 entered service cementing the advantage.
Japanese bombers were very vulnerable and German fighters were well armed with cannon.
The Me110 would come into its own as a strike aircraft having a good speed advantage over Japanese fighters and the Me410 would be very, very, effective.

On the ground the German army was well equipped to deal with the Japanese Army, only at sea was there a serious risk to German dominance. Even here the IJN were very poorly equipped for anti sub warfare and the German Navy were very good at submarine warfare so on balance I would edge it to the German fleet.
 
The Germans may have had a much better submarine force, but how many of those submarines had enough range to perform a useful patrol in Japanese waters ?

Transporting to Condor legion to Spain was what ? Less than 1000 miles by sea.
Transporting arms to China, how many miles ? 10,000 ?

It was a tremendous strain on the USA to supply China, and we're at about half that distance.
Germany did a poor job supplying it's troops in Russia, Africa. Where ever German troops went they lacked logistics.

And now nobody sees any problem with Germany supplying troops half a world away.

And Germany is going to make money doing this ?
 
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There was actually a joint combat simulation among Ki-43, Ki-44, A6M2 and He100-D in January, 1941.
A6M2 was a winner. Wiki says He100-D was superior to Me109. If so, Me109 could have been a loser.
 

The Germans had a total of 22 MK IX ocean going U-boats in Service by the end of 1940, not including losses. Germans were no great shakes at anti sub warfare even if they were good at submarine warfare. Japanese troubles with submarine warfare were pretty much doctrine/tactics and not equipment. The German surface ships were, for the most part (there were exceptions) short ranged and unreliable. Even with tankers and/or friendly harbors (refuel/replenish, not repair) the idea that the Germans could have gotten more than a handful of surface combat ships to Asian waters in condition to actually engage in combat is pretty far fetched. and then they are rather badly out numbered.
 
Since Germany is not at war in this scenario, where are all these hoardes of experienced pilots coming from? Did Germany start ramping up their wartime production just to go to China to fight?

And saying that Stalin would just let a massive army and supply-line snake across his country is ridiculous. Not only is Stalin dangerously paranoid, but that is asking a tremendous amount of trust on behalf of Hitler, who was dellusional beyond beleif. Also, how well would Germany be able to move this tremendous amount of equipment all the way over to China during winter and spring? They couldn't even move equipment on the road to Stalingrad.

Also saying that the Japanese were ill equipped to deal with submarine warfare is not close to correct. The Japanese were extremely adept with submarine warfare and the German surface fleet would be in serious trouble if they attempted to engage the Japanese navy. The U.S. navy and Allied elements weren't able to defeat the Japanese navy because the Japanese navy was ill equipped or poor performers, but because of tactical errors and a "great showdown" ideaology. Add to that the overwhelming amount of assets the U.S. pumped into the theater and the end was inevitable. On the other side of the world, the Kreigsmarine wasn't known for their tactical prowess, either. Far too many blunders wasted a good fleet and the growing weight of numbers from the Royal Navy, the U.S. Navy (and Allied elements) was just too much for the Germans in the end.
 

As you know the early DB601s didn't need a good supercharger because they didn't rely on supercharging to increase engine power, the superchargers job was almost purely altitude compensation. Daimler Benz pulled every trick In the book to extract maximum power and economy from the engine via high compression ratio's of around 7.0:1.0 to 7.5:1.0 (latter even 8.5:1) while every other engine was around 6.0:1.0 and 6.5:1.0

Since the superchargers wasn't being used to over boost the engine it had plenty of reserve for compensating the altitude of the engine.

The DB601 also had a form of construction in which the cylinder liners were used as a giant hollow bolt that was threaded to attach the integral head/cylinder block to the crankcase. Since space for the 4 usual bolt holes were not needed it had thinner cylinder walls and higher swept volume in the same sized engine and could thus process the same mass of air without compressing it.

The trick that DB used was direct multipoint fuel injection which allowed large valve overlaps that scavenged the engine thereby getting rid of end gasses and hot spots that caused pre ignition. (if not done properly direct injection can lead to carbon deposits on the cylinder). Fuel injection seems to have added about 10% over the DB600.

When the DB601N was introduced on the Me 109E4/N and Me 109E7/N towards the end of the Battle of Britain in 1940 it used early C3 fuel (about 93/110) and it was noted that the supercharger was inadequate so latter DB601N improved the supercharger. Daimler Benz continued to improve supercharger fluid dynamics throughout the war but it became more critical as higher performance C3 fuel (96/125 and likely 100/130) became available as well as Water Injection allowed increased over boost.

No doubt the Japanese Naval aircraft and Army aircraft (to a lessor extent) had extremely impressive ranges which were obtained predominantly by cutting back on armour and self sealing fuel tanks. However the Me 109 range limitations need to be considered in context.

Range of an Me 109E4 was about 410 miles at maximum cruise inclusive of climb and reserves. Slow the aircraft to economical cruise and the range goes up to around 1100km (650 miles). Add a 300L drop tank to supplement the 400L internal fuel the ranges are about 650 miles and 1000 miles respectively.

Me 109's also seem to be able to cruise at speeds almost as fast as Japanese maximum speeds: this is what was essential in the European context. The Me 109 like the Spitfire was designed to intercept an enemy aircraft that might have risen from an airfield only a few dozen kilometres away.

Note, I believe the DB601Aa (a for ausland (foreign export) had a different supercharger ratio setup that gave a lower FTH) they were used on Luftwaffe aircraft nevertheless.
 
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How Germans saw Japanese Navy and how Japanese saw German Navy circa 1940.
Here is an insight.

Article of Weekly Photos 165th issue written by Photography Association of Japan in 1941 introduces several German local magazines with this caption: "Germany has been obstructed its possession of naval power as thoroughly as possible since the 1st World War was over. It is no surprise that they see our navy with their absolute trust and are glad to introduce our photos in local magazines repeatedly".

I don't think they were confident with their naval power.

 
What about airfields? How many airfields would have been able to accommodate large, long-range transport aircraft? The likes of converted Fw-200s and, slightly later, Ju 252s would be very useful, albeit more costly for fuel used and unlikely practical to supplant land/sea supply routes. (perhaps enough to fill the gaps for whatever materials/resources/personnel were least possible to move on the ground or at sea)



GrauGeist said:
Since Germany is not at war in this scenario, where are all these hoardes of experienced pilots coming from? Did Germany start ramping up their wartime production just to go to China to fight?
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Most of Germany's most skilled/experienced early-war pilots were already around in 1939. We're basically talking starting with the same sort of personnel and equipment that Germany had online just before invading Poland.

No Hitler, possibly not a Nazi government as we know it at all.


That said, managing supply routes through British/French (possibly some Dutch) held territories might be more practical, especially if they weren't sending equipped troops, but unequipped personnel with military equipment being sold to China separately and the supplemental forces being equipped once they reached Chinese soil.





They also may have cut back funding for new designs without the war in Europe pushing the need, but indeed shifting the targets for what needs they did have (for both home defense if hostilities should flare up and for actions in China). The He 100 and Fw 187 were already there in development pre-war as were Heinkel's Jets (though not really relevant for action in China). Some cuts to designs originally made to focus on volume production in war-time may have been kept in development though, like the DB-603, Ju 252, Fw 206, and re-evaluating the merits of the He 100 and Fw 187 against the competition in service or to supplement existing designs. (the Bf 110 did have advantages over the 187 and ones that might have proven much more useful against Japan than they had against Britain)

The Fw 190 may have totally supplanted the Bf 109 and perhaps led to the He 100 being dropped as well. The combination of utility, performance, adaptability, and good flying characteristics (reducing losses due to training and operational accidents would be a huge deal) could make an array of Fw 190 derived aircraft the standard multi-role single engine fighter/fighter-bomber in Germany.

I overlooked it before, but if range was seriously considered during the initial design phase, the early small wing might have been replaced by a wing with more attention given to fuel storage capacity and be even more useful than the suggestions for swapping some of the gun bays for fuel tanks.

The DB 605 also might not have been developed and, instead just followon designs more closely based on the 601E. (perhaps with the 603 supercharger and/or WM/50)

The He 177 and Ju 290 projects may have been canceled entirely in favor of more cost-conscious modifications to the Fw 200 for long range patrol and transport duties, and the Do 217 possibly retained as the front line 'heavy' bomber along with the Do 215, Do 17, Ju 88, and He 111. The He 111 might have been more efficiently used for maratime patrol as well, with better coordination. (assuming the post-Hitler government cut out a lot of the Nazi political BS dysfunctionality in the military)


The need for long-range single seat fighters should have forced a re-think on the Fw 187 as well. (on top of the points I made about that airframe likely being adaptable to be pretty good with a number of otherwise useless-for-fighter engines) Adapting the Bf 110 or Fw 187 to the tank-busting role with an MK-101 gun pod might have been useful too. (the Bramo powered 187 variant I suggested might fit better there due to better resistance to ground fire while still likely fast enough to out-run most early war Japanese fighters)

Even the MG c/30L might have been useful against some of the light Japanese armor in use, and certainly offer less of a performance detriment.


Aside from possibly the Fw 190, I think there's a reasonable argument for a greater preference for developments and adaptations of existing 1930s designs and scaling back/cancellation of the likes of the Me 210/410, Ju 188/288/388, Ju 290, He 177, etc, probably excepting some private ventures and possibly some long-term government investment in gas turbine development.


Glider said:
The Me110 would come into its own as a strike aircraft having a good speed advantage over Japanese fighters and the Me410 would be very, very, effective.
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As above, I think development of existing (or well into development) types of 1939 might have made more sense, and besides that, the Me 110 did have room for growth on its own. (tasks the 410 could do that the 110 couldn't at al1 would likely fall to Ju 88 variants)

But on the Bf 110 in particular:

wiking85 said:
Messerschmitt Bf 110 â€" Wikipedia

Better than the Fw190. With external tanks that increased to 1500 miles.
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I'd forgotten the 110C had significantly longer range than the 110G, that and the 633 km/h at 7000 m for the Bf 110G-2 is a bit surprising.

The figures on English wikipedia and especially on this site seem very different though. Messerschmitt Bf 110C
 
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This is very significant and may clear up some of the range discrepancies for the Bf 110 figures as well.

It seems range at economical cruise with drop tank wasn't much worse than the P-40C or P-39D, and possibly better than the Spitfire Mk.II.
 

The book "Hitlers Table Talk" by Hugh Trevor Roper, a compilation of fireside talks that Martin Bormann supposedly compiled Hitler says many positive things about the Chinese and notes they have a considerably more illustrious history of civilisation than his own. There as no intrinsic problem between Germans and Chinese or with Hitler (dead in this scenario).

Nevertheless as the Japanese-German allegiance strengthened the head of the Siemens company in China, a kindly Nazi by the name of John Rabe, had become very concerned by the misbehaviour of Japanese troops towards the Chinese and used all his influence to protect as many as he could while directly writing to Hitler, eloquently using his knowledge of National Socialist ideology and party membership appealing to for Hitler's humanitarian intervention. Of course the Japanese allegiance was becoming critical this could be an embarrassment to the Japanese and Rabe was shutdown and ended up having an interview with the Gestapo.

With the treaty of Versailles having created an economically ridiculous and impoverishing situation for overall trade and economic wellbeing of Europe, not only Germany, Germany turned to China, Japan, Sth America and the Middle East for trade often using barter arrangements to avoid entanglement in "Allied" controlled banking systems.

Germany had many friends, though they were not militarily powerful. The Germans had done nothing horrible to the Arabs or Turks. They had tried 'peaceful imperialism' by building the Berlin Baghdad railway(Orient Express) which was supposed to connect central Europe to the Persian Gulf thus bypassing the Suez. (Paranoia over this probably caused British, French and Russian involvement in WW1). They hadn't split the Middle East into politically, economically and ethnically incompatible regions, embarrassed Muslims, manipulated regime change or become embroiled in the morally ambiguous Belfour declaration. China and Germany had good relations, and so did Germany with the Middle East.

Japan had been an Western Allie during WW1 and had taken German trading colonies in Asia as war booty. Stalin was wary of the Japanese and might turn a blind eye to clandestine supply flights over the Soviet Asian Regions.

In terms of logistics: the German navy can transport a few hundred tons per each U-boat. Without the Royal Navy or Coastal Command to worry about they can refuel on the way or at sea and make a cracking pace travelling on the surface. They may even be able to use the Suez canal. The deep diving U-boats with outstanding passive sonar would easily avoid the IJN as they submerged through the straights of Malacca etc.

By 1939 Lufthansa has the Fw 200 kurrier/condor which can carry about 3 tons cargo 2200 miles and maybe 4400 miles with special tanks in the cabin and a small load. If one wanted to fly to Bejing/Peking or Shanghai 2 refuelling stops.

However if you can fly out of Baghdad Iraq, Iran or even the Capitals of the Balkan states you can reach the Sth Western Provinces of China by flying over the Himalayas. Who in Afghanistan or Tibet will notice?

Tehran(Iran) to Xinjian(China) is 2900km (1700 miles)
Mashhad(Iran) to Kashgar(China) is 2200km (1400 miles)
Baghdad(Iraq) to Kashgar(China) is 2850km (1350 miles)
Mosul or Erbil(Turkey)to Kashgar(China) is 2800km 1320 miles.

Northern Parts of Finland or the Baltic states get to Mongolia in 4800km/3000 miles by flying over the Nth Pole (Partially Soviet Airspace). Don't ask me how you work a magnetic compass or even keep a gyro compass aligned.

Besides the Focke-Wulf Fw 200 there is the Blohm Voss BV 142 with about 4000km/2400 miles range with cargo using its Diesels and the Dornier Do 26 Flying Boat offering ranges of nearly 9000km/5500 miles. The Seaplane version of the BV142, the Ha 139, like the Dornier Do 26 can be catapult launched from ships. There might also be a sea plane route using rivers and lakes.

Higly capable transports such as the Ju 252 and Ju 290 would ease the problem considerably though these are 1942 aircraft not 1939 aircraft. A Me 109 can easily be broken down by removing both wings, removing the engine and propeller and the horizontal tail. it might fit in the Fw 200.

If the cooperation of the states of the middle east can be secured this can be done by airlift. I would imagine an aircraft would require 3 days for a round trip and 1 day maintenance suggesting 4 aircraft would be required to get 3 tons in by air per day. Hence a fleet of 40 would be required to transport 30 tons per day.

The Chinese would need to supply fuel and food in most scenarios. This would be for essential supplies, replacements and spare parts, personnel transport etc.

Missions to the Northern provinces of china via Helsinki or Bergen might be possible.
 
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In 1938-40 nobody's supercharger could be classed as very good. And with most of the world using 87 octane fuel most countries/companies were using superchargers for altitude performance with 2 speed superchargers used to boost take-off performance or low altitude performance. Even the Americans weren't over boosting their engines at this point. The American 100 octane was pretty much 100/100 so while better than 87 octane it didn't allow for the overboost the British 100 octane did. The DB 601 supercharger (compressor) wasn't bad and it might have even been above average. Many countries/companies improved the supercharger fluid dynamics of their superchargers as the war went on even on single/two speed-single stage versions.
A lot of people think that it was the supercharger (and supercharger drive system) that gave early 109s (E F) their altitude performance. It wasn't, it was the fact that the Germans used a high powered engine in a small/light aircraft. Swap a P-40's 1150hp Allison for a 1100-1175hp DB601 and you would still get a dog at altitude. Reverse the swap and the 109 with Allison would do pretty good. Making the DB601 try to haul almost a ton more aircraft would kill it's altitude "performance" pretty quick while lightening the Allison's load by the same amount would do wonders for it's climb rate at 25,000ft and above. Some people are confusing cause and effect.
The DB was a bit ahead of the curve with the variable speed drive (which actually does nothing for the actual performance of the compressor) as P W was only introducing 2 speed superchargers into service in 1940, however much they had fooled around with 2 speeds and 2 stages before then. The French had NO 2 speed superchargers in squadron service. And so on, and please note that 2 speed superchargers do very little for altitude performance that couldn't be done with with a single speed supercharger using the same or similar gear ratio as the high gear.



This seems to be at odds with at least one book showing range/fuel consumption charts ( or facsimile) for a 109E. Using a cruise setting of 2200-2400rpm and 1.15 ATA and speeds are about 455/520kph at 3000/5000meters and fuel used in 0.64/0.63 liters per km. or just under 400 miles not inclusive of take-off,climb and reserves. Using 1400/1600rpm and 0.76/0.63 ata at 3000/5000 meters gives speeds of 350/360kph and a fuel burn of 0.43 liters per km at both altitudes. range is now 576 miles not inclusive of take-off,climb and reserves
 
kool kitty89 said:
This is very significant and may clear up some of the range discrepancies for the Bf 110 figures as well.

It seems range at economical cruise with drop tank wasn't much worse than the P-40C or P-39D, and possibly better than the Spitfire Mk.II.
Click to expand...

Me 109 fuel tankage never increased much beyond the 400 Litre 87 Imp Gallon fuselage tank unless one counts the 130L supplementary tank from 1944 onwards that could carry either MW50 or extra fuel, the latter not quite compensating for the increasingly more powerful and therefore thirsty engines. Nevertheless the DB601/DB605 somewhat compensated by remaining very economical in high speed cruise. The Fw 190 had room for fuel in the wings where the outer gun stations were though I know that this was to be used only on the Fw 190D13 (which had deleted the outer guns and compensated with a motor gun). The Me 109G with a 1320hp engine was faster than a P-40F or N with a more powerful engine.

The Me 109 wings seem to have been full of the pilots liquid oxygen supply though there must have been some room as I believe the Nitrous Oxide might be carried there as well.
 
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