How chaotic was Nazi organization?

[Orko]

I hear that in all that comes to administration and military, the Nazis were extremely disorganized. It included many overlapping authorities, many times officials did not know how to respond as they did not know which duties were under whose control, it was all geared in a way that would limit officials so as to increase the fuhrer's power which only meant hell for lower-tier Nazis. But exactly how disorganized was the Nazi state? Can I get examples of this chaos?

[Moglwi]

I hear that in all that comes to administration and military, the Nazis were extremely disorganized. It included many overlapping authorities, many times officials did not know how to respond as they did not know which duties were under whose control, it was all geared in a way that would limit officials so as to increase the fuhrer's power which only meant hell for lower-tier Nazis. But exactly how disorganized was the Nazi state? Can I get examples of this chaos?

The German Post office had a Nuclear weapons program:eek:

[Arachnid]

I would suggest Adam Tooze's Wages of Destruction (http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Wages-Destruction-Breaking-Economy/dp/0141003480/ref=sr_1_sc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334767637&sr=8-1-spell) for a look at the Nazi economy. Basically there were about 10 different organisation including the Office of the 4 Year Plan, the Reichsbank, the Army, Reich Economics Ministry etc. all pursuing different and frequently contradictory strategies.

[MSZ]

Well for starters, after the Nazis took power in Germanyin 1933, they did not technically dissolve the old Landers, but moved state authorities and powers to their pre-established party administration of the Gaue. So you had a situation where the same territory was ruled both by a Nazi Gaueleiter like say, Bavaria under Wagner with him holding uncertain powers - as there was no constitution or governmental act on "what are exactly the powers of Gauleiter, what decisions he can, and which he can't " - while the state administration of Bavaria still technically existing and von Epp being Prime Minister (Reichsstatthalter) with his powers decided by the past Bavarian Constitution, Weimar constitution and other acts - none of which were however respected. So if some bourgmaister of Munich had been presented with some administrative situation which was out of his authority, he really did not know who to turn to for anwsers -the Gauleiter or Reichsstatthalter. And should he turn to both he might get contradictory anwsers - which makes the situation even more chaotic as there is no law saying who is in fact in charge.

The judiciary was also very chaotic, as former civil and criminal laws while still standing, were allowed to by ignored due to the introduction of many general clauses by which judges could hand out verdicts based on non-existant laws ("common sense of the Volk" being a typical one). So anybody going to court with any case couldn't really know if the articles which he was bringing up were really in force or not, if they were usable or not. Neither did the judges, so similiar cases might be resolved in a completly different manner, creating a judiciary chaos.

[BlairWitch749]

they had 8 different teams working on surface to air missiles; none of which cooperated with the large well funded V1 operation :rolleyes:

[Snake Featherston]

It was actually an extremely autocratic system, Hitler exercised power every bit as total and thorough as Stalin did. The system as it evolved, regardless of just how much effort Adolf Hitler put into forcing it to evolve thus or it doing so naturally on its own, was one where a single, lazy, boorish manchild occupied a position of total control of Germany in all spheres.....and encouraged and deliberately fostered a system so chaotic and unwieldy that it required him to make all the decisions. The problem is that Hitler was only one man and 95% of his ideas were bullshit, but since he was the only one empowered to make decisions on 100% of everything.......

[MSZ]

It was actually an extremely autocratic system, Hitler exercised power every bit as total and thorough as Stalin did. The system as it evolved, regardless of just how much effort Adolf Hitler put into forcing it to evolve thus or it doing so naturally on its own, was one where a single, lazy, boorish manchild occupied a position of total control of Germany in all spheres.....and encouraged and deliberately fostered a system so chaotic and unwieldy that it required him to make all the decisions. The problem is that Hitler was only one man and 95% of his ideas were bullshit, but since he was the only one empowered to make decisions on 100% of everything.......

Combine it with the fact that he was also mostly unavailable for anyone, as he rarely was in Berlin, disliking the city. So any decision before being finalized had to wait until his return, for a short time making the administration work 24 hours a day because of some grand idea he had returned with as well as that some of the stuff could be done in the meanwhile only because he was present at work.

[Garrison]

The BBC documentary series 'The Nazis: A warning From History' also goes into the sheer chaos of the system as applied in the conquered territories in the east. Essentially how things were done had little to do with any supposed rules and much to do with the personalities of those in charge.

[BlairWitch749]

It was actually an extremely autocratic system, Hitler exercised power every bit as total and thorough as Stalin did. The system as it evolved, regardless of just how much effort Adolf Hitler put into forcing it to evolve thus or it doing so naturally on its own, was one where a single, lazy, boorish manchild occupied a position of total control of Germany in all spheres.....and encouraged and deliberately fostered a system so chaotic and unwieldy that it required him to make all the decisions. The problem is that Hitler was only one man and 95% of his ideas were bullshit, but since he was the only one empowered to make decisions on 100% of everything.......

Beyond this Hitler was always appointing people to similar posts with the same responsibilities without establishing clear chains of command which in turn made everyone turn to him as the final arbiter

the whole kesselring and rommel thing in italy and africa, and later rommel, schweppenberg and rundstead thing in france are typical examples of hitler's divide and conquer method of governing

[Johnrankins]

About as well as you would expect from a would be painter, a chicken farmer, and a serious drug addict ! :D

[Snake Featherston]

Combine it with the fact that he was also mostly unavailable for anyone, as he rarely was in Berlin, disliking the city. So any decision before being finalized had to wait until his return, for a short time making the administration work 24 hours a day because of some grand idea he had returned with as well as that some of the stuff could be done in the meanwhile only because he was present at work.

^Exactly. The difference in this regard with Stalin was that he created the bureaucracy from Hell. Hitler was a very lazy man who managed to parlay all the defects in leadership such laziness meant into a pure variant of autocracy through deliberately strengthening gridlock. The result was that this system was very good for Adolf Hitler, very bad for everything and everyone else that was German.

Beyond this Hitler was always appointing people to similar posts with the same responsibilities without establishing clear chains of command which in turn made everyone turn to him as the final arbiter

the whole kesselring and rommel thing in italy and africa, and later rommel, schweppenberg and rundstead thing in france are typical examples of hitler's divide and conquer method of governing

^Add to this the deliberate creation of the Waffen-SS as a rival army and state within a state, ensuring that the SS *also* had its *own* internal incompatibilities and rivalries to prevent Himmler potentially challenging Hitler. Hitler perfectly designed a system that was entirely autocratic and dependent on him, but did so in such a fashion that if anything happened to him the whole thing would start to fall apart under its own weight.

[Dave Howery]

Germany had 3 land armies... the regular Wehrmacht, the Waffen SS, and the Luftwaffe infantry units (which were done solely because Goering didn't want his Luftwaffe men under the control of someone else; when the Luftwaffe was effectively destroyed, the army wanted the Luftwaffe men to be drafted into the Wehrmacht)...

[Wolfpaw]

^Exactly. The difference in this regard with Stalin was that he created the bureaucracy from Hell. Hitler was a very lazy man who managed to parlay all the defects in leadership such laziness meant into a pure variant of autocracy through deliberately strengthening gridlock. The result was that this system was very good for Adolf Hitler, very bad for everything and everyone else that was German.Kershaw describes the Stalin-Hitler differences well, summarizing them as respective examples of Weber's "Bureaucratic Authority" and "Charismatic Authority."

The Third Reich would probably best be described as a monocratic polycracy, with Hitler being the only thing keeping the hydra from devouring itself.

[Snake Featherston]

Germany had 3 land armies... the regular Wehrmacht, the Waffen SS, and the Luftwaffe infantry units (which were done solely because Goering didn't want his Luftwaffe men under the control of someone else; when the Luftwaffe was effectively destroyed, the army wanted the Luftwaffe men to be drafted into the Wehrmacht)...

You're right, I forgot about those guys. That just illustrates it moreso: the Nazi regime was structured for the personal benefit of Adolf Hitler, he didn't care about anyone else.

[Johnrankins]

^Exactly. The difference in this regard with Stalin was that he created the bureaucracy from Hell. Hitler was a very lazy man who managed to parlay all the defects in leadership such laziness meant into a pure variant of autocracy through deliberately strengthening gridlock. The result was that this system was very good for Adolf Hitler, very bad for everything and everyone else that was German.



^Add to this the deliberate creation of the Waffen-SS as a rival army and state within a state, ensuring that the SS *also* had its *own* internal incompatibilities and rivalries to prevent Himmler potentially challenging Hitler. Hitler perfectly designed a system that was entirely autocratic and dependent on him, but did so in such a fashion that if anything happened to him the whole thing would start to fall apart under its own weight.

Agreed, Stalin, for all his flaws, was not lazy from everything I have read . He got to the top by doing a lot of work on the way up. He parlayed the General Secretary title from being a purely administrative role no one wanted to the most important position in the USSR due to a lot of spade work , double dealing and crass manipulation of people. This took a lot of time and effort.

As for your second point Hitler used politics 101, particularly for a totalitarian state. Like you said dividing the SS against itself prevented Himmler from overthrowing him. Personally, I don't think he gave a damn what happened to Germany after he died. We are talking about a man who gave orders to pretty much destroy Germany because the country failed him. :eek:

[Snake Featherston]

Agreed, Stalin, for all his flaws, was not lazy from everything I have read . He got to the top by doing a lot of work on the way up. He parlayed the General Secretary title from being a purely administrative role no one wanted to the most important position in the USSR due to a lot of spade work , double dealing and crass manipulation of people. This took a lot of time and effort.

As for your second point Hitler used politics 101, particularly for a totalitarian state. Like you said dividing the SS against itself prevented Himmler from overthrowing him. Personally, I don't think he gave a damn what happened to Germany after he died. We are talking about a man who gave orders to pretty much destroy Germany because the country failed him. :eek:

Stalin was if anything prone to the opposite problem: he tried to micromanage everything through bureaucracy to a point that the USSR really embodied Catch-22 and all the tropes seen in fiction about bureaucracy in practice. The Soviet system he designed was also ruled by a tyrant, but a tyrant who entered into the political system from the POV that he would take that system and make it dependent on bureaucrats he created and regularly snuffed out any sign of independent action in. In the Soviet Union Stalin's Purges prevented the emergence of things like the Himmler-Goering-Bormann Empires within the Empire, but at the price of creating a system that regularly had alternating brilliant efficiency in a few select areas at its best and crashes and burns and blithering idiocy at its worst, and most commonly grey, muddling nonentities who were for all practical purposes interchangeable.

So it was either the guy who was too lazy to do anything (the Slacktivist version of a dictator) or the guy who micromanaged everything to the point of dictating how shiny his soldiers' buttons were on their uniforms...OR ELSE.

[Snake Featherston]

Kershaw describes the Stalin-Hitler differences well, summarizing them as respective examples of Weber's "Bureaucratic Authority" and "Charismatic Authority."

The Third Reich would probably best be described as a monocratic polycracy, with Hitler being the only thing keeping the hydra from devouring itself.

I'd amend that to "monocratic polyocracy and kleptocracy." Nazi economics amounted in practice to shooting people and confiscating their stuff afterward, to the gruesome extreme of SS officials getting very wealthy indeed from looting bodies killed in the murder factories. This is how Stalinism wound up looking genuinely more efficient because it was, namely in that Stalinism had a lot of bad ideas, the Nazis really didn't have *any* ideas.....while a bad idea is always better than no idea at all.

[BlairWitch749]

Agreed, Stalin, for all his flaws, was not lazy from everything I have read . He got to the top by doing a lot of work on the way up. He parlayed the General Secretary title from being a purely administrative role no one wanted to the most important position in the USSR due to a lot of spade work , double dealing and crass manipulation of people. This took a lot of time and effort.

As for your second point Hitler used politics 101, particularly for a totalitarian state. Like you said dividing the SS against itself prevented Himmler from overthrowing him. Personally, I don't think he gave a damn what happened to Germany after he died. We are talking about a man who gave orders to pretty much destroy Germany because the country failed him. :eek:

Hitler wasn't lazy; he had a messiah complex and steadily lost all of his ability to delegate

Hitler started late; but he worked late; usually putting 12 hour days and was actually quite adept at understanding a very wide range of issues

but no man can be all things to all people; especially a declining man

in the early days hitler didn't even write or read the laws being passed... hess wrote them and gave them to him for signature; half the time Hitler would ask Hess for a rough description of what was being passed, the rest of the time he just trusted Hess' judgement that the law was good for the party... he even allowed Hess veto power over all laws and allowed him to exercise it when he would go on his retreats

as hitler's messiah complex grew his ability to let anyone think for themselves and to trust anyone's judgement other than his own waned to nonexistance; with marked spikes of decline in 41 and especially after july 20th

[LeoXiao]

Well, I guess in essence you had one ideology based on absolute state control of production and prices, which led to totalitarianism, and another ideology based on twisted nostalgia and pride but was actually reliant simply on conquering stuff.

[SergeantHeretic]

Honestly, I cannot for the life of me think of or remember a more chaotic or disorganized system than National SOcialist Germany.

Adolph Hitler was, in effective terms, the king of Germany in de facto terms and the longer he "Reigned" the worse things, got.

As others have said it reached a point where no one was allowed to do anything or make any descition without Hitler's personal say-so.

That is a system guarunteed to fail. To the extent that it cannot NOT fail.

[Michel Van]

about Internal politic of NSDAP, simple put in one word: CHAOS

between 1925–1930 the NSDAP was in grip of opportunists, power hungry maniacs and war profiteer
also was a ideological struggle between Hitler Arier fraction and Strasser Socialists fraction
it was so worst that Joseph Goebbels almost left the Party !

the climax in ideological struggle ends in "Night of the Long Knives" between June 30 and July 2, 1934
the SS fraction eliminate Leading figures of the left-wing Strasserist faction and SA fraction.

but only to be replace by power struggles around Hitler grace.
Himmler, Goering, Goebbels, Hess, Bormann were in constant intrigues agains each other.
Rudolf Hess made his fly to England.
Goering goof up every thing he touch, but stay in favor of Hitler
Himmler build his state inside Hitler reich

[Kalvan]

To drag this thread off on a tangent, let's imagine how Nazi Germany (and WWII) would have been different if we assume the screwdriver that just after being released from prison, Hitler starts scrawling broad outlines of a planned Nazi constitution, administration structure, and legal code. He then graduates around 1931 or so to the typewriter, and by 1933, he has a draft of each he finds himself satisfied enough with.

1: What would it look like, in broad outline?

2: How would it change WWII?

[SergeantHeretic]

about Internal politic of NSDAP, simple put in one word: CHAOS

between 1925–1930 the NSDAP was in grip of opportunists, power hungry maniacs and war profiteer
also was a ideological struggle between Hitler Arier fraction and Strasser Socialists fraction
it was so worst that Joseph Goebbels almost left the Party !

the climax in ideological struggle ends in "Night of the Long Knives" between June 30 and July 2, 1934
the SS fraction eliminate Leading figures of the left-wing Strasserist faction and SA fraction.

but only to be replace by power struggles around Hitler grace.
Himmler, Goering, Goebbels, Hess, Bormann were in constant intrigues agains each other.
Rudolf Hess made his fly to England.
Goering goof up every thing he touch, but stay in favor of Hitler
Himmler build his state inside Hitler reich

SO National SOcialist Germany was basically a Clusterf%&#ocracy.

[wiking]

I would also highly recommend checking out "Goering: Hitler's Iron Knight" and "War and Economy in the Third Reich" both by R.J. Overy for excellent examples of administrative choas. "Arming the Luftwaffe" isn't bad either, but focuses on solely the problems with the Luftwaffe. Finally the Military Research office of the Bundeswehr put out the "Germany and the second world war" series of which volumes 1 and 5 parts 1 and 2 focus on bureaucratic and economy functions of the Nazi state. It is the single best resource in English on the overview of the German war effort and its major failures in every conceivable realm.

[SergeantHeretic]

I would also highly recommend checking out "Goering: Hitler's Iron Knight" and "War and Economy in the Third Reich" both by R.J. Overy for excellent examples of administrative choas. "Arming the Luftwaffe" isn't bad either, but focuses on solely the problems with the Luftwaffe. Finally the Military Research office of the Bundeswehr put out the "Germany and the second world war" series of which volumes 1 and 5 parts 1 and 2 focus on bureaucratic and economy functions of the Nazi state. It is the single best resource in English on the overview of the German war effort and its major failures in every conceivable realm.
So,yeah, I am sticking with "Clusterf&%#ocracy".

[wiking]

So,yeah, I am sticking with "Clusterf&%#ocracy".

My initial response to the OP was simply "very". Its rather a testament to the horrible fuck ups of the Allies that the Nazis got as far as they did...

[Mike Stearns]

So,yeah, I am sticking with "Clusterf&%#ocracy".

LOL! Sigged.

[SergeantHeretic]

LOL! Sigged.

I has been SIGGED AWESOME! YAY!

[Orko]

The German Post office had a Nuclear weapons program:eek:

Really? are you serious? How... why... who authorised that?

[Beedok]

Really? are you serious? How... why... who authorised that?
My money is on the Swedes.

[SergeantHeretic]

My money is on the Swedes.
I was gonna say Eva Braun?

[Moglwi]

Really? are you serious? How... why... who authorised that?

From Wiki
Manfred von Ardenne,
For example, his research on nuclear physics and high-frequency technology was financed by the Reichspostministerium (RPM, Reich Postal Ministry), headed by Wilhelm Ohnesorge. Von Ardenne attracted top-notch personnel to work in his facility, such as the nuclear physicist Fritz Houtermans, in 1940.

[SergeantHeretic]

From Wiki
Manfred von Ardenne,
For example, his research on nuclear physics and high-frequency technology was financed by the Reichspostministerium (RPM, Reich Postal Ministry), headed by Wilhelm Ohnesorge. Von Ardenne attracted top-notch personnel to work in his facility, such as the nuclear physicist Fritz Houtermans, in 1940.
Holy crap, that S%$t was real?

[The Oncoming Storm]

Holy crap, that S%$t was real?

My thoughts exactly :eek:

Given the level of personal and agency rivalry and animosity in the regime it wouldn't surprise me if the post office had launched a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Sanitation Department...

[Snake Featherston]

Really? are you serious? How... why... who authorised that?

It happened because Hitler figured no Bomb would exist in time for the war in Europe (which as it happened he was right in chronology, not considering the outcome that happened, obviously, but he was still right) and Heisenberg and company didn't want to give it up. Given the way the Nazis were going about it, Hitler would still have been right as no Bomb built on that basis would have been deliverable without something like Turtledove's Potter-raid.

[Snake Featherston]

My thoughts exactly :eek:

Given the level of personal and agency rivalry and animosity in the regime it wouldn't surprise me if the post office had launched a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Sanitation Department...

Again this was because Hitler (rightly, in actual fact) did not think Germany would have a workable Bomb by the end of the war. Even if the alarmingly large number of ASB-level idiocy on the part of the Allies had conspired to give Germany such a bomb, it would have been like a lot of the USSR's thermonuclear weapons: status weaponry, not useable in a military sense. Hitler was a lazy omnicidal manchild but he was actually right on an alarmingly large number of things about the German war effort (which may be the most damning verdict of the WWII German officer corps).

[Mutzi]

The funny thing is that this chaos was actually a part of their ideollogy.
The idea is somehow like:"If you want great leaders without democratic nonsense, you have to let different people compete with each other, finally somebody will be better than the rest an show himself worthy of being a true leader."

Add to this Hitlers wish to control and decide at a whim what happens with different proposals possible this is indeed not really a great bureaucracy.

[Beedok]

My thoughts exactly :eek:

Given the level of personal and agency rivalry and animosity in the regime it wouldn't surprise me if the post office had launched a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Sanitation Department...

I do think that if you ISOTed them to an empty world you would see the various militaries and departments at war with one another in a year or two.

[Karelian]

I would also highly recommend checking out "Goering: Hitler's Iron Knight" and "War and Economy in the Third Reich" both by R.J. Overy for excellent examples of administrative choas. "Arming the Luftwaffe" isn't bad either, but focuses on solely the problems with the Luftwaffe. Finally the Military Research office of the Bundeswehr put out the "Germany and the second world war" series of which volumes 1 and 5 parts 1 and 2 focus on bureaucratic and economy functions of the Nazi state. It is the single best resource in English on the overview of the German war effort and its major failures in every conceivable realm.

Mazowers "Hitler's Empire" is also a worthy read.

[Johnrankins]

The funny thing is that this chaos was actually a part of their ideollogy.
The idea is somehow like:"If you want great leaders without democratic nonsense, you have to let different people compete with each other, finally somebody will be better than the rest an show himself worthy of being a true leader."

Add to this Hitlers wish to control and decide at a whim what happens with different proposals possible this is indeed not really a great bureaucracy.

Yeah, Friedrich Nietzsche's superman . That worked out real well, didn't it? :rolleyes:

[Mike Stearns]

My thoughts exactly :eek:

Given the level of personal and agency rivalry and animosity in the regime it wouldn't surprise me if the post office had launched a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Sanitation Department...

Now, THERE's and interesting TL. Germany wins the war, and gets the bomb, evetually, somehow, and the first nuclear war is fought as a result of an interdepartmental spat between the Postal Service and the Sanitation Department....

HAHAHAHHA!

[Max Sinister]

There's this joke from Nazi Germany:

Who doesn't do accordingly, will be punished accordingly.
What "accordingly" means in which case, is decided by the common will of the German people.
In doubt, the local gauleiter will decide.

[Grey Wolf]

Himmler was great at creating organisational structures...and then not using them! Not sure if it was Padfield, but there's an excellent quote on how Himmler would subvert and undermine the very structures he put in place.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf

[sharlin]

The inter-service rivalry was also a huge setback for the Germans, the Nazi's seemed incapable of agreeing on anything. The rivalries between manufacturers led to issues as well. For example the HE-219 Uhu, a superb aircraft in its role and quite the looker too was built in insufficeint numbers partially hindered by the squabbling in the upper echolons of Nazi leadership 'due to political rivalries between Josef Kammhuber (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Kammhuber), commander of the German night fighter forces, Ernst Heinkel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Heinkel), the manufacturer, and Erhard Milch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erhard_Milch), responsible for aircraft construction in the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Aviation_%28Germany%29) (RLM — the German Aviation Ministry)' According to wikipedia.

Other bits include.

The RLM rejected the design in August 1940 as too complex and risky. Lusser quickly offered four versions of the fighter with various wingspans (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wingspan) and engines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reciprocating_engine) in order to balance the performance and risk. At the same time, he offered the P.1056 dedicated night fighter with four 20 mm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20_mm_caliber) cannons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autocannon) in the wings and fuselage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuselage). The RLM rejected all of these on the same grounds in 1941. Heinkel was furious and fired Lusser on the spot.

. Heinkel was sure he had a winner and sent the design off to the RLM in January 1942 while he funded the first prototype (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype) himself. Nevertheless, the RLM again rejected the He 219 in favour of new Ju 88- and Me 210-based designs.

When Kammhuber saw the prototype on the 19th, he was so impressed he immediately ordered it into production over Milch's objections. Milch — who had rejected the He 219 in January — was enraged.

Milch repeatedly tried to have the He 219 program killed and in the process, Kammhuber was removed from office. Production ceased for a time but was restarted because the new Junkers Ju 388s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_Ju_388) were taking too long to get into service.



And thats just the construction of a single aircraft....

[BlairWitch749]

The inter-service rivalry was also a huge setback for the Germans, the Nazi's seemed incapable of agreeing on anything. The rivalries between manufacturers led to issues as well. For example the HE-219 Uhu, a superb aircraft in its role and quite the looker too was built in insufficeint numbers partially hindered by the squabbling in the upper echolons of Nazi leadership 'due to political rivalries between Josef Kammhuber (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Kammhuber), commander of the German night fighter forces, Ernst Heinkel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Heinkel), the manufacturer, and Erhard Milch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erhard_Milch), responsible for aircraft construction in the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Aviation_%28Germany%29) (RLM — the German Aviation Ministry)' According to wikipedia.

Other bits include.

The RLM rejected the design in August 1940 as too complex and risky. Lusser quickly offered four versions of the fighter with various wingspans (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wingspan) and engines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reciprocating_engine) in order to balance the performance and risk. At the same time, he offered the P.1056 dedicated night fighter with four 20 mm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20_mm_caliber) cannons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autocannon) in the wings and fuselage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuselage). The RLM rejected all of these on the same grounds in 1941. Heinkel was furious and fired Lusser on the spot.

. Heinkel was sure he had a winner and sent the design off to the RLM in January 1942 while he funded the first prototype (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype) himself. Nevertheless, the RLM again rejected the He 219 in favour of new Ju 88- and Me 210-based designs.

When Kammhuber saw the prototype on the 19th, he was so impressed he immediately ordered it into production over Milch's objections. Milch — who had rejected the He 219 in January — was enraged.

Milch repeatedly tried to have the He 219 program killed and in the process, Kammhuber was removed from office. Production ceased for a time but was restarted because the new Junkers Ju 388s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_Ju_388) were taking too long to get into service.



And thats just the construction of a single aircraft....


Milch was right to reject the 219... it's wingloading was very high for the period; especially at altitude; it's performance like every other heinkel design never matched the production brochures either... more to the point the ME-110 was effective enough as a night fighter where a purpose built design wasn't required anyway

the problem was hitler allowing his buddy ernst heinkel to continue low priority development after Milch repeatedly say it wasn't going to happen

[wiking]

Milch was right to reject the 219... it's wingloading was very high for the period; especially at altitude; it's performance like every other heinkel design never matched the production brochures either... more to the point the ME-110 was effective enough as a night fighter where a purpose built design wasn't required anyway

the problem was hitler allowing his buddy ernst heinkel to continue low priority development after Milch repeatedly say it wasn't going to happen

Agreed; it was badly underpowered, which made it useless for its intended role.
The Ju 88 G would ultimately prove to be Germany's best night fighter anyway.

[BlairWitch749]

Agreed; it was badly underpowered, which made it useless for its intended role.
The Ju 88 G would ultimately prove to be Germany's best night fighter anyway.

the same cancelling but not cancelling projects thing happened with the me-264 and a bunch of other stupid and wasteful designs that sucked up resources from projects the LW actually wanted