Discussion: Comparing British and German industries 1900-1940

Thomas1195

Banned
Or they can force Germany to manufacture them in Britain if they want to get access to wolfram mines, like the Chinese did with foreign electronic firms regarding rare earth. Tungsten is a major input for high speed steel.
Well, synthetic dye was an even bigger blunder. Britain had the invention, the material AND the huge textile and clothing industries as potential customers.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
The lack of electricity production in Britain also acted as a constraint for its development of electrochemical, which thrived in Germany and especially the US.
 
Or they can force Germany to manufacture them in Britain if they want to get access to wolfram mines, like the Chinese did with foreign electronic firms regarding rare earth. Tungsten is a major input for high speed steel.
The difference is that if you have the base material, in times of crisis (or war funnily enough but you like to arbitrarily discount that because it doesn't help your narrative), you can get around to domestically produce the materials needed; that crunch can be dealt with. If you do not and just can make the latter, you are boned if that supply gets cut off. This alone is a massive advantage, since you cannot easily close down the former, but you definitely can the latter.
Well, synthetic dye was an even bigger blunder. Britain had the invention, the material AND the huge textile and clothing industries as potential customers.
Oh no, a person that had controlling interest in natural dyes didn't want to bother with spending more money, resources, and time making the same thing that they already have a lot of for their particular industries. I really am curious if you are aware of economics and how they might dictate policy. Probably not considering you were unaware of why the Germans went for electrified factories rather than relied on coal burning during the Victorian and Edwardian Era.
The lack of electricity production in Britain also acted as a constraint for its development of electrochemical, which thrived in Germany and especially the US.
Oh no, it's one industry that they are not ahead of. I mean, they only have a larger grip on shipbuilding, textiles, electronics (especially later on), agriculture, raw resource production, and so on. Not that it matters since you change the goalposts to intentionally eliminate British industries by decrying them as light industry or whatnot.
 
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Thomas1195

Banned
Oh no, a person that had controlling interest in natural dyes didn't want to bother with spending more money, resources, and time making the same thing that they already have a lot of for their particular industries. I really am curious if you are aware of economics and how they might dictate policy. Probably not considering you were unaware of why the Germans went for electrified factories rather than relied on coal burning during the Victorian and Edwardian Era.
Wrong, European society greatly valued Perkin's invention of synthetic dye when it was introduced, because it allowed rare colour like purple to become popular. Besides, synthetic dye had proved its superiority. Britain had big initial advantage, but they failed to protect it.

As a result of moving to electric power, Germany reaped big gains and its factories dwarfed British factories in efficiency and output rather than sticking to outdated steam powered plants like Britain.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Oh no, it's one industry that they are not ahead of. I mean, they only have a larger grip on shipbuilding, textiles, electronics (especially later on), agriculture, raw resource production, and so on. Not that it matters since you change the goalposts to intentionally eliminate British industries by decrying them as light industry or whatnot.
Oh yeah, they fell behind in the majority of industries that emerged after 1870. Dyestuff in particular and organic chemistry in general was only one of them. The other major new sectors that they fell behind significantly were electrical equipment and machine tool.
 

hipper

Banned
The lack of electricity production in Britain also acted as a constraint for its development of electrochemical, which thrived in Germany and especially the US.

I do not believe Britain was deficient in electricity production compared to Germany. Do you have any figures on generating capacity 1890 to 1910 for example?

Anyway I'd be interested at the point it became possible to transport electricity by high voltage cable more economically than the transportationn of coal to generate power to generate power on site. I suspect that this becomes possible in the mid 1890s

Btw merry christmas everyone
 
Y'know, just like another person who believed in a pet cause, you seem unable to use multiquotes.
Wrong, European society greatly valued Perkin's invention of synthetic dye when it was introduced, because it allowed rare colour like purple to become popular. Besides, synthetic dye had proved its superiority. Britain had big initial advantage, but they failed to protect it.

As a result of moving to electric power, Germany reaped big gains and its factories dwarfed British factories in efficiency and output rather than sticking to outdated steam powered plants like Britain.
That's why even the book you cite that took teeth pulling by smarter members than me to get out of you to list has mentioned in its pages how the Germans only ever reached 5/6th of English worker productivity. Plus two more components I want to point out:

1. Like Tungsten, the British can actually go to other markets, since they only really need it as a component for their money maker: textiles. There's a nice advantage to having a world wide market and the ability to buy from it all.
2. Brits still did absolutely fine when it mattered with their "shacks". And we commented on why they stuck with steam; when you have anthracite rather than rubbish brown coal, you can use steam better for longer, and guess which variant of coal the Isles had a lot of?
Oh yeah, they fell behind in the majority of industries that emerged after 1870. Dyestuff in particular and organic chemistry in general was only one of them. The other major new sectors that they fell behind significantly were electrical equipment and machine tool.
And none of that actually mattered when the game began. Especially since if you're going to use this as a gold standard, I'll use the German's massive subsidies and refusal to mechanize agriculture to cater to their nobles as my hammer home point, and that one seems much more serious of a concern IMHO.

And merry Christmas to you @hipper .
 

Thomas1195

Banned
I do not believe Britain was deficient in electricity production compared to Germany. Do you have any figures on generating capacity 1890 to 1910 for example?
https://books.google.com.vn/books?i...QAhVFH5QKHd3QD6cQ6AEIHjAB#v=onepage&q&f=false
Electricity output: Germany (13000 megawatt hours)> Entente (11600 megawatt hours) at the beginning of ww1

Oh no, it's one industry that they are not ahead of. I mean, they only have a larger grip on shipbuilding, textiles, electronics (especially later on), agriculture, raw resource production, and so on. Not that it matters since you change the goalposts to intentionally eliminate British industries by decrying them as light industry or whatnot.
I am not sure about electronic industry, although British did have several inventions like radar or TV (but the latter was not really a major product until post war). In radio, Telefunken was the main competitor of Marconi. Besides, German Enigma actually had a commercialized version.

Other things you mentioned, agree.

But there is another crucial industry that Germany had a strong lead both in output and technology: industrial machinery, and machine tools in particular.

Btw, merry christmas to you guys
 
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I think we've covered how the British preferred to just buy the items they needed already using their wealth and financial influence to do so, focusing on what they already had in spades to make loads of dosh. It's why they just preferred to buy specialized machine tools from Germany and the US to kit their factories, while their own tools were designed to be more generalized in nature instead.

Don't get me wrong, considering that Germany was reaching parity with them in productivity pre-war and had Europe's largest Industrial-Complex is noteworthy indeed; it's just they were not so hot in using what they had and they couldn't weather the strain as well as their compared rival in the thread which is the clincher for me. Well that and each nation had their own set of specialties they liked to focus on, which means the picture is larger than what is being posited.
 
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Thomas1195

Banned
I think we've covered how the British preferred to just buy the items they needed already using their wealth and financial influence to do so, focusing on what they already had in spades to make loads of dosh. It's why they just preferred to buy specialized machine tools from Germany and the US to kit their factories, while their own tools were designed to be more generalized in nature instead.

Don't get me wrong, considering that Germany was reaching parity with them in productivity pre-war and had Europe's largest Industrial-Complex is noteworthy indeed; it's just they were not so hot in using what they had and they couldn't weather the strain as well as their compared rival in the thread which is the clincher for me. Well that and each nation had their own set of specialties they liked to focus on, which means the picture is larger than what is being posited.
Well, that habit accelerated the running out of its dollar reserves during 1940-1941, and without Lend Lease, they clearly would not be able to keep up fighting. Lots of that money was used to buy American machine tool before and during Lend Lease.

Next, let me correct, German productivity in overall economy never reached parity until 1968, but in industry, they already surpassed.

You do know that during ww1, Germany financed the whole CP war efforts, and self-produced all of its war materials, without any dependence on foreign sources, but still managed to hold off the Entente for 5 years. They even won the Eastern Front decisively, while also nearly starved Britain with submarines. They only lost the war similar to a tennis player losing a tiebreak in the fifth set, their lands were still unscathed.
 
Well, that habit accelerated the running out of its dollar reserves during 1940-1941, and without Lend Lease, they clearly would not be able to keep up fighting. Lots of that money was used to buy American machine tool before and during Lend Lease.

Actually it was failure of Americans to realise they needed to trade on normal commercial terms that used up the British dollar reserve, Lend-Lease was necessary both to keep the British in the fight for markets open to the US and to stop the US economy falling over prior to its own entry into the war.

Next, let me correct, German productivity in overall economy never reached parity until 1968, but in industry, they already surpassed.

By what measure, you see your statement would stand up better if you actually cited some figures which gave a quantifiable meaning to your definition. There are many measures of industrial output and efficiency and you really need to pick one and stick with it or attempt to learn what all the different measures mean and apply to...but the latter will mean coming to understand that the picture is much more complex than you seem willing to allow for.

You do know that during ww1, Germany financed the whole CP war efforts, and self-produced all of its war materials, without any dependence on foreign sources, but still managed to hold off the Entente for 5 years. They even won the Eastern Front decisively, while also nearly starved Britain with submarines. They only lost the war similar to a tennis player losing a tiebreak in the fifth set, their lands were still unscathed.

Except that what it actually did was simply print lots of money while looting considerable amounts of agricultural produce and raw materials from its allies and conquests. In return some allies like the Austro-Hungarians received arms but not to the value of the resources claimed by Germany, which is why the Habsburgs were forced to admit to the Germans they would need to throw in the towel by December 1918 which allowed the Germans to sneak their armistice in for November. Basically the German Empire screwed over its allies in World War 1 and was highly dependent on them for its continued ability to wage war. The fact that post war Germany welched on its debts is one of the factors behind the economic problems that afflicted the Weimar era.

Beaten on sea, beaten on land and faced with the final implosion of their economy the German Empire collapsed in a revolution. It was every bit as beaten as Russia just luckier with the aftermath.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Actually it was failure of Americans to realise they needed to trade on normal commercial terms that used up the British dollar reserve, Lend-Lease was necessary both to keep the British in the fight for markets open to the US and to stop the US economy falling over prior to its own entry into the war.
But Britain was dependent on US imports anyway.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=169307&start=75

Look at two most important industrial resources for making weapons: steel and machine tool.

Steel (1942):
UK: 12.9 mil tons
Germany: 30.9 mil tons

Machine tool (1940-1944):
UK: 379000
Germany: 813000

Now, assume that UK steel output rose to 17-18 mil tons and UK machine tool production rose to 650000-700000. If we assume that compared to OTL, the output of ships, tanks, trucks and planes rose in correlation with this increase in machine tool production, Lend Lease could be limited to just oil or even butterfly away.
 
Aircraft 1940-1944 (Source Overy, Why the Allies Won)

UK :111539
Germany: 102046

Why make machine tools when you can focus on making the machines of war?

The Soviets (who btw outproduced the Germans in weapons of war with less inputs as well) show the folly of production simply for production's sake however given their greater smarts in avoiding hot wars it took the Cold War a lot longer to finish off their system in fact the longevity of the USSR matched of the Kaiserreich and Third Reich combined and easily exceeded the existence of either regime in isolation in fact it comes close even if you count the Weimar years in the middle.

The thing is the British had a system whereby they did not need to make all their machine tools, they built ships and planes and guns instead, they might make the bomb and shell casings but they could import large amounts of high quality RDX and TNT filling from Canada and the USA. The British were able to retain a more focused and thus productive war economy which for long periods outproduced Germany from a smaller nominal base.

Indeed I would go further and argue that is the unfortunately persistent flirtation with war and thus the need for autarky that held the Germans back. It was once they abandoned such nonsense they began to perform more in line with their natural potential and pull ahead.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Aircraft 1940-1944 (Source Overy, Why the Allies Won)

UK :111539
Germany: 102046

Why make machine tools when you can focus on making the machines of war?

The Soviets (who btw outproduced the Germans in weapons of war with less inputs as well) show the folly of production simply for production's sake however given their greater smarts in avoiding hot wars it took the Cold War a lot longer to finish off their system in fact the longevity of the USSR matched of the Kaiserreich and Third Reich combined and easily exceeded the existence of either regime in isolation in fact it comes close even if you count the Weimar years in the middle.

The thing is the British had a system whereby they did not need to make all their machine tools, they built ships and planes and guns instead, they might make the bomb and shell casings but they could import large amounts of high quality RDX and TNT filling from Canada and the USA. The British were able to retain a more focused and thus productive war economy which for long periods outproduced Germany from a smaller nominal base.

Indeed I would go further and argue that is the unfortunately persistent flirtation with war and thus the need for autarky that held the Germans back. It was once they abandoned such nonsense they began to perform more in line with their natural potential and pull ahead.

Britain's heavy reliance on the destructive lend lease had a profound negative impact on their post war economy. If they had a bigger capacity to produce basic industrial products and capital goods like steel and industrial machinery to support the production of war machines, they could have avoided Lend Lease, or reduced their dependence on LL to at least Soviet's level (while LL was crucial for Soviet, Soviet's dependence on LL was far less than British Empire, despite losing a big chunk of industrial regions).

We can also argue that if British shipbuilding industry was not obsolete and more mechanized (thus requure less labour), their output would have exceeded their losses without the need of US shipbuilding programs like Liberty or other Kaiser shipyards, and hence could have won the Battle of Atlantic earlier.

German production of land warfare weapons and equipment far exceeded Britain, with the exception of trucks. Britain was very lucky to be an island as they never ever fought a land war with a similar scale of the Soviet-German front during the ww2 like either the Germand or the Russian had to.

Btw, the value of munition output of Germany far exceeded Britain, but it was heavily skewed toward land war equipment.

Which really begs the question, what was the electricity useful delivery in Germany ;) After all there is many a slip between power station and kettle.

Merry Christmas

Well, it's had to find about the efficiency of electricity delivery back then
 
Britain's heavy reliance on the destructive lend lease had a profound negative impact on their post war economy. If they had a bigger capacity to produce basic industrial products and capital goods like steel and industrial machinery to support the production of war machines, they could have avoided Lend Lease, or reduced their dependence on LL to at least Soviet's level (while LL was crucial for Soviet, Soviet's dependence on LL was far less than British Empire, despite losing a big chunk of industrial regions).

We can also argue that if British shipbuilding industry was not obsolete and more mechanized (thus requure less labour), their output would have exceeded their losses without the need of US shipbuilding programs like Liberty or other Kaiser shipyards, and hence could have won the Battle of Atlantic earlier.

German production of land warfare weapons and equipment far exceeded Britain, with the exception of trucks. Britain was very lucky to be an island as they never ever fought a land war with a similar scale of the Soviet-German front during the ww2 like either the Germand or the Russian had to.

Btw, the value of munition output of Germany far exceeded Britain, but it was heavily skewed toward land war equipment.



Well, it's had to find about the efficiency of electricity delivery back then


Germany lost mate.

Twice...
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Germany lost mate.

Twice...
We are not discussing diplomacy. You cannot win a 5 vs 3 fight with the former including the US. I agree that German diplomacy records were lousy.

You can take a POD before 1900 to make a ww1 with Russia neutral, now Germany would have laughed at British naval blockade as it can trade freely on land with Russia, and they would press 7 armies on France and the war would be over by Christmas.
 
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We are not discussing diplomacy. You cannot win a 5 vs 3 fight with the former including the US. I agree that German diplomacy records were lousy.

You can take a POD before 1900 to make a ww1 with Russia neutral, now Germany would have laughed at British naval blockade as it can trade freely on land with Russia, and they would press 7 armies on France and the war would be over by Christmas.

Like France could in the 1800s? They lost too...

Could the German transport infrastructure have supported seven armies invading France simultaneously?
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Like France could in the 1800s? They lost too...

Could the German transport infrastructure have supported seven armies invading France simultaneously?
Well, as I said, if Russia stays neutral, they might already have 5-6 armies in the West instead of 4, and their railway system could carry 2 armies.
 
We are not discussing diplomacy. You cannot win a 5 vs 3 fight with the former including the US. I agree that German diplomacy records were lousy.

You can take a POD before 1900 to make a ww1 with Russia neutral, now Germany would have laughed at British naval blockade as it can trade freely on land with Russia, and they would press 7 armies on France and the war would be over by Christmas.

Germany only ended up fighting the US when it launched its unrestricted submarine warfare campaign of 1917, it only went to unrestricted submarine warfare because it could not endure the British blockade. Had Germany held off on unrestricted submarine warfare you ought still to have seen the Russian Empire collapse however the Germans found it a struggle to extract loot from Russia and most of what they did extract was consumed by their occupation armies in the East. Austria-Hungary was also a valuable source of supply and Germany extracted resources from the Habsburg Empire to the detriment of the Habsburg dominions own war effort with the result that the ability of AH to continue resistance was exhausted by December 1918. Evidence from the military operations of 1918 strongly suggests that Germany could not defeat the Entente in that year and with the fall of Austria-Hungary would have needed to sue for terms.

In the Second World War the Germans had conquered France and the Soviet Union was a neutral heavily supplying their needs and yet this proved insufficient for the German war economy in the face of British blockade. The led to the Germans concluding that they had to invade the USSR to gain its resources without having to pay for them. This led to the invasion of June 22nd 1941.

In both cases the Germany war economy did not exist in isolation and rather than relying on trade as the British did in World War 1 had access to and a reliance on loot to maintain itself.

The evidence of World War 2 is clear that Germany would not have laughed off a British blockade. The issue with an invasion of France was never the number of troops but the lack of roads to put them on...soldiers stuck in traffic are just an additional road block to supplies for soldiers at the front. Of course having a 1914 kick off without Russian involvement is a tad hard as the French would not go to war to support Serbia but went to war to support Russia who were supporting Serbia. The British went to war to support France and ensure the Germans did not make off with Belgium.

A war fought too close to 1900 sees France a lot stronger relative to a weaker Germany, not to mention the British.
 
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