Munitions in WW1

[Guaporense]

Was the production of munitions much smaller in WW1 compared to WW2 in terms of ammunitions guns and artillery? I read that in WW1 the US was making 15,000 rifles per day in 1917, that is about 5 million per year. That's more than US average production in 1943-1944, when they made 4 million rifles per year.

[Dave Bender]

Production of explosives was the critical path during both world wars. You can produce artillery pieces and rifles faster then you can produce propellent and HE filler for artillery shells.

[Guaporense]

Production of explosives was the critical path during both world wars. You can produce artillery pieces and rifles faster then you can produce propellent and HE filler for artillery shells.

So, do you know how many tons of explosives Britain or Ger made in 1917?
How many tons of artillery rounds?

[Dave Bender]

Data is from "The Pity of War" by Niall Ferguson.

1914 explosivess
5,000 tons. Britain.
14,400 tons. Germany.

1915 explosives.
24,000 tons. Britain.
72,000 tons. Germany

1916 explosives.
76,000 tons. Britain.
120,000 tons. Germany

1917 explosives.
186,000 tons. Britain.
144,000 tons. Germany.

Approximately 60% of British ammunition was manufactured for Russian use. Britain also made explosives for France, Italy and the USA. Consequently the huge British explosives production of 1917 to 1918 does not equate to the British army being awash in ammunition.

By the same token, Germany supplied explosives and much other material to nations in the Central Powers. However Austria-Hungary was nowhere as needy as Russia. The Russians needed to import practically everything except food and petroleum products.

[Art]

Approximately 60% of British ammunition was manufactured for Russian use.

I've allready seen this statement and frankly speaking it simply puzzles me. Simple common sense says that in this case the amount of ammunition received by the Russian Army must exceed the same amount recieved by British, which was obviosly not the case. The British Army spent some 170 millions shells on the Western Front alone and that was about three times higher than the number of shells recieved by Russia through export and domestic production.

[Dave Bender]

Artillery shells come in all different sizes. A small shell like the British 18 pounder contains about .5kg of HE filler. A heavy howitzer shell like the German 15cm contains about 6kg of HE filler - 12 times as much. That's why the number of shells fired is a meaningless figure. You need to know how much high explosive was dropped on the enemy. The best way to gauge a nation's artillery firepower is to measure the quantity of high explosives produced.

[Terry Duncan]

The 60% figure is almost certainly incorrect, though that is hardly suprising if it comes from Ferguson who tends to be far more sensationalist than objective and accurate. Russia was not in the war by 1918 when British ammunition supply was running high, and not for all of 1917 either. Shell supply did not stop as soon as Russia had problems, indeed the Provisional Government carried on taking much the same deliveries during its lifetime.

The larger British guns and the major bombardments are all in the period 1916 - 1918, Third Ypres seeing a huge proportion of the total shells fired up until that point IIRC, so it is hard to see how this figure is correct unless it is an edited figure to gain attention such as the music industry uses regularly (for example a record is often advertised as 'The biggest selling album of the year' which is correct when the rider 'By a band from X country' or 'Released on a Sunday' is added in). Given both Britain and France had trouble finding enough shells for their own armies guns until 1916-17 it is hard to see them shipping over half to Russia.

The one possibility that comes to my mind is that it may be 60% of the shells produced in Britain that was shipped to Russia, which would therefore not include any shells supplied from the US or France?

[Dave Bender]

60% is just a ball park figure.

Artillery shells are complicated devices made from several sub-components.
- Shell main body. Made from a fairly high quality steel to resist firing stress.
- Shell fuze.
- Driving band. Typically made of copper. This fits around the shell and grips the barrel rifling.
- High explosive filler. A major product in it's own right with several sub components.
- Propellent. Another major component with several sub components.

Russia imported lots of shell fuzes from Britain as they were unable to expand their own production capacity for this critical item.

Russian shell main bodies were usually made locally. However the copper for the driving band was often imported.

The high explosive filler was often made locally. However many of the chemical sub components like toluene were imported.

Propellent was made locally using imported saltpeter. (something like 5,000 tons of imported saltpeter blew up at Arkhangelsk during 1915)

As you can see the issue is clear as mud.
However it's safe to say that Russian munitions production received a huge amount of foreign assistance during both world wars. Without this assistance Russia could not sustain a long term war. Britain took the lead to supply Russia with vital raw materials and sub components for munitions production.

[Terry Duncan]

Dave,

I would agree with what you say, but Britain was not getting enough artillery supplies herself in 1914-16 so its not too likely that she supplied Russia with more than her own armies, and the difficulties apply to whoever wants the product. Russian armies always seemed to be short of ammo too, I dont think any army had as much ammo as they wanted really until quite late in the war.

Looking over the numbers involved it could be that Britain produced 60% of the ammo used by Russia, rather than supplied Russia with 60% of the ammo made by Britain. That would produce figures not too hard to support, and delivering them would not need a vast number of convoys too.

[stg 44]

According to Norman Stone in "the Eastern Front", Germany produced in 1916 12 millions shells a month, Russian 4.5 million, and Austria-Hungary 1 million. Apparently Russia was not nearly as bad off as myth suggests, rather, mismanagement and incompetence cost Russia the dearest. By 1917 Russia was supposedly able to produce enough shells to match the western powers, but had no armies to use them.

[Art]

To add some data to the discussion here are some tables from "Statistics on Military Efforts of the British Empire in the Great War. 1914-1920":
British artillery ammunition production 1914-18:




British ammuntion expenditure on the Wester Front:

Shipments of British artillery weapons and ammunition to other countries:

Production of explosives:

Source:
http://www.vlib.us/wwi/resources/britishwwi.html

[Art]

As concerns Russian ammunition production, first, it must be said that the most part of ammunition actually recieved by the Army came from domestic industry. Although large orders were placed abroad (the total amount was at least 40 millions shells), their execution was neither accurate nor timely, as a result only a small number of ordered ammunition reached the army. Russian production of ammunition was as follows:

76-mm gun ammunition (shrapnel and HE shells):
1914- 78 800
1915 - 8 825 800
1916 - 26 899 000
1917 - 17 712 800
Total 53 525 400

122-mm howitzer:
1914 - 24 000
1915 - 358 938
1916 - 2 212 512
1917 - 3 238 404
Total 5 833 854

107-mm gun:
1915 - 243 589
1916 - 720 812
1917 - 759 487
Total 1 723 888

152-mm:
1915 - 131 724
1916 - 1 130 433
1917 - 2 676 164
Total 3 938 321

If higher calibers are added then the total production was 104 900 in 1914, 9 567 888 in 1915, 30 974 678 in 1916, and 24 413 552 in 1917, total 65 061 018. As might be seen about 80% of the total number of shells produced were 76-mm. The numbers actullay recieved by the army by the end of 1917 were somewhat smaller - 47 518 000 76-mm shells, 9 110 000 medium caliber shells (107-152-mm) and 28 731 high-caliber.

As concerns foreign deliveries, Russia received 12 918 000 76-mm shells (here only ammunition actually reaching Russian territory is counted), 1 385 400 shells for British 4,5-inch howitzers (note that the number is smaller than in British sources), 670 015 shells for Frehcn 90-mm guns, 324 640 shells for French 120-mm guns, 100 950 - French 152-mm guns, 146 440 - British 60-pr guns. Some other items added 2 649 845 foreign shells of >76-mm caliber were recieved, plus 86 750 high caliber (20-cm and higher). So import accoounted for roughly 15,6 millions artillery shells, not counting ammunition for mortars.

The situation with powder and explosives production was more criticla and here Russia to a large degree depended on supplies from abroad. In all in 1914-17 the Russian Army recieved 83 500 tons of smockless poweder mostly for artillery ammunition, of them 51 700 or 62% were imported, mainly from the USA. Deliveries of major explosives in 1915-1916 were as follows:
TNT and trinitroxylol - 11 840 tons from domestic plants and 9 100 tons from import, total 20 940 tons
Picric acod - 6 340 tons from domestic production, 8 860 tons from export, total 15 200 tons
Ammonium nitrate - 9 180 tons from domestic production, 13 300 from import, total 22 480 tons
Ammonal etc - 13 580 tons from domestic industry, 10 010 from import, total 23 590 tons
In all some 41 000 tons from Russian plants and the same number from import. The ratio of demestic production to import was almost exactly 1:1. So the average deliveries per year were 41 thousands tons of explosives, of them 20 thousands - from abroad.
I want to repeat that I find it hard to reconcile these data with the notion of 60% of British explosived and ammunition coming to Russia. IMO it's simply a mistake.
All the data quoted are from "Artillery of the Russian Army" by Barsukov.

[Dave Bender]

Excellent information. Thanks!

By chance do you know the manufacturing location for each ammunition type?

[Guaporense]

Impressive that in WW2 apparently ammunition production was significantly greater, even thought was relatively less important. Germany produced 280 million rounds of ammunition in 1944, that's about 23 million per month. Much more than the 12 million figure for 1917.

[Dave Bender]

WW2 apparently ammunition production was significantly greater, even thought was relatively less important.

What makes you say that?

Artillery caused most battle casualties during WWI. It still causes most casualties during modern conventional conflicts.