German Armament Production

Discussions on the economic history of the nations taking part in WW2, from the recovery after the depression until the economy at war.
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Re: German Armament Production

#31

Post by Piotr Kapuscinski » 02 Oct 2010, 00:25

Germany actually mobilized 17,9 million men
Wasn't it more?:

http://www.feldgrau.com/stats.html

BTW - anyone has German tank production statistics by type (all types) for period 01.09.1939 - 31.12.1940 with monthly breakdown?

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Re: German Armament Production

#32

Post by Guaporense » 02 Oct 2010, 02:23

Domen121 wrote:
Germany actually mobilized 17,9 million men
Wasn't it more?:

http://www.feldgrau.com/stats.html

BTW - anyone has German tank production statistics by type (all types) for period 01.09.1939 - 31.12.1940 with monthly breakdown?
According to the link you posted:

"Total in Wehrmacht Service 1939-1945: 17,893,200"

Yep, 17.9 million men. More than the US (they mobilized 16.2 million men).
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz


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bf109 emil
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Re: German Armament Production

#33

Post by bf109 emil » 02 Oct 2010, 09:56

Guaporense wrote:
Domen121 wrote:
Germany actually mobilized 17,9 million men
Wasn't it more?:

http://www.feldgrau.com/stats.html

BTW - anyone has German tank production statistics by type (all types) for period 01.09.1939 - 31.12.1940 with monthly breakdown?
According to the link you posted:

"Total in Wehrmacht Service 1939-1945: 17,893,200"

Yep, 17.9 million men. More than the US (they mobilized 16.2 million men).
this tell us little other then simply mobilized...does it refer to the number or % mobilized which would be used in actual combat...

as Germany was facing a crisis on all fronts, often the number mobilized are used for training, equipping, and logistics, etc. of a nations army army in order to allow itself a combative advantage over the enemy...hence the initial advantage of the Wehrmacht in the Heer, LW and KM in WW2, but shortly afterwords as loses gained, German mobilization required nothing more then a trigger finger or a sufficiently untrained pilot to enter combat, hence the superiority quickly shown by Allied troops over the much bolstered initial plight of the Wehrmacht some years earlier.

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Re: German Armament Production

#34

Post by Paul_Atreides » 02 Oct 2010, 18:49

Domen121 wrote:BTW - anyone has German tank production statistics by type (all types) for period 01.09.1939 - 31.12.1940 with monthly breakdown?
Look at Jentz's Panzertruppen 1933-42.
There is no waste, there are reserves (Slogan of German Army in World Wars)

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Re: German Armament Production

#35

Post by RichTO90 » 03 Oct 2010, 22:39

Guaporense wrote:
Domen121 wrote:
Germany actually mobilized 17,9 million men
Wasn't it more?:

http://www.feldgrau.com/stats.html

BTW - anyone has German tank production statistics by type (all types) for period 01.09.1939 - 31.12.1940 with monthly breakdown?
According to the link you posted:

"Total in Wehrmacht Service 1939-1945: 17,893,200"

Yep, 17.9 million men. More than the US (they mobilized 16.2 million men).
Sigh. Here we go again. :lol:

Note that the total figures are Wehrmacht, which includes:

Heer (Feldheer and Ersatzheer)
Kriegsmarine
Luftwaffe
Waffen-SS
Wehrmachtgefolge (Beamte, NSKK, OT, RAD)

(Note also that the totals for the combat services actually exceeds the Wehrmacht total - they are guesstimates at best.)

Those are not comparable to US figures that include only the uniformed personnel of the two Services, the US Army (including the Army Air Corps) and the US Navy (including the USMC and Coast Guard). Nor are the figures contemporary in terms of timespan that the totals are estimated for; the German figures are for 1 September 1939 to 8 May 1945, while the American figures are for 1 June 1940 to 31 August 1945 for the US Army and 7 December 1941 to 31 December 1946 for the US Navy (Navy only, I haven't bothered to look to see when the USMC and Caost Guard figures cover).

To give the thoughtful reader an idea of how these figures may skew the results, an idea willfully ignored by the thoughtless poster, civilian personnel strength of the US War Department alone as of 1 december 1941 was 440,000, grew to 1,545,000 as of 1 June 1943, and peaked 1 June 1945 at 1,881,000. Thus, even ignoring attrition and new hiring, at least 1,441,000 civilians were mobilized into the War Department during the war, raising the US mobilization "total" to at least 17.6-million. Note that I'm not going to bother looking for the Navy civilian personnel figures since I think this is sufficiant to illustrate the ongoing nature of these problematic "comparisons". :roll:

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Re: German Armament Production

#36

Post by RichTO90 » 03 Oct 2010, 23:05

Guaporense wrote: 1942 - 4,524
1943 - 15,599
1944 - 24,015
1940 (June-December) - 470
1941 - 1,849
1945 - 7,309
For Germany:

1941 - 14,200
1942 - 11,000
1943 - 11,600
1944 - 15,800
Speer's Schnellberichte as of the end of January 1945 gave totals for the Ge7a, Ge7e, and Ge7es as:

1941 - 14,172
1942 - 11,028
1943 - 11,628
1944 - 15,792
In 1943 and 1944 the US produced more, but Germany produced slighly more torpedoes for the entire war.
Yeah, but I suspect that US production in 1945 was greater, given that German production fell off after 8 May. :roll: It might be significant too that the US only had two torpedo arsenals functioning in 1941 (Alexandria was a storage facility after 1927 and did not resume manufacturing along with Newport and Keyport until refurbishing of the facilities was completed in 1942 and production by Pontiac Motors Division; the International Harvester Co; American Can Co. (Amtorp); Westinghouse Electric Corp.; Western Electric Co.; and General Electric Co. was phased in from 1942 on as well.
2- The ground artillery ammunition category was given by the Wartime Production Achievements page 108. I don't know how they separate ground from sea ammunition. I would like a simple big picture number like: munitions, tons, so I could directly compare to Germany's ~10 million ton number (I estimated that US production of "exploding" munitions (bombs, ammo) was between 11 and 12 million tons).
Given that Germany's figure is actually a guess, why is that a problem? Some figures are given as rounds and totals are calculated from round weight, but other figures are for tons of propellent and explosive - does that get counted separately or is it included in the round weight? Compare what can be compared rather than assumed numbers.

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Richard Anderson
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Re: German Armament Production

#37

Post by RichTO90 » 03 Oct 2010, 23:36

Guaporense wrote:I don't have exact data on the number of guns over 75mm that the US produced, but Germany produced 60,000 in 1944. The US apparently didn't produce such number of guns in 1944, but I don't have an exact number. Also, considering that you gave the extreme number of 17 centimeter calibre artillery, may you provide it?
"Heavy artillery" is typically meant in the period to include guns of about 15cm and larger and howitzers of 155mm and larger. In the US system heavies were the 155mm M1 and M2 Gun, the 8" M2 Howitzer, the 8" M1 Gun, and the 240mm M1 Howitzer. In the German system heavies were the 15cm Kanone, the 17cm Kanone in Moerserlafette, the 21cm Moerser, and various small-production types such as the 21cm Kanone, 24cm Kanone, and similar.

US production included:

Complete pieces:
1,882 M1 & M2 Guns
1,006 M2 8" Howitzers
139 8" M1 Guns
315 240mm Howitzers
347 155mm M40 SP Guns
24 T89 240mm SP Howitzers

Spare Cannon:
3,469 M1 & M1A1 155mm Guns
1,054 M2 8" Howitzers
414 M1 8" Guns
262 M1 240mm Howitzers

8,912 Total

German production included:

173 15cm Kanone 18, 39, and in Moerserlafette
338 17cm Kanone in Moerserlafette
1,049 21cm M18
86 21cm Kanone (38/39/40/41/52)
10 24cm K3
18 24cm H39/40
8 35.5cm M1

1,682 Total

You can add in the stuff like the 42cm Gamma refurbished in 1940 and railroad artillery, but...

[Edit] I forgot to mention that well over half that "artillery" produced by the Germans that was over 75mm was actually 75mm and a good portion of that wasn't "artillery", but were tank guns

7.5cm FK 7M85 = 10
7.5cm leIG = 4,846
7.5cm Geb.Gesch. = 456
7.5cm LG = 237
7.5cm Pak = 15,548
7.5cm Kwk 37 = 486
7.5cm StuK 37 = 137
7.5cm Kwk40 = 3,356
7.5cm Kwk42 = 4,188
7.5cm StuK39 = 5,737
Total = 35,001 of which 5,549 were artillery, 15,548 antitank guns, and the rest tank guns.

Comparable US production in 1944 was:

3" TD Gun M5 & M6 = 1,000
75mm Howitzer M1A1 = 915
76mm Gun M1A1 = 8,502
75mm Gun M2 & M3 = 778
75mm Gun M6 = 2,370
75mm Howitzer M3 = 1,699
76mm Gun for GMC T70 = 207
75mm Howitzer for HMC M8 = 170
75mm Gun M4 & M5 = 803
Total = 16,444

Of course, 1944 wasn't the peak year for that class of production in the US (that was 1943 when 35,664 were produced), but then we know that you like to use such comparisons. :roll: :lol:
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Re: German Armament Production

#38

Post by LWD » 04 Oct 2010, 14:20

Didn't 155mm howitzers and 155mm guns use the same ammo? If the latter are considered "heavy" and the former aren't how do you tell which the ammo was made for? Also didn't some of the German railroad guns use the same ammo as thier naval guns?

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Re: German Armament Production

#39

Post by RichTO90 » 04 Oct 2010, 14:41

LWD wrote:Didn't 155mm howitzers and 155mm guns use the same ammo? If the latter are considered "heavy" and the former aren't how do you tell which the ammo was made for? Also didn't some of the German railroad guns use the same ammo as thier naval guns?
Same projectile, different charge. Both were semi-fixed, but the M2 Howitzer had a base charge and six adjustable increments. The M1 & M2 Gun utilized a base charge and a single increment.

Heavy had less to do with the size and weight of the ammo than it did with the size and weight of the piece. An M2 155mm Gun weighed over 15 short tons (30,600 pounds) in march configuration, while an M2 155mm Howitzer weighed 6.5 tons (13,000 pounds).

Yes, railroad guns were often ex-naval weapons and I believe some of the German ones were, but I'm not sure why that is relevent?

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Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall: the 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers on D-Day
Stackpole Books, 2009.

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Re: German Armament Production

#40

Post by LWD » 04 Oct 2010, 14:53

RichTO90 wrote:
LWD wrote:Didn't 155mm howitzers and 155mm guns use the same ammo? If the latter are considered "heavy" and the former aren't how do you tell which the ammo was made for? Also didn't some of the German railroad guns use the same ammo as thier naval guns?
Same projectile, different charge. Both were semi-fixed, but the M2 Howitzer had a base charge and six adjustable increments. The M1 & M2 Gun utilized a base charge and a single increment.

Heavy had less to do with the size and weight of the ammo than it did with the size and weight of the piece. An M2 155mm Gun weighed over 15 short tons (30,600 pounds) in march configuration, while an M2 155mm Howitzer weighed 6.5 tons (13,000 pounds).

Yes, railroad guns were often ex-naval weapons and I believe some of the German ones were, but I'm not sure why that is relevent?
...
I thought some claims had been made about production of ammo for "heavy artillery". I'm not sure how accurate such claims can be if the same round is used for heavy and non heavy guns. Likewise claims have been made about "ground artillery" and ammo production for the same. What then it the defintion of "ground artillery"? Certainly the rough numbers can be generated but some of the claims require a bit more detail than I'm seeing (at least those made by one poster in this thread).

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Re: German Armament Production

#41

Post by RichTO90 » 04 Oct 2010, 15:17

LWD wrote:I thought some claims had been made about production of ammo for "heavy artillery". I'm not sure how accurate such claims can be if the same round is used for heavy and non heavy guns. Likewise claims have been made about "ground artillery" and ammo production for the same. What then it the defintion of "ground artillery"? Certainly the rough numbers can be generated but some of the claims require a bit more detail than I'm seeing (at least those made by one poster in this thread).
Sure enough, but I wasn't posting information about bogus ammunition production claims; I was posting information about bogus and deceptive artillery production claims... 8-) :lol:

Mind you, given the habit of the OP to simply repost his disinformative, deceptive, out-dated, incomplete, and bogus figures in a new thread as if that magically suddenly makes them correct, I'm more than a little tired of chasing him down his rat- (sorry), rabbit-hole. Yes, I do understand the moderator attitude that the responses to such tripe do constitute valuable additions, but that doesn't help the poor person that pulls up the reams of carefully twisted factoids that comprise the OP's sum total of knowledge and assumes that because he posts so prolifically at this respected research site then his goofiness has some validity.

And, yes, I do sometimes dream that a moderator will have the balls to tell him to put up or shut up...to answer the many questions that he has dodged over the last months by taking the discussion to a new rat- (sorry again) rabbit-hole when challenged. Like that will ever happen... :roll: :lol:

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Richard Anderson
Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall: the 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers on D-Day
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Re: German Armament Production

#42

Post by Jon G. » 06 Oct 2010, 09:55

Guaporense wrote:
bf109 emil wrote:lets not forget horse shoes as the German army employed over 6,700,000 horses during 1941-1945
I think it is 2,7 million horses, not 6,7. The German army never had more than ca 1,2 million horses at the same time.
How did you arrive at that figure? have you considered the attrition rate of military horses? A good place to start your studies would be Heeresgruppe Mitte in the winter of 1941-1942. Come back and tell us what you've found out.

While I would tend to dismiss the importance of horseshoes as an important item in the German military inventory, the need for horseshoes on a regular basis for the Wehrmacht's vast hordes of equines does leave room for some fascinating Guaporense-style maths. Consider that 1.2 (not 1,2 :roll: ) million horses need 4.8 million horseshoes, rounded up to 5 million and that each horse would need shoes - let's round that up to five per horse, after all, it's only on average that horses have four legs - every six weeks or so, let's call it a month, or 5,000 tons of good quality iron a month, or 60,000 tons of iron a year which we can transform into steel at will.

In other words, the Germans could have built another Bismarck every year if they'd done away with all those useless horses, and with horses out of the picture, there would be plenty of barley for the crew to eat, and maybe horseflesh for the holidays. In other other words, the Germans, had they started their battleship program in 1933 and had they abolished horses at the same time, would have started the war with six more battleships than they had historically.
RichTO90 wrote:...Mind you, given the habit of the OP to simply repost his disinformative, deceptive, out-dated, incomplete, and bogus figures in a new thread as if that magically suddenly makes them correct, I'm more than a little tired of chasing him down his rat- (sorry), rabbit-hole. Yes, I do understand the moderator attitude that the responses to such tripe do constitute valuable additions, but that doesn't help the poor person that pulls up the reams of carefully twisted factoids that comprise the OP's sum total of knowledge and assumes that because he posts so prolifically at this respected research site then his goofiness has some validity.

And, yes, I do sometimes dream that a moderator will have the balls to tell him to put up or shut up...to answer the many questions that he has dodged over the last months by taking the discussion to a new rat- (sorry again) rabbit-hole when challenged. Like that will ever happen...
I've put in more time than I care to remember splitting off Guaporense's insane and repetitive ideas to new threads, consolidated others into existing threads, as well as issued numerous topicality and sourcing warnings (particularly about giving precise sources, rather than just book/article titles) - all on top of usually participating in the discussions myself. My conscience is clean, although I am no longer a moderator here.

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Re: German Armament Production

#43

Post by RichTO90 » 06 Oct 2010, 12:40

Jon G. wrote:[While I would tend to dismiss the importance of horseshoes as an important item in the German military inventory, the need for horseshoes on a regular basis for the Wehrmacht's vast hordes of equines does leave room for some fascinating Guaporense-style maths.
:lol: :lol: :lol:
I've put in more time than I care to remember splitting off Guaporense's insane and repetitive ideas to new threads, consolidated others into existing threads, as well as issued numerous topicality and sourcing warnings (particularly about giving precise sources, rather than just book/article titles) - all on top of usually participating in the discussions myself. My conscience is clean, although I am no longer a moderator here.
Fair that Jon. It's having to (well, I suppose I should say "choosing to") do this every year as one of these leandros-types eventually crash and burn only to be replaced by yet another mouth-breathing fanboy. It gets mind numbing after a while...I understand why you and others drop out of the moderation gig.

Cheers!
Richard Anderson
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Cost: 405-billion RM

#44

Post by nebelwerferXXX » 25 Apr 2011, 13:07

The historical German Armament Spending during the war cost 405-billion RM. The German military production of Small arms, Tanks and Armored vehicles reached 770,000 MG-34/MG-42 machine guns, 1,047,000 MP-40 SMGs, less than 500,000 assault rifles (including 7,000 FG-42 paratroop rifles and 80,000 StG-44 assault rifles), several millions of standard rifles, 5,000 Panther tanks, 1,000 heavy tractors, 15,000 medium APCs (including 60 'Uhu' IR vehicles) and 4,250 light APCs. The sinking of the Graf Spee, the Battles of Britain 1940 and Moscow 1941 were Hitler's first three setbacks.

In the Battle of Stalingrad, Hitler lost 1,500,000 casualties between August 1942 and February 1943, while about 3,500 tanks and assault guns (about 7 months production), with over half a year's output of guns and mortars (about 12,000), and 3,000 aircraft (at least 4 months production). At Kursk, by July 1943, the Wehrmacht deployed 570,000 combat troops, 330,000 support troops, 2,700 tanks and assault guns (including 147 Tigers and 200 Panthers), 10,000 guns and mortars and 2,500 aircraft (Geoffrey Jukes mentions this).

The German war industries made 1,400 Czech T-38 tanks, 1,350 Tiger tanks, 484 King Tiger tanks, 90 Porsche Ferdinand assault guns, 12,000 assault guns (including 500 early Marder SP guns and 800 late Marder SP guns) and two 800-mm railway guns named 'Dora' and 'Gustav', though they were expensive but they were all built.

For comparison purposes:
1) The German 'Z-Plan' cost 33-billion RM as programmed.
---2 x 42,000-ton Bismarck-Class battleships (sunk)
---2 x 32,000-ton Scharnhorst-Class battle-cruisers (sunk)
---2 x 23,000-ton GZ-Class aircraft carriers (never completed)
---6 x 56,000-ton H-Class battleships (never completed)

2) The Peenemunde Secret Rocket Test Center was erected at a cost of 180-million RM to house,
eventually, over 2,000 scientists.
---30,000 V-1 flying bombs (all were completed)
---10,000 V-2 rockets (all were completed)

Some of the weapon systems inflicted 20,000,000 Russian casualties.

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Re: German Armament Production

#45

Post by Jabberwocky » 29 Apr 2011, 05:29

Nebelwerfer, you seem to conveniently omit several critical facts related to the Z-plan.

The Z-plan was never fully implemented, so most of the estimated RM33 billion was never spent.

Your outline of the Z-plan omits a large number of units that the plan envisioned but were cancelled:

3 x 35,000 tonne battlecruisers
6 x 5,700 tonne large destroyers
4 x 8,500 tonne light cruisers
2 x 9,300 tonne light cruisers
1 x 15,700 tonne heavy cruiser (last of the Hipper class)
12 x 23,000 tonne heavy cruisers

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