IMHO

And now the question: whom do you read on the topic of Nazi Germany economy apart from Speer and Tooze? Mason? Overy?

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=99326 Thought we've got a Sea Lion mod coming

In 1938 the Turkish standing army had 20 000 officers and 174 000 men. Military service lasted for three years... The armed forces were poorly equipped; weapons shipments from Germany, Great Britain, and U.S. did little to improve that condition... By 1940 the Turkish air force was composed of four air regiments (each regiment contained six air companies), and had in possession a total of 370 aircraft (it had 8 500 personnel). Thanks to British and French shipments one more air regiment, along with five independent air wings, was formed in 1941. Shipments of military equipment from Germany replaced the shipments from Allied countries in the same year. Well... If we allow one more streak of luck I guess Germany could have pushed Turkey into submission. So Germany needed Spain/Portugal to keep a leverage on the UK, Norway/Sweden to have the ore and Turkey to threaten the USSR. So they'd have been stretched for mere 5.5 thousand kms Piece of cake

Agree on the change of mind for Chamberlain. They prepared Norway landing and that was hardly a policy of appeasement I guess they would have tried to starve Germany resource wise. Like US oil embargo on Japanese just more subtle. Not pushing it to an open conflict because the idea of going to war was unpopular at the time both in France and UK. So containment Your thoughts? Well... Here's more complex. On the one hand Spain was also importing 80% of their oil and no way Germany could have made up for that. But on the other hand Franco and Salazar were opportunistic. Having a real threat of Wehrmacht millions ready to sprint over the border they would have given in I believe. After all this would have been right after they've had an easy walk in France and Low Countries. They were thought unbeatable. Overall I totally agree it's probably the sweetest option but Germany would need many saves and loads to implement it. Too much luck with Allies and satellites. Too many clairvoyant decisions both in weapons production and foreign policy decisions. Too much is based on coordination and team play among German elite. And they had warring feudal fiefdoms for the team play.

First of all, hard to argue not having read Tooze so take it with a grain of salt. 1. I agree that politically Hitler would have had hard time keeping the political and emotional momentum behind war idea for many more years ahead. Though I don't think it spelled real problems for his reign - he was a veritable hero of the German nation at the end of 30's. He really gambled all on the war but that was not the economy - that was just psychology. 2. The idea that it was impossible to increase war materiel production is simply untrue. E.g. see the numbers for the AFV production and count in that 1939 AFV were way simpler and less resource consuming than 1944 AFVs. 3. What are the basis of the estimation that 60% of the German GDP were going to Wehrmacht? E.g. synthetic fuel production grew from 10 million barrels p.a. in 1938 to 36 million barrels p.a. in 1943. 1939 AFV production was 1359, 1944 - 22100. 1939 Wehrmacht headcount was 4,722,000, 1944 - 12,070,000. These are the bodies taken away from civil economy and these are the people you have to provide with weapons, ammo, logistics etc. Again, I haven't read Tooze but having these numbers I'd say there should be really bullet-proof evidence that Wehrmacht consumed 60% of German GDP in 1939. Unless you really believe you can increase GDP ten times times within 5 years. 4. I don't have coal production numbers at hand at the moment thought I strongly suspect coal production grew up to 1944 (synthetic fuel production consumes a lot of coal so to grow it 3.6 you need to substantially increase coal production either). Shortages were probably caused by low coal stockpiles - War Command was notorious for underestimating resource requirements (probably because Hitler decision making was unpredictable).

Why? It's credible. I guess it's another option for playing an anti-commie stalwart to France and Britain. Bust Danzig they could have got without attacking Poles.

You bested all You should write a book around this option, I think.

Well... That would have made their life easier I believe. To what extent is unclear. But I think it wouldn't change it drastically. Skilled industrial workers are either evacuated with the works or drafted and peaceful peasants still don't grow tanks and don't milk oil. But it's definitely would have made life way more difficult for Uncle Joe.

1. To win Moscow Germans would have had to concentrate the effort in single thrust to the city. Roads do not exist, no gas stations to stop and top up the tanks So they'd need to concentrate logistics. But Moscow per se does not mean anything. Just another city with all production evacuated beyond Urals. So here comes the winter and Germans cannot move much beyond Moscow. While Stalin raises new divisions and builds new tanks. And next year the Germans are pushed back because they truly believe that winning Moscow equals winning the war. Just like in France 2. Germans didn't get much resources from Russia. The objective of the southern group of armies was getting oil fields in Maykop. Grozny and Baku. So they got 4.3 mln tons of crude which is almost as much as they were getting from Russia for free (4.0 million per year). Most of what they got, I believe, was from the stockpiles so if they stayed they would have gotten way less next year.

I found the source. http://www.feldgrau.com/stats.html

Michael, I've found your insightful posts on http://forum.axishistory.com I generally agree with your scenario. But I believe it could have been implemented even after Anschluss and Czech occupation. Having strong isolationist sentiments in the US and general unwillingness to fight in France and UK (never mind Churchill - he always wanted to fight - whoever, whenever )... Think they would forgive the Germany if it would have behaved... And what do you think abut Mediterranean option? Like foregoing Vichy, pushing Spaing and Portugal into submission (seems doable at the moment), winning the hearts and minds at Istanbul (what could she do having all her Northern neighbors occupied/allied with Axis) and then occupying Gibraltar. I don't believe Gemany could pull off Sea Lion or could hope to go after Middle East oil fields but at least it could play for a stalemate with the West at that point. Like mobilizing economy, pushing Sweden to build much needed North-South iron-ore railway, maxing out production of aircraft, U-boats, synthetic fuels. Destroying UK's Mediterranean fleet at the expense of hundreds of aircraft if she does not evacuate the ships before. Controlling Mediterranean plus increased U-boat / aircraft fleet operating out of Portugal/Spain give sufficient though not knock-out leverage against UK imports. Putting maximum land forces on the East front and playing for the threat of Finland / Turkey / Poland based invasion against USSR to keep it out of the war. And using US isolationism from full commitment of their economy to the war effort. Though it's still very unstable position for the Germany - if either US or USSR goes to war, Germany still goes under, I believe. What do you think? But as an afterthought this is certainly purely fantastical scenario. Having Hitler Germany was not able to muster much in the field of reasonable politics and state management. Having him not they would have hardly ever started the war And military decision making process wouldn't have provided the level of coordination and team play required.

Wow, 35 yrs ago I was... Well... I actually wasn't here at all Sorry for my lame advice I didn't read Tooze - will run first thing tomorrow. Can you elaborate on what he/you think on the topic? I mean the production numbers show increase in output across the board, Germans are able to put into production ever more sophisticated weaponry. Sure we face the lack of non ferrous metals and oil but that's the plight we can't avoid once we started to go this path. So?

1. Sorry I misunderstood you on the second point. Definitely agree - Doenitz could have made a difference. 2. As for Bismarck... My view the Royal Navy had the resources to chase her down without unduly endangering their positions in the North Sea. So it did Inventing ways to resupply her in the North Atlantic was more of a headache for the Kriegsmarine than her presence for the Royal Navy. Every time she would try to mess with the convoys she'd be in great danger from the air cover. And sooner rather than later she'd have been sunk. Taking the costs to build and operate her in the North Atlantic vs. costs to sink her with Swordfish her presence was a great waste of resources. Disagree?

1. I wouldn't mix StuG performance with JPzIV. Almost all JPzIV had 7.5 L70 (probably the best AT gun of WWII) whereas StuG - 7.5 L48 tops. JPzIV had very sloped armor whereas StuG's glacis is a mess. JPzIV, if I'm not mistaken, had lower gun depression angles than StuG. 2. I don't have after action reports at hand at the moment but I remember even in Eastern front soldiers preferred PzKpfW IV to StuG. One reason, if I'm not mistaken, was gun depression angle - StuGs are difficult to put into hull down.

That I disagree. There was no particular problem pumping up production. Here's the tank production numbers as an example. Trust me other weapons production numbers will look similar except for some exotic stuff (these I took from wikipedia but they look good - you can cross check). Pre-war 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945 3,503 370 2,799 3,623 5,530 13,657 18,956 4,406 The thing is the Germany was a peaceful economy until Speer implemented economy mobilization in 1943. Before that there were a lot of unused reserves in terms of production capacity allocated to peaceful means. Plus women - even at the end of WWII women labor in Germany was quite rare. And that was quite an unused reserve. As far as I remember - hard to look up the numbers at this hour - forced labor was not massively used for then-hi-tech military production. It was mostly employed at infrastructure projects and low-tech or supporting staff. That was actually why it was a death row - they made people haul heavy things and hardly fed them. But FREE local labor at heavy industries at France, Czech, Hungary DID contribute much of high quality stuff. In general quality for things like armor or shells fell firstly because delivery of non ferrous metals were cut out. Wehrmacht counts I took from something like axishistory.com - google it and you'll find. I have some paper sources for the German WWII production/imports but if google stuff looks good I don't cross check to save time. If you're interested an "Inside the Third Reich" by Speer book might be a nice source. It does not have too many numbers but it reads like a thriller and gives the most accurate perspective of German economy.

I was reading the sources on the German raw material imports during WWII and found a funny story. Fanta was created by the German subsidiary of the Coca Cola company when Allies made it difficult to import Coca Cola syrup into Germany. So they made a drink out of the locally available stuff

Please do. Some points of my particular interest... Do you think Bismark's important? First they'd kill her sooner or later. Second how would she have been important from a strategic point of view? It can't interdict convoy routes without subjecting itself to an unbearable risk from air cover. Just want to understand your logic... What would it change? Can they take carriers to the Atlantic bypassing the Isles? If they manage to do it can they resupply them afterwards? Again just trying to understand the logic...

Well... In CMBO you can take chances and still win. And in CMBN it's simple - if you have a slightest doubt you can risk doing something, don't do it as you will be punished 100%

Why? I never said let's create a Hollywood-style "German wins" scenario. As I said my personal belief is Germany lost the war when it attacked Poland. But may be we can go for a draw, can't we?

No let's keep resource and political constraints. Like if Germany attacks Norway Chamberlain goes down. Just change more or less probable decisions like what competing weapons to produce, what R&D programs to pursue.

I don't think he blinded he just wrongly thought he can read others 100% But I'd bet on Germans even if Stalin kept the officers. Soviet Army was way too arrogant. Deep operations doctrine was too risky - Tukhachevsky didn't account for the air supremacy and logistics.

Well... Personally, I think the Germans lost the war when they attacked Poland. Poland made it inevitable that US and the USSR would have joined against Germany at some point of time. And this would have made it a lost case for Germany anyway. But it's interesting what others think...

The question is as given in the topic. Range of questions to consider: 1. Don't we need to throttle up before going to war? (Speer's reforms) 2. Who needs Roeder's big hulls, why don't we give all Kriegsmarine budget to Doenitz? 3. Why don't we have a strategic bomber yet, Mr. Goering? 4. Do we think our Luftwaffe pilots never die, don't we, Mr. Goering? (The issue of trained pilots pipeline for air superiority and CAS planes) 5. Let's imagine pesky Italians hadn't had their Balkan mess so we could have started USSR attack earlier, couldn't we? 6. Why do we need to waste resources on Tigers, Mouse etc. - let's keep it cheap (Stugs + PzKpfW III + PzKpfW IV + PzKpfW V). 7. Radars are force multipliers, aren't they? 8. If a wise guy suspects something we shall listen, shall we not? (Doenitz and Enigma bombes) And so on and so on... Whoever is interested - please keep emotions low and language gentlemanly

Oh that's clear. I'm rather speaking about the balance of decision making - how many decisions are made by TacAI and how many by humans. So 1. The command structure is getting more and more complex (I'm actually all for it ). You can call it a more clear communication of user intent to the TacAI. Or you can call it putting more constraints on how TacAI behaves. 2. We have real-time now. I bet if you compare user behavior in CMx1 and CMx2 - players are using real-time to go deeper into the tactical level. I don't mean to criticize - just it's very interesting how a unique concept evolves over time.

Actually I'd say they run out of bodies only in 1945. Stats are given below. 1945 numbers looks good (greater than 1942) but they include volksturm, hitlerjugend and other "hopeless" units. Bodies were never and issue. First and foremost the problem was industrial production capacity and access to critical materials. Second is military decision making - command structure and decision making, weapons production priorities, research and development etc. Wehrmacht In Wehrmacht Service*, 1939: 4,722,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1940: 6,600,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1941: 8,154,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1942: 9,580,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1943: 11,280,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1944: 12,070,000+ In Wehrmacht Service*, 1945: 9,701,000+