The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

Discussions on the economic history of the nations taking part in WW2, from the recovery after the depression until the economy at war.
Post Reply
Michael Kenny
Member
Posts: 8251
Joined: 07 May 2002, 20:40
Location: Teesside

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#61

Post by Michael Kenny » 18 Sep 2016, 16:08

Stiltzkin wrote:Obvious myths are obvious. You do realize cav never charged tanks with sabers right? It was propaganda made up by Guderian and subsequently picked up by the Soviets.
As has been proven many times I am a novice in this area. I know very little about anything.

Stiltzkin wrote: Yes, makes their performance stand out even more,
Performance? You mean 12 weeks for the total collapse of its army in NWE and the fastest time for a run from France to the German border until the TGW was introduced?

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#62

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 18:27

John T wrote:
Guaporense wrote:
Guaporense wrote: Also, the most advanced an economy is, the bigger is the fall in productivity due to mobilization for war. The reason is that a blacksmith can shift from plowshares to swords easily while a modern economy that employs lawyers and burger flippers will have a hard time shifting the lawyers and burger flipper's employment to work in bomb and tank factories without losing a lot of productivity in the process.
If not the bigger economy have a much more flexible structure.
Not really. It's the inverse as I have explained before.

More advanced economies, however, can cut civilian consumption more and mobilize a higher fraction of their GDP into warfare. The reason is that higher incomes allow for people to cut down consumption more. Also, more advanced economies are more industrialized so that a higher fraction of their economy is easily mobilized for the armed forces and munitions production.
Aha, I am plain Wrong, " the bigger economy have a much more flexible structure"
While your "Also, more advanced economies are more industrialized so that a higher fraction of their economy is easily mobilized for the armed forces and munitions production." Are right

So the difference is about you are right and I'm wrong or how do you interpret the difference between "bigger economies" (like US compared to Germany in this case) to "more advanced economies"

I can't see the big difference in the two statements except that you claim you are right?
There is an enormous difference.

A more advanced economy can be a smaller economy (for example, Belgium was much more advanced than Japan but still smaller).

The US was not more "advanced", it was bigger GDP wise because it was a bigger country but both countries were at the time near the so called "technological frontier" (as France, UK, Belgium, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, etc). For a modern example, India is a much bigger economy than the Netherlands (right now) but the Netherlands is a far more advanced country.

There was nothing special about the US's economy besides the fact that it was (and is) the largest industrialized country, but it was not the ONLY industrialized country. In 1940 there were ca. 20 industrialized countries in the world, including:

Germany
France
UK
Belgium
Netherlands
Luxembourg
Denmark
Sweden
US
Canada
Austria
Czechoslovakia
Switzerland

And countries like:

Argentina
Australia

That were relatively rich but had little manufacturing activity.

Interestingly, the majority of the world's industrialized countries were inside the German sphere of power in WW2. Although the biggest one (US) and the third biggest (UK) were not. The richest country in the world at the time of WW2 was inside the German sphere of power, that country was Switzerland.
Guaporense wrote:
Guaporense wrote: So, I think that statistics showing wartime GDP growth are mostly an artifact of statistical distortion caused by government manipulation of prices and quantities sold in the market. The true market value of output would certainly decrease in wartime. Well, it's not like private individuals would be willing to pay 80 times the price of a car for a Sherman tank which was the average difference in official sales prices between Sherman tanks in 1943 and cars in 1939.
What the relevance?
If US government paid 80 times as much for a Sherman then fine, US could afford to pay the bill.
Well, it shows how inefficient the production of tanks was: the cost of producing a tank was much, much, much higher than the cost of producing the same weight in terms of civilian cars. Even though the cost of producing a Sherman tank should have been lower than civilian cars on a per ton basis due to it's massive bulk.
IT SHOULD ??
AS you obviously do not know anything about production, why do you bother to write so much on this forum regarding maters you have not the slightest unerstanding of?
You could start to note the difference between how to press steel to make the body of a car with how you make the glacis o a tank.
So you would think that single detail would certainly imply that the cost of production per ton will always be higher for tanks?

On the other hand, 80 cars have way more pieces and moving parts than 1 Sherman tank, so they, as a set, are a way more complex than a single Sherman.

I just don't understand this military fetishism that assumes everything that is military must be more expensive because its "military grade dude". The reason why military stuff is so expensive are several besides inherently higher costs:

(1) military goods are produced in small quantities so their cost is high

(2) military goods are produced for the government, the government is highly inefficient and doesn't care about minimizing costs, so they are willing to pay way more for stuff than private companies, hence military goods are overpriced.

(3) companies that work for the government, such as Lockheed-Martin, become de-facto monopolies in supplying military goods, as result the price of these goods is driven artificially upwards.

(4) the good old factor of corruption is nearly always involved in government operations.
Last edited by Guaporense on 18 Sep 2016, 20:09, edited 8 times in total.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz


Rob Stuart
Member
Posts: 1200
Joined: 18 Apr 2009, 01:41
Location: Ottawa

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#63

Post by Rob Stuart » 18 Sep 2016, 18:35

Guaporense wrote: Why you don't compare Canadian to German production of locomotives, instead?
Why would I want to do that? My underlying point is that the US was not the only country to see its GNP and overall prosperity increase during the war. In any case, I do not know how many locomotives Canada produced during the war, except that it was sufficient to meet the country's needs and that in addition 145 were exported to India.
Guaporense wrote:Locomotives were far more important [than trucks] for the German war effort because they were the basic means to supply armies.
Not true. Both were important.

In a previous thread you have argued that the Germans could have defeated the USSR, without saying how they may have done this. How in hell were they supposed to pull that off without far more trucks than they actually possessed, given that the Russians destroyed pretty much any locomotive they could not withdraw to the east and that the Germans could use their own locomotives and rolling stock only after converting the tracks to German gauge? Their lack of the additional trucks, tanks, aircraft and other items which you claim would be superfluous may well have cost them victory in that campaign. Regarding the fuel they would require, I would point out that:

1. If the Germans had twice as many trucks, tanks and aircraft it does no follow that fuel consumption would double. It would undoubtedly increase by something less than 100%, since many of the trucks, tanks and aircraft would be held as spares and not used until issued to forward units to replace losses.

2. If the Germans used up pretty much all their fuel reserves in 1941 but defeated the USSR because they had the extra trucks, tanks and aircraft, then military operations on the eastern front would all but cease and they could build their reserves back up again.

Finally, you have completely failed to take into account the cost to the war effort of producing and transporting all the fodder required for all those horses. How many thousands of people were kept on farms producing fodder who could have been employed doing something else? How many thousands of trains took fodder to the east instead of, to name just one example, winter clothing? How many of the insufficient number of trucks had to take fodder from the railheads to artillery units instead of shells?

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#64

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 18:41

South wrote:Good morning Guaporense,

On my screen's page 4 of thread, you've got a string of statements requiring comments. This is only for discussion; not for defamation at all.

Nationalism doesn't get a benchmark start date with the French Revolution (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, Lend-Lease) ? This was the EARLY 19th century. Robespierre can amplify.
Well, you can find examples of nationalism in ancient Greece.
You estimate productivity using GDP. The economic world does not.
Not really.
This is called "circular reasoning": "...Italian armies supplied adequately?...their logistical situation....their own standards of adequacy." Adequate logistical support is an objective standard, with parameters. It cannot be adjusted by High Commands.
Not really. It's subjective and culturally determined.
Highly specialized machines in sophisticated economies can be producing eg morphine vials for civilian consumption and, presto, convert to military production. It only takes olive drab packaging with black block lettering. Ditto: foot powder.

The usual example is a TRACTOR factory compared to tank factories; not car factories.

Advanced economies, eg the US, had as much economic flexibility as the recent pre-industrial European countries. Actually, the US had more.
I see so you just ignored my whole argument.

The fact is that the more advanced an economy is, the higher is the degree of specialization and hence, the higher is the degree in which war causes negative productivity shocks because the structure of production is more specialized to do certain things.
You write "German industrial investment in WW2 was....same relative proportion to US's". You are being highly selective to make your case.
Not remotely.

I am using statistics on TOTAL INDUSTRIAL INVESTMENT relative to INDUSTRIAL CAPITAL STOCK.

In the US's case manufacturing capital stock increased from 39 billion in 1939 to 64 billion in 1945, in 1945 dollars, an increase of 60%, similarly the value of the machine tool stock increased by 60%. Similarly, in German industrial investment was in the order of 40 billion RM from 1939 to 1945, while the industrial capital stock in 1939 was 55 billion RM.

So it's just plain wrong for people to claim that the US's industrial investment in WW2 was something special, it was just the normal adjustment of an economy to the war effort. The same happened with France and Austria-Hungary in WW1, for instance.
Re: "...our modern post-industrial economies have lower war making potential ... because ... LESS industralized...";

During Spring break from Woods Hole, Wyoming internship, visit a US Gulf Coast refinery. Return via Silicon Valley. A side trip to a satellite launching facility eg Vandenberg AFB, Wallops Island, Virginia, will show an absence of organic food production for Trader Joe stores.
I see that you completely failed to understand that argument.
Those in the real world do not compare cost production of discussed products using weight.
You didn't understand the point, again.
Last edited by Guaporense on 18 Sep 2016, 19:35, edited 1 time in total.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#65

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 18:52

Rob Stuart wrote:
Guaporense wrote: Why you don't compare Canadian to German production of locomotives, instead?
Why would I want to do that? My underlying point is that the US was not the only country to see its GNP and overall prosperity increase during the war. In any case, I do not know how many locomotives Canada produced during the war, except that it was sufficient to meet the country's needs and that in addition 145 were exported to India.
So you clearly did not understand my point there. As I explained, in all major countries in WW2 there was a massive increase in observed productivity. In WW1, on the other hand, there was a decrease in productivity. I am trying to understand that.

My hypothesis is that there was no increase in productivity in WW2 but an statistical distortion caused by government price manipulation in the economy which inflated GDP figures. This applies to all countries that mobilized: Germany, UK, US, USSR, Canada, etc.

While in WW1, there was not statistical distortion because the degree of government intervention into the price system was smaller. Hence, inflation was higher which was reflected into the fall of productivity per worker in WW1.
Guaporense wrote:Locomotives were far more important [than trucks] for the German war effort because they were the basic means to supply armies.
Not true. Both were important.
That doesn't contradict what I said. I said that LOCOMOTIVES were MORE important not that trucks were not important.
In a previous thread you have argued that the Germans could have defeated the USSR, without saying how they may have done this.
I never said that. But could they? I can suggest many ways to improve their chances in beating the USSR relative to the historical record.

Overall, it was quite an amazing feat of resistance that the USSR managed to survive the German attack. I wouldn't say the Germans were being inefficient or made a weak attack with Barbarossa, because it was not a weak and poorly supplied operation by any measure but instead it was the largest and most well supplied military operation in human history up to that point in time: by June 1941, the Wehrmacht was the world's best military force by a huge stretch, they were not only the best trained but also were the best equipped military in the world, and thanks to low casualties they were at the peak of their effectiveness in WW2.

That the Red Army resisted it and managed to drive the Wehrmacht back to Berlin was a historical feat of great note (in fact, it was the capacity of socialism to allow for a third world country like the USSR to defeat Europe's foremost economic power, Germany, that served as a main argument for the adoption of socialism in many countries following WW2).

You talk as if you were not aware of these historical facts.
How in hell were they supposed to pull that off without far more trucks than they actually possessed
Because they used locomotives.
given that the Russians destroyed pretty much any locomotive they could not withdraw to the east and that the Germans could use their own locomotives and rolling stock only after converting the tracks to German gauge? Their lack of the additional trucks, tanks, aircraft and other items which you claim would be superfluous may well have cost them victory in that campaign.
Do you have any source supporting that claim? Because you see, German soldiers were on average 800% as efficient as Soviet soldiers in inflicting casualties. Still, they lost. Clearly, you argue that if they had more trucks, tanks and aircraft they would suddenly become like 1,000% as efficient? 1,200% as efficient? 1,400% as efficient?

The fact is that historically German soldiers were about 200% as effective as WAllied soldiers and 800% as effective as Soviet soldiers. Despite all claims floating around the internet of the Wehrmacht being under-supplied with tanks and stuff. Those claims are ignorant.

The high fighting power of the Wehrmacht was only possible because the Wehrmacht was well equipped in WW2 and had adequate supply of ammunition and food, etc, which enabled it to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.

Also, tanks, aircraft and trucks were not that important in WW2. The main sources of casualties were artillery and infantry weapons, aircraft and tanks inflicted less than 5% of all casualties, and that was specially smaller given the massive scale of the Eastern front. While trucks could be substituted for horses, their role was just to link railway depots with the army*. Increasing the German supply of aircraft, trucks and tanks wouldn't do anything to help the Wehrmacht, but it would only hurt it because of the additional manpower lost to do maintenance and field these pieces of equipment while they wouldn't have the fuel to operate them.

*Supplying an army with trucks alone was extremely inefficient and invading the USSR with a huge army without using the railways would be impossible.
Regarding the fuel they would require, I would point out that:

1. If the Germans had twice as many trucks, tanks and aircraft it does no follow that fuel consumption would double. It would undoubtedly increase by something less than 100%, since many of the trucks, tanks and aircraft would be held as spares and not used until issued to forward units to replace losses.

2. If the Germans used up pretty much all their fuel reserves in 1941 but defeated the USSR because they had the extra trucks, tanks and aircraft, then military operations on the eastern front would all but cease and they could build their reserves back up again.
They were already consuming way more fuel than they produced in 1941. Aircraft fuel consumption was 140% of supply in 1941 and that was for a campaign that lasted only half of 1941.
Finally, you have completely failed to take into account the cost to the war effort of producing and transporting all the fodder required for all those horses. How many thousands of people were kept on farms producing fodder who could have been employed doing something else? How many thousands of trains took fodder to the east instead of, to name just one example, winter clothing? How many of the insufficient number of trucks had to take fodder from the railheads to artillery units instead of shells?
However, they had to use horses because they lacked the fuel for trucks. It's true trucks were more cost effective than horses but its also true that Germany lacked any substantial oil supplies which forced then to use horses to replace trucks.
Last edited by Guaporense on 18 Sep 2016, 19:39, edited 6 times in total.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

Richard Anderson
Member
Posts: 6349
Joined: 01 Jan 2016, 22:21
Location: Bremerton, Washington

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#66

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Sep 2016, 19:07

Guaporense wrote:Not in an advanced industrialized economy based on a high level of specialization in production, in those cases machines were made for specific purposes.
You are describing a commercial assembly line. Machines and people tasked to single purposes. It has little to do with how "advanced" the industrial economy is, but rather how specialized its output is. However, specialized, single-purpose assembly lines and the single-purpose machine tools supporting them don't work so well for military production applications. See especially the mass, assembly line production of aircraft. Or, look at how Chrysler equipped the DTA with machine tools. They were MULTI-purpose or GENERAL-purpose machine tools, which facilitated incorporating design changes or the production of completely different models.
In a less sophisticated economy, the degree of flexibility is higher. Around 1940, the world was much less sophisticated than it is today so that industries back then were less specialized. Still the degree of specialization was high enough so that a shock caused by war would certainly have lowered productivity dramatically. As I have explained: a blacksmith can easily shift from plowshares to swords, while a car factory cannot switch so easily to produce tanks.
No, industries then tended to be more, not less, specialized, lame analogy or not. Meanwhile, you apparently have little real awareness of how tanks were produced. So tell me, which "car factories" were "switched" to produce tanks? In Germany or the U.S.? Here's a hint. None.

Krupp-Gruson was a former steel mill re-purposed to produce tanks.
Daimler-Marienfeld was a derelict (consequences of the German depression) plant (No. 40) converted in 1934 to produce tanks, armored cars, and other military vehicles. In 1935 a second plant was built nearby as expansion.
Alkett was established in 1937 in an abandoned factory, which hadn't been used since 1927. When bombed out in 1943, assembly was moved to another unused locomotive factory at Falkensee. BTW, there is a good Wochenschau of Alkett in 1942. No assembly ine, they are using station assembly.
And so on.
Only Niebelungenwerke was built from the ground up as tank factory.

Meanwhile, German mobilization planning switched existing about half of the existing automotive industry, laboriously built up over the first Nazi Five Year Plan, to producing aircraft components.
Well, German industrial investment in WW2 was of the same relative proportion as the US's. In both cases there was an increase of about 60% of the stock of metal working machine tools with similar increases in terms of the value of the installed stock of industrial machines.
No matter what you seem to think estimations told to your grandmother are not good substitutes for data. U.S. Federal outlays for national defense 1940-1945 were $262,560-million. The War Department outlay for tank and motor vehicle construction, armor plate, and armor castings facilities, was $69.344-million out of a total War Department construction outlay of $10,002.151-million. The result was the construction of three complete tank arsenals - DTA, FGBTA, and LTA, each with the capacity of about one-half the entire German industry, and the conversion of some 17 or 18 other factories to tank production. Meanwhile, Germany built one new factory, expanded one other, relocated one, and converted two.

So what was the German outlay for that conversion as a proportion of their total expenditure?
So I don't think your statement is actually true.
Yes, we all know you like to negate or ignore inconvenient data.
Richard C. Anderson Jr.

American Thunder: U.S. Army Tank Design, Development, and Doctrine in World War II
Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall
Hitler's Last Gamble
Artillery Hell

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#67

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 19:55

Stiltzkin wrote:
while being a democracy
Imperial, nationalistic times, during the collapse of the last feudal systems. France was a country which had to face strong opponents, continously over centuries. A better correction: It does not apply to the Nation that is Invaded, fighting on their soil.
That's a factor that allowed the Entente to win in WW1 and the USSR to win WW2: they were fighting for their own soil.
backward army using horses to supply its Panzer Divisions in 1945
Yes, makes their performance stand out even more, considering they conquered so much in such an amount of time with Horses and Bolt Action rifles. :roll: I am sure the British would have been able to fully motorize their forces when launching such an operation like Barbarossa in 41, on the grand Steppes of the Eastern front, just like Arthur Percival could rely on fully motorized units.
Indeed. That German soldiers were 200% as effective as the WAllies and 800% as the Soviets despite being such poorly equipped backward third world armed forces... :roll: Makes one wonder how effective they would have been if Germany were not such a third world country that didn't have resources to properly equip their soldiers. (sarcasm)
Much secret mobilization occured prior to Pearl Harbor
Actually, the US was very undermilitarized (look at outlays). The enormous ecnomic power allowed them to convert quickly.
There was nothing special about the speed of US mobilization. It was pretty average actually.

Germany and France in WW1 and the USSR in WW2 mobilized much faster than the US did in WW2. It's true that the US had a tiny military before which slowed down the increase in the size of the armed forces due to the time it took to train more officers (a bottleneck in the army's expansion).

Also, even the estimates by Harrison of the fraction of national resources mobilized overestimate US's mobilization levels because the prices of most civilian goods were frozen so that their relative size in GDP became smaller than it would have been if prices were not frozen, which means that the military expenditures' apparent share of GDP became larger than it's "real share".

This applies to other countries in WW2 like the UK, Germany and the USSR. And helps to explain why military outlays in WW2 were larger in all major combatants proportion to GDP than in WW1.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

Stiltzkin
Member
Posts: 1159
Joined: 11 Apr 2016, 13:29
Location: Coruscant

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#68

Post by Stiltzkin » 18 Sep 2016, 20:25

There was nothing special about the speed of US mobilization. It was pretty average actually.
I was actually speaking about the conversion, not the pure "recruitment" part. The Germans and the USSR prepared for quiet long, the Soviet build up process started already in the 20s, while the Germans were preparing in the shadows of the treaties. Operational War readiness was high, while the US went to war after a "wake up" blow. Military outlay percentage was already much higher in the respective states than the US, this value changes drastically in a shorter amount of time in the States (Ger 20 - US 2- USSR 4, I think it was your own table). The reason for mentioning this: When describing this particular issue in histography, people tend to compare apples with oranges, not taking into account the context. Historians act as if the USSR was startled and ONLY then decided to mass mobilize....(any event before 41 is blurred out). To put it simply (alright this might sound ridiculous): The US was a big Netherlands ( :D ), while the USSR was a big North Korea and Germany was something in between.
Germany and France in WW1 and the USSR in WW2 mobilized much faster than the US did in WW2. It's true that the US had a tiny military before which slowed down the increase in the size of the armed forces due to the time it took to train more officers (a bottleneck in the army's expansion).

The same happened with the RKKA, not the purges but the expansion (lacking officers) was the real problem, often overlooked.

Rob Stuart
Member
Posts: 1200
Joined: 18 Apr 2009, 01:41
Location: Ottawa

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#69

Post by Rob Stuart » 18 Sep 2016, 20:39

Guaporense wrote:
So you clearly did not understand my point there.

You talk as if you were not aware of these historical facts.

Despite all claims floating around the internet of the Wehrmacht being under-supplied with tanks and stuff. Those claims are ignorant.

The high fighting power of the Wehrmacht was only possible because the Wehrmacht was well equipped in WW2 and had adequate supply of ammunition and food, etc, which enabled it to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.
I am a former professional soldier, I have a degree in history and I have been studying WW2 for the better part of 50 years. I do not rely on the internet and I am not ignorant of the issues I'm talking about.

To dismiss others as ignorant and ill-informed because they don't agree with you is arrogant, rude and uncalled for, particularly when you're making dubious arguments which run contrary to the entire historiography of the war. Good bye.

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#70

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 20:41

Guaporense wrote:
John T wrote:
Guaporense wrote:
Guaporense wrote: Also, the most advanced an economy is, the bigger is the fall in productivity due to mobilization for war. The reason is that a blacksmith can shift from plowshares to swords easily while a modern economy that employs lawyers and burger flippers will have a hard time shifting the lawyers and burger flipper's employment to work in bomb and tank factories without losing a lot of productivity in the process.
If not the bigger economy have a much more flexible structure.
Not really. It's the inverse as I have explained before.

More advanced economies, however, can cut civilian consumption more and mobilize a higher fraction of their GDP into warfare. The reason is that higher incomes allow for people to cut down consumption more. Also, more advanced economies are more industrialized so that a higher fraction of their economy is easily mobilized for the armed forces and munitions production.
Aha, I am plain Wrong, " the bigger economy have a much more flexible structure"
While your "Also, more advanced economies are more industrialized so that a higher fraction of their economy is easily mobilized for the armed forces and munitions production." Are right

So the difference is about you are right and I'm wrong or how do you interpret the difference between "bigger economies" (like US compared to Germany in this case) to "more advanced economies"

I can't see the big difference in the two statements except that you claim you are right?
There is an enormous difference.

A more advanced economy can be a smaller economy (for example, Belgium was much more advanced than Japan but still smaller).

The US was not more "advanced", it was bigger GDP wise because it was a bigger country but both countries were at the time near the so called "technological frontier" (as France, UK, Belgium, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, etc). For a modern example, India is a much bigger economy than the Netherlands (right now) but the Netherlands is a far more advanced country.

There was nothing special about the US's economy besides the fact that it was (and is) the largest industrialized country, but it was not the ONLY industrialized country. In 1940 there were ca. 20 industrialized countries in the world, including:

Germany
France
UK
Belgium
Netherlands
Luxembourg
Denmark
Sweden
US
Canada
Austria
Czechoslovakia
Switzerland

And countries like:

Argentina
Australia

That were relatively rich but had little manufacturing activity.

Interestingly, the majority of the world's industrialized countries were inside the German sphere of power in WW2. Although the biggest one (US) and the third biggest (UK) were not. The richest country in the world at the time of WW2 was inside the German sphere of power, that country was Switzerland.
Besides per capita income, another good way to measure development is life expectancy, in 1935 life expectancy at birth was:

Germany ---- 61.5
US ------------ 60.9
UK ------------ 62.1
France ------- 58.3
Belgium ------ 60.0
Netherlands -- 66.5
Italy ---------- 56.2
Japan --------- 48.3
Russia --------- 39.5

source: https://www.gapminder.org/data/
Last edited by Guaporense on 18 Sep 2016, 22:42, edited 1 time in total.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

Richard Anderson
Member
Posts: 6349
Joined: 01 Jan 2016, 22:21
Location: Bremerton, Washington

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#71

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Sep 2016, 21:08

Guaporense wrote:There was nothing special about the speed of US mobilization. It was pretty average actually.
Really? Let's look at tanks for moment shall we? On 8 September 1939, Roosevelt declared a limited state of emergency. The effect for tanks was limited indeed. Two of the hundreds of "educational" contracts let to industry went to tanks - one to the Van Dorn Ironworks to produce light tank hulls for the M2A4 and one to Baldwin Locomotive to produce ten (10) Medium Tanks M2A1. Otherwise, the sole production contract let was to American Car and Foundry to produce 319 of the Light Tank M2A4 (Van Dorn supplying the hulls). Serious mobilization began in August 1941 with the contract to Chrysler for DTA and the Medium Tank M2A1 (subsequently changed to the M3).

The result to 1 July 1940 was precisely 45 tanks produced by mobilization, by AC&F, plus 50 produced under existing work at the Federal Rock Island Arsenal. In the second half of the year another 280 tanks were produced by AC&F and six (6) by Rock Island, ending their participation.

The mobilization results (excluding existing Federal production) of medium, light, and heavy tanks (excluding tank-based chassis such as GMC, HMC, and TD) were:

In 1940, 325 were produced.
In 1941, 4,023 were produced.
In 1942, 23,891 were produced and peak output was achieved, 4,772 in the month of December.
In 1943, 29,504 were produced. With the war won, production was reined in.
In 1944, 17,566 were produced.
In 1945 (8 months), 11,945 were produced.

German tank production (excluding tank-based chassis) in 1940, after six years of industrial development and one year at war, was 1,543.
In 1941, it was 3,256.
In 1942, it was 4,197.
In 1943, it was 5,897.
In 1944, it was 8432, with July as peak with 840 produced.
Germany and France in WW1 and the USSR in WW2 mobilized much faster than the US did in WW2. It's true that the US had a tiny military before which slowed down the increase in the size of the armed forces due to the time it took to train more officers (a bottleneck in the army's expansion).
No, the bottleneck to expansion for the U.S. military was the supply of manpower period. The 10.9 million originally planned for 1943 was reduced by nearly 2 million in order to meet the demands for industrial manpower. Initial officer manpower was sufficient for the Army given the starting point of 13,797 Regular, 21,074 National Guard, and 226,837 Reserve officers available 1 July 1940 for the 1.8 million total planned for 1941.
Richard C. Anderson Jr.

American Thunder: U.S. Army Tank Design, Development, and Doctrine in World War II
Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall
Hitler's Last Gamble
Artillery Hell

Richard Anderson
Member
Posts: 6349
Joined: 01 Jan 2016, 22:21
Location: Bremerton, Washington

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#72

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Sep 2016, 21:24

Guaporense wrote:The high fighting power of the Wehrmacht was only possible because the Wehrmacht was well equipped in WW2 and had adequate supply of ammunition and food, etc, which enabled it to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.
Utter and complete balls.

As of April 1943, the 26 active Panzer divisions required roughly 5,200 Panzers to meet their organizational strength. As of 14 April they had 1,425 operational and 978 in repair for a total of 2,403 on hand. Another 481 were in route.

As of June 1944, the 36 active Panzer divisions required roughly 7,200 Panzer and had 3,045 operational and 659 in repair with 1,098 in route.

Equipment and ordnance shortfalls were endemic in the Wehrmacht, reducing its ability to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.
Richard C. Anderson Jr.

American Thunder: U.S. Army Tank Design, Development, and Doctrine in World War II
Cracking Hitler's Atlantic Wall
Hitler's Last Gamble
Artillery Hell

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#73

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 22:45

Rob Stuart wrote:
Guaporense wrote:
So you clearly did not understand my point there.

You talk as if you were not aware of these historical facts.

Despite all claims floating around the internet of the Wehrmacht being under-supplied with tanks and stuff. Those claims are ignorant.

The high fighting power of the Wehrmacht was only possible because the Wehrmacht was well equipped in WW2 and had adequate supply of ammunition and food, etc, which enabled it to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.
I am a former professional soldier, I have a degree in history and I have been studying WW2 for the better part of 50 years. I do not rely on the internet and I am not ignorant of the issues I'm talking about.

To dismiss others as ignorant and ill-informed because they don't agree with you is arrogant, rude and uncalled for, particularly when you're making dubious arguments which run contrary to the entire historiography of the war. Good bye.
I am sorry but saying that Stalingrad was an easy victory is rather ignorant.

Yes I am being rude, sorry for that.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

Rob Stuart
Member
Posts: 1200
Joined: 18 Apr 2009, 01:41
Location: Ottawa

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#74

Post by Rob Stuart » 18 Sep 2016, 23:10

Guaporense wrote:
Rob Stuart wrote:
Guaporense wrote:
So you clearly did not understand my point there.

You talk as if you were not aware of these historical facts.

Despite all claims floating around the internet of the Wehrmacht being under-supplied with tanks and stuff. Those claims are ignorant.

The high fighting power of the Wehrmacht was only possible because the Wehrmacht was well equipped in WW2 and had adequate supply of ammunition and food, etc, which enabled it to fight effectively. To claim otherwise is to show ignorance. Plain and simple.
I am a former professional soldier, I have a degree in history and I have been studying WW2 for the better part of 50 years. I do not rely on the internet and I am not ignorant of the issues I'm talking about.

To dismiss others as ignorant and ill-informed because they don't agree with you is arrogant, rude and uncalled for, particularly when you're making dubious arguments which run contrary to the entire historiography of the war. Good bye.
I am sorry but saying that Stalingrad was an easy victory is rather ignorant.

Yes I am being rude, sorry for that.
I said the following about Stalingrad:
Would 6th Army have been surrounded so easily if the Romanian armies on its flanks had been given lots of Panzer IVs?
To anyone with a basic understanding of Stalingrad, it would have been clear that I was referring specifically to Operation Uranus, and not to the entire 1942 campaign or the entire Stalingrad battle. Since you seem to unaware of it, I will note that Uranus was launched 19-20 November against the Romanian 3rd and 4th Armies, which were deployed on 6th Army's flanks, and that on 22 November the Soviet spearheads linked up at Kalach, thus encircling 6th Army. It was indeed as easy as it could have been.

Your apology is not accepted, given that you've again, and without justification, called me ignorant in the very post in which you've made it!

User avatar
Guaporense
Banned
Posts: 1866
Joined: 07 Oct 2009, 03:35
Location: USA

Re: The American WW2 Economic Puzzle

#75

Post by Guaporense » 18 Sep 2016, 23:38

Rob Stuart wrote:It was indeed as easy as it could have been.
Indeed, Soviet casualties were so light in that operation Uranus: 154,885 KIA and 330,892 WIA in 2.5 months. Super easy victory indeed. (sarcasm)

They just lost several times the number of men killed and wounded as the Germans lost in the whole Western front during the 3 months of operation Overlord (total of about 100,000 KIA+WIA).

While British losses at Somme were lower at 420,000 total or 620,000 including French losses, but over a longer period of time than Uranus (4.5 months instead of 2.5 months for Stalingrad offensive). In Stalingrad as a whole, the Red Army suffered 1,764,179 casualties, those were their casualties to encircle a German army of 350,000.

The problem with your argument is that you claim that the German output of tanks was insufficient and this lead to the loss at Stalingrad. But that's just plain wrong, it's like saying that WW1 was won because France produced more aircraft than Germany.

The Eastern front was a war of manpower, the USSR won because they had way more manpower to lose (including 500,000 KIA+WIA in 2.5 months in a single battle alone). You cannot just make more tanks to compensate for the lack of actual manpower. Making more tanks will make it harder because you have to use more manpower to use the tanks (maintenance, logistics, etc).

So, Germany's problem was that they were a country of 80 million that declared war on countries with over 400 million people. It was not a problem of quality of their armed forces, as the Wehrmacht was the best and most effective armed forces in the world, thinking on a per soldier basis, but that they were outnumbered and this problem was caused by the lack of military age male population in Germany versus the rest of the world (as Germany was effectively at war with the whole rest of the world with a few exceptions (Japan)).
Last edited by Guaporense on 18 Sep 2016, 23:57, edited 3 times in total.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

Post Reply

Return to “Economy”