What If- Earlier Jets and their effect on WWII?

I was aware of the short range issues and I thought that might give an advantage to someone defending their own nation.

Would that mean that high performance piston engined aircraft would still be used as escorts or would it be necessary to have mid-air refueled jets to do the job? How much better were the early jets versus the late war piston aircraft?

I was thinking that the Navy might still be using piston aircraft of aircraft carriers if the Japanese were somewhat behind in development. But they could also be using jets at the 'base' for them is able to get much closer to the target, putting the target inside the operating range of the jets.

Would we see a turboprop during the war?
 
I was aware of the short range issues and I thought that might give an advantage to someone defending their own nation.

Would that mean that high performance piston engined aircraft would still be used as escorts or would it be necessary to have mid-air refueled jets to do the job? How much better were the early jets versus the late war piston aircraft?

I was thinking that the Navy might still be using piston aircraft of aircraft carriers if the Japanese were somewhat behind in development. But they could also be using jets at the 'base' for them is able to get much closer to the target, putting the target inside the operating range of the jets.

Would we see a turboprop during the war?

Once something like the nene powered Vampire or the Hs11 powered Me P1011 are in service, the props are dead. The jets can use their superior speed much as the Bf109s did when they engaged I16 at the start of the Russian campaign. You either develop jet escorts, or, like the MiG15 proved over Korea, piston powered bombers (B29 there) and their similarly powered escorts will be wiped out...
 
You either develop jet escorts, or, like the MiG15 proved over Korea, piston powered bombers (B29 there) and their similarly powered escorts will be wiped out...

Maybe not quite so dire effects, although obviously the B-29s days were numbered.

When the Korean War ended on July 27, 1953, the B-29s had flown over 21,000 sorties, nearly 167,000 tons of bombs had been dropped, and 34 B-29s had been lost in combat (16 to fighters, four to flak, and fourteen to other causes). B-29 gunners had accounted for 34 Communist fighters (16 of these being MiG-15s) probably destroyed another 17 (all MiG-15s) and damaged 11 (all MiG-15s). Losses were less than 1 per 1000 sorties.
http://www.joebaugher.com/usaf_bombers/b29_12.html
 
Once something like the nene powered Vampire or the Hs11 powered Me P1011 are in service, the props are dead. The jets can use their superior speed much as the Bf109s did when they engaged I16 at the start of the Russian campaign. You either develop jet escorts, or, like the MiG15 proved over Korea, piston powered bombers (B29 there) and their similarly powered escorts will be wiped out...
Actually no, the allied (mostly American) pilots figured out a way of dealing with the Me-262, catch it as it was landing of taking off, they took down quite a number this way, and induced the jets to seek protection from Fw-190s and swathes of flak cannons, and even then, it didn't prevent quite a number being damaged.
 
Actually no, the allied (mostly American) pilots figured out a way of dealing with the Me-262, catch it as it was landing of taking off, they took down quite a number this way, and induced the jets to seek protection from Fw-190s and swathes of flak cannons, and even then, it didn't prevent quite a number being damaged.

But the TL here is about much earlier jet development. both sides would have their jets earlier. Assuming this is done by solving the engines problem. Wich is very easy for the Brits, and very hard for the Germans, this allows for the next generation jets to arrive in time for the 1944 showdown. The logical next step for the Brits would be to put the Nene on the Vampire, while the Germans would put the Hs11 on the P1101.
This puts us on Luft 46 territory, of course.
Mind that I regard a 1944 Nene vampire as doable, reliable good Germans jet engines in 1944 ASB...
 
And if you believe those claims from the B29 gunners I have a solid gold coconut that I'll mail you as soon as you deposit 1 000 000€ in my Caiman bank account:D

The losses in the opposed sorties are the ones that matter. Lots of those B29 missions were not opposed

It was the loss per sortie rates that are more to the point. The USAF obviously adjusted tactics and loss rates were deemed acceptable or they would have done something else.
What do you have against those poor B-29 gunners? :D
 
It was the loss per sortie rates that are more to the point. The USAF obviously adjusted tactics and loss rates were deemed acceptable or they would have done something else.
What do you have against those poor B-29 gunners? :D

Nothing, it's just their numbers were about as reliable as Greek financial records;)
The Soviets claimed 66 B29 shoot down. They also regarded daylight missions of B29 inside their interception zones easy meat.
The MiG15 speed, high altitude handling and excellent power to weight made it excellent for diving passes at the B29, while its powerful guns made hits count.
A lot of Korean records are old, one sided accounts. Of course post 91 Russian sources are also inflated, but sending prop bombers against jet interceptors would be a very costly business.
The Me262 was a flawed aircraft that was used too late and in the wrong way. The sweep wing, single engined P1101 would be the real threat...
 
Am I misremembering or are the metals needed for high-temperature alloys on the list of things that Germany was short of? If this was the case then giving everyone the same boost in jet technology would hurt Germany, because they're not going to be able to build all the engines that they need.
 
B-29's in Korea were switched to night missions once the MiG-15 turned up, except when they were used as "bait"...
 
Am I misremembering or are the metals needed for high-temperature alloys on the list of things that Germany was short of? If this was the case then giving everyone the same boost in jet technology would hurt Germany, because they're not going to be able to build all the engines that they need.

Nickel, Chromium
 
Germany was short of chromium and nickel which are needed in high temperature alloys, and by 1944 this shortage was acute. However I think IITL Germany would see the need to acquire these ores in larger quanities and take steps to do so, lessening the crisis in the first half of the wear. But as I said in my first reply having jets on both sides would cancel each other out and the war would be decided by alliances and productive capacity and the shortage of jet alloys would be the sort of thing that would doom Germany in this scenario.
 
Am I misremembering or are the metals needed for high-temperature alloys on the list of things that Germany was short of? If this was the case then giving everyone the same boost in jet technology would hurt Germany, because they're not going to be able to build all the engines that they need.
I mentioned that few post before. German engines were unreliable with short operational life. Because of shortage of the materials, different alloys were used, which affected the hours. If I remember correctly, Jumo engines had something like 30 hours life before rebuilt.
 
Germany was short of chromium and nickel which are needed in high temperature alloys, and by 1944 this shortage was acute. However I think IITL Germany would see the need to acquire these ores in larger quanities and take steps to do so, lessening the crisis in the first half of the wear. But as I said in my first reply having jets on both sides would cancel each other out and the war would be decided by alliances and productive capacity and the shortage of jet alloys would be the sort of thing that would doom Germany in this scenario.
Well chromium, nickel etc were also additives for armor manufacturing and quality of German armor went down the water because of lack of material.
If they didn't fix the problem of shortages of these material in OTL, how they gonna fix it with even higher demand if jet engines are manufactured at huge quantities?
 
Nothing, it's just their numbers were about as reliable as Greek financial records;)
The Soviets claimed 66 B29 shoot down. They also regarded daylight missions of B29 inside their interception zones easy meat.
The MiG15 speed, high altitude handling and excellent power to weight made it excellent for diving passes at the B29, while its powerful guns made hits count.
A lot of Korean records are old, one sided accounts. Of course post 91 Russian sources are also inflated, but sending prop bombers against jet interceptors would be a very costly business.
The Me262 was a flawed aircraft that was used too late and in the wrong way. The sweep wing, single engined P1101 would be the real threat...

Agreed, essentially. I trust USAF and Soviet records of their own losses more than I do the claims of what they shot down. Particularly the former in that it is hard to hide personnel losses.
As another poster stated, switching to night bombing missions removed the M-15 threat to the B-29s.
 
Invade or co-opt Turkey to get the chromium mines, work on leaning out other processes requiring these metals, put more effort into recovering and recycling of these metals, chase more marginal deposits of these metals. Germany was chronically short of everything in WW2 yet they seemed to be able to fight for 6 years, something must be able to be done otherwise this couldn't have occured.
 
Invade or co-opt Turkey to get the chromium mines, work on leaning out other processes requiring these metals, put more effort into recovering and recycling of these metals, chase more marginal deposits of these metals. Germany was chronically short of everything in WW2 yet they seemed to be able to fight for 6 years, something must be able to be done otherwise this couldn't have occured.
Something was done. Quality of finished product was lowered as war continued not to Germany advantage.
 
Would the way missions were done change? Do you HAVE to have aerial refueling to do useful things with these jets?

If jets are viable at the beginning of the war, how long until the US can do strategic bombing of Germany from either Greenland or mainland US? Do jets make that more likely?

I'm actually thinking that they might build a few bombers that can do that, but with England and the various Pacific Islands available, the Allies might simply not bother.
 
Something was done IOTL to deal with the circumstances that appeared IOTL, that doesn't necessarily mean that if jets were around in 1940 that the OTL 1944 solution would be used.

Perhaps Germany would decide not to lean the nickel and chromium out jet engines, since they are responsible for providing air superiority, but to lean it out of something else, perhaps battleship armour or piston engine crankshafts. Perhaps IITL Hitler actually puts his threats of laying up the surface ships into action and recycles the nickel in their armour, all of a sudden you have tons of high quality nickel steel available that IOTL was tied up in surface ships that did bugger-all.
 
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