Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

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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vszulc
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#46

Post by vszulc » 02 Mar 2009, 18:32

The German economy was haunted by bad decisions.
Just as one example to add to the above, was IG Farbens "BUNA" rubber factory at Auschwitz: Consumed enormous ressources and manpower, used more electricity every day than a small city, yet never managed to produce any rubbwe.
No matter where those ressources would have been spent instead, it would have been a better choice.

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Qvist
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#47

Post by Qvist » 05 Mar 2009, 17:39

Well, that is one example of something you think was a bad decision. It requires more to substantiate the argument that it was "haunted by bad decisions".

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#48

Post by Boby » 11 Mar 2009, 15:37

Tooze, Wages of Destruction, pp. 445-446
The construction of IG Farben's plant at Monowitz claimed the lives of at least 30,000 inmates.51 In light of such horror, it is easier to think of Auschwitz as a place of pure negativity, of destruction pure and simple.52 Unfortunately, however, the reality is more complicated and disturbing. It is true, as is commonly remarked, that IG Auschwitz never produced any rubber. But by 1942 it was no longer simply a Buna facility. Under severe pressure from the Berlin authorities to justify their huge investment, IG's managers at Auschwitz decided in the summer of 1942 to start up methanol production at the earliest possible opportunity.53 Methanol was a vital ingredient of war production, both for aircraft fuel and as one of the basic ingredients in the manufacture of explosives.54 The first tanker load of methanol to leave Auschwitz-Monowitz in October 1943 was the occasion of a major celebration, to which IG not surprisingly - 446 - invited Camp Commandant Rudolf Hoess. By 1944 Speer's Armaments Ministry expected Auschwitz to account for one-tenth of the total supply of methanol. Heydebreck was scheduled for twice that much. When British and American bombers started doing serious damage to IG Farben's plant at Leuna in 1944, the Silesian complex stood ready.

According to the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Auschwitz and Heydebreck 'came to the rescue' of the German war effort in 1944.55 By the end of 1944 Auschwitz was responsible for 15 per cent of Germany's methanol production and, in acknowledgement of the plant's success, Dr Johann Giesen, the man responsible for the Auschwitz fuel
programme, was nominated by Speer's Armaments Ministry to take charge of the methanol sector across the Reich. Though it is certainly true that the expenditure of resources in Silesia was out of all proportion to the net benefit received, this was a question of timing, not inherent logic. The chief beneficiaries of Krauch's huge investment programme turned out to be the Soviets, who dismantled much of the high-pressure apparatus, and the Poles, who inherited the buildings and electricity generators. By the 1950s, the renamed facility at Auschwitz-Oswiecim was the hub of coal-based chemistry in the Silesian region. The plant also survived the fall of Communism and is today the third-largest producer of synthetic rubber in Europe, with capacity equal to roughly 5 per cent of global consumption. As of 2003, at least two of the world's leading tyre manufacturers source their rubber from the plant at Oswiecim, the foundations for which were laid in 1941, when Carl Krauch received his largest-ever allocation of steel. According to the records of the Four Year Plan, no less than 2.5 billion Reichsmarks were channelled into Krauch's chemicals projects in 1940 and 1941.56

51 Wagner, IG Auschwitz, p. 7, 10, 287

52 As Sybille Steinbacher has pointed out, the camp and industrial site were the foundation of a thriving experiment in urban Germanization in Eastern Silesia. See S. Steinbacher, 'Musterstadt' Auschwitz: Germanisierungspolitik und Judenmord in Ostoberschlesien (Munich, 2000).

53 See the comments made by Himmler during his visit to IG's building site on 18 July 1942. IMT, IG Farben Case VIII, NI-14551, pp. 477-478

54 The role of the IG Farben manager Johann Giesen, who was later employed in the Swiss chemicals industry, in the development of methanol production at Auschwitz has been highlighted by Lukas Straumann in his contribution to the OnlineReports.che website, 'Das dunkelste Kapitel in Christoph Blochers Ems Chemie'. See also J. R. White, 'Target Auschwitz: Historical and Hypothetical German Responses to Allied Attack', Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 16 (2002), pp. 54-76

55 USSBS, Over-all Report (European War) (Washington, 1945), p. 51

56 D. Petzina, Autarkiepolitik in Dritten Reich (Stuttgart, 1968), p. 183
Boby,

Mostlyharmless
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#49

Post by Mostlyharmless » 19 Mar 2009, 23:19

This thread is dominated by Adam Tooze's brilliant Wages of Destruction because before WoD's publication it would have come to a rapid end with the answer yes. Tooze has clearly completely convinced several of the posters. Thus their response to the non-production of BUNA from a BUNA plant (apparently Germany's largest single investment of the period) is that that is just one example. If an opponent added the FMO aero-engine plant (certainly the largest aero-engine investment), they would be told that that is only two examples. Clearly, all the economies of WW2 had examples of great inefficiency, so it is not helpful to collect anecdotes. However, as Boby has started to display passages of WoD, I would like to quote part of page 432 from chapter 13, to show magnitude of the task that Tooze has taken on.

“Once the ammunition crisis of 1940 had passed, Fritz Todt's bid to assume complete control of the armaments effort faltered. An uneasy stand-off developed between Todt, the OKW's military-economic office under General Thomas and the procurement offices of the three armed forces. This power struggle was further complicated by Göring's dual position as head of the air force and head of the four year plan, and by occasional interventions of Walter Funk, the head of the civilian economic administration. All sides in this multi-sided bureaucratic battle hurled allegations of incompetence and inefficiency. The archival paper trail thus appears to confirm the statistical indicators produced later in the war by the Speer Ministry, which appear to demonstrate the inefficiency and under-mobilization of the German war economy in 1940 and 1941. But if we are interested in the real outcomes of the armament effort, the bureaucratic battles in Berlin are a distraction. The politics of the German war effort may have been messy, but the record of industrial production between June 1940 and June 1941 in fact bears the unmistakable imprint of strategic design.”

The Tooze case is that a group of loathsome individuals of average ability who hated each other happened to produce a sensible organization of the German ecomomy. An alternative is that everyone tried to move the most resources possible to projects under his control. This accounts for the massive effort demonstrated in Tooze and perhaps also for the limited output.

Another possible criticism of Tooze's argument might be that while he finds evidence that some Germans in 1940 understood the potential of US production, there are also statements recorded from both Hitler and Göring showing a huge underestimation (for example, John Ellis in "Brute Force", chapter 7, page 345-6, quotes a letter from Hitler to Mussolini of 21st June 1941 and Göring: Air Leader by A. Lee, 1972). However, I am not sure if this is a valid criticism as even the underestimated US production might still have demanded a huge response if it was to be matched by Germany.

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Qvist
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#50

Post by Qvist » 19 Mar 2009, 23:55

This thread is dominated by Adam Tooze's brilliant Wages of Destruction because before WoD's publication it would have come to a rapid end with the answer yes. Tooze has clearly completely convinced several of the posters.
Even if that was true, which it isn't, so what?
The Tooze case is that a group of loathsome individuals of average ability who hated each other happened to produce a sensible organization of the German ecomomy.
No, the Tooze case is that it makes little sense to interpret the German economy as a chaotic mess given that it is a fact that it actually achieved quite noteworthy results. This is to derive interpretation from fact.
An alternative is that everyone tried to move the most resources possible to projects under his control. This accounts for the massive effort demonstrated in Tooze and perhaps also for the limited output.
Except that the output wasn't "limited". The whole point is that the output was in fact pretty good.
Thus their response to the non-production of BUNA from a BUNA plant (apparently Germany's largest single investment of the period) is that that is just one example.
Which it is. And what in the excerpt posted by Boby do you have trouble understanding?
Clearly, all the economies of WW2 had examples of great inefficiency, so it is not helpful to collect anecdotes.
Indeed. So your point here is what exactly?

vszulc
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#51

Post by vszulc » 14 Apr 2009, 01:42

I have a feeling that no matter how many examples you come up with, the response will still be: "That's just another example, read WoD!"

Well, here's another example: Germanys agricultural output. Instead of thoroughly modernizing agriculture and moving to more efficient farms, Nazigermany insisted on keeping the traditional small familyfarms that might provide a meager income for a family, but which were vaslty inferior to modern, larger farms that were better suited for economy of scale and mechanisation.

Coal-distribution is (yet) another example. With efficient leadership and a thorough plan, there was just about enough coal in occupied Europe for everybody, even occupied countrys. Germany's response? Pretty much "Pfft, we'll just grab what we need in Ukraine instead!"

Wages of Destruction also provides some good examples on how Germany started the war without a clear way of finishing it, changing their focus from defeating the UK to defeating the Soviet Union.

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#52

Post by Qvist » 14 Apr 2009, 08:37

I have a feeling that no matter how many examples you come up with, the response will still be: "That's just another example, read WoD!"

Well, here's another example: Germanys agricultural output. Instead of thoroughly modernizing agriculture and moving to more efficient farms, Nazigermany insisted on keeping the traditional small familyfarms that might provide a meager income for a family, but which were vaslty inferior to modern, larger farms that were better suited for economy of scale and mechanisation.

Coal-distribution is (yet) another example. With efficient leadership and a thorough plan, there was just about enough coal in occupied Europe for everybody, even occupied countrys. Germany's response? Pretty much "Pfft, we'll just grab what we need in Ukraine instead!"

Wages of Destruction also provides some good examples on how Germany started the war without a clear way of finishing it, changing their focus from defeating the UK to defeating the Soviet Union.
Well, read WoD.

All of these issues are dealt with at length, and none of them are even remotely as simple as you seem to believe.

The problems with German agriculture were well-known, but they were hardly a result of wartime or pre-war planning, and it was also an issue of enormous social consequence and impacrt for society generally - if you think the Germans could just have switched to large-scale farms within the space of 15 years, then you have not realised the magnitude of the issue. It would have meant uprooting millions of families, creating a surge of population for the cities and fundamentally revolutionising the basic social structure of German society. But this of course was also a driving factor for the whole Lebensraum project - in this sense, lack of space was exactly the fundamental problem.

Coal was a real bottleneck in the european economy, for various and complex reasons. One was that the european transport system simply was not calibrated to deal with a full-running economy simultaneously with supporting a major war, another that mining output was limited by labor shortages and above all by low productivity, which again went back to extensive use of forced and occupied-country labor. In the former case at least productivity was also affected by food shortages.

WoD in fact also argues the exact opposite of last paragraph, namely that Germany retained a focus on combatting the western powers even as they launched Barbarossa.

Which is why you keep being referred to WoD - no rational person discards a well-documented analysis because posters on internet forums drag up half-digested objections about things they have not understood, and which are dealt with comprehensively in the book they attempt to dismiss before trying to get to grips with it. So, may I suggest reading the book? :)

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#53

Post by Jon G. » 14 Apr 2009, 09:27

Qvist wrote:...
Coal was a real bottleneck in the european economy, for various and complex reasons. One was that the european transport system simply was not calibrated to deal with a full-running economy simultaneously with supporting a major war, another that mining output was limited by labor shortages and above all by low productivity, which again went back to extensive use of forced and occupied-country labor. In the former case at least productivity was also affected by food shortages...
All things being relative, of course :) The coal shortage was nowhere as serious as the food deficit, for example. Despite a relative shortage of coal, the Germans could still find enough of it to embark on an enormously coal-intensive synthfuel programme, and also ship about a million tons of it by rail to Italy each month. In peacetime (and perhaps surprisingly), German coal for Italy actually went by ship from Rotterdam, rather than by rail.

German coal production declined more than eg. British coal production did at the outbreak of war, but German production declined from a very high level; the Germans produced more coal per man-hour than anyone else outside the US because German coal production was highly mechanized. When the coal miners were drafted into the army at the outbreak of war the unskilled replacement workers (an increasing proportion of them forced labourers, as you say) could not maintain the same production levels. This has been covered quite thoroughly by Overy. I have an article by him on the subject *somewhere* and can post a couple of scans if you're interested.

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Qvist
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#54

Post by Qvist » 14 Apr 2009, 11:09

Certainly, that would be interesting.

It's been a while since I read this, but Tooze here focuses on the interaction of several problem areas. In terms of output, the main problem was decreasing productivity. The drafting of very large numbers of skilled miners was in itself a reason for this, and the general manpower crunch also made it difficult to replace them even with unskilled labor. POWs and forced labor was increasingly used, but their usefulness was in turn limited by lack of skills, which made them suitable mainly for manual labor, and by the strained food situation, there being a direct correlation between chaloric consumption and productivity in hard manual labor. Labor unrest limited productivity in occupied western europe.

And then there were the transport challenges. This was strained beyond normality by the demands of supporting the armed forces, and also by the disappearance of most of the atlantic coastal shipping routes. It was particularly acute in the occupied West, as a result of the Reichsbahn plundering the French and Belgian railways of much rolling stock, this again being a result of lack of investment in DRB during the thirties which left them with inadequate resources in this regard.

These apparently were the main limiting factors in the exploitation of european coal for the German war effort. This, if I remember correctly, was indirectly a main bottleneck for a period early in the war, in that it prevented expansion in the direct bottleneck commodity, which was steel. But as you say, everything is relative. Unless I am much mistaken, they also managed to largely overcome this problem by 1943.

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vszulc
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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#55

Post by vszulc » 15 Apr 2009, 02:01

Qvist wrote:
So, may I suggest reading the book? :)

cheers

Sure. I'm already done wist most of it though ;)

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Re: coal stuff

#56

Post by Jon G. » 15 Apr 2009, 02:25

Try as I might, I can't find the Overy essay which I was babbling about above. As sort of half an answer to my own post, above, here is a blurb about the productivity of the Ruhr district

Image
From Chauncy D. Harris: The Ruhr Coal-Mining District, Geographical Review, vol. 36 no. 2, April 1946

...and here is something about European coal reserves:

Image
From Walter H. Voskuil: Coal and Political Power in Europe, Economic Geography, vol 18 no. 3, July 1942

I don't want to sidetrack the discussion, and I'll get back to the Overy stuff once I've found it, but data never hurts.

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#57

Post by ljadw » 18 Jul 2009, 20:26

In "The German War economy: the motorisation myth" on p.67:German crude oil production My tired eyes see the following :december 1939:100000 metric ton ,july 1940 140000 ,july 1942 140000 ,july 1943(coincide with the Strategic Air Offensive against Germany)160000,july 1944(idem):170000 In 1942,1943, 1944 the actual production was higher than the planned one. Conclusion:efficacy of the Bomber Offensive isn't very clear to my. Germany's war effort badly run?Not in the oil production.

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#58

Post by Jon G. » 19 Jul 2009, 16:07

For the oil angle, also see these threads:

Why was Germany short on oil?
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=35176

Germany and Oil
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=78524

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#59

Post by Guaporense » 31 Oct 2009, 23:24

Was the german war effort badly run? Yes it was.

Proof? The time it took to reach full war production levels.

For the russians, it took less than a year, in 1942 the URSS was pumping out at 100% of its capacity. For the americans, it took about 18 months, from December 1941 to mid 1943. For the germans? It took nearly 5 years, from september 1939 to july 1944.

I read tooze's book. Where did he say that the german war effort wasn't badly run? From reading the book I only concluded that they made a great effort since the beginning of the war, but with no good results until around 1943.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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Re: Was Germany's War Effort Badly Run?

#60

Post by Qvist » 01 Nov 2009, 00:35

In that case I would read it again, if I were you.

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