That's a glide-bomb, not a cruise missile. And you have to be practically overhead for it to work. You might as well develop an aerial torpedo and be done with it, at least one of those could be carried with relatively minimal drag.[/QUOTE]
BlondieBC
Banned
Actually from a Nazi perspective, it was worse than that. The worst part was the winter of 1941/42. For the first 3 months or so, the railroad workers worked the normal work week. Holidays off, weekends off, etc. Most of regauging is just labor. The Nazi could have converted the gauge at twice the rate of OTL for no major costs. And with a little more foresight, the could have also boosted RR engine and car production. When the German armies were fighting up to 600 miles past a railhead in the winter, it easily could have been 100's of miles less. Less strain on trucks, less fuel consumption, more supplies. Whoever the Nazi was in charge of the rail conversion deserves a high Soviet medal for saving countless Soviet lives. While not a war winner in and of itself, it is one of the more powerful POD to help the Germans in the east. You probably move the attack on Moscow up at least 2 full weeks, lower German casualties over the winter as more fuel, ammo, and winter clothing arrive, and greatly boost soviet casualties.
BlondieBC
Banned
It is an easy POD to get guide weapons early in the war. Don't lose the research/work done in WW1 and start a bit earlier. It has a huge benefit, but then Hitler did not think he would fight a war with the UK. And he was an army man. And from a WW1 perspective, having Russian neutral and France conquered would guarantee a win. Easy to understand the lack of work on naval issues. And it is easy enough to get a big enough warhead to sink whatever ship you need to. It would be a fun TL to read.
SAVORYapple had a thread about glide bombs it's not a TL but it's still interesting reading here's a link https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=253129
While it started as a glide bomb the addition of a rocket motor made it a cruise missile. Granted the range was only 12km, but it still qualifies. The drag was not excessive, but the weight (1095 kg) was such that no more than one could be carried by one aircraft.
This photo shows a Focke Wulf Fw-200 C4/U10 carrying two Henschel Hs-293s so a four engine bomber could carry two but considering it's slower speed the LW crews would have been better off just carrying the one Hs-293 in a faster twin engine plane.
Give every German solider an MP40 and as much ammo as he can carry, rather than have the majority of the German army use the K98 rifle right up until the end of the war. However I think with many of these decisions, there was more money than resources to go round...hence why money is not enough...You can't buy bullets and shells out of thin air...
Yes, shorten it. The extra strain on the German logistics alone would be entertaining - especially for the Soviets.
deathscompanion1
Banned
A more practical idea would be to develop an automatic rifle pre war.
But German infanrty doctrine focussed on the machine gun and it worked fine.
It was Strategic weaknesses not poor small arms that lost the war.
Deleted member 1487
They were working on it pre-war, but the problem was that the gas ejection system could not be worked out until the SVT-40 was captured during Barbarossa. Even the first semi-auto mass produced rifle, the Gewehr 41, was a failure until the gas ejection system was worked out, which produced the Gewehr 43, right when the Stg 44 entered service.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gewehr_43
Edit:
It seems the work on the intermediate cartridge was in the 1930's, but the assault rifle was a wartime invention.
The high command was fixated on logistics and ammo consumption rates for rifle bullets and were wary of even semi-auto rifles as being too heavy consumers of ammunition...they thought the men would be wasteful of rounds and not take careful aim.
This photo shows a Focke Wulf Fw-200 C4/U10 carrying two Henschel Hs-293s so a four engine bomber could carry two but considering it's slower speed the LW crews would have been better off just carrying the one Hs-293 in a faster twin engine plane.
I stand corrected. I would not want to be the pilot of that Condor, though; that's a very heavy load for that aircraft and it would make flying it quite difficult.
Deleted member 1487
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebelwerfer
They were used in Poland, so they had rocket launchers pre-war.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/15_cm_Nebelwerfer_41
The MLRS first appeared in the Wehrmacht in 1940 after the Battle of France.
Cook
Banned
That’s my point, the Germans had a great deal of experience with rocketry, why didn’t they develop their own Katyusha? The nebelwerfer's were a short range, mortar rocket; but that and the various other rocket systems under development mean they were technically proficient. You would have thought a battlefield artillery rocket would have been just their thing.
Deleted member 1487
In what way? They had a MLRS before invading the Soviet Union. The USSR could afford to mount their on trucks, something the Germans could not afford, as they needed as most of theirs for logistics, while the Soviets had a surplus they could use for mounting MLRSs on. The Nebelwerfer was pretty much the same thing, just not mounted on a truck. Maybe I am misunderstanding your question, but this was the German Katyusha.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/21_cm_Nebelwerfer_42
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30_cm_Nebelwerfer_42
Not sure what the difference is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyusha_rocket_launcher
This is virtually the same thing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebelwerfer#8_cm_Raketen-Vielfachwerfer
Prior to this system the Germans built more expensive and much more accurate rockets, though they eventually copied the really cheap, really inaccurate Katyusha.
Cook
Banned
I has kind of picturing Germans firing counter-battery missions against Russian Katyushas with their own, longer range rocket artillary. The Germans didn't throw their rocket scientists into gulags at any stage, they threw money at them; they should have been able to produce a longer range alternative.