4 ms·
Our technology also continued to evolve throughout the war, updated fighters, better engines, even whole new designs. The Germans as far as mass produced design
by Aloha 7y ago
Our technology also continued to evolve throughout the war, updated fighters, better engines, even whole new designs. The Germans as far as mass produced designs went were effectively frozen in 1939. A lot of this was the complete inefficiency of the Reich Air Ministry at project management, as well as the political supremacy of the Heer over the Luftwaffe. In addition to the political whims of a dictatorship (Technological choices were often driven by ideology, and perception, much more than in the other dictatorship at the time (the Soviet Union, where for the most part, the technocrat reigned supreme))
All this said, from purely a material point of view the war in europe was won by the allies in 1941 when the US joined the conflict, but the Axis could have dragged the conflict out much longer had they had an effective strategic bombing program, and more modern fighters.
- stcredzero 7y agoOur technology also continued to evolve throughout the war, updated fighters, better engines, even whole new designs. The Germans as far as mass produced designs went were effectively frozen in 1939. Well, not completely. "Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles" has a nice video on, "Why was the BF109K faster than the P51D? MW 50!" So to try and compensate for only having lower octane fuel, German engineers in WWII went to water/methanol injection for emergency power. Things did go back and forth quite a bit. Granted, the BF109 was one of the most advanced late 1930's designs going up against 1940's allied wartime designs. But there were times when updates on older designs would outclass the other sides slightly older versions, and this happened repeatedly on both sides. Technological choices were often driven by ideology, and perception, much more than in the other dictatorship at the time "Yes, but can it dive bomb?" probably did about as much to compromise designs of Nazi fighter/interceptors and slow the release of new airplanes as espionage and sabotage by the allies!
- willyt 7y agoRegardless of Spitfires, Alan Turing, anti-sub technology, RADAR etc, WW2 was won and lost on the Eastern front. The Normandy invasion would have been impossible without the Russians sacrificing between 8-11 million soldiers. This compares to about 400k each for the UK and US. I'm just saying, don't get carried away with the technological superiority argument, there was plenty of innovation on both sides. After all, the engineer that designed the Apollo rocket was a Nazi weapons scientist.
- Aloha 7y agoNo real disagreement there - the war was won on the back of Russian Bodies, American Trucks, and British Grit. The germans did indeed have wonderful technology in labs, and had it made it into mass production, it would have made the war stretch out much much longer.
- philwelch 7y agoAnd the Eastern Front was largely won and lost on the Atlantic Ocean.
- antod 7y agoAnd the Arctic Ocean etc etc The Soviets won out eventually, but without the west they could very well have lost before they really got ready.
- mbrodersen 7y agoThe end of the war began when Germany invaded Russia. Europe/Russia had already killed 30+ million German soldiers and destroyed most of the German war machine when the US joined the conflict. The real contribution of the US was stopping Russia from invading Europe after the war (see Berlin Airlift) by threatening to drop nuclear bombs on Russia (Russia at that point wasn't a nuclear power).