@KurtGodel7:
But the fact that the Axis war effort had been doomed by the Allies’ sheer quantity doesn’t mean we shouldn’t respect the technological innovations which occurred. One good measure of a technology’s worth is the extent to which it became the basis for postwar weapons or other innovations. Using that as the basis, the Allies made good technological progress during the war.
You make a good point here, but the influence of Germany’s weapons on the post-war era is easily and often overstated, IMO.
Later, the problem of attacking bombers was considerably simplified when the jets were given R4M rockets (which had a much longer attack range than the 30mm cannon).
Practically useless against the opposing fighter planes of the time. Without knocking down the escorts, Germany was unable to even slightly weaken the Allied bombing campaign during the last years of the war. Perhaps the biggest aircraft-related RMA of WWII was that bombers by themselves do not win wars - they need escorts, and lots of them - and that escorts, with their ability to suppress enemy planes and other air defenses, were the true kings of the sky. But the reverse is also true - to attack the enemy’s bombing potential, you have to destroy his ability to escort those fighters. The Me-262 completely missed the mark as far as this military truism is concerned. With no ability to counter Allied escort fighters, the Luftwaffe was destined to lose the bomber campaign and any sliver of air superiority.
You mentioned the Essex class carrier as an Allied innovation. I’ll grant it was better than the German carrier under construction, or the Japanese carriers of the war. But how much of the superiority of the Americans’ design was the result of the fact that the U.S. could afford larger, more expensive, better carriers than could the Axis?
Well, if you grant this concession, you’ll be joining everyone else who knows anything about naval warfare in WWII. The German carrier, which if you’ll remember was never even completed, would have been a poor rival to the Essex and British Illustrious/Implacable classes, or for that matter, the Shokakus. Its aircraft complement would have been less than half of a fully loaded Essex, and in any case, what carrier-based fighters did Germany produce to compete against the Hellcats, Corsairs, and latest Seafires? The cruiser-caliber guns that would have armed the Graf and the associated role the Kriegsmarine envisaged for this carrier meant it probably would have ended up on the bottom of the ocean before too long.
Sure, the Essex was only made possible by America’s wealth in resources and labor, but you dismiss the technological feats apparent in the class’ design. With a speed of 30+ knots, the Essex could outrun almost any other warship. The C4ISR capabilities of this carrier were superior to any other combat ship of the war and set the way in design and tactics for future development of the U.S. Navy. The class survived until the early 1990s, testifying to the technological superiority and far-sightedness enjoyed by the U.S. during WWII (I apologize if far-sightedness is not a word, I couldn’t think of anything else!). The Essex is much more than a giant hunk of steel. It embodies the success of American society in producing and fielding the weapons that would win the war, from its able workforce and skilled designers to its first-rate scientists and to the competent sailors and fliers who were graduating from the world’s best military schools.
People are impressed with the late-war German research and weapons development not just because the weapons “looked cool,” but because it was clear that late-war Germany was in the midst of building a solid qualitative advantage over its enemies even as it was in the process of being destroyed. That is an impressive feat on a number of levels, especially considering the Allies’ advantage in population size and available funding.
It is wrong to assert that Germany had built any “solid” qualitative lead over the Allies. There were pockets of modernization but they were small and few between. By 1944 - the year in which Germany’s production capacity peaked - only one-tenth of the German army was mechanized. The rest were dependent on horses or by train, and were forced to fight a slightly refined version of the artillery and infantry battles of 1918. Germany’s efforts to introduce a new generation of aircraft (greatly stalled by Udet’s insistence that all aircraft - even four-engined planes - possess a dive-bombing capability) ended in a wasteful series of technical flops. The Luftwaffe was stuck throughout the war with proven but older planes. Allied planes only increased in sophistication and efficiency. I remember reading a famous order to German pilots to avoid any combat with the Russian Yak-3 because the Luftwaffe’s aircraft just couldn’t compete.
Germany developed some very sophisticated weapon systems (many of which were paralleled, though maybe not matched, by Allied research) but almost all were still in a stage of utmost infancy, despite tremendous allocations of resources and production. Many were second-rate and only marginally better than the systems they replaced, and in some cases were worse. The only reason many of these projects are even discussed is because they were thrown into combat, unfinished and untried, in a desperate attempt to clear the darkening clouds. Some German units were able to exploit the new systems to deadly use, but in most cases, the weapons were too underdeveloped to have any effect on the battlefield.
What is impressive to me is, during the second half of the war, how effective German soldiers could fight without support aircraft, short supplies, long marches on foot, a shortage of tanks and trucks, little ammunition and an enemy that only grew stronger.
