What If...?

[evangilder]

Don't forget that the weather also played a part in bomb accuracy before the H2S

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

yes that's true, all i'm trying to say is that before H2S, most of the reason so few of our bombs were on target was because so few found the target!! if the bomber made it to the target, he was pretty cirtain to hit it, you can't really miss a city if you're over it........

 

[plan_D]

It was only precision targets that were missed, when on city bombing missions even in the early days they were hitting the target.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Exactly unless you are trying for a precision target it is pretty hard to miss it, hense precision.

 

[Smokey]

It certainly would be fair. The Luftwaffe was based around the sole purpose of ground support. In fact, it was so perfectly tuned to that role that when it came to change to a strategic bomber campaign, it failed.

It wasn't so much because the Luftwaffe was perfectly tuned to ground support, it was because Goering refused to have any four engined bombers and because General Walther Wever, a strong four engine bomber supporter, was killed in an air crash before the war, so ending the four engine bomber program. If these bombers had entered service before WW2, then they would have needed a long range escort fighter, which General Walther Wever may have insisted upon. Together, these could then form a 'long range command' in the Luftwaffe, which was equipped with four engined heavy bombers. As the Allied heavy bombers over Caen showed, close support of ground forces with relatively high altitude heavy bombers is not exactly a good idea, so this 'long range command' would be used for raids on factories.
Basically the Luftwaffe could easily have had both excellent close air support aircraft and a good long range force, but the death of General Wever and Goering's idiocy prevented this. And this, along with Hitler refusing Doenitz's demand for 300 U boats before the war, and the delay of Operation Barbarossa, thankfully cost Hitler the war.

Junkers Ju 89

http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/ju89.html

Developed as part of General Walther Wever's Ural bomber program, the Ju 89 proved to be far more capable than it's primary competitor the Do 19. Though this aircraft had impressive potential, support for the long range heavy bomber program died with Gen. Wever. The Ju 89 prototypes were eventually used as test beds and to set records but the development program was terminated on April 29, 1937.

Has a passing resemblance to the Lancaster don't you think?

http://www.luftarchiv.de/flugzeuge/junkers/ju89.htm

 

[cheddar cheese]

Yeah it does a bit...

 

[plan_D]

No it doesn't. And the fact that the Luftwaffe didn't have heavy bombers proves my point exactly. The Luftwaffe were too finely tuned to ground support roles instead of being well-rounded like the USAAF and RAF.

 

[Smokey]

Yet more proof of how Hitler and Goering were their own worst enemies

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

that doesn't really look like the lanc............

 

[cheddar cheese]

I think it does.

 

[Smokey]

The Dornier Do19, primary competitor the Junkers Ju 89, looks sort of like a Lancaster with Hercules radials

Dornier Do 19
http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/do19.html

Both the Ju 89 and the Do 19 first flew in 1936

If Speer had used the distributed manufacture system before the war/ early in the war, then the Luftwaffe could have had hundreds of these in service by 1940/1941.
The Junkers Ju 89 was the favourite, and with better engines would have been better than the Heinkel He177/277 with its crap dual engine design

 

[Smokey]

goddamn double post

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

actually that looks more like the stirling........

 

[cheddar cheese]

Yeah that is Stirling-esqe. But much uglier

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

yes

 

[vanir]

So what would have happened if those heavy bombers made it into the war? They'd be shot down by Spitfires and Jugs and we'd be talking about how unprotected and poor performing they were? Or how they were the next biggest Luftwaffe mistake and it would've all been different if only they'd...

I'm guessing some of us would only be happy if the Luftwaffe used Spits and Lancs like the rest of us. Damn commie bastards. I mean fascists.

 

[vanir]

I've got one. What if Brits never believed in aircraft. At all. They just said sometime in the 30's, "Oh nobody could possibly win a war with aircraft. None that couldn't get past our mighty anti-aircraft guns and stolid British resolve."
?

No Spit. No Hurricane. No Lancaster. Just lots of new battleships.

But...Frank Whittle invented the guided missile in 1938 instead of the Jet engine.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

a similer idea was being proposed in the 60s, a purely missile defence of Britian, the lightening however porved that they still needed intercepters

and the british stiff upper lip is powerfull enough to bring down any foe who is unfortunate to gaze upon it!

 

[plan_D]

Frank Whittle invented the jet engine in the early 20s.

 

[Smokey]

The amazing thing is that the Luftwaffe did NOT have a long range force. If Hitler and Goering planned to invade the Soviet Union at some point, surely it was obvious that long range bombers and escort fighters were needed?
It is the extreme idiocy of Hitler and Goering that is so amazing in this case.