WW2 Article: Advanced German Technology

[KurtGodel7]

@221B:

Still, I think there is too much emphasis on the German achievements and too little recognition of the allied “wonder weapons”; perhaps due to a respect for the Nazi scientists and engineers.  It is important to recognize that the allies had some amazing technological advances during this time as well.

Yours is a solid post, and a good contribution to this discussion! I came across many of the same things when doing research for my rules set

The race to build an atomic bomb started as a result of breakthroughs made by German scientists and published in academic journals. A successful atomic bomb effort required a large group of highly talented scientists and engineers, as well as a massive allocation of industrial capacity. Germany had the talented scientists it needed, but it lacked excess industrial capacity to devote to a project which would require years before yielding any benefits at all. Clearly the U.S. achieved something impressive both by having its scientists create a successful bomb design, and because it had been able to enrich the required uranium and plutonium. But Germany deserves credit for a strong nuclear program as well–albeit a nuclear program which lacked the access to industrial capacity to solve the problems the Americans solved.

You’ve correctly pointed out the proximity fuse’s impact on anti-air fire and artillery fire. It was devastating. Toward the end of the war, the Germans seem to have developed a proximity fuse of their own, which they had apparently intended to include on their surface to air missile. From the link (towards the end):

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Both proximity and self-destruction fuzes were provided. The proximity fuzes were projected on the I.R., Electronic, and acoustic principals; however, the latter had essentially been dropped by the designers as the maximum range at which the actuating impulse was of sufficient magnitude was too small to derive most effective results from the warhead.

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Unfortunately, the article does not indicate how the proximity fuses described above compare to those employed by the British and Americans; or whether the Germans’ proximity fuses were small enough to be practical for normal AA fire. (The referenced surface to air missile weighed 1800 kg / 4000 lbs.) At first glance, proximity fuses seem to be an area similar to radar, in the sense that the Germans had a respectable research effort underway, even if the British and Americans were somewhat ahead.

I also looked at the R4M–a German air-to-air missile used near the end of the war–on the theory that it might also have had a proximity fuse. From Wikipedia:

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Only a small number of aircraft were fitted with the R4M, mostly Messerschmitt Me 262s and the ground attack version of the Fw 190s . . .

The weapon had excellent results. . . . in March 1945, six R4M-armed Me 262s flying out of the Oberammergau flight test center and led by Luftwaffe General Gordon Gollob claimed to have shot down fourteen B-17s in a mission.[citation needed] In April 1945, R4M-equipped Me 262s claimed to have shot down thirty B-17s for the loss of three aircraft.[citation needed]

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Unfortunately, the Wikipedia is light on detail, and doesn’t indicate whether the R4M used a proximity fuse.

You mentioned that the Allies were ahead of the Germans in cryptography. That’s a good point and one worth expanding upon. During the war Britain had several Colossus computational machines. These were digital programmable electronic devices designed for problem-solving. They may or may not be considered full-fledged computers, depending on how broad your definition of a computer is. Regardless, they were critical in Britain’s code-breaking and computational efforts.

Germany had also made breakthroughs in computational research. From Wikipedia: “[The Zuse Z3 was] the world’s first working programmable, fully automatic computing machine. It was Turing-complete, and by modern standards the Z3 was one of the first machines that could be considered a complete computing machine.” The Z3 was introduced in 1941; several years before the Colossus. However, development on the Zuse machines was considerably slowed due to lack of adequate funding. “Zuse asked the German government for funding to replace the relays with fully electronic switches, but funding was denied.” But by the end of the war, Zuse had built the Z4, which was “the world’s first commercial digital computer.” (Albeit an electro-mechanical computer, instead of fully electronic like the Colossus or the later, far more powerful ENIAC.)

The war was won by the allies because the Nazi’s failed to defeat the Soviet Union.  The Nazi wonder weapons were too little, too late but even if they had been developed soon enough, I think the Allied wonder weapons could have countered the Nazi’s.

It’s tempting to point out that the Allied advantage in industrial capacity and manpower was so overwhelming that they did not need to counter Germany’s wonder weapons with wonder weapons of their own. Sheer numbers would have been enough. In 1939, Germany had a population of 69 million people, as compared to 169 million for the Soviet Union. That disparity gave the Soviets an overwhelming advantage in the manpower available for infantry. In the spring of 1941, the German Army consisted of 150 divisions, 100 of which were used to invade the Soviet Union. By the fall of '41, Soviet recruitment efforts had increased the size of their own army to a staggering 600 divisions. Also, if you look at these aircraft production numbers you can see that the Allies had an overwhelming advantage in military aircraft production (a reasonably good proxy for overall military production).

If those advantages had been taken away–if the Allies had had roughly equal manpower and industrial capacity to that of the Axis–would the new weapons being designed by the Allies have been enough to counter those of the Germans? I don’t think they would have been. German jets, with their air-to-air missiles, would have gained near-total domination of the skies. Their advanced Type XXI U-boats would have been devastating against Allied shipping. Allied artillery and AA guns would have been very significantly enhanced by proximity fuses, but the artillery would have been vulnerable to attacks from the air. (Especially because Germany had developed an air-to-surface missile.) The Germans would have had better tank designs, and night vision for their planned tanks. Not to mention their increasingly long-ranged Panzerfaust hand-held anti-tank weapons. While the Allies would have had their share of advantages as well, I don’t think those advantages would have offset all that.

[221B Baker Street]

Kurt,

Excellent points, I appreciate you taking the time to discuss.  It is difficult, however, to assess what might have happened so there are no right or wrong answers.  What if this had happened, what if they had developed that…

A couple of more points I’d really like your opinion on if you (or others) have time:

1. How would the German ME262 compare to the UK built (and operational during WWII) Gloster Meteor jet in combat?  What about the Horton HO-229 vs. the Meteor ?  Or the US P-80?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me262
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloster_Meteor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horten_Ho_229

My guess is that the Ho-229 would have ran circles around them all…but I cannot definitely say that since we don’t know what would have happened.

2. The German V-2 was an incredible advance unmatched by the Allies…or was it?  Consider what the American Robert Goddard developed decades before the Germans or the cold war space race between the US and USSR:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_H._Goddard

Its a long read (but very well worth it), so I’ll simply quote from Werner Von Braun …

Don’t you know about your own rocket pioneer? Dr. Goddard was ahead of us all.

Wernher von Braun, when asked about Goddard’s work following World War II[84]

What if the US had invested even a small amount of money toward Goddards work (as they certainly would have had the V-2 or proposed V-3 really started affecting the Allied war effort)?

[CWO Marc]

@221B:

What if the US had invested even a small amount of money toward Goddards work (as they certainly would have had the V-2 or proposed V-3 really started affecting the Allied war effort)?

I’d say that, if the Americans had developed a ballistic missile along the lines of the V2, and had gotten it operational around the same time the German V2 came into service, the effect on WWII would have been minimal. Although very sophisticated by WWII standards, the V2 was a relatively short-range weapon carrying a relatively light payload, and its guidance system was only accurate enough to allow it to hit a city-sized target.  It would have been useless as a tactical weapon, and it would only have been significantly useful (in American hands) as a strategic weapon if it had carried a nuclear warhead.  Armed with a conventional high-explosive warhead, it was a far less efficient strategic weapon (in both precision and payload) than groups of heavy bombers (which the Americans were deploying in huge numbers by 1944 and 1945).  And the short range of the V2 would have limited its use to Europe; the distances between Japan and the bases the Americans were able to set up in the Pacific were too great.

An upgraded missile like the V3 might have had more range, and perhaps a bigger payload, but again without a nuclear warhead it would have been a less effective delivery system than the B-17 or the Superfortress.  It should also be noted that, in Japan’s case, the most effective bombing tactic turned out to be mass low-level raids using incendiary bombs…a technique not suited to ballistic missiles.

[aequitas-et-veritas]

The Krummlauf (English: Curved barrel) a bent barrel attachment for the Sturmgewehr 44 developed by Germany in World War II. The curved barrel included a periscope sighting device for shooting around corners from a safe position.

I found it in wikipedia and thought it would be as well an advanced tech…I originally found it in a book about German rifles WWII…Fighting from house to house is WCS (worst case Scenario) for a Soldier…Now these days they got camera and are able to bent the rifle barrel…

[Pvt.Ryan]

I’m not goin to write a long article like you guys but I want in on this topic. Yeah the Germans (my mom’s family has German roots  :-) ) invented alot of useful tools. To bad many were put to use by the power hungry Kaisers and the even greater evil  :evil: Adolf Hitler  :evil:. The MP 44 was the first assault rifle and the the V1 and V2 were some of the most advanced rockets of the time period. However all these inventions weren’t completely used. The German propoganda suggested that the Germans possed and incredible ammount of trucks and motorized vehicles for their units. However this is far from the truth. Only 40% of the Heer’s units were mechnized, while most relied on horses and wagons for supply colums and troops marched on foot or rode bicycles. The German advances in jet aircraft and heavy tanks such as the Messerschmitt Me 262 and King Tiger were not useful enough to end the war as the Allies outnumbered these with more quickly built machines like the P-51 Mustang and Sherman tanks. However none the less these advancments were very valuable to future sciences. And besides were not talking about how the Nazis lost the war right?  :-)

[KurtGodel7]

@221B:

Kurt,

Excellent points, I appreciate you taking the time to discuss.  It is difficult, however, to assess what might have happened so there are no right or wrong answers.  What if this had happened, what if they had developed that…

A couple of more points I’d really like your opinion on if you (or others) have time:

1. How would the German ME262 compare to the UK built (and operational during WWII) Gloster Meteor jet in combat?  What about the Horton HO-229 vs. the Meteor ?  Or the US P-80?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me262
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloster_Meteor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horten_Ho_229

My guess is that the Ho-229 would have ran circles around them all…but I cannot definitely say that since we don’t know what would have happened.

2. The German V-2 was an incredible advance unmatched by the Allies…or was it?  Consider what the American Robert Goddard developed decades before the Germans or the cold war space race between the US and USSR:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_H._Goddard

Its a long read (but very well worth it), so I’ll simply quote from Werner Von Braun …

Don’t you know about your own rocket pioneer? Dr. Goddard was ahead of us all.

Wernher von Braun, when asked about Goddard’s work following World War II[84]

What if the US had invested even a small amount of money toward Goddards work (as they certainly would have had the V-2 or proposed V-3 really started affecting the Allied war effort)?

Excellent post! In response to part 1–not all jets are created equal, as you yourself noted. There were basically two ways engineers could go with jet engines. On the one hand, they could use centrifugal flow jet engines. These were comparatively simple, easily engineered, and well-understood. However, they were associated with severe technical limitations. Their other choice was to use axial flow jet engines. Engines of this type posed a significantly greater engineering challenge than did centrifugal flow jet engines. But the potential reward (in terms of performance) was also greater.

The British and American jet programs of WWII used centrifugal jet engines. That, in combination with their lack of an advanced, aerodynamic body design, meant that their jet aircraft did not exceed the best available piston aircraft during WWII.

German jets used the advanced, axial-flow jet engines. (It had taken them several years to iron out the associated difficulties.) Not only that, but they were significantly ahead of the Allies in terms of aerodynamic research.

The Horten flying wing–otherwise known as the Ho 229–was similar in both shape and concept to the U.S.'s much later, flying wing stealth bomber. (The Horten also had stealthy properties and was difficult to detect on radar.) The flying wing was the result of an effort to meet Goering’s goal of 1000/1000/1000. He’d wanted a bomber that could travel 1000 km/hr, with an operational radius of 1000 km, and which could deliver 1000 kg to its target. The flying wing shape was originally intended to help the plane meet these three goals; but which unexpectedly gave the plane a stealthy profile with respect to radar. This jet bomber was faster than any of the available Allied planes of the time–including their jet fighters–and I agree with your assessment that it would have run circles around them all. The Me 262 achieved a 5:1 kill ratio, and I don’t see why the (very fast) Horten flying wing couldn’t have done the same.

To address the second part of your post: in itself, the V2 was a fairly useless weapon–at least for delivering a conventional payload. The OP stated that the Germans were working on improving the guidance systems for V2s, such that they could be targeted at specific Allied ships, or at the centers of Allied factories, with near-certainty of getting a direct hit. He added this would have been available in 1947 (IIRC). Had the Germans been able to achieve that, the V2 would have gone from being an expensive distraction whose only real purpose was to soak up far more of the Allied bombing effort than it deserved, to a real weapon with decisive strategic importance. However, I have not yet done the research necessary to either confirm or refute the OP’s statements about this.

Another potential use for Germany’s rockets would have been to deliver either chemical or nuclear payloads. The Germans were significantly ahead of the Allies in nerve gas-related research; which means that even a small, inaccurately delivered payload would have been devastating. The three- and four-stage rockets under development would have allowed that nerve gas to be delivered to any target in the world. That same technology would also have allowed them to deliver a nuclear payload anywhere in the world, had they been able to build one.

You made a good point about Robert Goddard. He gave the U.S. an early lead in the rocket race, and the U.S. even had a nascent rocket program during WWI! He began developing a bazooka-like weapon in 1917.

Thanks to a nozzle invented by Swedish inventor Gustaf Laval, Goddard was able to increase the efficiency of his rockets from 2% to 64%. Goddard’s research was intelligent and forward-thinking, and anticipated a number of later developments in rocketry and space flight. However,

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The publication of Goddard’s document gained him national attention from U.S. newspapers, most of it negative. Although Goddard’s discussion of targeting the moon was only a small part of the work as a whole and was intended as an illustration of the possibilities rather than a declaration of Goddard’s intent, the papers sensationalized his ideas to the point of misrepresentation and ridicule.

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According to an editorial in New York Times, “Of course [Goddard] only seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools.”

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As a result of harsh criticism from the media and from other scientists, and understanding better than most the military applications for which foreign powers could use this technology, Goddard became increasingly suspicious of others and often worked alone, which limited the impact of his work. Another limiting factor was the lack of support from the American government, military and academia as to the study of the atmosphere, near space and military applications.

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Irresponsible journalism by the New York Times and other media outlets meant that Goddard’s work was no longer seen as politically acceptable. From then on, the mainstream view was rejection and ridicule. That campaign cost Goddard much of the institutional support he might otherwise have received; and served to prevent the U.S. from developing much of a rocket program until after WWII. The reason for these media attacks was because Goddard had, in the '20s, mentioned the idea of someday flying a rocket to the Moon; and had done some preliminary calculations. All of this goes to show that one ought never to believe any statement any journalist makes about science, ever. (Unless, of course, that statement can be verified by a credible–i.e., non-journalist–source.)

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As an instrument for “reaching extreme altitudes”, Goddard’s rockets were not very successful; they did not achieve an altitude greater than 2.7 km (in 1937), at a time when airplanes could reach up to 15 km and balloons 22 km. By contrast, German rocket scientists had already achieved an altitude of 3.5 km with the A-2 rocket (in 1934), reached 12 km by 1939 with the A-5 and 84 km in 1942 with the A-4 (V-2), reaching the outer limits of the atmosphere.

Goddard’s pace was slower than the Germans’ because he did not have the resources they did.

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The above situation was the exact opposite of so many other forward-looking research efforts–such as computers and nuclear technology–in which the German scientists did not have the available resources of their Allied counterparts. The U.S. clearly had the spare resources to devote to Goddard’s rocket program, had it chosen to do so.

[CWO Marc]

@KurtGodel7:

The OP stated that the Germans were working on improving the guidance systems for V2s, such that they could be targeted at specific Allied ships, or at the centers of Allied factories, with near-certainty of getting a direct hit. He added this would have been available in 1947 (IIRC). Had the Germans been able to achieve that, the V2 would have gone from being an expensive distraction whose only real purpose was to soak up far more of the Allied bombing effort than it deserved, to a real weapon with decisive strategic importance. However, I have not yet done the research necessary to either confirm or refute the OP’s statements about this.

A terminal guidance system allowing a ballistic missile to hit a specific building or ship with near certainty is completely incredible for 1947.  This sort of thing only became possible very recently, with the introduction of laser designation systems (which require a friendly aircraft or ground unit to illuminate the target) and GPS-based targeting systems (such as those used on cruise missiles, which are conceptually closer to the V1 than the V2).  As recently the the First Gulf War, such systems weren’t foolproof: those precision strikes we saw on CNN were the ones that hit, not the ones that missed.

Another difficulty is that having a precise-enough guidance system is only one-half of what’s required.  The other requirement involves having the exact coordinates of the target, down to an accuracy of a few meters.  In pre-GPS, pre-satellite days, such precise data would have been difficult for Germany to acquire for enemy buildings, and impossible to acquire for non-fixed targets like ships (especially given the degree of air superiority which the Allies had over their own territories, which precludes enemy reconnaissance flights).

Just a few weeks ago, there were news reports that China was supposedly developing a ballistic missile system capable of targeting individual enemy ships off its coast.  Some analysts issued dire warnings that this spelled the end of U.S. naval supremacy, but others expressed scepticism over the feasibility of such a weapon system – so I find it difficult to believe that something similar would have been achievable by Germany sixty-plus years ago.

[KurtGodel7]

@CWO:

@KurtGodel7:

The OP stated that the Germans were working on improving the guidance systems for V2s, such that they could be targeted at specific Allied ships, or at the centers of Allied factories, with near-certainty of getting a direct hit. He added this would have been available in 1947 (IIRC). Had the Germans been able to achieve that, the V2 would have gone from being an expensive distraction whose only real purpose was to soak up far more of the Allied bombing effort than it deserved, to a real weapon with decisive strategic importance. However, I have not yet done the research necessary to either confirm or refute the OP’s statements about this.

A terminal guidance system allowing a ballistic missile to hit a specific building or ship with near certainty is completely incredible for 1947.  This sort of thing only became possible very recently, with the introduction of laser designation systems (which require a friendly aircraft or ground unit to illuminate the target) and GPS-based targeting systems (such as those used on cruise missiles, which are conceptually closer to the V1 than the V2).  As recently the the First Gulf War, such systems weren’t foolproof: those precision strikes we saw on CNN were the ones that hit, not the ones that missed.

Another difficulty is that having a precise-enough guidance system is only one-half of what’s required.  The other requirement involves having the exact coordinates of the target, down to an accuracy of a few meters.  In pre-GPS, pre-satellite days, such precise data would have been difficult for Germany to acquire for enemy buildings, and impossible to acquire for non-fixed targets like ships (especially given the degree of air superiority which the Allies had over their own territories, which precludes enemy reconnaissance flights).

Just a few weeks ago, there were news reports that China was supposedly developing a ballistic missile system capable of targeting individual enemy ships off its coast.  Some analysts issued dire warnings that this spelled the end of U.S. naval supremacy, but others expressed scepticism over the feasibility of such a weapon system – so I find it difficult to believe that something similar would have been achievable by Germany sixty-plus years ago.

Thanks for the informative response! It sounds like you have a firm grasp of your subject matter. I’ve been doing a lot of research for my rules set, but this sounds like one area that I can safely consider settled. (Unless, of course, someone were to post a link supporting the OP’s statements about highly accurate V2s by 1947.)

[CWO Marc]

@KurtGodel7:

This jet bomber was faster than any of the available Allied planes of the time–including their jet fighters–and I agree with your assessment that it would have run circles around them all. The Me 262 achieved a 5:1 kill ratio, and I don’t see why the (very fast) Horten flying wing couldn’t have done the same.

I was puzzled by the notion of a late-WWII bomber – whatever its propulsion system – “running circles” around a late-WWII fighter, since fighters are supposed to be more agile than bombers, so I had a quick look into this subject.  I was surprised to see that the Horten Ho 229A was actually quite a small 1-man plane, not at all the big lumbering aircraft which the word “bomber” normally suggests.  It had a loaded weight of 15,238 lb – about a ton lighter than the loaded weight of the Lockheed Hudson light bomber (17,500 lb), about half the loaded weight of the B-25J Mitchell medium bomber (33,510 lb), and about three-and-half times less than the loaded weight of the B-17G heavy bomber (54,000 lb).  That would put the Horten roughly in the same weight class as the Ilyushin Il-2 Shturmovik ground-attack aircraft (loaded weight = 13,580 lb), or the Lockheed P-38L Lightning multi-role fighter / ground-attack aircraft (loaded weight = 17,500 lb).  This suggests that the Horten could not have carried a large bomb payload – particularly since its Junkers Jumo 004B turbojets had a very high fuel consumption, which implies a large weight allocation for fuel tanks at the expense of bomb-carrying capacity.

[KurtGodel7]

@CWO:

@KurtGodel7:

This jet bomber was faster than any of the available Allied planes of the time–including their jet fighters–and I agree with your assessment that it would have run circles around them all. The Me 262 achieved a 5:1 kill ratio, and I don’t see why the (very fast) Horten flying wing couldn’t have done the same.

I was puzzled by the notion of a late-WWII bomber – whatever its propulsion system – “running circles” around a late-WWII fighter, since fighters are supposed to be more agile than bombers, so I had a quick look into this subject.  I was surprised to see that the Horten Ho 229A was actually quite a small 1-man plane, not at all the big lumbering aircraft which the word “bomber” normally suggests.  It had a loaded weight of 15,238 lb – about a ton lighter than the loaded weight of the Lockheed Hudson light bomber (17,500 lb), about half the loaded weight of the B-25J Mitchell medium bomber (33,510 lb), and about three-and-half times less than the loaded weight of the B-17G heavy bomber (54,000 lb).  That would put the Horten roughly in the same weight class as the Ilyushin Il-2 Shturmovik ground-attack aircraft (loaded weight = 13,580 lb), or the Lockheed P-38L Lightning multi-role fighter / ground-attack aircraft (loaded weight = 17,500 lb).  This suggests that the Horten could not have carried a large bomb payload – particularly since its Junkers Jumo 004B turbojets had a very high fuel consumption, which implies a large weight allocation for fuel tanks at the expense of bomb-carrying capacity.

You are correct about the limited size of the Horten flying wing’s payload. Its normal bomb load was 1000 kg (2200 lbs), as compared to 2000 - 3600 kg (depending on the distance of the target) for a Flying Fortress. The Superfortress carried 9000 kg of bombs. The Horten flying wing’s unique shape allowed it to carry a larger payload a longer distance than it otherwise could have; and did much to offset the inefficiency of the jet engines which you pointed out. But it was clearly not a heavy bomber like the four engined British and American aircraft. This airplane’s purpose was to be fast enough and stealthy enough to radar to allow the Germans to do at least some bombing, despite the Allies’ air supremacy. It was also intended for use as a fighter.

[221B Baker Street]

CWO Marc,

Actually, guidance systems were in existence during WWII:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beams

Guidance beams were used for the V-2 though the system was not foolproof:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2

Accuracy increased over the course of the war, particularly on batteries where Leitstrahl-Guide Beam apparatus was installed.

British intelligence leaked falsified information implying that the rockets were over-shooting their London target by 10 to 20 miles. This tactic worked and for the remainder of the war most landed in Kent due to erroneous recalibration.

Had the war extended to 1947, I think it is possible that the guidance systems would have improved to a significant accuracy (unless of course the counter-measures also improved).  A moving ship, I doubt could have been hit unless it (or a very near submarine) were transmitting a signal, but certainly a city and probably even a city block could have been targeted.   And, of course, chemical, biological, and especially atomic weapons would not have needed great accuracy as KurtGodel7 stated.

I think the reason that today the US Navy isn’t overly worried about Chinese missiles sinking one of its carriers is that they have some very potent countermeasures…

KurtGodel7;

While reading the article on the V-2, I came across this interesting bit of information:

The V-2 program was the single most expensive development project of the Third Reich:[citation needed] 6,048 were built, at a cost of approximately 100,000 Reichsmarks each; 3,225 were launched. SS General Hans Kammler, who as an engineer had constructed several concentration camps including Auschwitz, had a reputation for brutality and had originated the idea of using concentration camp prisoners as slave laborers in the rocket program. The V-2 is perhaps the only weapon system to have caused more deaths by its production than its deployment.[39]

The V-2 consumed a third of Germany’s fuel alcohol production and major portions of other critical technologies:[41] to distil the fuel alcohol for one V-2 launch required 30 tons of potatoes at a time when food was becoming scarce.[42] Due to a lack of explosives, concrete was used and sometimes the warhead contained photographic propaganda of German citizens who had died in allied bombing.[18]

I find the embedded quote particularly an interesting point of view:

“… those of us who were seriously engaged in the war were very grateful to Wernher von Braun. We knew that each V-2 cost as much to produce as a high-performance fighter airplane. We knew that German forces on the fighting fronts were in desperate need of airplanes, and that the V-2 rockets were doing us no military damage. From our point of view, the V-2 program was almost as good as if Hitler had adopted a policy of unilateral disarmament.” (Freeman Dyson)[40]

Perhaps this (and the lack of support given to Goddard by the Americans who certainly could have afforded it) is an indication of better operational research on the part of the allies.  Why spend the money on a rocket inflicting minimal damage to the enemy when the same development money could help fund the manhattan project and the construction money buy a useful fighter instead?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_research#Second_World_War

which might be one of the advantages the allies had during the war, though I am not certain it should be called a technological advantage.

I have heard it stated that the V-2 program cost the same as the manhattan project, which relates directly to the question of operational research.  But I can’t find a good source for this, the best approximation I have is the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichsmark

The Reichsmark was put on the gold standard at the rate previously used by the Goldmark, with the U.S. dollar worth 4.2 ℛℳ.

; therefore 100,000RM * 6000 /4.2 = $142M in 1938 dollars…probably not a great method to compare the costs…maybe someone knows (or can find) a better comparison?

I am really enjoying this discussion, thanks to everyone who is participating!

[KurtGodel7]

@221B:

CWO Marc,

Actually, guidance systems were in existence during WWII:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beams

Guidance beams were used for the V-2 though the system was not foolproof:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2

Accuracy increased over the course of the war, particularly on batteries where Leitstrahl-Guide Beam apparatus was installed.

British intelligence leaked falsified information implying that the rockets were over-shooting their London target by 10 to 20 miles. This tactic worked and for the remainder of the war most landed in Kent due to erroneous recalibration.

Had the war extended to 1947, I think it is possible that the guidance systems would have improved to a significant accuracy (unless of course the counter-measures also improved).  A moving ship, I doubt could have been hit unless it (or a very near submarine) were transmitting a signal, but certainly a city and probably even a city block could have been targeted.   And, of course, chemical, biological, and especially atomic weapons would not have needed great accuracy as KurtGodel7 stated.

I think the reason that today the US Navy isn’t overly worried about Chinese missiles sinking one of its carriers is that they have some very potent countermeasures…

KurtGodel7;

While reading the article on the V-2, I came across this interesting bit of information:

The V-2 program was the single most expensive development project of the Third Reich:[citation needed] 6,048 were built, at a cost of approximately 100,000 Reichsmarks each; 3,225 were launched. SS General Hans Kammler, who as an engineer had constructed several concentration camps including Auschwitz, had a reputation for brutality and had originated the idea of using concentration camp prisoners as slave laborers in the rocket program. The V-2 is perhaps the only weapon system to have caused more deaths by its production than its deployment.[39]

The V-2 consumed a third of Germany’s fuel alcohol production and major portions of other critical technologies:[41] to distil the fuel alcohol for one V-2 launch required 30 tons of potatoes at a time when food was becoming scarce.[42] Due to a lack of explosives, concrete was used and sometimes the warhead contained photographic propaganda of German citizens who had died in allied bombing.[18]

I find the embedded quote particularly an interesting point of view:

“… those of us who were seriously engaged in the war were very grateful to Wernher von Braun. We knew that each V-2 cost as much to produce as a high-performance fighter airplane. We knew that German forces on the fighting fronts were in desperate need of airplanes, and that the V-2 rockets were doing us no military damage. From our point of view, the V-2 program was almost as good as if Hitler had adopted a policy of unilateral disarmament.” (Freeman Dyson)[40]

Perhaps this (and the lack of support given to Goddard by the Americans who certainly could have afforded it) is an indication of better operational research on the part of the allies.  Why spend the money on a rocket inflicting minimal damage to the enemy when the same development money could help fund the manhattan project and the construction money buy a useful fighter instead?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_research#Second_World_War

which might be one of the advantages the allies had during the war, though I am not certain it should be called a technological advantage.

I have heard it stated that the V-2 program cost the same as the manhattan project, which relates directly to the question of operational research.  But I can’t find a good source for this, the best approximation I have is the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichsmark

The Reichsmark was put on the gold standard at the rate previously used by the Goldmark, with the U.S. dollar worth 4.2 ℛℳ.

; therefore 100,000RM * 6000 /4.2 = $142M in 1938 dollars…probably not a great method to compare the costs…maybe someone knows (or can find) a better comparison?

I am really enjoying this discussion, thanks to everyone who is participating!

Thanks for the good post! It looks like I have some reading to do about the guidance systems the V2s could potentially have used! If they could eventually have become reasonably accurate weapons, then Hitler’s decision to mass produce them seems somewhat less questionable. He may have reasoned that by 1946 or '47 the V2 would become a weapon with actual military value. Once that happened, he’d want to have them in full production. If such indeed was his reasoning, he may have felt that putting them into production a couple years too early would serve two purposes. 1) It would force the Germans to learn how to produce large numbers of V2s quickly, so that they’d be ready to massively deploy the more accurate V2s once they were available. 2) The V2s would distract Allied bombers. One could argue that, had that industrial effort gone into producing fighter aircraft instead, Germany would have lacked the fuel to use all those extra fighters.

As for the cost of the V2 program–my impression is that whatever industrial effort was expended mass producing V2s was almost completely wasted. But the effort invested into research about how to build better rockets should be placed into a different category.

Toward the end of the war, Germany had developed some extremely effective air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. I don’t know how much overlap there was between the rocketry research for those things and the V2 research effort. But often a research application which seems specific to one area can have an application in another. Germany and the U.S. should have provided solid funding for rocket research–which was, after all, the origin of the ICBM–but neither nation should have mass produced V2-like weapons.

[CWO Marc]

@221B:

Actually, guidance systems were in existence during WWII:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beams

In existence, yes, but with nowhere near the kind of accuracy needed to hit a specific building.  The British GEE system, for instance, allowed bombers to hit their targets with an accuracy of 165 yards at short ranges, of a mile at longer ranges over Germany, and of two miles at its extreme range of 400 miles (640 km).  And it was designed to guide bombers, not ballistic missiles.

[CWO Marc]

@KurtGodel7:

As for the cost of the V2 program–my impression is that whatever industrial effort was expended mass producing V2s was almost completely wasted. But the effort invested into research about how to build better rockets should be placed into a different category.

Research can pay all sorts of unexpected dividends, so it does have value.  That said, however, it can be argued that Germany’s multiple research programs into all kinds of advanced technologies suffered from the “trying to herd cats” syndrome.  It scattered its limited resources on a plethora of projects, including some of debatable practical value, rather than identifying a few that had the most potential to win the war and concentrating all its marbles in those areas.  And it didn’t just do this in the high-tech weapons field.  Just as an example, it developed too many tank types – including the Maus, which was too slow to have much practical value, and too big and heavy to handle bridges or to transport on most railroads.  The Soviets, by contrast, focused on manufacturing just a few basic but effective tank types designed for easy mass production, and as their technology got better they used these improvements mainly to producing upgraded models (as in the switch from the T-34/76 to the T-34/85) rather than developing new machines.

There’s also the larger point that it’s probably not a good idea to become mesmerized by the theoretical potential of high-tech “wonder weapons” at the expense of using a nation’s economic and industrial resources as efficiently as possible to produce the basic weapons and other tools needed in wartime, or having a coherent strategic plan for fighting and winning the war.  One of John Keegan’s books (I think it’s The Mask of Command) argues that Hitler in many ways never progressed beyond the level of a corporal (which he was in WWI) in his strategic thinking.  Keegan describes Hitler bending over a map of Stalingrad, expressing satisfaction over the news that this particular platoon had captured that particular block, while his generals stood nearby rolling their eyes and wondering what on earth any of this had to do with the overall situation on the Eastern Front.  As the situation deteriorated more and more in 1944 and 1945, Hitler seems to have clung increasingly to the idea that the “Wunderwaffen” under development would save the day for Germany at the last moment, and compensate for the errors which Germany had made up to that point.

I think I once mentioned it somewhere else on the board, but Arthur C. Clarke’s short story “Superiority” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superiority_(short_story) – explores the question of whether it’s better to have a vast number of ordinary weapons or a small number of super-weapons.  Clarke wrote in one of his book introductions that the story had been directly inspired by WWII.

[KurtGodel7]

@CWO:

@KurtGodel7:

As for the cost of the V2 program–my impression is that whatever industrial effort was expended mass producing V2s was almost completely wasted. But the effort invested into research about how to build better rockets should be placed into a different category.

Research can pay all sorts of unexpected dividends, so it does have value.  That said, however, it can be argued that Germany’s multiple research programs into all kinds of advanced technologies suffered from the “trying to herd cats” syndrome.  It scattered its limited resources on a plethora of projects, including some of debatable practical value, rather than identifying a few that had the most potential to win the war and concentrating all its marbles in those areas.  And it didn’t just do this in the high-tech weapons field.  Just as an example, it developed too many tank types – including the Maus, which was too slow to have much practical value, and too big and heavy to handle bridges or to transport on most railroads.  The Soviets, by contrast, focused on manufacturing just a few basic but effective tank types designed for easy mass production, and as their technology got better they used these improvements mainly to producing upgraded models (as in the switch from the T-34/76 to the T-34/85) rather than developing new machines.

There’s also the larger point that it’s probably not a good idea to become mesmerized by the theoretical potential of high-tech “wonder weapons” at the expense of using a nation’s economic and industrial resources as efficiently as possible to produce the basic weapons and other tools needed in wartime, or having a coherent strategic plan for fighting and winning the war.  One of John Keegan’s books (I think it’s The Mask of Command) argues that Hitler in many ways never progressed beyond the level of a corporal (which he was in WWI) in his strategic thinking.  Keegan describes Hitler bending over a map of Stalingrad, expressing satisfaction over the news that this particular platoon had captured that particular block, while his generals stood nearby rolling their eyes and wondering what on earth any of this had to do with the overall situation on the Eastern Front.  As the situation deteriorated more and more in 1944 and 1945, Hitler seems to have clung increasingly to the idea that the “Wunderwaffen” under development would save the day for Germany at the last moment, and compensate for the errors which Germany had made up to that point.

I think I once mentioned it somewhere else on the board, but Arthur C. Clarke’s short story “Superiority” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superiority_(short_story) – explores the question of whether it’s better to have a vast number of ordinary weapons or a small number of super-weapons.  Clarke wrote in one of his book introductions that the story had been directly inspired by WWII.

You make a lot of good points, and I agree with about 90% of what you’ve written. (Without having a definitive opinion, one way or the other, about the remaining 10%.)

I fully agree that Germany should have had fewer weapons designs, and should have concentrated its engineering and development efforts into improving those weapons. Its failure to do so was a major reason why the Soviet Union produced between 3 - 4 times as many land weapons in 1942 as did Germany, and nearly twice as many military aircraft in ‘42. (This, despite many of the Soviets’ factories had been overrun or relocated during '41.)

It’s harder to say that their research effort should have been concentrated into a few key areas. In hindsight, it’s easy to see which projects could have brought immediate military benefit, which ones would have been associated with more delayed gratification, and which were merely dead ends. (Though as you hinted at, a project which yields no direct military benefit may still significantly contribute to some other, more useful project.)

Toward the end of the war, Germany had developed the assault rifle, long range Panzerfaust anti-tank weapons, Me 262 jets which attained a 5:1 kill ratio (10:1 when fitted with the latest air-to-air missiles), and advanced type XXI submarines which would have been very difficult for the Allies to detect or sink. These were exactly the kinds of weapons Germany needed to win the war. However, these weapons appeared too late, and in too small quantities, to affect the war’s outcome.

One problem Germany faced is that its entire war effort had been more or less thrown together in a hurry. In 1933 when Hitler came to power, Germany’s army was a token force with no tanks. Germany as a whole was not allowed to build powered aircraft of any kind. A situation in which the military has few or no weapons means that factories will not be geared up for military production. Given that Germany was in the midst of a depression, and that the major democracies had closed themselves to German exports, German factories were not very well geared up for any kind of production! Going from a situation like that (in 1933) to war with Britain and France (1939) was just too small a time for them to get everything right. The emphasis during those years was on getting new military production running quickly, not necessarily on the disciplined standardization of a few designs which you described, and which was clearly necessary.

Toward the end of the war, the Germans had become fully aware of the problems you described, and were working to correct them. The E-Series tanks would have had far fewer moving parts, would have been easier to build and maintain, and would have represented far fewer tank designs, than Germany’s previous tank designs. The E-25 would have replaced the Panzer III and Panzer IV, the E-50 was to replace the Tiger I and the Panther, and the E-75 was to replace the Tiger II. Plans were also underway to improve the turrets of the Panthers and, therefore, of the subsequent E-50s and E-75s. The armor of the turrets was to be thicker–three times thicker on the roof–but the turrets would be lighter due to a narrower design.

Had they had another year or two, the German research and engineering effort would have resulted in tanks that were not only qualitatively superior to anything the Allies had, but which would have been easy to mass produce and maintain. Not only that, the Germans had by far the best handheld anti-tank weapons of the war. The Panzerfaust 150 could penetrate over 200 mm of armor at a range of 150 meters. The bazooka was significantly inferior, and was more useful against pillboxes and so forth than it was against German tanks. With the best tank design, the best aircraft designs, the best infantry weapons, by far the best submarine designs, and a number of other useful designs and innovations, Germany’s research and development effort seems quite impressive! That said, you are correct to say the way it was organized could and should have been better. I especially agree with your assertion that an engineering and production effort should begin with someone at the top having a clear vision of how he intends to achieve victory, who then selects the weapon designs necessary to put that vision into effect.

I’ve read the short story you mentioned, and it’s overly critical of the German quest for super weapons. Had Germany used exactly the same weapon designs as its enemies, and no other weapon designs, the outcome of the war would have been about the same. Germany’s enemies simply had too much production capacity and too much manpower for Germany to hope for victory. Only a decisive advantage in quality could allow Germany to balance out the Allies’ overwhelming advantage in quantity.

For most of the war, Germany produced weapons of standard-issue quality, albeit in smaller quantities than should have been the case. Those small quantities were because of various problems you identified (too many designs in production, too many moving parts per weapon, etc.), and not because of Germany’s efforts to obtain super weapons such as jets or air-to-air missiles. Developing the super weapons for the mid- and long-term made sense; and in fact the jet could probably have been finished noticeably sooner had it received a higher research and development priority. But in the meantime, Germany should have been more Soviet Union-like in its production of normal quality weapons. By that I mean it should have focused on a small number of designs, and those designs should have been as simple and as easily mass produced as possible.

[CWO Marc]

@KurtGodel7:

For most of the war, Germany produced weapons of standard-issue quality, albeit in smaller quantities than should have been the case. Those small quantities were because of various problems you identified (too many designs in production, too many moving parts per weapon, etc.), and not because of Germany’s efforts to obtain super weapons such as jets or air-to-air missiles. Developing the super weapons for the mid- and long-term made sense; and in fact the jet could probably have been finished noticeably sooner had it received a higher research and development priority. But in the meantime, Germany should have been more Soviet Union-like in its production of normal quality weapons. By that I mean it should have focused on a small number of designs, and those designs should have been as simple and as easily mass produced as possible.

Getting the right mixture of basic, advanced and super weapons (and other tools of war) is indeed a good recipe for victory (or at least for improving your chances of victory) – and, as you point out, it’s much easier to see the correct ingredients in retrospect.  An example of this type of mixture was given by Eisenhower after the war when he listed what he considered to be the four things which won WWII for the Allies.  One of them, the atom bomb, is clearly in the superweapon category.  Another one, the bazooka, can be regarded as an enhanced conventional weapon: sophisticated and effective, but based on relatively straightforward principles (the Monroe effect) which had been known as far back as 1888, and which did not not require a huge effort like the Manhattan Project to produce a practical weapon.  The other two, the jeep and the C-47 Skytrain / Dakota / Gooney Bird, were multi-purpose transportation devices – unromantic and harmless-looking, but immensely valuable as logistical support systems and as providers of battlefield mobility for ground forces and paratroops.

Bread-and-butter tools like transport vehicles and cargo planes aren’t as flashy as tanks and fighters, but they are vitally important.  There’s a great scene towards the end of the 1949 movie Battleground which shows just how much these machines meant to the troops.  The American forces surrounded at Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge have spent the movie holding the line against the Germans.  Heavy cloud cover has prevented their resupply all through the battle, and the U.S. troops have almost exhausted their resources.  The sky suddenly begins to clear, and moments later the drone of airplanes is heard in the distance.  The soldiers scan the sky suspiciously , then suddenly jump up and shout “C-47s!!!”  The sky fills with parachutes, and crates loaded with ammunition belts and ration packs start landing all around the troops, who rush to open them.  Even if someone watching the movie doesn’t know anything about the course of the Battle of the Bulge, he or she would understand right away that this scene is the great turning point of the battle, and that the guys in Bastogne are going to be saved.

[KurtGodel7]

@CWO:

Getting the right mixture of basic, advanced and super weapons (and other tools of war) is indeed a good recipe for victory (or at least for improving your chances of victory) – and, as you point out, it’s much easier to see the correct ingredients in retrospect.  An example of this type of mixture was given by Eisenhower after the war when he listed what he considered to be the four things which won WWII for the Allies.  One of them, the atom bomb, is clearly in the superweapon category.  Another one, the bazooka, can be regarded as an enhanced conventional weapon: sophisticated and effective, but based on relatively straightforward principles (the Monroe effect) which had been known as far back as 1888, and which did not not require a huge effort like the Manhattan Project to produce a practical weapon.  The other two, the jeep and the C-47 Skytrain / Dakota / Gooney Bird, were multi-purpose transportation devices – unromantic and harmless-looking, but immensely valuable as logistical support systems and as providers of battlefield mobility for ground forces and paratroops.

Bread-and-butter tools like transport vehicles and cargo planes aren’t as flashy as tanks and fighters, but they are vitally important.  There’s a great scene towards the end of the 1949 movie Battleground which shows just how much these machines meant to the troops.  The American forces surrounded at Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge have spent the movie holding the line against the Germans.  Heavy cloud cover has prevented their resupply all through the battle, and the U.S. troops have almost exhausted their resources.  The sky suddenly begins to clear, and moments later the drone of airplanes is heard in the distance.  The soldiers scan the sky suspiciously , then suddenly jump up and shout “C-47s!!!”  The sky fills with parachutes, and crates loaded with ammunition belts and ration packs start landing all around the troops, who rush to open them.  Even if someone watching the movie doesn’t know anything about the course of the Battle of the Bulge, he or she would understand right away that this scene is the great turning point of the battle, and that the guys in Bastogne are going to be saved.

Solid post, and I can’t find anything in it with which to disagree! :)

As you pointed out yourself, unglamorous vehicles such as jeeps, military trucks, and cargo transport planes were of critical importance to the war. That was clearly an area in which the Allies had a very powerful advantage over the Axis. During WWII, Canada produced more military trucks than all Axis nations combined.

There were several reasons for this. One was that Germany and Japan–especially Japan!–were not as far along in their industrialization efforts as were countries like the U.S. and Britain. That meant less military production overall. The other problem the Axis had is that jeeps, military trucks, and cargo transport planes are no more useful than scrap metal except to the extent you can fuel them. Japan, it will be recalled, went to war on the U.S. in the first place because the U.S. had imposed an oil embargo and Japan had little or no oil supply of its own. Germany also had almost no oil. Romania ran at an oil surplus–which helped–but not enough. During the years leading up to the war, Hitler had tried to address the problem of insufficient oil through synthetic oil production. A number of experts told him his goal of major synthetic oil production was economically impossible. But as Adam Tooze notes in The Wages of Destruction, those experts had severely underestimated “Hitler’s sheer bloody-mindedness.” Consequently, Germany received a major amount of oil from synthetic oil production by the start of the war.

But even adding in the Romanian oil, they barely had enough for their existing motorized vehicles. An Allied-like transportation and supply effort would have been impossible unless Germany could acquire large amounts of new oil. This was exactly why Hitler found it so important to take and hold Stalingrad–he wanted access to the Caucasus oil fields.

[CWO Marc]

@KurtGodel7:

The other problem the Axis had is that jeeps, military trucks, and cargo transport planes are no more useful than scrap metal except to the extent you can fuel them.

Yes indeed.  Patton expressed this idea well in 1944 in a message he sent to his superiors pleading to be given greater priority in the Allied allocation of fuel supplies: “My men can eat their belts, but my tanks need gas!”

@KurtGodel7:

Japan, it will be recalled, went to war on the U.S. in the first place because the U.S. had imposed an oil embargo and Japan had little or no oil supply of its own. Germany also had almost no oil. Romania ran at an oil surplus–which helped–but not enough. During the years leading up to the war, Hitler had tried to address the problem of insufficient oil through synthetic oil production. A number of experts told him his goal of major synthetic oil production was economically impossible. But as Adam Tooze notes in The Wages of Destruction, those experts had severely underestimated “Hitler’s sheer bloody-mindedness.” Consequently, Germany received a major amount of oil from synthetic oil production by the start of the war. But even adding in the Romanian oil, they barely had enough for their existing motorized vehicles. An Allied-like transportation and supply effort would have been impossible unless Germany could acquire large amounts of new oil. This was exactly why Hitler found it so important to take and hold Stalingrad–he wanted access to the Caucasus oil fields.

This ties in with what I was mentioning earlier about the importance of having a coherent plan for winning a war, regardless of the level of technology a country has.  Oil was absolutely crucial to all the major combatant nations in WWII, and as you point out Germany and Japan both had a critical lack of natural supplies in this area.  It was vital for both countries to view the improvement of their oil situation as a top strategic priority – and both countries flubbed it.  Japan correctly decided to seize the Dutch East Indies to obtain oil, but gave completely inadequate attention to the problem of defending its tankers from enemy submarine attack on the long sea voyage to Japan.  As for Germany, a far more sensible option for it in 1941 would have been to invade the Middle East rather than the USSR.  Germany could have secured vast oil resources that way (and by the same token would have deprived Britain of those same supplies).  It could at the same time have caught the British troops in Egypt between its Middle East invasion forces in the east and Rommel’s existing forces in the west.  This could potentially have knocked Britain out of Egypt / North Africa entirely, and deprived Britain of the use of the Suez Canal, its gateway to India, the Far East, Australia and New Zealand.

[KurtGodel7]

@CWO:

Yes indeed.  Patton expressed this idea well in 1944 in a message he sent to his superiors pleading to be given greater priority in the Allied allocation of fuel supplies: “My men can eat their belts, but my tanks need gas!”

I’m currently reading a book which makes the case Patton was assassinated by the U.S. government. The evidence for assassination is quite compelling, though not 100% conclusive. The book is worthwhile not just for information about the assassination attempt, but also because of the historical background information it presents. The WWII and early postwar administrations of FDR and Truman were pro-Soviet–so much so that if you suspected the Soviets, you became suspect yourself. Patton was strongly anti-Soviet, and therefore a source of friction in the alliance between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. that FDR in particular had hoped to build. Patton also protested the Morgenthau Plan and other acts of mass murder perpetrated by the Allied governments in the postwar era.

FDR also believed that the Soviet Union deserved to control most of postwar Europe because it had done the bulk of the work of defeating Germany. On the one hand Stalin had wanted a second front for Germany–which FDR provided on D-Day–but on the other he didn’t want the Western democracies to get too much of postwar Europe. FDR had no objection to this. The problem was that one of his generals was too good, and threatened to take too much of what both FDR and Stalin felt should be in the Soviet sphere. To prevent this from happening, Wilcox writes, Patton was deliberately and frequently deprived of the gas he needed to advance rapidly eastwards into Germany. That decision drew the war out and cost many lives. But on the bright side–at least from FDR’s and Stalin’s perspective–many, many more people lived under Soviet or Soviet satellite rule in the postwar era than would have been the case had Patton received his gasoline.

@CWO:

This ties in with what I was mentioning earlier about the importance of having a coherent plan for winning a war, regardless of the level of technology a country has.  Oil was absolutely crucial to all the major combatant nations in WWII, and as you point out Germany and Japan both had a critical lack of natural supplies in this area.  It was vital for both countries to view the improvement of their oil situation as a top strategic priority – and both countries flubbed it.  Japan correctly decided to seize the Dutch East Indies to obtain oil, but gave completely inadequate attention to the problem of defending its tankers from enemy submarine attack on the long sea voyage to Japan.  As for Germany, a far more sensible option for it in 1941 would have been to invade the Middle East rather than the USSR.  Germany could have secured vast oil resources that way (and by the same token would have deprived Britain of those same supplies).  It could at the same time have caught the British troops in Egypt between its Middle East invasion forces in the east and Rommel’s existing forces in the west.  This could potentially have knocked Britain out of Egypt / North Africa entirely, and deprived Britain of the use of the Suez Canal, its gateway to India, the Far East, Australia and New Zealand.

You’ve made very strong points. The possibility of an invasion of the Middle East–most likely through Turkey–should have been very strongly considered. (I don’t think that Germany had the extra transports + naval strength necessary for a sea invasion of the Eastern Mediterranean.) Ideally, Turkey could be pressured to become part of the Axis on its own; thereby granting the German Army immediate access to the British lands beyond. But Germany could also have fought its way through the Turkish mountains if necessary. The problem with that option would have been the inherent delay, and the chance for Britain to build up its army’s strength through soldiers from its colonies. If an invasion of Turkey had been necessary, I would think that nearly two years would have been needed between the beginning of the invasion and its conclusion. (Presumably with one German force swinging south from Turkey to meet the other force pushing east from Libya.) Success on this front would have given Germany the oil you mentioned, while facing a much weaker land force than the Red Army.

There were several reasons why Germany did not do these things. The first is Hitler’s thought that war between Germany and the Soviet Union was inevitable. He was therefore leery of concentrating too much of Germany’s strength in some venture such as the above, leaving it vulnerable closer to home. That fear may or may not have had a basis in reality. Another, highly credible perspective on Soviet diplomacy is that Stalin regarded both fascists and democracies as equally enemies; and therefore wanted the two sides to fight each other in as long and bloody a war as possible while the Soviet Union stayed neutral. Then when both sides had been bled white, the Red Army would move in to pick up the pieces. There is, however, the chance Stalin would have made a move early, especially if Germany looked weak.

Another reason Hitler launched the war against the Soviet Union was because he didn’t want to give Stalin the time to complete his program of industrialization and militarization. However, that program was much further along than Hitler had realized. It was Germany, not the Soviet Union, that required extra time to catch up. A third factor which led Hitler to choose the Soviets as his next target was the fact the Red Army had seen its performance severely downgraded by purges–a fact which had become evident in the Winter War against Finland.

But perhaps the main factor which led to the decision to invade was the misperception of the strength of the Red Army. Prior to Barbarossa, German military planners had believed the Red Army consisted of 200 divisions. But by the fall of '41 it consisted of 600 divisions, and the Soviets had attained a recruitment level of 500,000 men a month: a level they would sustain for the bulk of the war. Instead of the relatively rapid, blitz-like conquest of the western Soviet Union–a conquest which would have obtained for Germany the oil and grain it desperately needed–Germany found itself itself in a long, grinding, brutal war against an enemy much larger and stronger than itself; with an army and weapon production capacity several times as large as expected. A plan is only as good as the information it’s based upon; and Germany’s plan for victory was based on very faulty information indeed.

[Zhukov_2011]

Hmm, seems like a few have been watching too many History Channel specials on German technology, or basing too much info on achtungpanzer.com (which is known for not being the best source of info on German armor and other tech).

For instance, the OP’s article claims the Ak-47 was a direct copy of the Stg.44. While the design of the Stg. 44 undoubtedly had a bearing on how Kalashnikov would style his rifle (and all other assault rifles developed in the future), the internals of the two rifles couldn’t be much more dissimilar. The bolts and locking systems in the rifles are different, and though both use similar methods of working the action (gas-operated) neither rifle pioneered this system. Both are select fire but use completely different selector systems. I would say Kalashnikov probably copied the use of intermediate rifle rounds in the Stg.44 (7.92 kurz) for his rifle (7.62x39), but others suggest he could have gotten the idea from the .30 carbine used in the U.S. M1/M2 carbines.

While it may seem a trifle subject to debate, it is a good one in demonstrating that many of Nazi Germany’s “high-tech” weapons weren’t really that innovative and didn’t have the kind of bearing on the post-war world that many today believe.

Take Germany’s wartime rocket program. Despite almost endless funds into the V1/V2 missiles, these weapons were barely more than glorified bottle rockets and when they managed to hit their target, did little damage.  Around 5,800 of these weapons were fired at Britain and some 500 of them actually hit, killing around 9,000 Britons. Compare this with the round-the-clock bombing by the Allies, which killed tens of thousands of Germans and severely damaged the country’s infrastructure, and you can’t help but see that the whole program was a waste of time - as some in this discussion have already mentioned.

The American Bombing Survey, studying Germany’s defense industry and research programs after the war, concluded that Germany could have built at least 24,000 extra planes with the resources dumped into the missile programs. In any case, when captured German scientists were taken to the U.S. to help develop its own rocket program, U.S. scientists quickly realized the Germans weren’t all that far ahead.

I’ve seen the Me-262 hyped up considerably on this forum. For one, the fuel consumption of the Schwalbe and other jets was beyond Germany’s ability to meet. Furthermore, while the Schwalbe could out race Allied prop-fighters for a period of time, it was no match for the maneuverability or endurance of the latest Allied planes, the Spitfire Mk IX+ and P-51s and Lavochkin-7s. Most damning, however, was the state of German pilot training from 1943 on. By the end of the war, young German pilots left flight school with just a few hundred hours of flight time and were easy prey for crack Allied pilots. Their skills were barely adequate to get a prop plane of the tarmac, let alone operate a Me-262.

Another example , the Pzkw. VI, or Tiger. While the Tiger’s gun could take out most Allied tanks beyond their own range, and its armor not easy to crack, the tank was a logician’s worst nightmare. Besides the outrageous fuel consumption, a Tiger had to have its engine replaced about every 100 miles or so (and, since the German war industry inexplicably failed to produce adequate numbers of spare parts for any of its machines, there were never enough engines to go around). The Tiger’s interleaved suspension system, which gave the best ride of any tank of WWII, proved to be more of a liability than an asset on the Eastern front, where mud and water froze in between the outer and inner road wheels and prevented the tank from moving. The Russian T34 and U.S. Sherman were much better amalgamations of those three basic, but interdependent, characteristics of armor development: mobility, armor and firepower. The Tiger and other German heavy tanks were barely more than semi-mobile pillboxes.

The list really goes on and on. As one poster mentioned below, inadequate sources for fuel drove Germany to develop synthetic fuels. By the middle of the war, Germany was getting about three quarters of its fuel from synthetic sources, including from acorns and grapes in captured French vineyards. This fuel increased Germany’s ability to stay in the war (oil was their Achille’s Heel) but much of it was developed from low-grade lignite and other sources mentioned above, so the quality was subpar at best. It took German pilots far too long to realize their 87-octane fuel was no match for the pure aviation fuel used in U.S. and British planes, which gave Allied aircraft sudden bursts of power and overall much better performance.

I’m not saying Germany didn’t produce high tech weapon systems, but none (besides a German a-bomb) nor any combination of those wonder weapons could have had any major impact against the Allied steamroller to victory. The one German device that could have possibly changed the war’s outcome, the submarine snorkel, was developed by a Dutchman.

Now, take some Allied innovations that actually had a tangible, incredibly decisive effect on the war, like ASDIC and sonar, cavity magnetrons and radar, Liberty ships, convoy systems, Ultra, the atomic bomb, B-29 strategic bomber, and the list keeps going, all the way down to the superior infantry weapons used by Allied (especially American) soldiers.

The most important Allied innovation, however, was the American and Russian systems of mass production. Hitler and many German industry planners eschewed mass production, and felt every piece of equipment should be handmade - a piece of art, one of a kind and with all the latest features. Speer turned much of this around, but it was far too late to save Germany. Germany understood far too late the kind of industry total war requires, and this is arguably the country’s biggest war time mistake.

Richard Overy put it best in “Why the Allies Won”:
“The war accelerated the technical threshold, and brought the weapons of the Cold War within reach, but no state, even the most richly endowed, was able to achieve a radical transformation of military technology before 1945. The war was won with tanks, aircraft, artillery and submarines, the weapons with which it was begun.”

Edit: Sorry for the extremely long post. This is a controversial issue and one that’s always fun to argue over! If you are seriously interested in what made the German military in World War II so impressive, at least during the early part of the war, you have to look into German innovations that are less glamorous than Fritz flying bombs,“stealth bombers” and curved barrels (shakes head): military training in which NCOs and junior officers were taught to take the initiative and make their own tactical decisions; a superb doctrine of combined arms; and simple radios which, when provided to platoon leaders, tanks and aircraft, allowed unprecedented communication and coordination between different assets on the field. These are the innovations that made the German military so successful in the early years (these and the fact that Germany choose to fight Continental countries which were much weaker than itself, that is, until Barbarossa).