Effect of Area bombing on German war production prior 1944

[Andy H]

Split off from this thread viewtopic.php?f=34&t=161189




Hi

Between March and December 1943, bombing had done serious damage to 190 million square feet (7sq miles) of industrial and 590 million square feet (21square miles0 on non-industrial property. British bombs destroyed 1.4milion dwellings, forcing the resettlement of over 4.5million people. It was estimated that caused a 9% aggregate loss in war production with the heaviest losses to machine tools (59%).

The first clear sign as to the bombing effectiveness was the large degree of disruption, dislocation and dispersal of factories and people. As Richard Overy noted, “Bombing also had the effect of interrupting in arbitrary and unpredictable ways the web of supplies of materials and parts on which the whole industrial structure depended. The gradual collapse of the supply system forced firms to carry larger stocks again, and left regular gaps in the supply of components or scarce materials. Ultra intercepts from late 1943 show this growing shortage of components, including spare parts for artillery as well as Me109 and FW190 propellers. So much so for the latter that the salvage of crashed fighter aircraft took priority over all other salvage efforts. It was noted in 1944 onwards that though production rates had increased, many of the vehicles rolling off the production lines were actually unserviceable as they awaited missing components, due to production and transportation problems.

Horst Boog also noted in his book about Harris, that the dispersal of aircraft production resulted in the establishment of around 700 small shops, whereas previously the entire industry resided in around 30 large factories. He also noted on the human side, “The number of man hours lost through night alerts and absenteeism are incalculable.
Although German morale never broke, the relentless bombing clearly reduced it, while gradually tightening civilian rations caused higher levels of sickness and absenteeism. Even workers at their posts were less productive as the slow effects of nutritional inadequacies set in. At the Ford plant in Cologne, for instance, 25% of the work force was absent from the work each day.


Sources: Adam Tooze-Wages of Destruction, Richard Overy-The Air War 1939-45, abstracts from Horst Boogs-Harris:A German View, Robert Ehlers-Targeting the Third Reich

Regards

Andy H

[takata_1940]

Hello,

Between March and December 1943, bombing had done serious damage to 190 million square feet (7sq miles) of industrial and 590 million square feet (21square miles0 on non-industrial property. British bombs destroyed 1.4milion dwellings, forcing the resettlement of over 4.5million people. It was estimated that caused a 9% aggregate loss in war production with the heaviest losses to machine tools (59%).

It is certainly already proved that "British bombs" destroyed things in Germany, in particular dwellings. As for machine tools and "industrial" floor, it is also certainly proved that it wasn't disruptive at all for the war production considering the spare capacity available to the Germans. If machine tools or those "industrial" floor were the bottlenecks of German war production, any single loss would have caused an immediate output lower than achieved precedently. As a matter of fact, monthly production figures never stopped to rise at the same time. Effect of bombings are only perceptible in very localised daily output and without lasting effects. Because of the spare capacity in almost every sector, the losses could be balanced also in a matter of days. Hence, it is difficult to argue about this figure of "9% aggregate loss", or this would only mean that the war production would have risen 9% more without any bombing?
This is not even true as some real bottlenecks existed.

The first clear sign as to the bombing effectiveness was the large degree of disruption, dislocation and dispersal of factories and people. As Richard Overy noted, “Bombing also had the effect of interrupting in arbitrary and unpredictable ways the web of supplies of materials and parts on which the whole industrial structure depended. The gradual collapse of the supply system forced firms to carry larger stocks again, and left regular gaps in the supply of components or scarce materials. Ultra intercepts from late 1943 show this growing shortage of components, including spare parts for artillery as well as Me109 and FW190 propellers. So much so for the latter that the salvage of crashed fighter aircraft took priority over all other salvage efforts. It was noted in 1944 onwards that though production rates had increased, many of the vehicles rolling off the production lines were actually unserviceable as they awaited missing components, due to production and transportation problems.

Which is basically mixing two things: the shortages due to very high planned output figures or the direct cause of the bombings? I wonder how many usable propellers were recovered from wrecked aircraft.

Horst Boog also noted in his book about Harris, that the dispersal of aircraft production resulted in the establishment of around 700 small shops, whereas previously the entire industry resided in around 30 large factories. He also noted on the human side, “The number of man hours lost through night alerts and absenteeism are incalculable.
Although German morale never broke, the relentless bombing clearly reduced it, while gradually tightening civilian rations caused higher levels of sickness and absenteeism. Even workers at their posts were less productive as the slow effects of nutritional inadequacies set in. At the Ford plant in Cologne, for instance, 25% of the work force was absent from the work each day.

Mostly annecdotes and hard to consider them as "disruptive" for the war economy. Key productions (production which caused bottlenecks in certain branches), when possible, was transfered into underground place or remote areas safe from bomber's interference where people worked on a 24h basis shifts. Anywhere else, the production was maintained at a suffisant level to use everything that reached the plants and workshops. The bombings became really effective once the disruption of the transportation system caused delays that induced decreased output, which was not the case until very late (last quarter of 1944).

S~
Olivier

[Andy H]

Hi Oiliver

It is also certainly proved that it wasn't disruptive at all for the war production considering the spare capacity available to the Germans.

Do you not find this a rather sweeping statement! One should not equate ‘spare capacity’ with’ effective capacity’ when looking at these factors. Moving 30 factories into some 700 is hardly the most effective use of men or materials, and by sheer logic must be disruptive to overall production. The Germans High command certainly found the bombing campaign effective enough that Hitler said on May 31st 1943 “It is necessary to increase the flak and night fighter forces in order to protect German cities”. Also Sebastian Fox’s (author of two books on the Dresden raids) observation about the massive diversion of German personnel and weapons to air defence “This rather begs the question as to why, if the effects on the Reich economy were not significant, the Germans felt it necessary to divert military forces badly needed at the front to protecting the Reich?”

any single loss would have caused an immediate output lower than achieved precedently. As a matter of fact, monthly production figures never stopped to rise at the same time.

As I have already stated, though the production figures continued to rise, many of the vehicles rolling off them were unserviceable, so the production figure only gives us one angle to look at. I admit I don’t know what % were unserviceable but there % factor that needs to be addressed.

The bombings became really effective once the disruption of the transportation system caused delays that induced decreased output, which was not the case until very late (last quarter of 1944).

The Ruhr campaign of 1943 caused major disruption prior to then

Regards

Andy H

[takata_1940]

Hello again Andy,

It is also certainly proved that it wasn't disruptive at all for the war production considering the spare capacity available to the Germans.

Do you not find this a rather sweeping statement! One should not equate ‘spare capacity’ with’ effective capacity’ when looking at these factors. Moving 30 factories into some 700 is hardly the most effective use of men or materials, and by sheer logic must be disruptive to overall production. The Germans High command certainly found the bombing campaign effective enough that Hitler said on May 31st 1943 “It is necessary to increase the flak and night fighter forces in order to protect German cities”.

Hitler emphasized the need for Flak from before the war in almost every conference. Guess what? when scale bombardments started to hit Germany, why would he ask for less guns?

But you are talking mostly about assembly lines which were not that difficult to move because all they needed was power supply and floor space, both abundant almost everywhere in Germany. As for the skilled workers, it didn't take days to move them; unskilled workers would be re-affected to other duty.
This was not disruptive at all for "overall production" because assembly line's output depended largely on deliveries which were already in transit and were re-allocated to other plants during this transfer (as well as some manpower to cope with the increase of work). As most of the plants worked on a single shift basis, any temporary increase of output could be achieved simply by re-allocating diverted ressources, then the losses of production were negligible, mostly related to what was effectively destroyed during bombardments. This was "spare capacity" that could be turned into "effective capacity" in a very short time. Beside, in Britain, this system was called "shadow factories" IIRC.

Also Sebastian Fox’s (author of two books on the Dresden raids) observation about the massive diversion of German personnel and weapons to air defence “This rather begs the question as to why, if the effects on the Reich economy were not significant, the Germans felt it necessary to divert military forces badly needed at the front to protecting the Reich?”

I'm not arguing the fact that more ressources were allocated to Air defence in order to cope with Air attacks. This would be silly. But it doesn't certainly relate in any way to any "disruptive effect of the war production output". As, of course, those supplementary ressources allocated for Air defence do not substract from the German war effort but are fully part of it.

any single loss would have caused an immediate output lower than achieved precedently. As a matter of fact, monthly production figures never stopped to rise at the same time.

As I have already stated, though the production figures continued to rise, many of the vehicles rolling off them were unserviceable, so the production figure only gives us one angle to look at. I admit I don’t know what % were unserviceable but there % factor that needs to be addressed.

As I stated already myself, how much of the unserviceable output was due to bombardments instead of the increase of war material output in order to cope with the ambitious plan?

The bombings became really effective once the disruption of the transportation system caused delays that induced decreased output, which was not the case until very late (last quarter of 1944).

The Ruhr campaign of 1943 caused major disruption prior to then

Without any perceptible consequences for the war output level because at this time, the rolling stock was growing and a lot of spare capacity existed. But this was not the case during the 1941-1942 phase of the war where the needs of the Eastern front (due to the space conquered) caused a disruption of transport means, affecting the war production level.

In some way, the Germans caused themselves more harms by overstretching their transport capacity (read rail) - which impacted seriously their production during 1941-1942 - than the allies in 1943 by bombing the Ruhr, when the disminished German controlled space in the East resorbed many transportation bottlenecks.

S~
Olivier

[Andy H]

Hi Oiliver

You wrote:-

Hitler emphasized the need for Flak from before the war in almost every conference. Guess what? when scale bombardments started to hit Germany, why would he ask for less guns?

True, but going hand in hand with the scale, was in broad terms the effectiveness and thus the disruptive nature of the raids on the German economic infrastructure.

But you are talking mostly about assembly lines which were not that difficult to move because all they needed was power supply and floor space, both abundant almost everywhere in Germany. As for the skilled workers, it didn't take days to move them; unskilled workers would be re-affected to other duty.

Well on the face of it I would agree with that, but again the relocation would be of necessity and not design and as such the supporting infrastructure for the relocated assembly line/plant would not be set up for the optimum needs of said plant etc. It was noted that the dispersal led to quality control issues Equally moving skilled workers isn’t difficult in itself, but once again these workers may need to be re-housed dependent on where there relocated too, thus putting added strain on the local infrastructure and services. Also in addition one has to wonder how the relocated skilled workers would react emotionally to moving away from there families, potentially leaving them in harms way. That would surely have a potential effect on their individual productivity!

I'm not arguing the fact that more resources were allocated to Air defence in order to cope with Air attacks. This would be silly. But it doesn't certainly relate in any way to any "disruptive effect of the war production output". As, of course, those supplementary ressources allocated for Air defence do not subtract from the German war effort but are fully part of it

.

I disagree. So what your saying is that the increase in German AAA defences/output is purely down to bombing scale and not as I have stated earlier, bombing effectiveness in disrupting the German economic infrastructure? To this I will add that in June 1943, Göring ordered a massive dispersal of all aircraft production and LW operational assets. By October 1943, combat units had started to cannibalizing aircraft for spare parts as the subcomponents crisis and other effects of the Ruhr attacks took there toll.
ObLt Kogler the CO JG6 emphasized the profoundly negative effects of dispersed aircraft production on operational capabilities. Because each small factory produced only one or two components, these were often produced in poor conditions by poorly trained & unmotivated forced labour, thus quality was low and failure rate was high. Even worse components had to be shipped to a central assembly point and put together without effective quality control.

Thus in response to this:-

how much of the unserviceable output was due to bombardments instead of the increase of war material output in order to cope with the ambitious plan?

I would state it was more the likely to be the former than the latter from the balance of evidence I have read and know about

Regards

Andy H

[takata_1940]

You wrote:-

Hitler emphasized the need for Flak from before the war in almost every conference. Guess what? when scale bombardments started to hit Germany, why would he ask for less guns?

True, but going hand in hand with the scale, was in broad terms the effectiveness and thus the disruptive nature of the raids on the German economic infrastructure.

Basically, your way of reasoning is flawed from the start. You tend to justify the achievements of those city bombings - in consideration to the German armament output - by underlining mostly side effects unrelated to this specific German war output. If you want me to approve the fact that those Bombings had side effects, including political ones and induced forecast planning, of course I do agree with that. Nonetheless, the only measure available to us in order to measure its real impact on armament output IS the actual armament ouput level achieved. Not a single psychological crisis or any destructions of civilian dwelings or any private/state infrastructure which doesn't impacted directly the armament output is to be taken into consideration at this point. This will certainly have an effect only in the long term. What we are discussing here isn't to know if city-bombings killed people or destroyed things and generated many problems, but its effectiveness on German armament output at this stage.

But you are talking mostly about assembly lines which were not that difficult to move because all they needed was power supply and floor space, both abundant almost everywhere in Germany. As for the skilled workers, it didn't take days to move them; unskilled workers would be re-affected to other duty.

Well on the face of it I would agree with that, but again the relocation would be of necessity and not design and as such the supporting infrastructure for the relocated assembly line/plant would not be set up for the optimum needs of said plant etc. It was noted that the dispersal led to quality control issues Equally moving skilled workers isn’t difficult in itself, but once again these workers may need to be re-housed dependent on where there relocated too, thus putting added strain on the local infrastructure and services. Also in addition one has to wonder how the relocated skilled workers would react emotionally to moving away from there families, potentially leaving them in harms way. That would surely have a potential effect on their individual productivity!

Well first, this was made already possible by not concentrating all the war production into few big plants with a lot of workers, manning few machinery and working double shifts. Those would be very vulnerable to Air attacks and their disruption, following a single attack, would pass hardly un-noticed on the production data. Second, productiviy is irrelevant in term of measured output level. Output grew along the war but overall productivity decreased in many sectors due to many reasons but mostly due to skilled manpower shortages. Do you believe that all relocations of assembly plants were made in one single day without any actual planning?

I'm not arguing the fact that more resources were allocated to Air defence in order to cope with Air attacks. This would be silly. But it doesn't certainly relate in any way to any "disruptive effect of the war production output". As, of course, those supplementary ressources allocated for Air defence do not subtract from the German war effort but are fully part of it

.

I disagree. So what your saying is that the increase in German AAA defences/output is purely down to bombing scale and not as I have stated earlier, bombing effectiveness in disrupting the German economic infrastructure?

We are not talking about "economic infrastructure", but armament infrastructure which are two different things. Economic infrastructures are supposed to sustain the whole economy while armament infrastructure are only a part of it which may be growing when the economic base is contracting. By definition, war production is developped against whole sectors of the civilian economy. As a matter of fact, producing AAA armament is part of the armament output, then deal with it. It doesn't cause any disruption of the armament industry.

To this I will add that in June 1943, Göring ordered a massive dispersal of all aircraft production and LW operational assets. By October 1943, combat units had started to cannibalizing aircraft for spare parts as the subcomponents crisis and other effects of the Ruhr attacks took there toll.

Again, how this is supposed to measure any "effectiveness of British city bombings" related to the German war production? Your example of the "subcomponents crisis" is supposed to be the consequence of "City bombings" when it is unrelated: Production of spare parts and repair were cut down in order rise several times the aircraft output. It was considered more efficient to canibalize and recycle wrecked aircraft than to maintain those important stocks of spare parts with big repairs workshops using a lot of very skilled manpower which would find a better use at factories. Making the link between Ruhr's attack and this situation is a bit fallacious.

ObLt Kogler the CO JG6 emphasized the profoundly negative effects of dispersed aircraft production on operational capabilities. Because each small factory produced only one or two components, these were often produced in poor conditions by poorly trained & unmotivated forced labour, thus quality was low and failure rate was high. Even worse components had to be shipped to a central assembly point and put together without effective quality control.

All this had to do with shortages of skilled manpower and shortcuts taken during production for rising output much more than "British City-bombings".

If one want to find the reason why quality control was not going to improve at this stage of the war - considering the quality of manpower used - the real cause would have to be find in the eastern front which killed many soldiers which had to be replaced every months while manpower reserves were almost fully exhausted. Now, saying that this was due to British city bombings is left to Harris fanboys.

Concerning aircraft output, what augmented was the number of aircraft refused by the Luftwaffe and nowhere it is mentioned that aircraft were delivered to their units without all their equipment. I already posted full data based on fighters deliveries to units somewhere in this thread and it is very easy to verify that deliveries augmented many times during 1943. Hard to conclude because of such annecdotes that the armament industry was disrupted because of those British city bombings, as you did, when all figures are rising steeply.

S~
Olivier

[Andy H]

Hi Oliver

I dont have time for a full response as time is pressing, but you wrote:-

Nonetheless, the only measure available to us in order to measure its real impact on armament output IS the actual armament ouput level achieved.

That is a rather vacuous way at judging effectiveness of both the bomber campaign and production output, a single totalizsed figure in my opinion.

Regards

Andy H

[bf109 emil]

Basically, your way of reasoning is flawed from the start. You tend to justify the achievements of those city bombings - in consideration to the German armament output - by underlining mostly side effects unrelated to this specific German war output. If you want me to approve the fact that those Bombings had side effects, including political ones and induced forecast planning, of course I do agree with that. Nonetheless, the only measure available to us in order to measure its real impact on armament output IS the actual armament ouput level achieved.

this conclusion is flawed as assumed because armament productions increased, one makes the uneducated assumption that allied bombing had little or no effect.

When in essence to determine what level of attrition or production decreases allied bombing had, we must also know upon what % of increase Germany would have achieved, if and had they been allowed total free reign from possible destruction.

The question is not whether Germany increased it's armament production throughout the war and simply assuming because of this, Allied bombing took little or no toll, but rather by what number could have Germany increased it's production number's being free from Allied air attack, thus these numbers we will never know.

To argue otherwise, would be historically inaccurate to say Germany's wonder weapons and war effort in the creation and building of V weapons was not hindered by an Allied raid upon Peenemunde as shown by numerous documents and sources as to the length this program and production was delayed would be an injustice to any historical accuracy this forum is trying to establish

[takata_1940]

Hi "Bf109 emil",

Basically, your way of reasoning is flawed from the start. You tend to justify the achievements of those city bombings - in consideration to the German armament output - by underlining mostly side effects unrelated to this specific German war output. If you want me to approve the fact that those Bombings had side effects, including political ones and induced forecast planning, of course I do agree with that. Nonetheless, the only measure available to us in order to measure its real impact on armament output IS the actual armament ouput level achieved.

this conclusion is flawed as assumed because armament productions increased, one makes the uneducated assumption that allied bombing had little or no effect.
When in essence to determine what level of attrition or production decreases allied bombing had, we must also know upon what % of increase Germany would have achieved, if and had they been allowed total free reign from possible destruction.

Well, I'm not at all responsible for this thread's title (created from another one) as the argument was only about the 1943 British city-bombings campaign which, I pointed, were far from achieving any disruption - as it is humanly possible to measure it - on the German war economy. And this, globally, due to its intrinsic capacity of absorbing what little effects it had on the overall production.

And no, my conclusion was not flawed as I'm not assuming that something growing is going down, as it happened when bombings reached another level of efficiency by focusing on several targets that really impacted the war economy. It's like looking at the stock-market: you've got an indice and you compare it with its previous value and you'll be able to conclude yourself about the market tendency. When, in this case, the index is climbing sharply, it's pretty hard to argue that some crisis was hidden behind the number.

The question is not whether Germany increased it's armament production throughout the war and simply assuming because of this, Allied bombing took little or no toll, but rather by what number could have Germany increased it's production number's being free from Allied air attack, thus these numbers we will never know.

As I said several times before, if you would mind to read it before - which is something you usually don't really care about before using big words - I did not discussed the fact that bombers did hit things, killed people and destroyed goods. My claims was that they did not hit, kill and destroy what would have hampered the German war economy at this point of the war. But you are, of course, absolutely free to make the opposite demonstration by proving that they really did those crippling damages and disrupted the German war economy. So far, assuming they had an effect on it without addressing what it was is to be considered, hmm... very insuffisant.

To argue otherwise, would be historically inaccurate to say Germany's wonder weapons and war effort in the creation and building of V weapons was not hindered by an Allied raid upon Peenemunde as shown by numerous documents and sources as to the length this program and production was delayed would be an injustice to any historical accuracy this forum is trying to establish

What is supposed to be the relation between Peenemüde and 1943 city-bombings? I just wonder.
But if you are going this way, tell me what real damages this raid had on the V-program production and development?
When Peenemüde was attacked, the production was already underway elsewhere as this base was only a development center. The maximum effect it actually achieved was that one lucky bomb destroyed a building full of technicians. But only one guy out of the numerous victims was a valuable scientist working on the V-program. As such a program employed thousands of valuable scientists, you can easily measure the impact on the whole program... But yes, perhaps a movie was made about it.

Have a nice day,
Olivier

[bf109 emil]

And no, my conclusion was not flawed as I'm not assuming that something growing is going down, as it happened when bombings reached another level of efficiency by focusing on several targets that really impacted the war economy. It's like looking at the stock-market: you've got an indice and you compare it to its previous value and you'll be able to conclude yourself about the market tendency. When, in this case, the index is climbing sharply, it's pretty hard to argue that some crisis is hidden behind the number.

Yes, the stock market...God bless the last recession, the bottoming of mining stocks and there return has led me to now an early retirement and never left for a want of $$ again. But using a stock market, which prices are based upon "speculative" earnings which is the driving factor of index's rising and prices increasing, it is easy to argue that a variety of crisis do affect the numbers based upon pure and direct impact of said crisis. Currently we have the Greek economy playing a deciding role upon the current trend of the market in a direct relationship reflecting upon the buying and selling of stocks, those with no significant value based upon or within a collapse or threat of collapse of Greece's economy, but as a whole which reflects back upon the market itself.

But if we are looking at the stock market as a comparative tool, even with the average increase in the market going upwards...what % would these Index's have increased if and had this hidden crisis in Greece not have played a toll?

As I said several times before, if you would mind to read it before - which is something you usually don't really care about before using big words - I did not discussed the fact that bombers did hit things, killed people and destroyed goods. My claims was that they did not hit, kill and destroy what would have hampered the German war economy at this point of the war.

I think you misinterpreted the gist of my point as being, I do not argue that Allied bombing either stopped or prevented an increase in the German war effort as this is historically known, what is not known is whether the increase was limited or slowed by Allied bombing and upon what scale. As discussed earlier by a comparison using the stock market index's, we know the index is rising, but will never know upon how much this rise would have been had various hidden crisis not influenced the trend or rise within the stock market, similar to Germany.

Simply put Germany armaments increased as these where dictated or increase in production was being implemented within Germany's economy and war efforts...but even simply calculating say a destruction of a rail line/bridge, etc. which is made un-available to supply a factory even for a short time of 4 days, would not these 4 days of loss calculated into a total of 365 mean a loss of 1% of production due to bombing and reflect upon the totals Germany was able to increase her production over the previous year despite her over all increase...These are the numbers i sought to reflect upon as yes Germany increased her production, but at what % this increase was hampered by allied bombing we will never know...unless one calculates the maximum effort of a plant over a set period of say a week, times this by 52 to get the maximum efficiency number and compare this number to the actual production of said plant, which would reflect the losses this plant might have suffered due to Allied bombing, a disruption of material, lack of transportation facities, etc.

[takata_1940]

But if we are looking at the stock market as a comparative tool, even with the average increase in the market going upwards...what % would these Index's have increased if and had this hidden crisis in Greece not have played a toll?

Then it's up to you to make the demonstration of this disruptive effects on German war economy; but please, don't ask me to prove that Greece's crisis impacted the Euro quotation (and world economy) by showing you the relevant graph...

I think you misinterpreted the gist of my point as being, I do not argue that Allied bombing either stopped or prevented an increase in the German war effort as this is historically known, what is not known is whether the increase was limited or slowed by Allied bombing and upon what scale. As discussed earlier by a comparison using the stock market index's, we know the index is rising, but will never know upon how much this rise would have been had various hidden crisis not influenced the trend or rise within the stock market, similar to Germany.

This is proving rather that you don't know yourself, but you are assuming that the real output index do not reflect the real output as you would like to imagine it. On the other hand, I'm telling you that it's easy to verify that this same index is reflecting at later periods the fact that the bombings achieved a good level of efficiency. Then my method is proved and yours is... nothing else than a basic assumption.

Simply put Germany armaments increased as these where dictated or increase in production was being implemented within Germany's economy and war efforts...but even simply calculating say a destruction of a rail line/bridge, etc. which is made un-available to supply a factory even for a short time of 4 days, would not these 4 days of loss calculated into a total of 365 mean a loss of 1% of production due to bombing and reflect upon the totals Germany was able to increase her production over the previous year despite her over all increase...

1% loss at one single factory out of thousands consituting the war output index could hardly cripple or disrupt the German war economy. No need to nitpick ad nauseam and rather assuming that nothing measurable is perceptible, because such small losses also will occur due to plenty of other factors than bombardments (transportation, supply, manpower, etc.). The fact is that it was easy for the German to catch up with scheduled deliveries when this happened.

S~
Olivier

[Guaporense]

Second to the report on the British Strategic Bombing survey, bombing between July 1943 and December 1944 caused a loss of production of 7,500 aircraft, about 14% of actual output. Tank production was adversely affected too, with an estimated loss of 16.5%. Ammunition was not directly affected, but output would have been a little higher without the bombing of the transportation system. Overall, bombing was probably responsible for a loss of around 10% in war production in 1944.

[bf109 emil]

Then it's up to you to make the demonstration of this disruptive effects on German war economy; but please, don't ask me to prove that Greece's crisis impacted the Euro quotation (and world economy) by showing you the relevant graph...

no graph needed as it is proven in both stock and commodity prices on NA markets each and every time the crisis is shown or referred to in numerous brokerages

and no need to demonstrate disruptive effects as by your next statement you state...On the other hand, I'm telling you that it's easy to verify that this same index is reflecting at later periods the fact that the bombings achieved a good level of efficiency. which makes me happy that you fess up that bombing achieved a good level of efficiency, which as you likewise claim is reflected in your figures. Perhaps if you stated this earlier rather then the incorrect and false assumption you stated earlier as Allied air attacks-But it doesn't certainly relate in any way to any "disruptive effect of the war production output".

But most likely the flawed logic you intend to try and post is the following statement made...Nonetheless, the only measure available to us in order to measure its real impact on armament output IS the actual armament ouput level achieved.

Which is a given, but looking at the final totals made as deeming Allied bombing had no effect on production, we would have to likewise say the same for the destruction of Russia as if we measure only the "actual armament output achieved" and conclude it also raised each year, would all efforts of German bombing upon her cities, factories, etc, be equally deemed as being ineffective or insignificant by using only production totals and Russia's ability to increase production each year?

[Andy H]

The Following information is from German Aircraft Industry and Production 1933-1945 by Ferenc Vajda & Peter Dancey, Published by Society of Automotive Engineers International 1998

In regards to your statement about plants being moved underground which in effect negated the direct effects of the bombing, Vajda & Dancey note on Pg83:-

The principal Daimler-Benz factory at Genshagen was so badly damaged that production output dropped by 40%. The factory in the main was then transferred to a gypsum mine at Neckar-Els, near Heidelberg. In this new plant numerous (but I doubt unique) problems arose. The moisture was detrimental to the precious machine tools: the high humidity made working conditions almost impossible. The power supply was often interrupted by the bombing. In these conditions it was impossible to do precision work and turn out high quality aero-engines. At another Daimler-Benz licensee, part of the Bussing Werks were dispersed to a salt mine, where corrosion and humidity soon destroyed precious machine tools.

Thus as I have noted earlier, though the actual production number may be higher as the war progressed, so were the numbers of unfinished or un-airworthy airframes coming off the production line as the problems of quality spiralled and the lag time between production end and the plane being declared airworthy increased. In addition we can see that the physical destruction of the machine tools wasn’t the only means by which these valuable assets were denuded. Obviously such losses by various means in collusion with the disastrous bombing and supply of ball bearings, saw the replacement of effective machine tools ebb. The dispersement to less than ideal environments was a direct result off the Allied bombing campaign, and thus any losses in production can be attributed back to it.

Also on Pg83

During July-Sept’43 some 2072 tonnes of bombs were dropped on aircraft and engine plants, with a further 1,068 tonnes between Aug-Dec’43. These raids saw fighter production drop from 1109 in July to 982 in September. A slight increase was seen in October’43 with 1103 but this was soon negated by figures off 937 in November and only 721 in December.

Regards

Andy H

[bf109 emil]

What we are discussing here isn't to know if city-bombings killed people or destroyed things and generated many problems, but its effectiveness on German armament output at this stage.

Yes and if the Germany Reich is forced to replenish the dwellings of hundreds of thousands of workers homes, pay for the transportation of these workers, etc. would not the loss of billions of RM to fund these items as a direct result of an air bombardment also reduce Germany's effectiveness to purchase armaments, buy armaments, and import raw materials by the loss of these billion of Reich marks which would not be in Germany's coffers as a direct result of air bombardment!