AHC: Larger Post-1860 American Defense Industry

Delta Force

Banned
The United States had a large defense industry by the end of the 1860s, but it atrophied over the years to the point that both it and the United States military were small and technology backwards by the 1890s. Due to its neutrality and good all-around capabilities, I was thinking its role in the mid to late 1800s could akin to that of France after World War II, being willing to sell to most countries with few restrictions. In terms of potential markets, I'm thinking that Japan could be an early one due to the Boshin War. South America could be another market for countries seeking to avoid doing business with the major European powers. Imperial Russia, the Ottoman Empire, and Imperial China could also be potential markets for some American defense products.

Could the United States have used its Civil War era investments in industrial capacity and technology to create a larger defense industry in the 1860s, or would it be too difficult to compete with British, French, and Prussian/German manufacturers with better economies of scale due to large domestic orders?
 

TFSmith121

Banned
In some ways, it did, actually;

The United States had a large defense industry by the end of the 1860s, but it atrophied over the years to the point that both it and the United States military were small and technology backwards by the 1890s. Due to its neutrality and good all-around capabilities, I was thinking its role in the mid to late 1800s could akin to that of France after World War II, being willing to sell to most countries with few restrictions. In terms of potential markets, I'm thinking that Japan could be an early one due to the Boshin War. South America could be another market for countries seeking to avoid doing business with the major European powers. Imperial Russia, the Ottoman Empire, and Imperial China could also be potential markets for some American defense products.

Could the United States have used its Civil War era investments in industrial capacity and technology to create a larger defense industry in the 1860s, or would it be too difficult to compete with British, French, and Prussian/German manufacturers with better economies of scale due to large domestic orders?

In some ways, it did, actually; the Remington rolling block rifle (M1867 and/or M1870) were widely exported (and licensed) to Europe, including France, Spain, Sweden, and other minor states; they also were adopted widely in Latin America. Same holds true for the Gatling, of course.

The Army and Navy gun factories opened their doors in the 1880s, and the naval torpedo station had opened as early as 1867; iron-hulled gunboats (the 1,000-ton Alert class) were built in the 1870s, and US shipyards (Roach and Cramp) were building large iron-hulled liners in the 1870s, including the City of Tokio and City of Peking (5,000 tons), which were the largest ships of their day other than the Great Eastern.

The issue, of course, was the need - after the rapprochement with the British made manifest by the Alabama settlement, there was no foreign theat in the Western Hemisphere, and the needs of the frontier were for a constabulary, while the basic "gunboat" type policing requirements of the Navy and Revenue Marine could be easily met by the ships built during the Civil War, until the Alerts and then their steel half sisters started coming down the ways in the 1870s and 1880s.

So the answer is yes, given a threat greater than that of the remaining Plains tribes and interest in the arsenal and shipyard systems in both Congress and the White House.

Best,
 
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Driftless

Donor
Historically, how many American born weapons designers found great success & markets off-shore between the end of the ACW and WW1?

* Hiram Maxim
* John M Browning
* Richard J Gatling
* Charles Newton

Just four of the better known names.


*edit* appearing a little late for your POD, but Cramp & Sons of Philedelphia built the Russian (later Japanese) Battleship Retvizan (1902-1922)
 
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TFSmith121

Banned
I.N. Lewis and William Gardner, as well

Historically, how many American born weapons designers found great success & markets off-shore between the end of the ACW and WW1?

* Hiram Maxim
* John M Browning
* Richard J Gatling
* Charles Newton

Just four of the better known names.


*edit* appearing a little late for your POD, but Cramp & Sons of Philedelphia built the Russian (later Japanese) Battleship Retvizan (1902-1922)

I.N Lewis (barely) and William Gardner as well. Speaking of the Russians, their first series-built ironclads were license-built derivations of the US Passaic class, and Hiram Berdan's Berdanka rifle was a standard for the Russians for decades.

Retvizan is after the "New Navy" program was in place, but US yards had built steam frigates for Russia in the 1850s and ironclad frigates for Italy in the 1860s.

Best,
 
I.N Lewis (barely) and William Gardner as well. Speaking of the Russians, their first series-built ironclads were license-built derivations of the US Passaic class, and Hiram Berdan's Berdanka rifle was a standard for the Russians for decades.

....

Best,

I remember reading that in the Russo-Turkish war of 1877-78, many of the Ottoman infantrymen were armed with Winchester repeating rifles, which would mean that both sides of that war were heavily reliant on American small arms.

At least in certain classes of weapons, the US was already competitive in this period - it just didn't arm its own military particularly well because of lack of need.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Very true; even the British Army's breechloading conversion of the Enfield M1853

I remember reading that in the Russo-Turkish war of 1877-78, many of the Ottoman infantrymen were armed with Winchester repeating rifles, which would mean that both sides of that war were heavily reliant on American small arms.

At least in certain classes of weapons, the US was already competitive in this period - it just didn't arm its own military particularly well because of lack of need.

Very true; even the British Army's breechloading conversion of the Enfield M1853 used an action designed by an American, Jacob Snider; the result, the Snider-Enfield, remained in service in Indian Army units until late in the century.

Best,
 
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Delta Force

Banned
What about warships and artillery? The United States doesn't seem to have caught up on warship technology until the mid to late 1890s or possibly the 1900s (it even purchased British cruiser designs), while French artillery designs were used to equip the United States Army in World War I. The United States helped pioneer ironclad designs (at least for brown and green water operations), so it seems that is an area of potential leadership. I'm not sure about artillery though, the more advanced designs used during the war seem to have been British.
 
What about warships and artillery? The United States doesn't seem to have caught up on warship technology until the mid to late 1890s or possibly the 1900s (it even purchased British cruiser designs), while French artillery designs were used to equip the United States Army in World War I. The United States helped pioneer ironclad designs (at least for brown and green water operations), so it seems that is an area of potential leadership. I'm not sure about artillery though, the more advanced designs used during the war seem to have been British.

Post Root-reform, the US Army actually had several competitive artillery designs in production. The problem was that only a very limited number of each model was manufactured - a few dozen, in some cases. With its existing artillery inventory so small, when the US entered WW1, it adopted British and French artillery in the interest of standardization.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Alamo touched base on the artillery, but US Army Ordnance

What about warships and artillery? The United States doesn't seem to have caught up on warship technology until the mid to late 1890s or possibly the 1900s (it even purchased British cruiser designs), while French artillery designs were used to equip the United States Army in World War I. The United States helped pioneer ironclad designs (at least for brown and green water operations), so it seems that is an area of potential leadership. I'm not sure about artillery though, the more advanced designs used during the war seem to have been British.

Alamo touched base on the artillery and the operational needs behind the AEF's use of French artillery in 1917-18, but US Army Ordnance and the Naval Bureau of Ordnance were both providing modern designs in the last decades of the Nineteenth Century and then into early Twentieth; the standard Army weapons were the:

M1902 3 inch (76mm) (quite comparable to the French 75, German 77, etc.) and the M1906 4.7 inch (120mm); a 6 inch (152mm) field piece was also in the pipeline.

In terms of coast artillery, the US had been designing and manufacturing modern pieces in 3 inch, 5 inch, 6 inch, 8 inch, 10 inch, and 12 inch calibres since the 1880s, along with large calibre coast defense mortars; the navy's weapons for the steel navy ships (monitors, cruisers, battleships) were (largely) US designs and manufactures as well.

It's worth noting that (speaking to your last sentence) the "advanced" British designs of the 1860s were so much scrap by the 1870s or even before; the early British breechloading artillery (Armstrongs, Whitworths, etc), both for the army and navy, were replaced across the board by rifled muzzleloaders in the 1870s, both ashore and afloat, and for a mix of design and operational issues.

A rifled 8-inch muzzle-loading Rodman, for example, was hardly useless, even in the 1880s.

Best,
 
Post Root-reform, the US Army actually had several competitive artillery designs in production.
But US artillery was far from competitive in the period immediately after the American Civil War, though, which is the pertinent one to the discussion. It's asking a phenomenonal amount for them to leap from wrought-iron muzzle-loaders to cast steel breech-loaders that are better and cheaper than Krupp's. Just look at how difficult they later found making a 12in gun, catalogued here. There'd need to be a really compelling reason for customers to switch, as well. To adapt a phrase, nobody ever got sacked for buying Krupp, or Armstrong for that matter. Nor was Krupp a particularly fun man to compete with when it came to landing a contract.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
However, in terms of the original question, then

But US artillery was far from competitive in the period immediately after the American Civil War, though, which is the pertinent one to the discussion. It's asking a phenomenonal amount for them to leap from wrought-iron muzzle-loaders to cast steel breech-loaders that are better and cheaper than Krupp's. Just look at how difficult they later found making a 12in gun, catalogued here. There'd need to be a really compelling reason for customers to switch, as well. To adapt a phrase, nobody ever got sacked for buying Krupp, or Armstrong for that matter. Nor was Krupp a particularly fun man to compete with when it came to landing a contract.

However, in terms of the original question:

Could the United States have used its Civil War era investments in industrial capacity and technology to create a larger defense industry in the 1860s, or would it be too difficult to compete with British, French, and Prussian/German manufacturers with better economies of scale due to large domestic orders?

The answer is yes, given a) a threat greater than that of the remaining Plains tribes and b) interest in the arsenal, armory, and shipyard systems in both Congress and the White House.

Certainly the scientific, engineering, technical, and manufacturing capabilities present in 1865 could, given a reasonable level of federal support, have been nurtured.

The American small arms industry, obviously, managed it through the 1870s and into the 1880s; shipbuilding could have as well, given significant support, and so ordnance would have been part and parcel of that effort.

Best,
 

Delta Force

Banned
Post Root-reform, the US Army actually had several competitive artillery designs in production. The problem was that only a very limited number of each model was manufactured - a few dozen, in some cases. With its existing artillery inventory so small, when the US entered WW1, it adopted British and French artillery in the interest of standardization.

Do you mean Elisha K. Root? What kind of artillery was there?
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Pretty certain it was a reference to Elihu Root

Do you mean Elisha K. Root? What kind of artillery was there?

Pretty certain it was a reference to Elihu Root, secretary of war in the McKinley and T. Roosevelt administrations; among other accomplishments, the department created the Army War College, set up the general staff, integrated the National Guard under the 1903 act into an Army reserve, and reequipped and set the path for the differentation of the field and coast artillery, which were organized as separate branches under his sucessor.

The guns developed at this time were the the standard Army weapons were the M1902 3 inch (76mm), quite comparable to the French 75, German 77, etc., and the M1906 4.7 inch (120mm); the M1908 6 inch (152mm) howitzer was also developed.

Absent any of the French or British weapons adopted in 1917-18 as part of the war mobilization, a US division would have used the M1902 as the direct support weapon and the M1906 and M1908 as the indirect fire weapons.

Best,
 
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