German research

What if all long term Scientific research had carried on with an increased budget?

Would the result had been the war would of dragged on longer?

 

Not necessarily. There were plenty of projects out there that were completed as far as research is concerned but Germany did not have the resources to put them into production. Especially if fuel was involved. The Germans did have a way to produce synthetic fuel but their efforts were thwarted by the allied bombing. So, the Germans could not go from the drawing board to the field because of this. My 2 cents. Had their efforts not been thwarted, well then, the war would have gone on longer with much more destruction and evil unleashed throughout Europe

 

Their jet engines also suffered from the lack of rare metals to heat treat them and they only had a life span of approx. 8 hours.

The V-1 and V-2 were not much of a military weapon as they came down all over the place and only terriorized the public.

The Me-163 rocket fighter only had a flight time of approx 8 mins and the rest was just a fast glider.

Can't win wars with those types of weapons but they are nice engineering designs to improve off of.

 

Aren´t you glad Hitler did not like war gases....

The first nerve agent ever synthesised was GA (tabun) in 1936. GB (sarin) was discovered next in 1938, followed by GD (soman) in 1944.....

 

I am truly surprised he did not use them especially towards the end of the war or even against the Russians. Then again, I wonder how much of he believed in his own propaganda about rising up and winning the war still in 44'.

 

Many say that the amount of the nerve gases in stock were quite inadequate. Well, definitely enough to use in a battle or two ( if not more ) and just think of the fear factor if they ever found out piles of dead allied soldiers ( dead for no apparent reason ) it would be enough that those soldiers in the west would smell something odd and they would run run run...

 

Thanks guys, just as I thought. I had a general conversation about this subject and some of the guys believed Germany could have won hands down good example of those of us who read books and those who don't.

 

What the nazis needed was coherent industrial policy... They could not get half the things designed for them into production & the other half were either botched in manufactor or were items not needed for the situation.

Dr Porche should have been designing utility trucks, not tanks.

 

Coherency, that's the thing. I don't think the budget was particularly their problem. What they really needed from day one, but thankfully never really had, was an effective Chief of Staff. Stood looking at Cosford's collection of German guided missiles last week (schmetterling, fritz-x, V2, wasserfall etc.) it was impossible to deny the technical proficiency but the variety was quite obviously too wide. No senior person had stepped in and said 'no' often enough.
Cheers,
Adam.

 

Maybe this stopped AH from using the nerve gases...(?)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerve_gas

Speer, who was strongly opposed to the introduction of tabun, flew Otto Ambros, I.G.'s authority on poison gas as well as synthetic rubber, to the meeting. Hitler asked Ambros, "What is the other side doing about poison gas?" Ambros explained that the enemy, because of its greater access to ethylene, probably had a greater capacity to produce mustard gas than Germany did. Hitler interrupted to explain that he was not referring to traditional poison gases: "I understand that the countries with petroleum are in a position to make more [mustard gas], but Germany has a special gas, tabun. In this we have a monopoly in Germany." He specifically wanted to know whether the enemy had access to such a gas and what it was doing in this area. To Hitler's disappointment Ambros replied, "I have justified reasons to assume that tabun, too, is known abroad. I know that tabun was publicized as early as 1902, that Sarin was patented, and that these substances appeared in patents. (...) Ambros was informing Hitler of an extraordinary fact about one of Germany's most secret weapons. The essential nature of tabun and sarin had already been disclosed in the technical journals as far back as 1902, and I.G. had patented both products in 1937 and 1938. Ambros then warned Hitler that if Germany used tabun, it must face the possibility that the Allies could produce this gas in much larger quantities. Upon receiving this discouraging report, Hitler abruptly left the meeting. The nerve gases would not be used, for the time being at least, although they would continue to be produced and tested.

– Joseph Borkin, The Crime and Punishment of IG Farben

 

From what i have heard, i think Hitler experienced Poison Gas first hand during WWI. Based on its dependence on direction of the wind, it could pose more threat to his troops as the enemies, so deterred them from using it.

 

The problem with research, be it German, British, Japanese, US, or anyone else, is that results are less than certain, partially dependent on resources devoted to it (and availability) and, most importantly they have to be translated into a producable result. Each nation had only so much in the way of talent and resources to put into a particular line of research. Obviously, the US generally had more of each to put into a particular field. But, this did not always translate into the US getting the best results. Britain and Japan both developed millimeter radar and cavity magnetrons ahead of the US while Germany failed to do so at all (until they had captured ones).
In jet engines, the US was ahead of everyone in materials through their work on turbocharging but they failed to make the leap to the jet engine. The British designs were based on centrifugal models while the Germans were able to come up with the axial design but not the materials to make a durable engine.
Tungsten carbide was a German invention pre-war yet they fell behind because of patenting issues with the US taking the lead early in the war. If anything, the US made giant leaps in metallurgy while the Germans stagnated.
The British, with the US following, started the new field of operations research and industrial engineering. The US then became the leader in the later field inventing a whole new level of quality control that made their equipment so much more reliable.
Also, no one person in any country was able to completely influence how and where research was going. Private industry and individuals did some things regardless of goverment interest or a ready market. Various government agencies could also have influence. The Luftwaffe's technical branch (technische amt) was against much of the jet engine and aircraft development and threw road blocks into that field regularly. Even with Speer contramanding this things did not improve much.
In the US the Army ordinance department showed a high degree of pariocial disdain with an "not invented here" attitude towards many weapons that might have been far better than what was actually issued. Yet, no one could really force change on them either.
Bottom line: Hitler would have had little influence in allowing research to continue and the research itself would not have significantly changed the course of the war.

 

On the Ground-to-Air rocket:

" Wasserfall project did not begin until summer of 1942 after Göring had given his clearance for the project on Dec 17th 1942. The final production work on the "Wasserfall" could not begin until April 20 1943 as the necessary technicians had to be called back from the frontline units one by one."

From German Guided missiles by Nowarra

 

Way to dig up an old thread

 

I think that if Germany continued with scientific research, they could have been able to produce Me-262s Earlier so they would have air-superiority.


May have even gotten the V-3 to work along with the Silbervogel to work.
(Okay, maybe not the Silbervogel) Maybe they could have gotten the Atomic Bomb.

 

The German artillery arm is a example of how their research was often wasted. My refrence book for the Wehrmachts artillery is filled with examples of advanced and experimental guns. A few were produced in usefull quantities, but most were seldom see by the combat battalions. Particularly wastefull were the heavy guns. A seemingly endless number of 'Schwere Kannone, Haubitzers, & Morsers were designed, and then built in small quantities. Twenty of this model, fourty of that model, fifty of another. These heavy cannon used oversize crews, required extra support from the logistics train, and required a huge number of extra labor hours to build, over that required for the existing smaller and servicable designs. This vast park of heavy artillery seldom had the battlefield effect expected, and several production batches saw little or no combat.

Despite all this Wehrmacht and SS artillerymen found themselves increasingly short of cannon and ammunition. While on paper the Wehrmacht infantry divsion had the same ammount of medium and heavy artillery as the US Army divsion from 1942 replacement cannon and parts fell short of requirements and the effective strength fell off by approx 25% by 1944. In the case of the corps/army artillery groups the difference was far greater. Typically a German army artillery group would average 2-3 extra battalions per divsion. The US and Britian division had a average of 5-6 battalions available for reinforcing and general supporting fires from the corps/army artillery group. Britian & the US selected a small number of medium and heavy models for production, and confined the manufactor of the heavy cannon to the minimum requirement.

 

Hey AnEvilGuy! Welcome to the forums. Now, just a heads up, you opened one of the Forum pandora boxes!
I'll let other Forum members who get a kick out of this respond more thouroughly. I'll just speak a bit about air supremacy.

Well, due to Germany's war making potential, they couldn't field much aircraft at the same time late in war so, even if they produced more Me262 (tough I feel the Ar234 was a much more important design) they wouldn't be able to filed them all at once. For instance, late in war, when JG6 recieved 150 brand new Dora-9s, they could only field four at a time due to fuel shortages. So aerial supremacy would be very hard to achieve.



Cheers...

 

Do you have a resource for this?

 

This has been discussed and debunked many times before. I would suggest you read this thread.

http://www.ww2f.com/what-if/20325-what-if-me-262-created-earlier.html

 

Just getting up fron sleep I can't remember the exact amount LOL. But it is true the blades had a very limited service life. It has been stated here a few times in the others threads where the ME-262 has been discussed. I think one or more of our fellow posters can give the exact info .