alternatehistory.com

So throughout the cold war, much of the European aircraft industry atrophied.

From Hawker, Supermarine, Fairey, Short, Avro, Vickers, Westland, De Haviland, Handley Page, Bristol, Armstrong Whitworth, Fokker, Koolhoven, Saab, Junkers, Heinkel, Dornier, Feisler, Focke Wulf, Messerschmitt, Gotha, Blohm & Voss, Reggiane, Fiat, Macchi, Breda, CANT, Caproni, Piaggio, Savoia-Marchetti, IMAM, SNCAC, Amiot, ANF, Arsenal, Belriot, Bloch, Breguet, Caudron, Dewoitine, Hanriot, Loire, SNCASE, SNCAO, Farman, Moraine-Saulnier, Neiuport, Potez, IAR, PZL, Ikarus, Rogozarski, Avia, Letov, Aero, Praga,

And I'm sure im forgetting more.


All of them doing fairly extensive (especially given the size of some of these firms) in-house development and production of military aircraft in WWII.

To my knowledge, we're down to Saab, and Dassault for firms that do ground-up, in-house design, testing, and production of military aircraft.

Now I know there's been a general trend of consolidation and conglomeration (thanks again capitalism). But the US seemed to stay quite comparatively diversified until recently, with Northrup-Grumman, McDonnell-Douglas, Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, General-Dynamics, all either receiving or supporting large contracts at least until the 90's.


So. What happened? How can we stop it? What would the European defense market look like now?



And for fun:
Bonus points if the OTL CEO's, bordmembers, and/or stockholders are financially crippled in the process, or as bystander casualties. Like full on break their monetary kneecaps with a lead pipe. Just go to town.
Top