Allied strategic bombing - An overlooked success?
Posted: Sat Feb 21, 2004 5:51 am
There seems to be a widespread assumption on some Feldgrau threads that Allied bombing not only consumed large numbers of innocent German civilians but added insult to their injury by being ineffective.
I would suggest that Allied strategic bombing was far more effective than widely recognised. To set the ball rolling I offer a few statistics:
1) Effect of the Bomber Offensive on the Luftwaffe's offensive potential:
Bombers produced End 1939/1944/1945 - 737/2,287/0
Fighters produced End 1939/1944/1945 - 605/25,285/4,396.
(Source: "The German Aircraft Industry and Production, 1933-1945" by Ferenc A. Vajda and Peter Dancey, Airlife, UK, 1998)
In other words, in order to confront the Allied bomber offensive with the maximum number of fighters, Germany had given up bomber production by the end of the war altogether, thereby crippling its offensive potential at the front.
2) Effect of the bomber offensive on the diversion from the front of high velocity guns suitable for anti-aircraft and anti-tank use:
(Source: "Small Arms, Artillery and Special Weapons of the Third Reich" by Terry Gander and Peter Chamberlain, Macdonalds and Janes, London, 1978)
p.150 "When Allied bomber fleets started to grow in number and range, many Flak guns were gradually withdrawn from field units to home defence." Furthermore they detail how more and more guns were produced without mobile carriages, making them incapable of use with the army at the front.
p.152 contains monthly lists of details of heavy anti-aircraft gun holdings. These peaked in August 1944 at 12,000+ high velocity guns of 88mm and above. What might even a proportion of them have done for German anti-tank defences at the front?
3) Loss of Production due to Allied Bombing according to Reich Armaments Minister Albert Speer.
(Source: "Eagle in Flames" by E. R. Hooton, Arms and Armour Press, London, 1997)
p.262. "By the beginning of 1945 Speer calculated that the bombing had caused a 35% shortfall in tank production compared with potential, 31% in aircraft and 42% in trucks, meaning that in 1944 German aircraft production could have been 55,000 and tank production 30,000, while it was one reason why only 50% of aircraft scheduled in 1942 to be produced in 1944 emerged from the factories."
To this might be added U-boat construction etc. Allied strategic bombing damaged every German armed service.
4) Absenteeism in the German workforce due to Allied bombing.
P.263 of Wooton states that absenteeism in the industrial workforce increased from 4% in 1940 to 25% in 1944. Foreign workers, who were under a higher degree of compulsion, showed only a 3% absentee rate in 1944.
Whatever the moral and legal arguments, the terror effect of bombing seems to have been large.
5) The percentage of key armaments branches devoted to aerial defence according to Speer.
(Source: "The Air War 1939-1945" by R. J. Overy, Europa, London, 1980)
p.122. states that, according to Reich Armaments Minister Speer, in 1944 30% of total gun production, 20% of heavy ammunition, 50% of electrotechnical production and 33% of the optical industry were devoted to anti-aircraft defence, "starving the front" of essential communications resources in particular.
6) German human resources absorbed in anti-aircraft defence and clearing up the effects of Allied bombing according to Speer.
Anti-Aircraft defences absorbed some 2,000,000 people.
Clearing bomb damage absorbed some 1,000,000 to 1,500,000 people.
7) How miraculous was the increase of German production under Allied bombing?
(Source: Overy, p.150)
In terms of aircraft production there was, indeed, a massive rise in German aircraft numbers produced in 1943-44. However, this was in part because the production of multi-engined heavier types was drastically reduced and production switched to light, single-engined fighters.
To get a truer impression of the significance of Germany's increase in production it might be instructive to compare the German industry with the British industry (excluding the Commonwealth) at the time. The British continued to produce large numbers of heavy multi-engined aircraft.
Countries - German Reich : UK
Population - 90,000,000 : 47,000,000
Aircraft produced in 1944 - 39,807 : 26,461
Aeroengines produced - 54,600 : 56,931
Weight of aircraft produced - 199 million lbs. : 208 million lbs.
Thus Germany's 1944 air industry production levels, although impressive by its own modest earlier standards, were still no larger than British production levels. In terms of per capita production, Germany was still producing only about half the engines and weight of aircraft of Britain.
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I appreciate some of the above is simplistic and completely evades the moral and legal issues surrounding the methodology of the bombing campaign, but I would suggest that whatever its other limitations, it did produce a major military dividend.
Cheers,
Sid.
I would suggest that Allied strategic bombing was far more effective than widely recognised. To set the ball rolling I offer a few statistics:
1) Effect of the Bomber Offensive on the Luftwaffe's offensive potential:
Bombers produced End 1939/1944/1945 - 737/2,287/0
Fighters produced End 1939/1944/1945 - 605/25,285/4,396.
(Source: "The German Aircraft Industry and Production, 1933-1945" by Ferenc A. Vajda and Peter Dancey, Airlife, UK, 1998)
In other words, in order to confront the Allied bomber offensive with the maximum number of fighters, Germany had given up bomber production by the end of the war altogether, thereby crippling its offensive potential at the front.
2) Effect of the bomber offensive on the diversion from the front of high velocity guns suitable for anti-aircraft and anti-tank use:
(Source: "Small Arms, Artillery and Special Weapons of the Third Reich" by Terry Gander and Peter Chamberlain, Macdonalds and Janes, London, 1978)
p.150 "When Allied bomber fleets started to grow in number and range, many Flak guns were gradually withdrawn from field units to home defence." Furthermore they detail how more and more guns were produced without mobile carriages, making them incapable of use with the army at the front.
p.152 contains monthly lists of details of heavy anti-aircraft gun holdings. These peaked in August 1944 at 12,000+ high velocity guns of 88mm and above. What might even a proportion of them have done for German anti-tank defences at the front?
3) Loss of Production due to Allied Bombing according to Reich Armaments Minister Albert Speer.
(Source: "Eagle in Flames" by E. R. Hooton, Arms and Armour Press, London, 1997)
p.262. "By the beginning of 1945 Speer calculated that the bombing had caused a 35% shortfall in tank production compared with potential, 31% in aircraft and 42% in trucks, meaning that in 1944 German aircraft production could have been 55,000 and tank production 30,000, while it was one reason why only 50% of aircraft scheduled in 1942 to be produced in 1944 emerged from the factories."
To this might be added U-boat construction etc. Allied strategic bombing damaged every German armed service.
4) Absenteeism in the German workforce due to Allied bombing.
P.263 of Wooton states that absenteeism in the industrial workforce increased from 4% in 1940 to 25% in 1944. Foreign workers, who were under a higher degree of compulsion, showed only a 3% absentee rate in 1944.
Whatever the moral and legal arguments, the terror effect of bombing seems to have been large.
5) The percentage of key armaments branches devoted to aerial defence according to Speer.
(Source: "The Air War 1939-1945" by R. J. Overy, Europa, London, 1980)
p.122. states that, according to Reich Armaments Minister Speer, in 1944 30% of total gun production, 20% of heavy ammunition, 50% of electrotechnical production and 33% of the optical industry were devoted to anti-aircraft defence, "starving the front" of essential communications resources in particular.
6) German human resources absorbed in anti-aircraft defence and clearing up the effects of Allied bombing according to Speer.
Anti-Aircraft defences absorbed some 2,000,000 people.
Clearing bomb damage absorbed some 1,000,000 to 1,500,000 people.
7) How miraculous was the increase of German production under Allied bombing?
(Source: Overy, p.150)
In terms of aircraft production there was, indeed, a massive rise in German aircraft numbers produced in 1943-44. However, this was in part because the production of multi-engined heavier types was drastically reduced and production switched to light, single-engined fighters.
To get a truer impression of the significance of Germany's increase in production it might be instructive to compare the German industry with the British industry (excluding the Commonwealth) at the time. The British continued to produce large numbers of heavy multi-engined aircraft.
Countries - German Reich : UK
Population - 90,000,000 : 47,000,000
Aircraft produced in 1944 - 39,807 : 26,461
Aeroengines produced - 54,600 : 56,931
Weight of aircraft produced - 199 million lbs. : 208 million lbs.
Thus Germany's 1944 air industry production levels, although impressive by its own modest earlier standards, were still no larger than British production levels. In terms of per capita production, Germany was still producing only about half the engines and weight of aircraft of Britain.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I appreciate some of the above is simplistic and completely evades the moral and legal issues surrounding the methodology of the bombing campaign, but I would suggest that whatever its other limitations, it did produce a major military dividend.
Cheers,
Sid.