The airplane that did the most to turn the tide of the war.

[GrauGeist]

Most of which happened after the Battle of Britain. FDR refused to help when it looked like the British might lose.

Nope...wrong.

FDR bent some rules in order to assist the British and several types of aircraft I listed (and some I didn't) were sold to Britain prior to the BoB.

 

[Husky]

Let's get to the major issue. Could WWII be won without the US?

NO!

End of story.

Debate all the particulars you wish, but without the US's industrial might and logistical train it would be all over.

 

[Shortround6]

Surely the faster, and much more accurate Mosquito bomber would have been ideal for taking down the German war machine, but for some reason it didn't seem to get used nearly as much as I think it could have been, especially considering that its payload was not much worse than that of the B-17 but it had a huge advantage in terms of speed.

Are my impressions wrong, is there a reason why the Mosquito could not have been used as a strategic bomber to take out very specific targets?

We have a number of threads on this. Basicly the Mosquito was too late in timing, by the time it "proved" itself (some point in 1943?) you already had major industrial programs going to build BOTH British and American 4 engine bombers. Trying to change course, close factories (or retool from metal to wood construction) would have delayed things by many months, perhaps over a year, perhaps more. The bit about it carrying almost as much bomb load as a B-17 is a very popular furphy (or close to it) Yes it did (eventually) carry 4000lbs but that required the bomb load to be a single block buster bomb, the bomb bay to have bulged doors (not a big deal) and certain other structural modifications that were incorporated on the production line. Very few older planes were modified to carry the 4000lb "cookie" as the CG was bit out of whack and there were some handling problems. The 4000lb bomb load/cookie was not used until 1944 by the Mosquito which is certainly a bit late to revamp the production schedules of the B-17, B-24, Lancaster and Halifax bombers.

The B-17 could carry 5,000lb to Berlin if the bombs were HE bombs. (sometimes they carried 6,000lbs). the problem with the Mosquito carrying almost as much is not with Mosquito really but that when the B-17 carried incendiaries the load weight dropped to close to 3000lbs due to the larger/bulker bombs for the same weight. The B-17s were averaging about 4,000lb per plane depending on how many planes in each raid were carrying which types of bombs. Mosquitoes rarely carried incendiaries and wouldn't have been very good at it or perhaps I should say they wouldn't have carried a large number (depending on size).

Another factor is the wood used. The Balsa core to the sandwich construction came from South America, there were no Balsa plantations, all trees had to be cut in the 'wild" and Balsa trees don't grow in groves, they tend to be spread out with only a few per hectare. More Mosquitoes could probably have been built but not 10's of thousands more.

 

[GrauGeist]

Also, a Mossie carrying a 4,000 pound bomb made it vulnerable to attack, negating it's sole defense - speed.

 

[ykickamoocow]

Also, a Mossie carrying a 4,000 pound bomb made it vulnerable to attack, negating it's sole defense - speed.

How fast could the Mosquito go with those bombs? I know for instance it could still go way way way faster than the Lancaster.

I do wonder though if the British had enough wood, and prioritised the Mosquito over the Lancaster what Bomber Command's strategy would have been with a lot more Mosquito's, and if that strategy would have been more effective than simply carpet bombing German cities.

 

[Shortround6]

Again it is timing,

You would have had to prioritize the Mosquito in 1941 or early 1942, No 105 squadron got its first Mosquito in Nov 1941, The first operational raid by Mosquitos (4 of them) was on the 31st of May 1942.

I would also note that in 1940-41 the Mosquito, as planned and first built could only hold four 250lbs in the bomb bay. They shortened the tail fins on the 500lb bombs and managed to squeeze in four of them once they saw the Mosquito's performance. Later versions got the four 500lbs in the bomb bay and a 500lb under each wing. finally came the 4000lb cookie.
Prioritizing a plane with four 250lb bombs as it's planned bomb load over the 4 engine heavies wasn't going to happen in 1940/41/early 1942.

I believe (but am open to correction) that the famous twice to Berlin nights were flown by Mosquitos with 70 series engines (two stage superchargers) that flew higher and faster than the earlier Mosquitos with the 20 series engines.

SO many people use backward projection. Why didn't the British figure out in 1941 what the mosquitos performance would be in 1944 and plan the factory and raw materials allocations with the 1944 performance as the criteria?

 

[GrauGeist]

The Mossies carrying 4,000 bombs (cookies) flew at night for extra protection, although the Luftwaffe had various types that could hunt them down.
But just because the Mosquito "could" didn't mean it was a viable solution.

And there seems to be some misinformation about the Mosquito carrying the same load as a B-17 - this is simply not true. The B-17 could carry up to 17,600 pounds over short distances - with both internal and external stores.
But with any aircraft, the more the weight, the more the range penalty...especially if there's external stores, which create drag (adding additional performance penalty).
Typically, the B-17s carried 4,000 - 4,500 pounds of ordnance on deep penetration raids into Germany. This insured they had the range to get from England to Germany and back again using various routes that increased range but confused the Germans as to the specific target.

The Lancaster could carry up to 22,000 pounds (Grand Slam) or a max. of 14,000 pounds (internal) but again, the max. load meant shorter ranges.

The Short Stirling could carry a max. load of 14,000 pounds (internal), too...but again, max. load meant shorter ranges.

 

[pinehilljoe]

No offence but that is just American revisionism. Germany would have been defeated either way since Operation Barbarossa was not going to succeed, with or without American war materials. Sure American war materials certainly helped both the Soviets and British, but it was not the deciding factor.

The vast amount of material sent to Soviet Russia isnt revisionism. 10,000 tanks, 10,000 aircraft, almost 500,000 trucks, list goes on and on, plus rations, and raw materials. Add the 5000 tanks the UK sent. If you believe the Soviets really produced 40,000 T-34s, that means about 1 out 5 tanks on the Russian battle field were Lend Lease. The closed society of Russia means we'll never know what their home tank production actually was. Its rare to see photos of M-3, M-4 or Valentines in the Russian Army, they published photos of T-34. I think its possible Russia would have surrendered without Lend Lease.

 

[Elmas]

"Kein Fleisch, kein Fett,
um acht ins Bett
den Arsch kaum warm
Fliegeralarm!"
The bombs released by Mosquitoes were important not for the quantity but for the quality.
A single Mosquito arrives over Berlin soon after sunset.
It circles…
The fliegeralarm sounds
The nightfighers take off
The Flak starts to shoot
The Mosquito continues to circle
A bomb fell somewhere
The Mosquito departs undisturbed.
The fliegeralarm sounds.
After a quarter of an hour another Mosquito arrives.
It circles...

 

[buffnut453]

Let's get to the major issue. Could WWII be won without the US?

NO!

End of story.

Debate all the particulars you wish, but without the US's industrial might and logistical train it would be all over.

And without the USSR chewing through the German army on the Eastern Front, it would be all over.

And without the UK staying in the fight in 1940, it would be all over.

Undoubtedly the US made a vital contribution to winning WW2 but to say it was the sole factor in the Allied victory is rather jingoistic nonsense, I'm afraid.

 

[buffnut453]

Nope...wrong.

FDR bent some rules in order to assist the British and several types of aircraft I listed (and some I didn't) were sold to Britain prior to the BoB.

The only rule that was bent was in leaning towards the Allied cause...but even then, it was done at huge advantage to the US. The UK was paying for war materiel in gold until Lend Lease really kicked in in March 1941. The rapid expansion of US production capacity was, in large part, kick-started by British payments. It would have taken a lot longer for the "Arsenal of Democracy" to ramp up to full production without all the British gold coming in in 1939-1940.

 

[Timppa]

Basicly the Mosquito was too late in timing, by the time it "proved" itself (some point in 1943?) you already had major industrial programs going to build BOTH British and American 4 engine bombers. Trying to change course, close factories (or retool from metal to wood construction) would have delayed things by many months, perhaps over a year, perhaps more.
...
Another factor is the wood used. The Balsa core to the sandwich construction came from South America, there were no Balsa plantations, all trees had to be cut in the 'wild" and Balsa trees don't grow in groves, they tend to be spread out with only a few per hectare. More Mosquitoes could probably have been built but not 10's of thousands more.

1. Mosquito was operational (and "proved) in 1941, Lancaster only next year
2. For other factories, reverse engineering all-metal Mosquito would not have been so time consuming. Same fuel/electric/engine/landing gear/instrument/weapons/cockpit -systems. Same aerodynamic shape.
Only replacing the structural components with 2024 or 7075 alloys.

Russians did this on the fly.

 

[michael rauls]

An interesting question seems to have come up mainly, could the allies have won the war without the US or Russia?
After giving it some thought I'd say that depends on the scenario one constructs and what one means by" winning"
For example, if you take the US out of the war does that mean Imperial Japan confines its aggression to China( the only way to not involve the US is to not attack us) or do they carefully attack only British interests and avoid US ones?
If Japan doesn't attack the US or British interests and confines its aggression to China then I think the allies still win total victory over Germany and Italy no question even without the US, although it's more costly.
If, on the other hand, Japan attacks British interests but not the US( seems unlikely but posible) things become a bit more dodgy.
Now alot more variables come onto play.
For instance, in this scenario is the US still supplying the allies even though they are not actively fighting( it's hard to imagine we wouldn't) if so then I think the allies win for sure.
Also what do we mean by winning in this scenario? Even with no help of any kind from the US it's hard to imagine Germany, Japan, and Italy taking and occupying Australia, Russia, Canada, and Britain.
Even in the far fetched scenario that Japan attacks British interests and avoids US ones and the US does not even supply arms for some reason my money is still on the allies to at least hold the lines where they were in early 42 and most likely role most or all of that back eventually although it's going to be one tuff slog, that's for sure.

 

[buffnut453]

An interesting question seems to have come up mainly, could the allies have won the war without the US or Russia?
After giving it some thought I'd say that depends on the scenario one constructs and what one means by" winning"
For example, if you take the US out of the war does that mean Imperial Japan confines its aggression to China( the only way to not involve the US is to not attack us) or do they carefully attack only British interests and avoid US ones?
If Japan doesn't attack the US or British interests and confines its aggression to China then I think the allies still win total victory over Germany and Italy no question even without the US, although it's more costly.
If, on the other hand, Japan attacks British interests but not the US( seems unlikely but posible) things become a bit more dodgy.
Now alot more variables come onto play.
For instance, in this scenario is the US still supplying the allies even though they are not actively fighting( it's hard to imagine we wouldn't) if so then I think the allies win for sure.
Also what do we mean by winning in this scenario? Even with no help of any kind from the US it's hard to imagine Germany, Japan, and Italy taking and occupying Australia, Russia, Canada, and Britain.
Even in the far fetched scenario that Japan attacks British interests and avoids US ones and the US does not even supply arms for some reason my money is still on the allies to at least hold the lines where they were in early 42 and most likely role most or all of that back eventually although it's going to be one tuff slog, that's for sure.

I think this is a topic for an entirely new thread. It seems highly probable (to me, at least) that without the US, we would likely be looking at a Soviet-dominated Europe today because the odds of a D-Day landing occurring without the US are slim to non-existent. So Germany would absolutely be defeated but the "liberation" of Europe would be in name only. Situation in the Far East is also intriguing if Japan only attacks British/Dutch/French interests and leaves the US alone. It's entirely probably that US/Japan war would be delayed for a few years, and the entire make-up of the Allied side would likely be very different....so hard to discern how it might play out.

 

[Shortround6]

We have a lot of threads on this too.

My own opinion is that the truth lies somewhere between the two camps. One "story" about P & W is that the French (often under appreciated in this scenario) financed an expansion of the P & W Hartford factory that doubled it's size, the British orders doubled it's size again. which is obviously a substantial contribution. However FDR called for an American Air force of 50,000 planes in May (?) of 1940. There were a number of spending bills passed in 1940. Ford was given 14.3 million dollars just to build a new engine factory to make P & W R-2800s in Sept of 1940, that sum did not include a single engine, The Ford factory duplicated in size the P & W Hartford factory (the one that had quadrupled in size over it's 1937-38 size) The Ford factory would be tripled in size by some point in 1944. The P & W plant in Harford only expanded in size a limited amount after the two initial expansions. Instead 4 or 5 satellite plants were built at various locations in Connecticut. The plan to have other companies build P & W engines was in place well before Pearl harbor. Buick delivered 440 engines in March of 1942 so obviously plant construction/conversion had started well before Dec 7th. Chevrolet delivered their first engines in April of 1942. Studebaker delivered their first R-1820 Cyclones in Feb of 1942.
The US built the Detroit tank arsenal with American money. Baldwin locomotive, Alco, Pacific Car and Foundry and other railroad shops (and even others (FMC (?) were given contracts and tooled up to build tanks well before Pearl Harbor, I don't believe that any of that tank production capacity was paid for the British. The British did get early versions of American tanks including the General Grant M3 with a British designed turret (no MG cupola and the radio in the turret instead of the hull). Some idea of the scale of things is one claim (I don't know how true it is) that the British order for M3 medium tanks (over 1200 initially) exceeded the total amount of "cash" the British had in the US at the time. Please note that much of the initial M3 medium tank production was supplied by the above mentioned railroad locomotive shops and not the special built tank arsenal/factories.
M3 Half track production was well underway in 1941 even if not in full swing, While the British certainly wound up with half tracks (and the Russians got thousands) I don't believe they paid for any with cash, they might have been trying to set up bren/universal carrier production? They did build carriers in Canada.
Indirectly the increase in Canadian production benefited the US production as the vast majority of any machine tools used to equipe Canadian factories came from US tool makers (Britain could not supply their own machine tool needs) and I am sure the US machine tool industry benefited from such expansion and orders. Machine tools were always a big bottleneck in production. large buildings with empty floor space don't produce much of anything.

 

[buffnut453]

We have a lot of threads on this too.

My own opinion is that the truth lies somewhere between the two camps. One "story" about P & W is that the French (often under appreciated in this scenario) financed an expansion of the P & W Hartford factory that doubled it's size, the British orders doubled it's size again. which is obviously a substantial contribution. However FDR called for an American Air force of 50,000 planes in May (?) of 1940. There were a number of spending bills passed in 1940. Ford was given 14.3 million dollars just to build a new engine factory to make P & W R-2800s in Sept of 1940, that sum did not include a single engine, The Ford factory duplicated in size the P & W Hartford factory (the one that had quadrupled in size over it's 1937-38 size) The Ford factory would be tripled in size by some point in 1944. The P & W plant in Harford only expanded in size a limited amount after the two initial expansions. Instead 4 or 5 satellite plants were built at various locations in Connecticut. The plan to have other companies build P & W engines was in place well before Pearl harbor. Buick delivered 440 engines in March of 1942 so obviously plant construction/conversion had started well before Dec 7th. Chevrolet delivered their first engines in April of 1942. Studebaker delivered their first R-1820 Cyclones in Feb of 1942.
The US built the Detroit tank arsenal with American money. Baldwin locomotive, Alco, Pacific Car and Foundry and other railroad shops (and even others (FMC (?) were given contracts and tooled up to build tanks well before Pearl Harbor, I don't believe that any of that tank production capacity was paid for the British. The British did get early versions of American tanks including the General Grant M3 with a British designed turret (no MG cupola and the radio in the turret instead of the hull). Some idea of the scale of things is one claim (I don't know how true it is) that the British order for M3 medium tanks (over 1200 initially) exceeded the total amount of "cash" the British had in the US at the time. Please note that much of the initial M3 medium tank production was supplied by the above mentioned railroad locomotive shops and not the special built tank arsenal/factories.
M3 Half track production was well underway in 1941 even if not in full swing, While the British certainly wound up with half tracks (and the Russians got thousands) I don't believe they paid for any with cash, they might have been trying to set up bren/universal carrier production? They did build carriers in Canada.
Indirectly the increase in Canadian production benefited the US production as the vast majority of any machine tools used to equipe Canadian factories came from US tool makers (Britain could not supply their own machine tool needs) and I am sure the US machine tool industry benefited from such expansion and orders. Machine tools were always a big bottleneck in production. large buildings with empty floor space don't produce much of anything.

Tough to know who paid for what when it comes to capacity. In my experience, if you lack capacity to build something, then you fold the costs of that capacity expansion into the price for the first batch of customers. The funding has to come from somewhere, the only real options are (1) the US Government pays for new factories, (2) the defence contractors fund it themselves from existing profits (possible but, methinks, unlikely), or (3) the cost gets added to the bill for new orders onto the production line.

I never said the UK funded the entirety of US defence production ramp-up but it certainly helped get things moving (IMHO).

 

[michael rauls]

I think this is a topic for an entirely new thread. It seems highly probable (to me, at least) that without the US, we would likely be looking at a Soviet-dominated Europe today because the odds of a D-Day landing occurring without the US are slim to non-existent. So Germany would absolutely be defeated but the "liberation" of Europe would be in name only. Situation in the Far East is also intriguing if Japan only attacks British/Dutch/French interests and leaves the US alone. It's entirely probably that US/Japan war would be delayed for a few years, and the entire make-up of the Allied side would likely be very different....so hard to discern how it might play out.

Verry interesting. I think the Russians would dominate more of Europe but not all.
In the no US scenario the Brits, Canadians, South Africans et all can still come up from North Africa and into Italy and ultimately France ( the Germans are still fighting a 2 front war with Russia to the east so they have to split there efforts).
So probably there is no D-day, but Imho, that doesn't mean the Russians take all Europe save Britain.

 

[Shortround6]

1. Mosquito was operational (and "proved) in 1941, Lancaster only next year
2. For other factories, reverse engineering all-metal Mosquito would not have been so time consuming. Same fuel/electric/engine/landing gear/instrument/weapons/cockpit -systems. Same aerodynamic shape.
Only replacing the structural components with 2024 or 7075 alloys.

Russians did this on the fly.

1. The first "Operational" use of the Mosquito in 1941 was as a photo recon plane. It was Sept 19 of 1941 (W4055) over Bordeaux and Brest.
Of the first 50 Mosquitos 10 were photo recon, 30 were fighters (how many with radar I don't know) and only 10 were bombers.
First bomber raid into Germany was the May 31st 1942 raid, the day/night after the first 1000 bomber raid according to some sources, and again, the first 10 bombers were rated for four 250lb bombs, the change to four 500lb bombs came after the first 10 bombers (although the first 10 may have been updated)

Reverse engineering the mosquito to use metal construction might not be as easy as you think, certainly not impossible however.
Yes you are keeping all the moving 'stuff' but then most aircraft used the same "stuff " ( instruments, cockpit controls) in the cockpit even if not standardized.
Keeping the same shape while changing construction may or may not work. The Mosquito did have a better degree of surface finish than many metal aircraft so you do have that to worry about.

It is not just changing the structural components, it is changing the wing and fuselage skinning. On the Mosquito much of the fuselage strength was in the 'skin". You need to design a whole new fuselage with frames, longerons and stringers to be covered in metal. I am not sure of the wings but again just sticking in metal spars and ribs isn't going to do the trick.

 

[Dimlee]

No offence but that is just American revisionism. Germany would have been defeated either way since Operation Barbarossa was not going to succeed, with or without American war materials. Sure American war materials certainly helped both the Soviets and British, but it was not the deciding factor.

And someone can say that this just "European" or "pro-Soviet" revisionism.
Operation Barbarossa did not succeed even before serious lend lease supplies started to arrive, indeed. But Barbarossa brought USSR to the brink of collapse. And there were other German operations later which threatened the very existence of the Soviet Union.
Regarding US war materials... If we change the topic of this thread to "which vehicle did the most to turn the tide of the war", I'd suggest Studebaker trucks (probably US6 should be singled out) and Liberty ship. I see no opportunity for the Red/Soviet Army to conduct its large offensive operations in post Kursk period without this equipment.

 

[Dimlee]

Back to original subject of the airplane turning the tide.

I thought about Eastern Front and began to draw my own list of "tide turners" there... But then I thought again and about the definition of "to turn the tide of the war". And I dropped the list.
In my (so humble) opinion, there were no such aircraft on the Eastern Front.
One could mention Il-2 or Pe-2 - but they were used since summer 1941 and with mixed results. Or La-5 models which helped VVS in critical periods or lend lease bombers as B-25 and A-20 with their reliability and ruggedness. Or omnipresent and multirole PS-84/Li-2, etc. But I don't recall any major battle where one single type (OK, not single but 2-3) of the Soviet aircraft made decisive impact.
There were, however, several "tide turning" factors of which I'd name just a three in no particular order.
1. Improvements in training and education.
2. Change of tactics.
3. Improved supply (including lend leased materials).
Aircraft type could be one or another, Il-2 could be replaced by Su-2, new Yaks could lose competition to I-185 in the corridors of the Kremlin politics, Tu-2 could be accepted in mass production 2 years earlier. But I don't think that any historical or imaginary "wunderSovietwaffe" could turn the tide of events in the East without the factors mentioned above.