German Navy plan X and Y (before settling on Plan Z)

BlondieBC

Banned
And what exactly do you imagine the RAF and FAA are doing all this time? Also the notion of Goering releasing Luftwaffe units to the navy is simply impossible if you take account of the characters of the people involved.

Again, the myth that no Nazi leader ever changed their mind.

Hitler, the man known for refusing to retreated in Russia, was also the man prone to retreat in Norway. He had to be talked out of pulling his troops out of Narvik.

Only if, as so many assume, the RN are battleship obsessed dinosaurs who can't respond to reality. If the Germans try such an approach the British will move to counter it. More AA, more more minesweepers, more destroyers, more carriers. Oh and lets not forget that this air force designed to fight a battle the Germans weren't planning on is going to come out of the resources intended to build the Luftwaffe capability to support the army in the battles Germany is planning on fighting.
People keep forgetting that up until the Battle of Britain the Germans were still hoping to make a deal with the British, they were never a priority for German planning until far too late.

Wiking did not say the RN would not respond, the has the Germans with a net benefit.

You seem to take the position that if the Germans had used more resources to try to beat the RN, then the RN does better. The logical corollary is if the Germans don't use mines, airplanes and U-boats, the UK has a HARDER time winning the war.
 
Again, the myth that no Nazi leader ever changed their mind.

Hitler, the man known for refusing to retreated in Russia, was also the man prone to retreat in Norway. He had to be talked out of pulling his troops out of Narvik.



Wiking did not say the RN would not respond, the has the Germans with a net benefit.

Really? diverting

You seem to take the position that if the Germans had used more resources to try to beat the RN, then the RN does better. The logical corollary is if the Germans don't use mines, airplanes and U-boats, the UK has a HARDER time winning the war.[/QUOTE]

Sorry but I have no intention of keeping this piece of nonsense afloat, especially as the original question has been asked and answered.
 
Even if the Germans just rested their air force after June and the collapse of France for a month and dispatched half of their Ju88 and He111 to the naval air arm for training for another month, totally skipping the BoB as we know it, the Luftwaffe would be tremendously better off vis-a-vis the British.

Ah yes...

Don't worry, a few weeks training will turn all those men into expert anti-shipping crews. And of course we have loads of torpedoes for practice and use. And experts in over-the-sea navigation...

Oh, wait..we don't....:eek:
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Really? diverting

You seem to take the position that if the Germans had used more resources to try to beat the RN, then the RN does better. The logical corollary is if the Germans don't use mines, airplanes and U-boats, the UK has a HARDER time winning the war.

Sorry but I have no intention of keeping this piece of nonsense afloat, especially as the original question has been asked and answered.[/QUOTE]

I accept you conceded the point.

Have a nice day.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Ah, but if the Germans put more effort into the Naval war what are they putting less effort into?

There are several possibilities, each will give you a different result.

1) German was not a a full wartime economy between the fall of France and invasion of Russia, so i could be less idle time for some German workers.

2) Or less consumer goods in the Reich or conquered lands.

3) Balkans

4) Attacks on Russia

5) Bombing of British cites.

6) North Africa

7) Garrison troops for conquered lands.

etc.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Ah yes...

Don't worry, a few weeks training will turn all those men into expert anti-shipping crews. And of course we have loads of torpedoes for practice and use. And experts in over-the-sea navigation...

Oh, wait..we don't....:eek:

You are making it Binary, which presents a false choice. They will be better at naval warfare than OTL, but no where near as good as the Japanese naval aviation. As to practice torpedoes and real torpedoes, Wiking gave the sources for them. Italian production of live torpedoes and extra resources given to the naval aviation effort.
 

Deleted member 1487

1) German was not a a full wartime economy between the fall of France and invasion of Russia, so i could be less idle time for some German workers.
This is not the state of things. Germany had a full wartime economy from about 1937-8, but badly mismanaged it and as a result had tremendous inefficiency that could have resulted in much higher production than what actually was produced. This was the result after 1942, where the same resource base/number of factories produced increasing amounts of weapons as the war continued, despite the fall in the quality of labor and introduction of slave labor. This wasn't entirely due to bureaucratic issues or major inefficiencies due to cost+ contracts, as natural experience producing anything will result in greater efficiency over time, but there were awful issues with competing bureaucracies preventing production rationalization and even placing orders or allocating labor. Once this was worked out through the centralization of production under Speer, who took way too much credit for the resulting increases in production, as there were even other factors at play that resolved by 1942 unrelated to bureaucratic infighting, production shot up quickly.

Even resolving some of the issues by giving Erhard Milch control of the RLM and aircraft production would boost output of aircraft rapidly from 1938 on. OTL the British allocated half the resources the Germans did to their aircraft industry, yet had greater output than the Germans in 1940, despite the Germans having a larger industry and having prepared it for war since 1936. This mainly had to do with major bureaucratic issues such as Goering interfering arbitrarily in production and Udet's massive incompetence. Have Wever survive would prevent this, as would having Goering killed before Wever. Having a competent administrator like Milch in charge, aided by the competent development and production staff of Wever (Wimmer-Richthofen-Loeb) and the Germans could have been churning out over 20,000 aircraft in 1940, instead of the 8,000 or so IOTL.

2) Or less consumer goods in the Reich or conquered lands.
See above. There weren't excess goods to cut.
 
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This is not the state of things. Germany had a full wartime economy from about 1937-8, but badly mismanaged it and as a result had tremendous inefficiency that could have resulted in much higher production than what actually was produced. This was the result after 1942, where the same resource base/number of factories produced increasing amounts of weapons as the war continued, despite the fall in the quality of labor and introduction of slave labor. This wasn't entirely due to bureaucratic issues or major inefficiencies due to cost+ contracts, as natural experience producing anything will result in greater efficiency over time, but there were awful issues with competing bureaucracies preventing production rationalization and even placing orders or allocating labor. Once this was worked out through the centralization of production under Speer, who took way too much credit for the resulting increases in production, as there were even other factors at play that resolved by 1942 unrelated to bureaucratic infighting, production shot up quickly.

Even resolving some of the issues by giving Erhard Milch control of the RLM and aircraft production would boost output of aircraft rapidly from 1938 on. OTL the British allocated half the resources the Germans did to their aircraft industry, yet had greater output than the Germans in 1940, despite the Germans having a larger industry and having prepared it for war since 1936. This mainly had to do with major bureaucratic issues such as Goering interfering arbitrarily in production and Udet's massive incompetence. Have Wever survive would prevent this, as would having Goering killed before Wever. Having a competent administrator like Milch in charge, aided by the competent development and production staff of Wever (Wimmer-Richthofen-Loeb) and the Germans could have been churning out over 20,000 aircraft in 1940, instead of the 8,000 or so IOTL.

To expand on what wiking said here a bit. What the Germans were expecting was for a big war to be fought but much later on, the 1944-45 date much talked about. As a result the Germans were putting their focus on expansion of raw materials supply. Low Quality Iron Ore, Coal -> Plants, other chemical plants, Aluminium, etc. Much of it done by the 4 year plan in giant blob that was Goering's private business empire. At the same time the Germans were also trying to add production capacity for increased manufacturing.

In the sense of providing Germany with a war economy this made a great deal of sense. All of this expansion took up as much if not more resources than the overt armaments program. It didn't really spin down till 1942. By the end of summer 1940 the expansion program should have been shelved or re-configured in light of the new situation.

Germans still needed Oil and Aluminium for example but coal and Iron were really no longer much of an issue.

Michael
 

Deleted member 1487

To expand on what wiking said here a bit. What the Germans were expecting was for a big war to be fought but much later on, the 1944-45 date much talked about. As a result the Germans were putting their focus on expansion of raw materials supply. Low Quality Iron Ore, Coal -> Plants, other chemical plants, Aluminium, etc. Much of it done by the 4 year plan in giant blob that was Goering's private business empire. At the same time the Germans were also trying to add production capacity for increased manufacturing.

In the sense of providing Germany with a war economy this made a great deal of sense. All of this expansion took up as much if not more resources than the overt armaments program. It didn't really spin down till 1942. By the end of summer 1940 the expansion program should have been shelved or re-configured in light of the new situation.

Germans still needed Oil and Aluminium for example but coal and Iron were really no longer much of an issue.

Michael

Tremendous amounts of manpower and resources were wasted on these projects once the war started, as most were not completed when they were cancelled by 1942. Of course there was also the West Wall if we want to talk about a serious waste of resources...

It wasn't just these projects though that were the problem; most factories didn't even have a second shift working until 1941, as they were waiting for new factories to be completed instead of using existing equipment more efficiently. Not only that, but the allocation of labor was decided by the factories, local gauleiter, and the 4 year plan office all at the same time, so gridlock resulted in lots of workers not even being utilized. War orders weren't getting placed until 1940, so factories continued on prewar orders until mid-1940. Training of labor was under the military, which used an unnecessary 2 year program so that labor could be highly trained to perform in any industry as needed, instead of a 2-3 month program run by industry so that they could work in one factory producing a specific type of armament (small arms, air planes, tanks, etc.). There was also the problem of industry getting over allocated materials and using them on side projects, diverting machine, raw materials, and manpower to produce what they expected would be future orders such as consumer goods or aluminium barracks for tropical environments for when German 'got back her colonies'.

All of this just started to be sorted in 1941-2.
 
Tremendous amounts of manpower and resources were wasted on these projects once the war started, as most were not completed when they were cancelled by 1942. Of course there was also the West Wall if we want to talk about a serious waste of resources...

It wasn't just these projects though that were the problem; most factories didn't even have a second shift working until 1941, as they were waiting for new factories to be completed instead of using existing equipment more efficiently. Not only that, but the allocation of labor was decided by the factories, local gauleiter, and the 4 year plan office all at the same time, so gridlock resulted in lots of workers not even being utilized. War orders weren't getting placed until 1940, so factories continued on prewar orders until mid-1940. Training of labor was under the military, which used an unnecessary 2 year program so that labor could be highly trained to perform in any industry as needed, instead of a 2-3 month program run by industry so that they could work in one factory producing a specific type of armament (small arms, air planes, tanks, etc.). There was also the problem of industry getting over allocated materials and using them on side projects, diverting machine, raw materials, and manpower to produce what they expected would be future orders such as consumer goods or aluminium barracks for tropical environments for when German 'got back her colonies'.

All of this just started to be sorted in 1941-2.

So what is the earliest this switch could happen and why might it happen? As I understand it, Germany only really went all-out with production from 42-43.
 

Deleted member 1487

So what is the earliest this switch could happen and why might it happen? As I understand it, Germany only really went all-out with production from 42-43.

Define all out. Germany was technically 'all out' from 1938 on, in that they had a total war economy (all sustainable parts of the economy were dedicated to war production).
But this was horribly inefficient for a number of reasons that I'm not going to write about here, because it would take several pages and lots of notes.
The earliest they could go 'all out' in a 1942 sense is 1939. They could go 'all out' in a peace time context, i.e. without double/triple shifts, labor mobilization, in 1937-8.

If Goering were killed in an accident before June 1936 the German economy (pretty much the 4 year plan after 1936) would end up run by Fritz Todt most likely with Speer as his assistant, much like what happened starting in 1940. Todt was actually pretty damn good at getting things organized and efficiently run, as he demonstrated before his death in 1941. Speer took the credit for Todt's innovations and changes in production when he succeeded him in 1942.

Even just looking from the perspective of the Luftwaffe, which was probably the most critical organization in the German war effort, having Wever survive and/or having Goering die would change tremendous amounts and dramatically improve Germany's production of aircraft and ensure most of the production/technological issues that popped up after Wever's death in 1936 and the rise of Udet wouldn't occur.

So to bring us back to the main question, Germany, if it had its economic/labor mobilization plan ready in September 1939, which its wasn't, would have been able to start mass production with double shifts. Had Goering not been in charge of the economy and Todt was his replacement, then Germany would have already been on the path of best practices in 1938. When the war rolled around then things jump into high gear and Germany start in 1939 what they in 1942 OTL did. So OTL production 1944 would hit in 1942 and probably would be somewhat higher because bombing hadn't really started yet, so the dispersal program wouldn't be hindering production efficiency, nor would 'round the clock bombing directly disrupt production and workers' lives.
 
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