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Interesting! You always hear about the battles won with guns and bombs, but very rarely do you get to learn about battles between engineers.

by rcfox 16y ago

Yaggo 16y ago
Interesting indeed. If you think all the new tech in WW2 (missile, radar, atom bomb, Enigma, u-boat), calling the WW2 "the first war of engineering" isn't far from the truth.
- hcho 16y ago
  It is a bit far from the truth. Kadesh is possibly the first war of engineering we have accounts of, in which the manevourability of chariots were decisive. Actually, every nation that challenged the status quo of their times run a war of engineering.Avars and the stirrup, kinghts and the body armor, Turks and the cannon, etc, etc...
- arethuza 16y ago
  U-boats were a major factor in WW1 - the United States probably wouldn't have entered the war if it hadn't been for German attacks on transatlantic shipping.
  - eru 16y ago
    And even encryption was important in WW1. The Germans did a pretty good job at listening to the Russian communications.
hga 16y ago
One issue is that a lot of this wasn't declassified until long after the initial histories were written. Winston Churchill's fantastic multi-volume history makes no mention of ULTRA and I recall that a lot of the engineering stuff was only declassified in the '70s. I remember well searching for the book The Wizard War: British Scientific Intelligence, 1939-1945 (http://www.amazon.com/Wizard-War-Scientific-Intelligence-1939-1945/dp/0698108965/ http://www.amazon.com/Wizard-War-Scientific-Intelligence-193...) in the summer of 1978, the year it came out (the library hadn't yet gotten its copy). I'm almost finished reading a UK printing of The Deceivers: Allied Military Deception in the Second World War (http://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-Deception-Second/dp/1616080795/ http://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-Deception-Se...) which was first published in 2005 and it comments that a lot of its material was only recently declassified. Prior to it the only detailed history was the bit known as The Man Who Never Was: World War II's Boldest Counter-Intelligence Operation (http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Never-Was-Counter-Intelligence/dp/1557504482/ http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Never-Was-Counter-Intelligence...) from the '50s, which wildly overstates the importance this particular bit of deception used for the invasion of Sicily. It was one of many pieces which in total achieved complete success, but it and they don't hold a candle in "boldness" to FORTITUDE SOUTH and QUICKSILVER (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fortitude http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fortitude) which convinced Hitler and most of the Wehrmacht high command for well over a month that the Normandy landing was only a feint.
asolove 16y ago
Keep in mind that this is not pure engineering, as you're not just trying to solve a problem, you're trying to solve a problem against a living, reacting adversary. So strategy ("game theory") enters into the picture. Edward Luttwak's book "Strategy: The logic of war and peace" (http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Logic-Peace-Revised-Enlarged/dp/0674007034/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1281970942&sr=8-3 http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Logic-Peace-Revised-Enlarged/...) has a lengthy dioscussion of the strategic back-and-forth in the Battle of Britain. Besides the beams, both sides were also experimenting with new kinds of bombers, bombs, fighter planes, ways of finding and fighting fighter planes, countermeasures for preventing the enemy from finding your fighter planes, etc. Very interesting read.

Interesting! You always hear about the battles won with guns and bombs, but very rarely do you get to learn about battles between engineers.

by rcfox 16y ago

Interesting! You always hear about the battles won with guns and bombs, but very rarely do you get to learn about battles between engineers.

Yaggo 16y ago

Interesting indeed. If you think all the new tech in WW2 (missile, radar, atom bomb, Enigma, u-boat), calling the WW2 "the first war of engineering" isn't far from the truth.

hcho 16y ago
It is a bit far from the truth. Kadesh is possibly the first war of engineering we have accounts of, in which the manevourability of chariots were decisive. Actually, every nation that challenged the status quo of their times run a war of engineering.Avars and the stirrup, kinghts and the body armor, Turks and the cannon, etc, etc...
arethuza 16y ago
U-boats were a major factor in WW1 - the United States probably wouldn't have entered the war if it hadn't been for German attacks on transatlantic shipping.
- eru 16y ago
  And even encryption was important in WW1. The Germans did a pretty good job at listening to the Russian communications.

hga 16y ago

One issue is that a lot of this wasn't declassified until long after the initial histories were written. Winston Churchill's fantastic multi-volume history makes no mention of ULTRA and I recall that a lot of the engineering stuff was only declassified in the '70s. I remember well searching for the book The Wizard War: British Scientific Intelligence, 1939-1945 (http://www.amazon.com/Wizard-War-Scientific-Intelligence-1939-1945/dp/0698108965/ http://www.amazon.com/Wizard-War-Scientific-Intelligence-193...) in the summer of 1978, the year it came out (the library hadn't yet gotten its copy). I'm almost finished reading a UK printing of The Deceivers: Allied Military Deception in the Second World War (http://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-Deception-Second/dp/1616080795/ http://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-Deception-Se...) which was first published in 2005 and it comments that a lot of its material was only recently declassified. Prior to it the only detailed history was the bit known as The Man Who Never Was: World War II's Boldest Counter-Intelligence Operation (http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Never-Was-Counter-Intelligence/dp/1557504482/ http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Never-Was-Counter-Intelligence...) from the '50s, which wildly overstates the importance this particular bit of deception used for the invasion of Sicily. It was one of many pieces which in total achieved complete success, but it and they don't hold a candle in "boldness" to FORTITUDE SOUTH and QUICKSILVER (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fortitude http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fortitude) which convinced Hitler and most of the Wehrmacht high command for well over a month that the Normandy landing was only a feint.

asolove 16y ago

Keep in mind that this is not pure engineering, as you're not just trying to solve a problem, you're trying to solve a problem against a living, reacting adversary. So strategy ("game theory") enters into the picture. Edward Luttwak's book "Strategy: The logic of war and peace" (http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Logic-Peace-Revised-Enlarged/dp/0674007034/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1281970942&sr=8-3 http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Logic-Peace-Revised-Enlarged/...) has a lengthy dioscussion of the strategic back-and-forth in the Battle of Britain. Besides the beams, both sides were also experimenting with new kinds of bombers, bombs, fighter planes, ways of finding and fighting fighter planes, countermeasures for preventing the enemy from finding your fighter planes, etc. Very interesting read.