What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

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What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#1

Post by stg 44 » 12 Apr 2014, 21:17

Historically the Ural Bomber designs, the Do-19 and Ju-89, were subpar and their proponent, General Walter Wever, opted not to build them, instead opting to wait for the Bomber A design for mass production. What if the Do-19 or Ju-89 were as good as the B17 design though? Let's assume it could phase into production in October 1938 even if opted for. Would the Germans have built it? They would be able to use their Jumo 211B engine, which had the same horse power as the B-17G's engines, but with better fuel consumption rates and an upgrade of 150hp in January 1941. Let's assume that the Do-19 fits the bill, but with somewhat less defensive armament and armor with slightly more internal payload (4 tons instead of 3.6 of the B17). Range and speed are the same. Let's assume it avoids the dive bombing requirement that Udet was so infamous for ordering.

To 'pay' for it the Do17 is phased out in 1938 to make way for the Do-19, while the He-111 could phased out in 1940 in favor of the Do-19, as they basically fit the same role. The Ju-88 would remain unchanged other than probably getting less production capacity.

Frankly to me this seems like a good deal as the Do-17 was too slow, short ranged, and had too little defensive armament. The He-111, while better than the Do-17, still lacked sufficient range and defensive guns to survive during daylight hours in the West. Even with the risk of the British twin engine fighters the B17-like Do-19 would be no worse than the historical models of level bombers that Germany used in 1939-41. Before anyone mentions the 2 for 1 effect here, which is exactly right in terms of weight and engines, the Do-19 in this scenario would be able to carry twice the payload with twice the defensive armament and more range than even the He-111; with short ranged overload the B17 could even carry more than that, which would have been well within the range of most continental targets in 1939-40. They could achieve the same effect with less sortees then and less crew all things considered. Perhaps fuel consumption would actually be less than using two medium bombers even, while being more survivable. I basically see it replacing all twin engine bombers except for the Ju88 and removing the He-177 from consideration until it works out its design issues. It probably even prevents the Do-217. It would certainly prevent the Fw-200 due to being able to handle the naval recon role with less armor and probably less defensive armament.

If it replaces the Do-17 in 1938 and later the He-111 while eating up some of the Ju88 capacity there could actually be quite a few of them in service during 1940, perhaps as much as 1000 by May 1940. After that by avoiding much of the other messes, such as the Fw200, He177, and Do-217, this version of the Do-19 would essentially be Germany's only multi-engine bomber except for the Ju88 and Bf110 throughout the war. What impact would it have had on the war then?

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#2

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 13 Apr 2014, 13:55

stg 44 wrote:...
If it replaces the Do-17 in 1938 and later the He-111 while eating up some of the Ju88 capacity there could actually be quite a few of them in service during 1940, perhaps as much as 1000 by May 1940. ...
At a 1-2 substitution ratio that does not seem to add up. A quick check shows a bit over 1200 He111, Do17, & Ju88 in May 1940.

Addressing the question & implied questions...

In global stratigic terms I dont see much impact. That comes from a doubt about the ability to build enough of them. US & British industry combined required four to five years to create the 'Aluminum Overcast' that was necessary to significantly damage German or Japanese industry. Even then the final & most decisive impact came from attacks on transportation vs other industrial production targets. So, target selection/target strategy makes a difference. Both sides made many mistakes in this, which wasted much of their effort in deploying their bomber fleets. If a significant change is made in strategy in the BoB then maybe a fleet of 300 or 500 of these very long range bombers would be helpfull, and the same later in a few other campaigns.


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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#3

Post by stg 44 » 13 Apr 2014, 15:40

Carl Schwamberger wrote:
stg 44 wrote:...
If it replaces the Do-17 in 1938 and later the He-111 while eating up some of the Ju88 capacity there could actually be quite a few of them in service during 1940, perhaps as much as 1000 by May 1940. ...
At a 1-2 substitution ratio that does not seem to add up. A quick check shows a bit over 1200 He111, Do17, & Ju88 in May 1940.
http://sturmvogel.orbat.com/
This lists 1760 twin engine bombers in service in May 1940, but that leaves out the production continuity in this scenario that was lacking historically. There was significant time lost in production due to waiting on the Ju88 redesign and then working out major technical issues in production when it entered service and it had 50% of the airframe industry devoted to it; had half of those resources in addition to the HE111 and Do17 production resources gone into the hypothetical Do-19 in October 1938 then that time wouldn't have been lost in 1939.

Carl Schwamberger wrote: Addressing the question & implied questions...

In global stratigic terms I dont see much impact. That comes from a doubt about the ability to build enough of them. US & British industry combined required four to five years to create the 'Aluminum Overcast' that was necessary to significantly damage German or Japanese industry. Even then the final & most decisive impact came from attacks on transportation vs other industrial production targets. So, target selection/target strategy makes a difference. Both sides made many mistakes in this, which wasted much of their effort in deploying their bomber fleets. If a significant change is made in strategy in the BoB then maybe a fleet of 300 or 500 of these very long range bombers would be helpfull, and the same later in a few other campaigns.
British and US industry were behind Germany's in terms of mobilization for war; the British didn't have a serious four engine bomber in service until 1942 when they seriously began focusing on building strategic bombers, prior they had focused on 1 and 2 engine fighters and twin engine bombers with some limited Short Stirlings in 1941.
The US didn't start building heavy bombers or really even medium bombers until 1942:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_St ... rld_War_II
In 1942 the US build over 2000 heavy bombers, but needed then to build up the infrastructure of personnel and bases to support them, which took time. Germany already had that in 1939, having been prepping for war since 1932 in some fashion (a bit even earlier too if you look into Weimar preparations).

I agree with your point about the strategy being important, as using the historical BoB and Blitz flailing wouldn't get very far, though the bombers would probably be more survivable than the lighter bombers used historically, as they would have more armor and defensive guns, which would make the bomber boxes hard to break up, especially as the British lacked sufficient AAA to aid the process and the British fighters during the BoB hadn't yet adopted 20mm cannons.

The question is whether having better means to bomb Britain in 1940-41 would have resulted in a different strategy. Would the BoB have even been fought and something like the Blitz happen sooner? Having 600 or so operational B17-equivalent bombers would have made a much stronger impact on places like Liverpool:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz
The large port on the River Mersey, on the North West coast of England, had for many years been the United Kingdom's main link with North America, and this would prove to be a key part in the British participation in the Battle of the Atlantic. As well as providing anchorage for naval ships from many nations, the Mersey's ports and dockers would handle over 90 per cent of all the war material brought into Britain from abroad with some 75 million tons passing through its 11 miles (18 km) of quays. Liverpool was the eastern end of a Transatlantic chain of supplies from North America, without which Britain could not have pursued the war.
Liverpool would have been in range of the maximum internal payload of the B-17 and potentially of some overload external bombs too from bases in the Lowlands.
With 4 tons of bombs per bomber and 600 bombers that's 2400 tons of bombs on a city, which is more than Liverpool took in the entire Blitz:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blitz#Tables

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#4

Post by phylo_roadking » 13 Apr 2014, 16:25

http://sturmvogel.orbat.com/
This lists 1760 twin engine bombers in service in May 1940, but that leaves out the production continuity in this scenario that was lacking historically.
Unfortunately I can't hit that site for some reason...but remember while this is a "snapshot" total it consists of aircraft that had been constructed over quite a period of time and many early marks were still in service in training and conversion units etc. :wink:
British and US industry were behind Germany's in terms of mobilization for war; the British didn't have a serious four engine bomber in service until 1942 when they seriously began focusing on building strategic bombers, prior they had focused on 1 and 2 engine fighters and twin engine bombers with some limited Short Stirlings in 1941.
The British were focusing on strategic bombing from the end of WWI...it was just that the tools required and the reach required changed ;) STG, did you ever get a chance to order up a cheap copy of The Paladins? It's invaluable for this.

Their ideas on strategic bombing suited the tools provided before the Lancaster...it was just that the idea of unescorted, precision daylight bombing turned out to be incorrect, and Clausewitz shot them down in flames in late 1939 :wink: But believe me, they were QUITE serious about air power's strategic value....

...unfortunately, into the mix went the whole idea of "value" I.E. what the British government was prepared to PAY for... :P

However - don't knock the numbers of Stirlings in service in 1940 through into 1941; admittedly of often reliable early marks - but they were still there and flying strategic bombing ops with 3 Group ASAP.

The British experience was also coloured greatly...or rather - OUR vision of what happened looking back...by the Avro Manchester failure; although again only a "twin-engined bomber" it was to carry the same initial bombload as the Lancaster out to the same ranges! 8O

However, to digress back to the original posit - there's a LONG thread somewhere on here about the tactics and strategy of a Ural Bomber campaign....on the Urals LOL Range is brilliant, together with bombload....but at greater ranges like Liverpool, Glasgow etc., the ports servicing the NORTHERN Approaches...navigation becomes a major issue. As does the time over the UK, which of course permits far greater opportunities for repeated interception both on the way to target AND on the return leg. It doesn't matter HOW well-protected a LW "Ural Bomber" is...a half-dozen or dozen squadron-sized interceptions WILL still attrit them! Remember - longrange "Ural Bomber" raids on the UK would still not be escorted by LW fighters, and the Luftwaffe would very early be constrained onto night raids on these targets only...with all the issues of target acquisition on arrival, "Starfish" decoy sites", etc., etc...

And this is where you run into Carl's points above - attrition. An expensive to build, slow to build, technically advanced vs. OTL German long-range bomber force can embark on one of TWO things -

1/ a short, sharp campaign and absorb a high, constant, but only very slowly replaceable rate of attrition...

2/ a long, slow protracted campaign of NIGHT bombing with minimum attrition UNTIL British night defences improve.

Neither option can produce enough of an effect to knock Britain out of the war. OTL, in 1943-44-45, the USAAF and RAF....the RAF by night and the USAAF by day...a "round the clock" bombing campaign, circumstances permitting - twice to three times the number of aircraft available, and 3-4 times the bombloads delivered of any force the LW could have even approached in 1940....didn't do the job ;) It contributed....but air power did not WIN the European war as all the Douhetists and theorists believed.
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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#5

Post by stg 44 » 13 Apr 2014, 17:25

phylo_roadking wrote: Unfortunately I can't hit that site for some reason...but remember while this is a "snapshot" total it consists of aircraft that had been constructed over quite a period of time and many early marks were still in service in training and conversion units etc. :wink:
Agreed, but the initial act once a new model was available was the replace the older marks with newer units, so most of the older models were phased out by May 1940. If the site were still up it would show mostly Do17Z (enter production in October 1938), He111 Ps and Hs (October 1938 and April 1939 respectively), and Ju88s (started in September 1939). There were some older He111s in service, but the Do17s were virtually all Z types and all the Ju88s were 1940 vintage. That also doesn't count the modern models that were lost in combat in Norway and Poland, not to mention over the North Sea. So production was actually higher; by my count from October 1938 there was some 650 Do17s and Do215s produced through mid-1940, around 1000 or so He111s from October 1938-May 1940, and around 1000 Ju88s.

phylo_roadking wrote: The British were focusing on strategic bombing from the end of WWI...it was just that the tools required and the reach required changed ;) STG, did you ever get a chance to order up a cheap copy of The Paladins? It's invaluable for this.

Their ideas on strategic bombing suited the tools provided before the Lancaster...it was just that the idea of unescorted, precision daylight bombing turned out to be incorrect, and Clausewitz shot them down in flames in late 1939 :wink: But believe me, they were QUITE serious about air power's strategic value....

...unfortunately, into the mix went the whole idea of "value" I.E. what the British government was prepared to PAY for... :P
I did get it on interlibrary loan around 2 years ago; I don't think my post contradicted any of what you write here. Britain had the Whitley bomber, but not the four engine types that Carl mentioned; my post was more a reference to the Lancaster and Short Stirling numbers and why it took so long for them to be built; you make an important point that they were producing twin engine strategic bombers until 1942 (and beyond), but the 'heavy hitters' had to wait on the technology getting into production and of course the British to switch from defensive to offensive production mode post Blitz.

phylo_roadking wrote: However - don't knock the numbers of Stirlings in service in 1940 through into 1941; admittedly of often reliable early marks - but they were still there and flying strategic bombing ops with 3 Group ASAP.

The British experience was also coloured greatly...or rather - OUR vision of what happened looking back...by the Avro Manchester failure; although again only a "twin-engined bomber" it was to carry the same initial bombload as the Lancaster out to the same ranges! 8O
In what numbers though? My understanding was the British were not producing them in numbers until after the Blitz was over due to other obvious priorities trumping the need for strategic bomber production until mid-1941.

phylo_roadking wrote: However, to digress back to the original posit - there's a LONG thread somewhere on here about the tactics and strategy of a Ural Bomber campaign....on the Urals LOL Range is brilliant, together with bombload....but at greater ranges like Liverpool, Glasgow etc., the ports servicing the NORTHERN Approaches...navigation becomes a major issue. As does the time over the UK, which of course permits far greater opportunities for repeated interception both on the way to target AND on the return leg. It doesn't matter HOW well-protected a LW "Ural Bomber" is...a half-dozen or dozen squadron-sized interceptions WILL still attrit them! Remember - longrange "Ural Bomber" raids on the UK would still not be escorted by LW fighters, and the Luftwaffe would very early be constrained onto night raids on these targets only...with all the issues of target acquisition on arrival, "Starfish" decoy sites", etc., etc...
Point taken, its clear that the bombers, even without cannon armed British fighters by August and the heavier armor/defensive guns, would not be conducting deep daylight raids with the Bf110 as an escort. Which brings us back to night time raids for deep targets. I don't see what the issue is there as far as actually hitting the targets. The LW was pretty successful hitting British cities at night until Spring 1941 and even as late as May 1941 were still conducting heavy accurate raids. There were certainly issues of hitting British cities early in the Blitz due to limited experience night time bombing, such as the massive failure of finding Liverpool at night in August 1940, but those deficits were quickly made good by September/October historically. Having a longer range bomber with heavier payload will make the raids more effective if anything, as the British discovered with their four engine heavies.

phylo_roadking wrote: And this is where you run into Carl's points above - attrition. An expensive to build, slow to build, technically advanced vs. OTL German long-range bomber force can embark on one of TWO things -
The expensive, slow to build idea is something I take issue with; yes it certainly would be harder to produce and more expensive than any single twin engine bomber, but would it have taken more resources and man hours than two twin engine bombers (or three Do17s)? That I don't think so. I fully agree that in raw numbers the German bomber force would be smaller, but having one bomber type for level bombing (except a smaller run of Ju88s) would introduce economies of scale and production efficiencies that were absent historically. Not producing the Do17/215, He111, or as many Ju88s, or later Fw200s, He177s, and Do217s past October 1938 would mean many more B17 analogs are able to be produced and brought into service throughout the war. Assuming the He177 doesn't even get into production ever, then there is the option for a next generation B17 analog that is designed based on the practical experience of production and operating the Ural Bomber, so we don't run into the problems of the Bomber A, while being able to keep the Ural Bomber and Ju88 as the only two bomber designs in major production throughout the war; that will result in major efficiencies over the historical production scheme IMHO, especially as the war goes on. Even if a next generation version enter production in 1942-43 the older model can stay in limited production to the end given the need for numbers vs. superior performance from 1942 on. Using the He111 as a model, the H-series of that aircraft got progressively cheaper and easier to build, as did the B17 historically.

phylo_roadking wrote: 1/ a short, sharp campaign and absorb a high, constant, but only very slowly replaceable rate of attrition...

2/ a long, slow protracted campaign of NIGHT bombing with minimum attrition UNTIL British night defences improve.

Neither option can produce enough of an effect to knock Britain out of the war. OTL, in 1943-44-45, the USAAF and RAF....the RAF by night and the USAAF by day...a "round the clock" bombing campaign, circumstances permitting - twice to three times the number of aircraft available, and 3-4 times the bombloads delivered of any force the LW could have even approached in 1940....didn't do the job ;) It contributed....but air power did not WIN the European war as all the Douhetists and theorists believed.
I don't believe I suggested it would knock the British out of the war given the historical strategy and impulses. However a better directed night campaign could certainly have an effect with a heavier bomber carrying a heavier payload further. Especially as it could strip out some of its heavy defensive armament, gunners, and armor at night, so could carry somewhat more bombs as a result.

However during the day I don't think the losses would be as heavy as the historical BoB was due to the heavier armor and armament of a B17 analog here; the bomber boxes would be tougher to break into by SE fighters without cannons, especially with fighter escorts. Even the Bf110 would be useful for fending off the British twin engine heavy fighters if they are in turn escorted by Me109s. Still the BoB was a fool's errand for Germany, so even if its 'won' it would be a waste; here it would just be less costly due to the attributes of the B17 analog vs. the Do17, He111, and Ju88.

Now as far as comparing the Allied bombing offensive against Germany to a German one against Britain is only superficially similar due to the vital targets being different. British vulnerability was more based on imports than oil production or inland transport. However a campaign against British electrical infrastructure would have been pretty painful and potentially decisive, but was never attempted despite elements of the RLM pushing for it (same guy that came up with the Eisenhammer idea). IMHO such a campaign against Germany would have been just as decisive; IIRC there were 57 stations that had they been hit would have knocked out Germany's electric grid and taken them out of the war, but the Allies never attempted it historically...which brings us back to the issue of the Allied strategic bombing campaign being one of target selection, rather than overall effectiveness. The question is whether a German strategic bombing campaign against Britain could have been properly targeted with different leadership.

Had Wever lived and gotten a decent bomber out of the Ural Bomber design competition he would be leading such a campaign, rather that the incompetent Jeschonnek and Goering (and Hitler). Now of course he is an unknown given his early death and dearth of information about his leadership skills, but given the more mature doctrine that emerged from his tenure as CoS of the LW, I think he would have been produced a better strategy than the historic one, especially if he keeps his team of professionals intact (namely Helmuth Wilberg who actually authored LW doctrine in 1935 and was an experienced bomber unit commander in WW1, but was put in charge of a training school after Wever's death historically). Perhaps Felmy would actually survive in a command role in this scenario, which would be extremely helpful, because he was the man tasked by Goering in 1938 to develop a strategy to fight Britain and he arrived on the idea of bombing and mining the critical ports such as London and Liverpool. Historically he was removed after the Mecheln incident, but had he survived as commander of the 2nd air fleet he probably would have been in charge of operations against Britain by July 1940.
Having a more effective tool in the B17 analog would make a major impact on the strategy against Britain; sure Hitler wanted a quick end via Sealion, but the navy already came out against it and the LW went along with it due to Goering controlling Jeschonnek in a way the he never did with Wever. Wever I could see standing up against Goering and make a strong case against fighting the BoB.

In that case we see no BoB as we know it, instead a night mining and bombing campaign against major British ports. Even if it doesn't know Britain out of the war, then it at least inflicts more damage to the war economy at much less cost to the LW than the historical operations did.


Now I'm curious what effect a B17-analog Ural Bomber would have had against Russia...

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#6

Post by phylo_roadking » 13 Apr 2014, 18:52

Britain had the Whitley bomber, but not the four engine types that Carl mentioned; my post was more a reference to the Lancaster and Short Stirling numbers and why it took so long for them to be built; you make an important point that they were producing twin engine strategic bombers until 1942 (and beyond), but the 'heavy hitters' had to wait on the technology getting into production and of course the British to switch from defensive to offensive production mode post Blitz.
In what numbers though? My understanding was the British were not producing them in numbers until after the Blitz was over due to other obvious priorities trumping the need for strategic bomber production until mid-1941.
That's not actually the case; if you take a look as Postan's British War Economy. The "Emergency Production" period post-Dunkirk applied to bringin up entirely new designs...but construction of existing types continued, as did work on new marks etc....

What had affected Bomber Command more was the temporary hiatus post-Munich when resources were thrown at Fighter COmmand to complete the Dowding System and order in Hurricanes and Spitfires....but that was long over ;)
I don't see what the issue is there as far as actually hitting the targets. The LW was pretty successful hitting British cities at night until Spring 1941 and even as late as May 1941 were still conducting heavy accurate raids. There were certainly issues of hitting British cities early in the Blitz due to limited experience night time bombing, such as the massive failure of finding Liverpool at night in August 1940, but those deficits were quickly made good by September/October historically. Having a longer range bomber with heavier payload will make the raids more effective if anything, as the British discovered with their four engine heavies
The problem is - cities aren't viable targets in the UK unless you're after precision targets - like Liverpool Docks etc. The Luftwaffe had intelligence on a certain amount of British infrastructure targets - military and aircraft plants etc. - but it was limited by 1941 with new plants opening, production being moved etc.. The Coventry raid was the ONLY LW raid that really impacted British war production measurably - with its temporary effects on the Coventry Ordnance Works, and British Thompson-Houston....the magneto manufacturers...and of course Triumph Motorcycles! :D Other raids - even the successful raids on Belfast that destroyed tanks being manufactured and converted at Harland&Wolff, aircraft at Shorts etc. and mills for producing linen - aircraft fabric etc....were in real terms drops in the ocean.

Simply out - the morale-busting effects of German...and Allied!...strategic bombing raids proved to be far less...impactful...than anyone expected. Yes, Winston got a hard time ONCE when he visited the East End, but elsewhere people simply trudged out of the cities, slept in fields...and trudged back the next day to work! If you can't stop people turning up for work, and if you can't actually eradicate specific and irreplaceable production facilities - you never will :cry: All you really do is point up any need for "shadow" facilities or dispersed manufacturing.

GERMAN manufacturing was different; a far larger percentage of industrial output was in small industrial units scattered throughout cities - see for example the number of individual war-supporting manufactories destroyed in Hamburg, or Dresden ;) In other words - a gretaer percentage of german war industry was at what we refer to as the "cottage" level - and thus Allied citybusting COULD impact German war production to a greater extent than in the UK.
The expensive, slow to build idea is something I take issue with; yes it certainly would be harder to produce and more expensive than any single twin engine bomber, but would it have taken more resources and man hours than two twin engine bombers (or three Do17s)? That I don't think so. I fully agree that in raw numbers the German bomber force would be smaller, but having one bomber type for level bombing (except a smaller run of Ju88s) would introduce economies of scale and production efficiencies that were absent historically.
Thing is - as we've discussed before - a multi-engined bomber of the necessary range and the necessary bombload means - in German terms - (See E.R. Hooton) the following...

larger production facilities under one company umbrella sooner; A strategic bomber is NOT the sort of aircraft that can be produced off the drawingboard, as discussed so many times before it requires an evolution of design ability and manufacturing ability within one company or group of companies capable in the first place of embarking on projects like this. Look at Dornier...it's always said that all those big interwar flying boats stood them in good stead for desinging military aircraft...REALLY? Then how come their bombers turned out so....limited??? :wink: As to "larger" - remember, the reason that the RLM was ordering various tyoes of medium level bomber from various manufacturers wasn't that one was obviously better than any other in its class....if it HAD been they WOULD have stopped issuing orders to several manufacturers...it was that they were issuing orders based on the potential production capacity of various manufacturers AND lead time.

more skilled industrial personnel than historically available; the creation of a strategic bomber force, in addition to ALL the other aircraft requirments of the Luftwaffe...you can't just handwave these away (see below), you NEED fighters, Army Coop aircraft, transport aircraft, light and medium bombers....and especially, if you're creating a strategic force, multi-engined bomber crew trainers! - which means you need a MUCH larger German aviation industry than historically by the late 1930s. Here's what I mean...
Not producing the Do17/215, He111, or as many Ju88s, or later Fw200s, He177s, and Do217s past October 1938 would mean many more B17 analogs are able to be produced and brought into service throughout the war.
...what's going to provide all that essential tactical medium and low-level bombing? Maritime recce and attack? I think you need to grasp the actual amount of tactical bombing those Dorniers and Heinkels all did before and after the Battle of Britain in support of the Heer before you say that a B17 analogue could do everything they could...

more raw and processed/finished manufacturing materials; it's just not possible to simply wave away the wartime requirement for multi-role aircraft and a range of capacities of level bombers...because a strategic bomber isn't going to win a war! You still need everything the Luftwaffe fielded OTL to actually win on the ground as much as they did! The capacity to bomb and eradicate Paris, for example, isn't going to help the Heer on the ground in the Ardennes or Belgium in May 1940, or Poland in 1939! Either they have their "flying artillery"...or fail, months before the first bomb is ever dropped on London.

Better designers working earlier; Germany had designers, yes...but again, look at Hooton - all those failures...and there were many!...would indicate a LOT of limitations, dead ends, technological blind alleys...! NO German aviation company would have been able OTL to leap from doing what it did in the mid-1930s to creating and testing and building a successful strategic bomber in your timescales....because they DID try and fail - several times! The designs WE KNOW - the Do19, the He177 etc., etc. these failures were what Germany got :P

(And of course that's leaving aside the WHOLE issue of what exactly does happen to the rest of Germany's rearmament plans if a much larger number of talented designers are shunted onto working on a SINGLE AIRCRAFT TYPE???)

And then EXACTLY the same issues impact the German aviation ENGINE manufacturing industry in parallel...
However during the day I don't think the losses would be as heavy as the historical BoB was due to the heavier armor and armament of a B17 analog here; the bomber boxes would be tougher to break into by SE fighters without cannons, especially with fighter escorts.
You DO realise that what the RAF did to Luftwaffe bombers in the BoB they did BY nibbling at the edges of box formations? NOT breaking into them? RAF pilots were under standing orders NOT to intrude on LW box formations; a few did, and these were salutory examples to the rest.
Even the Bf110 would be useful for fending off the British twin engine heavy fighters if they are in turn escorted by Me109s.
This is very questionable too; as we already know, the 110 just wasn't a good dogfighter. That's why it ended up rapidly, during the Bob, having to be escorted themselves by 109s just as you say above. This IS what happened OTL...

Historically, the British didn't opt for heavy twin-engined day fighters early in the war, and the late interwar period; they didn't need to, because there was no suitable German opponent. There was nothing that a signle-engined fighter couldn't do to an OTL German bomber formation AND fight single-engined fighters. There were many wonderful designs for heavy fighters, and several actually made it into metal...

ATL - if the Germans HAD developed a strategic bombing capacity pre-war or on the eve of the war, the British would already have been preparing and testing and manufacturing a suitable counter. Leaving aside all the issues of budget constraints - the British...the Air Staff and Fighter Command...actually proved VERY good at forseeing what would be required during an early-war "defence of the UK Home Base" strategic defensive DAY battle.
However a campaign against British electrical infrastructure would have been pretty painful and potentially decisive, but was never attempted despite elements of the RLM pushing for it (same guy that came up with the Eisenhammer idea). IMHO such a campaign against Germany would have been just as decisive; IIRC there were 57 stations that had they been hit would have knocked out Germany's electric grid and taken them out of the war, but the Allies never attempted it historically...
Never wonder why? ;) ...
...which brings us back to the issue of the Allied strategic bombing campaign being one of target selection, rather than overall effectiveness. The question is whether a German strategic bombing campaign against Britain could have been properly targeted with different leadership.
The problem wasn't target selection - it was target acquisition I.E. a precision bombing capability. NEITHER side had it in 1939 or 1940...or for several years after the start of the war. Arguably, even the massed Allied strategic raids performed because of their ability to blanket targets. It wasn't until new aircraft with VERY different capabilities appeared that preicision daylight bombing was really possible...

Look at the GERMAN experience again; despite everything they believed, what did the BoB teach them about precision bombing??? :wink: It taught them that their tactical bombers couldn't do it, it was the converted fighters of ErPro210 that were successful at that...with all their range constraints!
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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#7

Post by phylo_roadking » 13 Apr 2014, 19:00

I'll keep this separate...
I don't think my post contradicted any of what you write here. Britain had the Whitley bomber, but not the four engine types that Carl mentioned; my post was more a reference to the Lancaster and Short Stirling numbers and why it took so long for them to be built; you make an important point that they were producing twin engine strategic bombers until 1942 (and beyond), but the 'heavy hitters' had to wait on the technology getting into production and of course the British to switch from defensive to offensive production mode post Blitz
You haven't grasped that the Lancaster wasn't actually part of the "planned" evolution of the RAF's strategic bomber force. It appeared because a VERY major element, the Avro Manchester...failed. It was, in effect, a panic measure that worked...but had itself a troubled and much delayed gestation. It was 6-8 months late getting into operations because of anumber of problems Avro had with skinning the new outer wing sectionds and stopping pannels flying off....AND keeping engine nacelle covers actually ON the aircraft!

This may not seem important on the surface, given what the Lancaster DID achieve...but the point is that it was the "new" sections of the aircraft's designs that gave the major issues, the bits that had to be HURRIEDLY changed because of the failure of the Manchester.

In other words - while the Lancaster was "late" into service because of the above - it's not accurate to look at the wartime history of Bomber Command and wonder "why it took so long for them to be built"- noone had "planned" to have to build them at all! 8O Whitleys, Wellingtons, Stirlings...even Manchesters...they could ALL reach Berlin, after all...
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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#8

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 14 Apr 2014, 10:50

phylo_roadking wrote:
http://sturmvogel.orbat.com/
This lists 1760 twin engine bombers in service in May 1940, but that leaves out the production continuity in this scenario that was lacking historically.
Unfortunately I can't hit that site for some reason...but remember while this is a "snapshot" total it consists of aircraft that had been constructed over quite a period of time and many early marks were still in service in training and conversion units etc.
I still cant bring it up. Whatever. I've been over this several times before on different sites & the end result is always the same. None of the sources I have on my shelf show remotely close to 1700 twin engine bombers operational with the German air force in may 1940. No one has produced anything from German records that show that sort of operational strength. It could be as Phylo wrote the 1700 number represents total production to May 1940, from which 500 - 600 lost to combat and accident might be subtracted.

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#9

Post by stg 44 » 14 Apr 2014, 13:45

According to the website before it went down there were ~1760 total units for the Kampfgruppen, of these nearly 1200 were operational in all theaters, including back in Germany and in Norway.

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#10

Post by stg 44 » 14 Apr 2014, 14:57

phylo_roadking wrote:I'll keep this separate...
I don't think my post contradicted any of what you write here. Britain had the Whitley bomber, but not the four engine types that Carl mentioned; my post was more a reference to the Lancaster and Short Stirling numbers and why it took so long for them to be built; you make an important point that they were producing twin engine strategic bombers until 1942 (and beyond), but the 'heavy hitters' had to wait on the technology getting into production and of course the British to switch from defensive to offensive production mode post Blitz
You haven't grasped that the Lancaster wasn't actually part of the "planned" evolution of the RAF's strategic bomber force. It appeared because a VERY major element, the Avro Manchester...failed. It was, in effect, a panic measure that worked...but had itself a troubled and much delayed gestation. It was 6-8 months late getting into operations because of anumber of problems Avro had with skinning the new outer wing sectionds and stopping pannels flying off....AND keeping engine nacelle covers actually ON the aircraft!

This may not seem important on the surface, given what the Lancaster DID achieve...but the point is that it was the "new" sections of the aircraft's designs that gave the major issues, the bits that had to be HURRIEDLY changed because of the failure of the Manchester.

In other words - while the Lancaster was "late" into service because of the above - it's not accurate to look at the wartime history of Bomber Command and wonder "why it took so long for them to be built"- noone had "planned" to have to build them at all! 8O Whitleys, Wellingtons, Stirlings...even Manchesters...they could ALL reach Berlin, after all...
I'm aware that the Lancaster wasn't planned, but it was the Manchester evolved to the technical realities; yes the Manchester was the original idea, but it did appear in a modified form, so to me they are essentially the same aircraft, as would the He177B had it ever appeared in service.

I understand your wider point that the British weren't sitting around in 1940-41 waiting, they were building strategic bombers prior to 1942 and conducting operations, however in terms of resources it seems that the strategic bomber force didn't get the presidence it did after 1941. Prior was a focus on fighter command, AAA, and the army. Once that was built up by late 1941 then the focus shifted to greater resources for bomber command. It seems to me the shift really came in late 1941:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic ... in_the_war

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#11

Post by stg 44 » 14 Apr 2014, 15:35

phylo_roadking wrote: That's not actually the case; if you take a look as Postan's British War Economy. The "Emergency Production" period post-Dunkirk applied to bringin up entirely new designs...but construction of existing types continued, as did work on new marks etc....

What had affected Bomber Command more was the temporary hiatus post-Munich when resources were thrown at Fighter COmmand to complete the Dowding System and order in Hurricanes and Spitfires....but that was long over ;)
Sure, but how much resources were dedicated to BC during the 1940-41 period? My impression is that they were relatively under resourced until late 1941/1942.


phylo_roadking wrote: The problem is - cities aren't viable targets in the UK unless you're after precision targets - like Liverpool Docks etc. The Luftwaffe had intelligence on a certain amount of British infrastructure targets - military and aircraft plants etc. - but it was limited by 1941 with new plants opening, production being moved etc.. The Coventry raid was the ONLY LW raid that really impacted British war production measurably - with its temporary effects on the Coventry Ordnance Works, and British Thompson-Houston....the magneto manufacturers...and of course Triumph Motorcycles! :D Other raids - even the successful raids on Belfast that destroyed tanks being manufactured and converted at Harland&Wolff, aircraft at Shorts etc. and mills for producing linen - aircraft fabric etc....were in real terms drops in the ocean.

Simply out - the morale-busting effects of German...and Allied!...strategic bombing raids proved to be far less...impactful...than anyone expected. Yes, Winston got a hard time ONCE when he visited the East End, but elsewhere people simply trudged out of the cities, slept in fields...and trudged back the next day to work! If you can't stop people turning up for work, and if you can't actually eradicate specific and irreplaceable production facilities - you never will :cry: All you really do is point up any need for "shadow" facilities or dispersed manufacturing.

GERMAN manufacturing was different; a far larger percentage of industrial output was in small industrial units scattered throughout cities - see for example the number of individual war-supporting manufactories destroyed in Hamburg, or Dresden ;) In other words - a gretaer percentage of german war industry was at what we refer to as the "cottage" level - and thus Allied citybusting COULD impact German war production to a greater extent than in the UK.
I'm offering up what General Felmy suggested historically, which was the bombing/mining of major ports to suppress imports and thus bring Britain to the negotiating table.





phylo_roadking wrote: Thing is - as we've discussed before - a multi-engined bomber of the necessary range and the necessary bombload means - in German terms - (See E.R. Hooton) the following...

larger production facilities under one company umbrella sooner; A strategic bomber is NOT the sort of aircraft that can be produced off the drawingboard, as discussed so many times before it requires an evolution of design ability and manufacturing ability within one company or group of companies capable in the first place of embarking on projects like this. Look at Dornier...it's always said that all those big interwar flying boats stood them in good stead for desinging military aircraft...REALLY? Then how come their bombers turned out so....limited??? :wink: As to "larger" - remember, the reason that the RLM was ordering various tyoes of medium level bomber from various manufacturers wasn't that one was obviously better than any other in its class....if it HAD been they WOULD have stopped issuing orders to several manufacturers...it was that they were issuing orders based on the potential production capacity of various manufacturers AND lead time.

more skilled industrial personnel than historically available; the creation of a strategic bomber force, in addition to ALL the other aircraft requirments of the Luftwaffe...you can't just handwave these away (see below), you NEED fighters, Army Coop aircraft, transport aircraft, light and medium bombers....and especially, if you're creating a strategic force, multi-engined bomber crew trainers! - which means you need a MUCH larger German aviation industry than historically by the late 1930s. Here's what I mean...

...what's going to provide all that essential tactical medium and low-level bombing? Maritime recce and attack? I think you need to grasp the actual amount of tactical bombing those Dorniers and Heinkels all did before and after the Battle of Britain in support of the Heer before you say that a B17 analogue could do everything they could...

more raw and processed/finished manufacturing materials; it's just not possible to simply wave away the wartime requirement for multi-role aircraft and a range of capacities of level bombers...because a strategic bomber isn't going to win a war! You still need everything the Luftwaffe fielded OTL to actually win on the ground as much as they did! The capacity to bomb and eradicate Paris, for example, isn't going to help the Heer on the ground in the Ardennes or Belgium in May 1940, or Poland in 1939! Either they have their "flying artillery"...or fail, months before the first bomb is ever dropped on London.

Better designers working earlier; Germany had designers, yes...but again, look at Hooton - all those failures...and there were many!...would indicate a LOT of limitations, dead ends, technological blind alleys...! NO German aviation company would have been able OTL to leap from doing what it did in the mid-1930s to creating and testing and building a successful strategic bomber in your timescales....because they DID try and fail - several times! The designs WE KNOW - the Do19, the He177 etc., etc. these failures were what Germany got :P

(And of course that's leaving aside the WHOLE issue of what exactly does happen to the rest of Germany's rearmament plans if a much larger number of talented designers are shunted onto working on a SINGLE AIRCRAFT TYPE???)

And then EXACTLY the same issues impact the German aviation ENGINE manufacturing industry in parallel...

One of the major reasons that the Do-19 didn't work out was it was given 700hp engines to work with that had a maximum continuous of 600hp. Had it had access to the higher HP engines like the Ju89 did it wouldn't have required as much wing area and gotten the resulting drag and weight issues, which it could have plowed into more range and payload as a result. I'm coming to accept that the idea of excluding all medium bombers but the Ju88 is not a viable option in this scenario, but replacing the Do17 with a B17-like D0-19 would be potentially viable if it had a network of subcontractors to work with like the Ju88 did historically or even the He177, such as Arado.

But note that I didn't say that all other aircraft would be replaced, just the He111 and Do17 and half of the historical Ju88 resources (which as I stated made up 50% of total production capacity by 1939). So the Ju88 would still be around for scouting aircraft, naval strike, fast bombing, etc. The army liaison aircraft, Ju87s, etc would be unaffected in terms of resources.

In a modified scenario that results in much less B17 analogs, we have Dornier and Arado use their historic resources devoted to Do17/215/217 and the Ju88 program instead for Do19s that are similar in capacity to the B17, while Heinkel and Junkers remain unaffected along with the rest of their subcontractors for the He111 and Ju88 program. The He111 can fulfill the maritime strike role and later so can the Ju88.


phylo_roadking wrote: You DO realise that what the RAF did to Luftwaffe bombers in the BoB they did BY nibbling at the edges of box formations? NOT breaking into them? RAF pilots were under standing orders NOT to intrude on LW box formations; a few did, and these were salutory examples to the rest.
It would be harder to go after heavier bombers with heavier defensive armament and armor than the historical Ju88, He111, and Do17s. I'm not saying that they couldn't inflict losses, but as the Germans found out when going against the B17 the cannon armed bombers were a lot tougher to knock down that the twin engine Whitleys and Blenheims, so they needed things like FLAK to break up the bomber boxes, along with large rockets and twin engine fighters with cannons that could attack outside the range of the edges of the box.





phylo_roadking wrote: This is very questionable too; as we already know, the 110 just wasn't a good dogfighter. That's why it ended up rapidly, during the Bob, having to be escorted themselves by 109s just as you say above. This IS what happened OTL...

Historically, the British didn't opt for heavy twin-engined day fighters early in the war, and the late interwar period; they didn't need to, because there was no suitable German opponent. There was nothing that a signle-engined fighter couldn't do to an OTL German bomber formation AND fight single-engined fighters. There were many wonderful designs for heavy fighters, and several actually made it into metal...

ATL - if the Germans HAD developed a strategic bombing capacity pre-war or on the eve of the war, the British would already have been preparing and testing and manufacturing a suitable counter. Leaving aside all the issues of budget constraints - the British...the Air Staff and Fighter Command...actually proved VERY good at forseeing what would be required during an early-war "defence of the UK Home Base" strategic defensive DAY battle.
Sure, I made allowances for that. The strategic bomber would be limited in daylight over Britain, which is why I'm suggesting the major impact would be a night where that mattered less.


phylo_roadking wrote: The problem wasn't target selection - it was target acquisition I.E. a precision bombing capability. NEITHER side had it in 1939 or 1940...or for several years after the start of the war. Arguably, even the massed Allied strategic raids performed because of their ability to blanket targets. It wasn't until new aircraft with VERY different capabilities appeared that preicision daylight bombing was really possible...

Look at the GERMAN experience again; despite everything they believed, what did the BoB teach them about precision bombing??? :wink: It taught them that their tactical bombers couldn't do it, it was the converted fighters of ErPro210 that were successful at that...with all their range constraints!
The issue isn't daylight precision bombing necessarily, though the LW did have success hitting the airfields they targeted. As far as industry targeting you are spot on. Which is why the answer was to go after the ports with mines and bombs at night guided by KG100 and X/Y-Verfähren.

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#12

Post by BDV » 14 Apr 2014, 17:19

stg 44 wrote:The issue isn't daylight precision bombing necessarily, though the LW did have success hitting the airfields they targeted.
But at a very high cost in very hard to replace bomber crews. Cost of precision daylight bombing was such that even british and americans could not in turn sustain such rate through 42-44 even with much bigger bomber crew recruitment and training programmes. Only when LW was literally shot out of the skies did behind-the-frontline daylight bombing become feasible.
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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#13

Post by LWD » 14 Apr 2014, 17:32

I'm not sure a 2:1 substitution of 2 enigne to 4 engine bombers is right either. I suspect it something greater than 2:1 but not sure how much. Comparisons might be made with the cost, materials, and manhours of comparable allied planes. Just assuming that you increase production due to continuity isn't necessarly right either, although you likely will get some increase. However planes required some raw materials that were rather in short supply in the Third Reich and I don't see this scenario alleviating those shortages.

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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#14

Post by phylo_roadking » 14 Apr 2014, 17:48

The issue isn't daylight precision bombing necessarily, though the LW did have success hitting the airfields they targeted.
That success needs to be quantified....in that medium and high-level raids were very poor, with only 10-15% of bombs falling within airfield bondaries. It was the low-level converted fighters that achieved the notable succcess of the last week of August and first half-week of September...flying mission profiles that no "B17 analogue" could ever fly!
I'm offering up what General Felmy suggested historically, which was the bombing/mining of major ports to suppress imports and thus bring Britain to the negotiating table.
Thing is - it's not going to be effective in the short- and medium-term duration campaign that a small LW strategic force can mount before attrition bites into its efforts....and the Germans of all people should have realised from their WWI experience that it could take 2-3 YEARS to bring the UK to its knees in that way - AND it would need to be combined with an effective maritime interdiction I.E uboats, surface raiders etc., etc...

Mining wasn't the magic solution; events actually proved that it was difficult to lay mines accurately inside swept channels and ports...early-war German designs had a tendency to "sledge" and end up deploying on their bottom anchors some distance away from where they were laid. The British ALSO developed countermeasures...AND were repared to sweep, sometimes three times a day to schedule, in busy port roads' and estuaries...as well as mornings after aircraft observed in the area.

As for attacks on ports - look at the Liverpool examples, and the square miles of dock damaged in the summer of 1940 IIRC. Damaged...but not put out of action IIRC. Or the example of the plastering that the RAF gave Brest when the cream of the KM was stuck there in the last few months of 1941. It's actually quite hard to put ports out of action - you need to BLOCK them I.E. sink shipping there. Cranes/derricks can be replaced, rails re-laid etc....ships can use their OWN steam cranes if necessary to unload onto the quayside. In other words - keeping ports closed is going to require REPEAT raids time and again on the same targets....and I'm sure you know that repeating mission profiles to the SAME target time after time is a real meatgrinder. It allows the defenders to redeploy fighters close to the bombers' "best economy cruise" routes, concentrate AA defences, build decoys etc. etc.
It would be harder to go after heavier bombers with heavier defensive armament and armor than the historical Ju88, He111, and Do17s. I'm not saying that they couldn't inflict losses, but as the Germans found out when going against the B17 the cannon armed bombers were a lot tougher to knock down that the twin engine Whitleys and Blenheims, so they needed things like FLAK to break up the bomber boxes, along with large rockets and twin engine fighters with cannons that could attack outside the range of the edges of the box.
Thing is - and I KNOW you know the equation...the sort of jump in aviation technology AND engine technology to get extra range, extra bombload, AND extra weight bearing capacity for extra armour, guns, ordnance AND gunners is beyond the Germans in the late 1930s. Look at the legendary FW200 equation - where the re-engining of the Fw200 allowed extra range, extra defensive armament, and its gunners and brass etc....but only 25 pounds' weight for actual airframe strengthening! 8O

Not only are you talking a jump beyond what the German aviation industry could ever produce in the period - you're talking about a jump, a change, in what the RLM and LW saw as necessary for defending aircraft; like SO many other nations, they began the war in the WWI mindset, that single-MG installaions of rifle-calibre were enough to defend aircraft...

...and you're also arguing against the Germans' learned lesson of the Spanish Civil War - where the Condor Legion's fighters had to hide within the defensive MG umbrella of Condor Legion bombers :lol: You're needing them to throw out ALL the lessons they'd just learned in favour of a huge jump in defensive armament and armour etc. when they had just discovered that WWI-standard bomber defences WERE adequate! 8O
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Re: What if Ural Bomber designs as good as B-17?

#15

Post by stg 44 » 14 Apr 2014, 17:59

LWD wrote:I'm not sure a 2:1 substitution of 2 enigne to 4 engine bombers is right either. I suspect it something greater than 2:1 but not sure how much. Comparisons might be made with the cost, materials, and manhours of comparable allied planes. Just assuming that you increase production due to continuity isn't necessarly right either, although you likely will get some increase. However planes required some raw materials that were rather in short supply in the Third Reich and I don't see this scenario alleviating those shortages.
What materials were those? Did it stop them from making 1200 He177 strategic bombers historically?

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