Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

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Tim Smith
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#46

Post by Tim Smith » 03 Jan 2012, 19:09

Teske wrote:The large black hole in your argument is that the aircraft with the the bomb could be downed.
Which is much less likely if the bomber carrying the atom bomb is hidden within a huge formation of identical bombers carrying conventional high explosive bombs, heavily escorted by P-51 fighters.

The atom bomb attacks on Japan were conducted by lone bombers since the Japanese air defences had been reduced to the point where they were no longer considered a serious threat. Presumably that wouldn't be the case over Germany (Me 262), so the bomber carrying the atom bomb wouldn't be expected to fly to the target alone.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#47

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 19:18

Tim, that's why I suggested it was dropped by the RAF at night - the Kamhuber Line idea strictly limits the number of interceptions a fixed number of GCI'd nightfighters can attempt...and by the end of the war the RAF can overload the Kamhuber Line, blind its radars, fly its own nightfighter intruders etc. - so achieving a FAR more level playing field than ever possible by day.
The atom bomb attacks on Japan were conducted by lone bombers since the Japanese air defences had been reduced to the point where they were no longer considered a serious threat.
Actually, they were flown by formations of three - the Bomber plus two chase planes.
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#48

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 20:29

Here's something ELSE to think about....

In 1942-3 the U.S. intervened to force the British-Canadian Bomb project based on the "Montreal Lab" to be closed down; they withekld heavy water from the Canadians, and the whole project became moribund...in favour of the two U.S. fissionables projects.

Eighteen months later, the Canadians began work again, at the Chalk River site...and THEIR "third way" of unfissionables prduction produced weapons-grade material only six months after Hiroshima...

In other words - the Canadian project, although 18 months out of step, reduced the gap between them and the U.S. projects BY A YEAR...

So what if the Americans hadn't forced the work at the Montreal Lab to be closed down??? Could we actually have had fissionable material for a Bomb anywhere from a year to eighteen months earlier???

:wink:
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#49

Post by wm » 03 Jan 2012, 20:36

phylo_roadking wrote: ...all 3 marks of the British "BRL" nuclear weapons effects calculators state that "isolated" fires as a result of the heat pulse from a 20Kt (~Nagasaki sized) bomb can still occur out to two miles for an air burst (1.5 miles for a ground burst) 8O. In fact - the initial heat pulse could start isolated fires in flammable material right out to the 1 p.s.i. overpressure limit.

And as for Berlin - by 1945 it had lost a goodly part of its protection against heat pulse-propagated "isolated fires"...
I suppose the protection was the best available - lack of secondary ignition sources.

Nuclear weapons emit large amounts of thermal radiation as visible, infrared, and ultraviolet light. [...]
The light is so powerful that it can start fires that spread rapidly in the debris left by a blast. However, the high winds following the blast wave will put out almost all such fires, unless the yield is very high. This is because the intensity of the blast effects drops off with the third power of distance from the explosion, while the intensity of radiation effects drops off with the second power of distance. However, in urban areas, the extinguishing of fires ignited by thermal radiation matters little, as fires will be started anyway by electrical shorts, gas pilot lights, overturned stoves, and other ignition sources.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of ... _radiation

Hiroshima’s Post Office, 0.12 mile from ground zero, was gutted by fire hours later well in the firestorm, but over 50% of its 400 occupants had already survived the explosion and escaped. Photos of the final burned out areas show firestorm effects which occurred after survivors had time to escape, not unsurvivable, instant Encore-type thermal radiation-induced newspaper-filled inflammable room flashover in a dry desert. The firestorm in Hiroshima took 2-3 hours to reach a maximum intensity. The secret (full) U. S. Strategic Bombing Survey May 1947 report on Hiroshima interviewed over 1,000 survivors, and their evidence was that the fires were started by the blast wave overturning the obsolete charcoal braziers in obsolete city-centre wooden housing slums, which were full of inflammable paper screens and bamboo furnishings.

This obsolete mechanism caused the firestorm, not thermal flash ignition, which cannot directly ignite sound wood
.

Dr Clayton S. White, M.D., “Biological Effects of Blast.”

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#50

Post by wm » 03 Jan 2012, 20:46

phylo_roadking wrote: So what if the Americans hadn't forced the work at the Montreal Lab to be closed down??? Could we actually have had fissionable material for a Bomb anywhere from a year to eighteen months earlier???
but only for the inefficient gun-type fission bomb, it would be too early for the implosion-type bomb.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#51

Post by Teske » 03 Jan 2012, 20:48

phylo_roadking wrote:Teske, can you post lists of questions in a single post? They'd be much easier to address that way.
They would have great difficulty getting a foothold on the continent and not being thrown out again.
There are a number of places such as Brittany or the Cotentin Peninsula where geography would have assisted greatly - there's at least two long threads in this Section dealing with the former, one of them VERY detailed...or of course what Churchill pressed for for some time, heading BACK to the North Norway Enclave!

But the secret is actually what the British planned on for several years after Dunkirk - to put just enough on the Continent at one place to defeat what was there to oppose them....and before more could be brought up, allowing them THEN to consolidate their bridgehead. That's why some of the late 1940-1941 divison counts for a European break-in seem so small; they weren't intending to fight ALL the German Army....just those within reach to buy time to establish a strong bridgehead.
A much stronger german groundforce would be able to push anything that landed back into the sea.Reserves would be much stronger in this scenario and the situation in the air would be more favorable for Germany.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#52

Post by Teske » 03 Jan 2012, 20:55

Tim Smith wrote:
Teske wrote:The large black hole in your argument is that the aircraft with the the bomb could be downed.
Which is much less likely if the bomber carrying the atom bomb is hidden within a huge formation of identical bombers carrying conventional high explosive bombs, heavily escorted by P-51 fighters.

The atom bomb attacks on Japan were conducted by lone bombers since the Japanese air defences had been reduced to the point where they were no longer considered a serious threat. Presumably that wouldn't be the case over Germany (Me 262), so the bomber carrying the atom bomb wouldn't be expected to fly to the target alone.
Against strong air defenses there would be a not insignificant risk of having the bomb being downed with the bomber and it is not obvious that this risk would be taken.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#53

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 20:58

A much stronger german groundforce would be able to push anything that landed back into the sea.Reserves would be much stronger in this scenario and the situation in the air would be more favorable for Germany.
You are aware that the Allies managed to land many divisions on part of the entire European coastline where the Germans did NOT have their maximum strength? That they sucessfully decoyed them elsewhere? That they inhibited the Germans' ability to move them to the front in the days immediately after D-Day?
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#54

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 21:08

suppose the protection was the best available - lack of secondary ignition sources.
Nuclear weapons emit large amounts of thermal radiation as visible, infrared, and ultraviolet light. [...]
The light is so powerful that it can start fires that spread rapidly in the debris left by a blast. However, the high winds following the blast wave will put out almost all such fires, unless the yield is very high. This is because the intensity of the blast effects drops off with the third power of distance from the explosion, while the intensity of radiation effects drops off with the second power of distance. However, in urban areas, the extinguishing of fires ignited by thermal radiation matters little, as fires will be started anyway by electrical shorts, gas pilot lights, overturned stoves, and other ignition sources.
This is of course the question - has enough damage been done already to Berlin conventionally to remopve all the above fire risks? :wink: I'm aware of rolling power cuts in early 1945, gas supply problems, shortages of kerosene - but NOT a total absence of same, so a good percentage of those risks will be present.

Hiroshima’s Post Office, 0.12 mile from ground zero, was gutted by fire hours later well in the firestorm, but over 50% of its 400 occupants had already survived the explosion and escaped. Photos of the final burned out areas show firestorm effects which occurred after survivors had time to escape, not unsurvivable, instant Encore-type thermal radiation-induced newspaper-filled inflammable room flashover in a dry desert. The firestorm in Hiroshima took 2-3 hours to reach a maximum intensity. The secret (full) U. S. Strategic Bombing Survey May 1947 report on Hiroshima interviewed over 1,000 survivors, and their evidence was that the fires were started by the blast wave overturning the obsolete charcoal braziers in obsolete city-centre wooden housing slums, which were full of inflammable paper screens and bamboo furnishings.

This obsolete mechanism caused the firestorm, not thermal flash ignition, which cannot directly ignite sound wood.
I'm not sure a reference to the “Biological Effects of Blast” is necessarily a good reference on what thermal flash can or cannot do. And "The Effects of Nuclear Wepons" would argue differently...given that out to 3-3 and a half miles, the wood in buildings will NOT be....sound, but in the form of debris, shattered timbers - and painted wood, flammable period furnishings, wallpaper etc....European debris, as tested in the post-Trinity tests over the next few years and recorded in "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons"
but only for the inefficient gun-type fission bomb, it would be too early for the implosion-type bomb.
Inefficient in terms of total conversion of fissionables into energy (or not!)...but we're NOT talking in terms of that here, but instead in terms of final explosive yield. A kiloton is a kiloton in terms of shockwave, overpressure etc....
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#55

Post by LWD » 03 Jan 2012, 21:39

There's also the option of targeting say Kiel instead of Berlin for the first drop and possibly cities in the Ruhr so that the bombers with the A bomb don't have to fly all the way to Berlin. If they decide to drop mulitples on one night with the first dropped fairly close to the German border the EMP would likely take out a lot of the radar and fighter direction capablity for several hours at least alowing a second bomber a much easier route deeper into Germany.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#56

Post by wm » 03 Jan 2012, 21:53

phylo_roadking wrote: I'm not sure a reference to the “Biological Effects of Blast” is necessarily a good reference on what thermal flash can or cannot do. And "The Effects of Nuclear Wepons" would argue differently...given that out to 3-3 and a half miles, the wood in buildings will NOT be....sound, but in the form of debris, shattered timbers - and painted wood, flammable period furnishings, wallpaper etc....European debris, as tested in the post-Trinity tests over the next few years and recorded in "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons"
Well, maybe we should go for something more modern, this is computer simulated heat deposition from Hiroshima-size bomb over Oklahoma city. Top - 300 meters above ground detonation, bottom - a surface detonation. Red color shows the dangerous zone where fires are to be expected, the yellow area is the first degree burns zone.
Image
from: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory "Thermal Radiation from Nuclear Detonations in Urban Environments"

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#57

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 21:55

There's also the option of targeting say Kiel instead of Berlin for the first drop and possibly cities in the Ruhr so that the bombers with the A bomb don't have to fly all the way to Berlin. If they decide to drop mulitples on one night with the first dropped fairly close to the German border the EMP would likely take out a lot of the radar and fighter direction capablity for several hours at least alowing a second bomber a much easier route deeper into Germany.
This brings up a couple of new questions....

1/ did the MANHATTAN scientists know about EMP before Trinity? After all, they weren't really knowledgeable about the directly-propagated radiation and/or fallout until live use...

2/the can-of-worms that is deciding what target to drop the Bomb on first.

All the 1945 discussions are well preserved, and have been discussed on AHF a number of times. The one that REALLY bears on targetting decisions in Germany as well as Japan is that of..."If we don't go big, how do the Nazis interpret it???"

The Allies had already declared the doctrine of unconditional surrender a number of times; and yet the Germans constantly seem to have believed some sort of negotiated settlement was possible, right up to BOTH Göring and Himmler trying again to negotiate with the Allies in April '45 8O...

So - if the Allies DON'T attack Berlin with the first Bomb - what does the Nazi mindset say? IS this a signal that they ARE willing to negotiate? And thus will the Nazis actually hold out and attempt back-channel discussions?

And if they DO do that - are the few bombs the Allies CAN muster enough to convince them otherwise? You have to remember that they'd be constantly measuring the Allies' actions against what THEY would do - the Nazis would have used a German Bomb on London as soon as it was reaady....so does THAT make them think that it's the ONLY Bomb the Allies have, and thus they'll try to absorb the blow and carry on?

It's two different mindsets at war.... :wink:
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#58

Post by wm » 03 Jan 2012, 22:01

LWD wrote:There's also the option of targeting say Kiel instead of Berlin for the first drop and possibly cities in the Ruhr so that the bombers with the A bomb don't have to fly all the way to Berlin. If they decide to drop mulitples on one night with the first dropped fairly close to the German border the EMP would likely take out a lot of the radar and fighter direction capablity for several hours at least alowing a second bomber a much easier route deeper into Germany.
Unfortunately the EMP of such a small bomb is negligible, not to mention that the vacuum tube/valve technology of that era was quite resistant to the EMP effects.

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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#59

Post by phylo_roadking » 03 Jan 2012, 22:04

Well, maybe we should go for something more modern, this is computer simulated heat deposition from Hiroshima-size bomb over Oklahoma city. Top - 300 meters above ground detonation, bottom - a surface detonation. Red color shows the dangerous zone where fires are to be expected, the yellow area is the first degree burns zone.
It would be interesting to know if they've taken the percentage of flammables present in the environment into consideration....

The other thing is - how do their different colour "zones" map across into the A/B/C/D damage bands that the Americans and British used throughout the Cold War? I'm asking because "The Effects of Nuclear Weapons" mentions - as I noted before - that isolated flash fires would occur right out to the 1psi overpressure line - which is right out halfway through Band D for a ground burst (glass smashed and tiles displaced only)
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Re: Could The USA/British Empire have won on their own?

#60

Post by Kingfish » 03 Jan 2012, 22:18

So - if the Allies DON'T attack Berlin with the first Bomb - what does the Nazi mindset say? IS this a signal that they ARE willing to negotiate? And thus will the Nazis actually hold out and attempt back-channel discussions?
It wouldn't take much to clarify the allied position in the event Berlin is not targeted.
And if they DO do that - are the few bombs the Allies CAN muster enough to convince them otherwise?
Yes, because the Germans would not know the number of bombs the allies had. I believe this was the deciding factor that forced the Japanese to accept the allied terms. Not the actual physical damage/loss of life, but that there was no end in sight.

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