Tooze's Wages of Destruction : An Inquiry

[ljadw]

To return to the claim that the German aircraft industry was inefficient,because it produced less aircraft,using more resources ,than the British aircraft industry:IMHO,this is meaningless:it is saying that GM is inefficient,because it is producing less cars (using more resources) than Mitsubishi
What about :comparing fighters with bombers (more resources were needed to produce bombers)
What about :speed,armament,fuel consumption,weight,crew,etc ?
And :what about the start level :had the Germans and the British as much factories,raw materials,workers,...in september 1939 ?If there was a difference in 1939,obviously this would benefit A and hurt B.
And how to compare the importance of the numbers of factories with the numbers of machine tools,workers ..?
If the Germans were using 1.5 more resources,was this 1.5 more factories (and,what about big and small ones?),1.5 more machine tools,workers,raw materials ,..?
What about the change of priorities ? If,at a certain moment,the LW was ordering more and other bombers,and less fighters,this would of course result in production difficulties.
Only using the numbers of aircraft is a wrong method .
IMHO,there is no way to prove that the German aircraft industry,the tank industry,...... was less efficient than the British one,the US one,...

[ljadw]

About the official German history versus Tooze :I think I am not far of the truth,that the point is :it is a German history,they had 2 choices :saying :it was a mess,and Speer(the a-political manager) did some improvements,or,it was reasonably good,even before Speer,implying that the nazi's were no band of inept mobsters .What do you think the MGFA would do ? Risk a certain social and political suicide ,by choosing the latter?

[stg 44]

What a wall of text. The thing you claim was mismanagement actually led to increased production later on.Resources initially spent on building capacity ⟶ then increased capacity leads to Speer miracle.
Everything else you say is contradicted by 'Demystifying the German “armament miracle'. But i guess they're wrong too.

Considering that less than half of these projects were completed before being cancelled suggests they were a waste of resources that the Germans couldn't afford, nor contributed to the later increase in production, other than to tie up labor and materials that were released into production when they were cancelled.

Actually cost-plus and fixed price-multiyear contracts from my 'wall of text' comes from the 'demystifiying' article. Also the article focuses solely on the aircraft industry and doesn't account for a number of factors, rather than 'contradicting' my post. They don't mention the command fragmentation that Milch had to deal with, the struggle for raw materials, the over allocation and hoarding of resources by manufacturers that used some of their aluminum ration to produce consumer goods that they stored and planned to sell post war, or terribly inefficient machining methods that wasted about 1,500 pounds of aluminium to make one DB601 engine that Milch discovered when auditing production methods in 1941. Edward Homze analyzes the German aircraft industry much more effectively in "Arming the Luftwaffe" another book from the 1970's, citing its gross inefficiencies, including the lack of trained engineers.

I mean none of this even mentions the debacle of the He177, a four engined bomber produced from 1940-1944 with over 1200 units, yet were never combat ready due to major technical failings. Or the Me210 bomber that had several major factories tooled up to build it, but due to it falling out of the sky was never built and cost Germany years of development and required converting all of the factories, which never produced a single aircraft during tis period, back to Me110 production.
Or the Henschel factory which was required to retool 5 times from 1938-1944 before completing retooling the previous time, never producing an aircraft until 1945, due to command uncertainty.
Check out Horst Boog for more examples: http://www.bookfinder.com/dir/i/The_Con ... 854966978/

As for the German history if it was written before the Tooze book it will just parrot the established view. That's the way academic books are written.How do you think the Speer miracle survived for 60 years?
Finally 'Inefficiency' without explanation is a meaningless term.

Not really. Criticize it after you read it. It doesn't parrot any view as it establishes a separate POV outside the US academic mainstream. German sources have a different view from US academic view, which has been heavily influenced by the USSBS, a document not used by the Germans, as they have the original data and a much longer time to produce their work, as the USSBS was published in 1947, long before the situation became clear about the German war effort. It was a political document produced to justify the strategic bombing effort under pressure from the government, not to assess the actual situation in the German war economy.

[stg 44]

To return to the claim that the German aircraft industry was inefficient,because it produced less aircraft,using more resources ,than the British aircraft industry:IMHO,this is meaningless:it is saying that GM is inefficient,because it is producing less cars (using more resources) than Mitsubishi
What about :comparing fighters with bombers (more resources were needed to produce bombers)
What about :speed,armament,fuel consumption,weight,crew,etc ?
And :what about the start level :had the Germans and the British as much factories,raw materials,workers,...in september 1939 ?If there was a difference in 1939,obviously this would benefit A and hurt B.
And how to compare the importance of the numbers of factories with the numbers of machine tools,workers ..?
If the Germans were using 1.5 more resources,was this 1.5 more factories (and,what about big and small ones?),1.5 more machine tools,workers,raw materials ,..?
What about the change of priorities ? If,at a certain moment,the LW was ordering more and other bombers,and less fighters,this would of course result in production difficulties.
Only using the numbers of aircraft is a wrong method .
IMHO,there is no way to prove that the German aircraft industry,the tank industry,...... was less efficient than the British one,the US one,...

The numbers were adjusted for weight of aircraft. Remember that the British were continuing their mass production of 4 engined bombers in 1940 too, preparing for strategic bombing since 1933. Even for weight adjustments the British produced heavier and more aircraft.
If you'll notice I said factory floor space, not just factories. This is the square footage of space dedicated to production. The 1.5x is a average number of all these factors, but holds pretty much overall.
Change in priorities is also a factor of command uncertainty, but doesn't seem to be an issue as fighters didn't get priority prior to 1944. So Germany was focused in two engine bombers and fighters over single engine fighters, but so was Britain, though instead of two engine bombers, they were building Lancaster 4 engine bombers, far larger than the German bombers. Plus the Blenheims and Beaufighters.

About the official German history versus Tooze :I think I am not far of the truth,that the point is :it is a German history,they had 2 choices :saying :it was a mess,and Speer(the a-political manager) did some improvements,or,it was reasonably good,even before Speer,implying that the nazi's were no band of inept mobsters .What do you think the MGFA would do ? Risk a certain social and political suicide ,by choosing the latter?

Huh??? The German official history comes from a totally different social, political, and academic areana of the late 1970's when it was written. I.E. after the war without Nazis involved. It was primarily academics hired by the Bundeswehr and were not influenced by the debate in the US started by the USSBS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany_an ... _World_War

[paspartoo]

What a wall of text. The thing you claim was mismanagement actually led to increased production later on.Resources initially spent on building capacity ⟶ then increased capacity leads to Speer miracle.
Everything else you say is contradicted by 'Demystifying the German “armament miracle'. But i guess they're wrong too.

Considering that less than half of these projects were completed before being cancelled suggests they were a waste of resources that the Germans couldn't afford, nor contributed to the later increase in production, other than to tie up labor and materials that were released into production when they were cancelled.

Actually cost-plus and fixed price-multiyear contracts from my 'wall of text' comes from the 'demystifiying' article. Also the article focuses solely on the aircraft industry and doesn't account for a number of factors, rather than 'contradicting' my post. They don't mention the command fragmentation that Milch had to deal with, the struggle for raw materials, the over allocation and hoarding of resources by manufacturers that used some of their aluminum ration to produce consumer goods that they stored and planned to sell post war, or terribly inefficient machining methods that wasted about 1,500 pounds of aluminium to make one DB601 engine that Milch discovered when auditing production methods in 1941. Edward Homze analyzes the German aircraft industry much more effectively in "Arming the Luftwaffe" another book from the 1970's, citing its gross inefficiencies, including the lack of trained engineers.

I mean none of this even mentions the debacle of the He177, a four engined bomber produced from 1940-1944 with over 1200 units, yet were never combat ready due to major technical failings. Or the Me210 bomber that had several major factories tooled up to build it, but due to it falling out of the sky was never built and cost Germany years of development and required converting all of the factories, which never produced a single aircraft during tis period, back to Me110 production.
Or the Henschel factory which was required to retool 5 times from 1938-1944 before completing retooling the previous time, never producing an aircraft until 1945, due to command uncertainty.
Check out Horst Boog for more examples: http://www.bookfinder.com/dir/i/The_Con ... 854966978/.

Man i'm seriously going to start banging my head against a wall. You said :

In fact it was producing based on a principle of cost-plus contracts, meaning each item was paid for by its cost and a percent of profit between 5-10%. This was in contrast to fixed price, multiyear contracts that the Allies used and the Germans wanted to use.


'Demystifying the German “armament miracle' says :
The government decided in 1938 that aircraft producers had to concentrate on a few different types, and in 1937 that cost-plus contracts were replaced with fixed price contracts. What followed was not a sudden
production miracle but a continuous development which was fuelled first by learning-bydoing
and then by the ongoing growth of the capital and labor endowment.

Also your examples show a poor understanding of 'inefficiency'. The LW production was focused on three planes the Bf109,FW190 and Ju-88. The He-177 was a waste since there was never fuel for it regardless whether it was good or not but it was a tiny part of LW production.By the same logic the American P-36 and P39 were also a waste of resources.Same with British Defiant and all medium bombers .

[

As for the German history if it was written before the Tooze book it will just parrot the established view. That's the way academic books are written.How do you think the Speer miracle survived for 60 years?
Finally 'Inefficiency' without explanation is a meaningless term.

Not really. Criticize it after you read it. It doesn't parrot any view as it establishes a separate POV outside the US academic mainstream. German sources have a different view from US academic view, which has been heavily influenced by the USSBS, a document not used by the Germans, as they have the original data and a much longer time to produce their work, as the USSBS was published in 1947, long before the situation became clear about the German war effort. It was a political document produced to justify the strategic bombing effort under pressure from the government, not to assess the actual situation in the German war economy.

Do you honestly think a German author would ever write that the NS economy or any other aspect of the NS state worked well?

Insulting content removed. Jon, moderator.

[stg 44]

Man i'm seriously going to start banging my head against a wall.Have you been drinking ? You said :

In fact it was producing based on a principle of cost-plus contracts, meaning each item was paid for by its cost and a percent of profit between 5-10%. This was in contrast to fixed price, multiyear contracts that the Allies used and the Germans wanted to use.

'Demystifying the German “armament miracle' says :
The government decided in 1938 that aircraft producers had to concentrate on a few different types, and in 1937 that cost-plus contracts were replaced with fixed price contracts. What followed was not a sudden
production miracle but a continuous development which was fuelled first by learning-bydoing
and then by the ongoing growth of the capital and labor endowment.

In the NS state just because one agency orders something doesn't mean it was carried out. Tooze makes that point in an article he wrote about the dangers in studying the German economy.

The quote above is at best a partial truth. Homze demonstrates that the fixed price, multiyear contracts started to be introduced in 1937 and it took until 1940 before it could be applied across the board in the aircraft industry. And this was only in the aircraft industry. In all others it wasn't until 1942 that the fixed price contracts could be applied by Speer.
Of course the full effects of this method would only be achieved after several years, which interestingly enough, despite asking for it in 1934, the Wehrmacht did not get to employ these types of contracts until the war had started.

The problem wasn't simply cost-plus contracts though. It was mainly command fragmentation, which is never mentioned in this article or in Tooze, as they want to focus on single issues to prove points, rather than 'muddy the waters' by dealing with the full range of problems the German war economy dealt, something that Overy, among others, does a better job of.

How about rather than continuing this argument further you go out and get "War and Economy in the Third Reich" and read it. Once you do we can discuss its merits and flaws in comparison to Tooze's "Wages of Destruction", rather than you just demanding that Tooze and only Tooze is right about all things. If you disagree with Overy after you've read his argument, fine, that's your prerogative, but until you do we cannot have a full discussion of the different models for analyzing the German war economy. Otherwise you're just relying on assumptions. I don't own Overy's book either to start quoting passages at length, so how about we adjourn this discussion until you read it?

Also your examples show a poor understanding of 'inefficiency'. The LW production was focused on three planes the Bf109,FW190 and Ju-88. The He-177 was a waste since there was never fuel for it regardless whether it was good or not but it was a tiny part of LW production.By the same logic the American P-36 and P39 were also a waste of resources.Same with British Defiant and all medium bombers .

It was focused on the He111 as well, not to mention the Do17, He115, Fw200, Fw189, Ju87, Hs129, Fw190, Ju52, etc. There were many more models produced than what you or I have listed.

Do you honestly think a German author would ever write that the NS economy or any other aspect of the NS state worked well?

By that logic I can ask whether an American, British, or Russian author would ever write that the NS state performed poorly, as it diminishes the achievement of the Allied victory and shows how utterly incompetent they were to be held off for so long by an incompetent state of genocidal racists.

[paspartoo]

Man i'm seriously going to start banging my head against a wall.Have you been drinking ? You said :

In fact it was producing based on a principle of cost-plus contracts, meaning each item was paid for by its cost and a percent of profit between 5-10%. This was in contrast to fixed price, multiyear contracts that the Allies used and the Germans wanted to use.

'Demystifying the German “armament miracle' says :
The government decided in 1938 that aircraft producers had to concentrate on a few different types, and in 1937 that cost-plus contracts were replaced with fixed price contracts. What followed was not a sudden
production miracle but a continuous development which was fuelled first by learning-bydoing
and then by the ongoing growth of the capital and labor endowment.

In the NS state just because one agency orders something doesn't mean it was carried out. Tooze makes that point in an article he wrote about the dangers in studying the German economy.

The quote above is at best a partial truth. Homze demonstrates that the fixed price, multiyear contracts started to be introduced in 1937 and it took until 1940 before it could be applied across the board in the aircraft industry. And this was only in the aircraft industry. In all others it wasn't until 1942 that the fixed price contracts could be applied by Speer.
Of course the full effects of this method would only be achieved after several years, which interestingly enough, despite asking for it in 1934, the Wehrmacht did not get to employ these types of contracts until the war had started.

The problem wasn't simply cost-plus contracts though. It was mainly command fragmentation, which is never mentioned in this article or in Tooze, as they want to focus on single issues to prove points, rather than 'muddy the waters' by dealing with the full range of problems the German war economy dealt, something that Overy, among others, does a better job of.

How about rather than continuing this argument further you go out and get "War and Economy in the Third Reich" and read it. Once you do we can discuss its merits and flaws in comparison to Tooze's "Wages of Destruction", rather than you just demanding that Tooze and only Tooze is right about all things. If you disagree with Overy after you've read his argument, fine, that's your prerogative, but until you do we cannot have a full discussion of the different models for analyzing the German war economy. Otherwise you're just relying on assumptions. I don't own Overy's book either to start quoting passages at length, so how about we adjourn this discussion until you read it?

I think it's better to adjourn permanently .You are just repeating things that have been debunked and it takes energy to respond. You have your own definition of inefficiency. I give you the Alan Milward award in historical research

Also your examples show a poor understanding of 'inefficiency'. The LW production was focused on three planes the Bf109,FW190 and Ju-88. The He-177 was a waste since there was never fuel for it regardless whether it was good or not but it was a tiny part of LW production.By the same logic the American P-36 and P39 were also a waste of resources.Same with British Defiant and all medium bombers .

It was focused on the He111 as well, not to mention the Do17, He115, Fw200, Fw189, Ju87, Hs129, Fw190, Ju52, etc. There were many more models produced than what you or I have listed.

Like i said before you have a ridiculous grasp of LW production.

Do you honestly think a German author would ever write that the NS economy or any other aspect of the NS state worked well?

By that logic I can ask whether an American, British, or Russian author would ever write that the NS state performed poorly, as it diminishes the achievement of the Allied victory and shows how utterly incompetent they were to be held off for so long by an incompetent state of genocidal racists.

Well of course why do you think all anglo books portray Hitler as a crazy maniac and his top people as idiot yes-men? If only Hitler has done X he would have won the war. That's the standard argument of 99% of authors.

[stg 44]

So in the absence of a rational argument, you instead insult me. Congrats, you just lost.

Let's just recap: instead of looking at any of the sources I mentioned, you just either insult them or ignore them. Then you claim that I am a sycophant of an author that I never mention, nor endorse. Instead you refuse to read anything or continue the discussion when I ask you to broaden your horizons.

Next you claim I have a ridiculous grasp of LW production, without answering the challenge that in fact Germany focused on many more types of aircraft throughout the war than just the three you claim, while totally ignoring the major resources invested in preparing for types that were never produced. Which of course means that I have the ridiculous grasp of LW production. Get back to me once you've read Edward Homze, the recognized expert in LW production in English, or Horst Boog, the German equivalent.

[Jon G.]

Knock it off with the insults, paspartoo. I have edited insulting content from your post, above.

It's perfectly possible to make your point without resorting to ad-hominem arguing. Further insulting posts from you will be deleted.

[paspartoo]

Knock it off with the insults, paspartoo. I have edited insulting content from your post, above.

It's perfectly possible to make your point without resorting to ad-hominem arguing. Further insulting posts from you will be deleted.

What part of : I think it's better to adjourn permanently , was not understood? I'm out of this discussion.
By the way apologies to Cannae for going off topic.

[ljadw]

about the official German history,you are missing the point :it has nothing to do with the old USSBS.It is the fact that the MGFA(working with government money,thus :who finds me bread and cheese....)had 2 options
1) it was saying that the nazi's were a bunch of incapable mobsters,and the production increasing was due to the non nazi Speer (the Ludwig Erhard of the Third Reich)
2) it was saying that the increase of the war production was not the work of Speer,implying that it was the work of the nazi's,thus,that Milch,Göring,Hitler (horresco referens)had made good decisions,and,this would be going against the 2 basic principles of the BRD,who are
1)Hitler is responsible for the holocaust (meaning that the German nation was innocent),thus,anyone saying one favorable word about Hitler /his satellites is a nazi
2)Hitler is responsible for the defeat (meaning Guderian,Manstein,blahblah could have won,without Hitler's interference),thus,any one saying that Hitler and/or .......had any qualities ,is implying that Guderian, Manstein,...blahblah also were responsible for the defeat ,,and this would take away any particle of self-confidence,consolation :the Germans no more could say (secretly):we lost,but,without Hitler,we would have won .
It is obvious that the MGFA was choosing option 1)

[stg 44]

about the official German history,you are missing the point :it has nothing to do with the old USSBS.It is the fact that the MGFA(working with government money,thus :who finds me bread and cheese....)had 2 options
1) it was saying that the nazi's were a bunch of incapable mobsters,and the production increasing was due to the non nazi Speer (the Ludwig Erhard of the Third Reich)
2) it was saying that the increase of the war production was not the work of Speer,implying that it was the work of the nazi's,thus,that Milch,Göring,Hitler (horresco referens)had made good decisions,and,this would be going against the 2 basic principles of the BRD,who are
1)Hitler is responsible for the holocaust (meaning that the German nation was innocent),thus,anyone saying one favorable word about Hitler /his satellites is a nazi
2)Hitler is responsible for the defeat (meaning Guderian,Manstein,blahblah could have won,without Hitler's interference),thus,any one saying that Hitler and/or .......had any qualities ,is implying that Guderian,Manstein,...blahblah also were responsible for the defeat ,,and this would take away any particle of self-confidence,consolation :the Germans no more could say (secretly):we lost,but,without Hitler,we would have won .
It is obvious that the MGFA was choosing option 1)

Though the MGFA doesn't seem to indulge in controversy like whether Fritz Todt was assassinated, they do focus on the effects of various policies and more often let the facts speak for themselves rather than just providing analysis.
As the volumes mostly don't focus on the Holocaust, they instead focus on the war and the effects of various political actors on the various initiatives and outcomes of the war.

They don't take either approach IMHO. Instead they focus on the failures of the regime to mobilize effectively in 1939 due to command fragmentation and the variety of reasons for that. Hitler is blamed for his failures, which were many, as were any number of commanders for theirs. Speer is not praised, nor reviled. Its more a matter of "Hitler/Speer decided X, Y resulted. Y wasn't necessarily good/bad"
If anything it goes on to show that Hitler really didn't make decisions and often reversed himself. Speer isn't credited with a miracle, though improvements under his tenure are noted and listed, though just as often attributed to their cause, whether that be Speer or someone/something else. I'd say personal judgement is often avoided in favor of presenting details of the war effort.

Check it out for yourself and make a decision. IMHO it was remarkably evenhanded, exposing the flaws of the Nazi system and explaining how they did so well, when necessary crediting the system with its successes.

[stg 44]

Hello to all,

As of lately my historical research has been confined to the World War 2 period in a quest of knowledge relative to military history. Most of you know that the decisive factor in the conflict pertained to the economic resources brought to bear in the multiple theaters. If I may, most scholarship on the topic was jejune in concluding insight up until Tooze's Magnus Opus known as The Wages of Destruction. Tooze speculated on many theories, such as the ineffectiveness of the allied bombings, the Holocaust events, and procurement in German industries. The historians' excellence amid the use of German archives and other literature backed up his sentiments to a great extent. To date, arguably, there has been no tolerable challenge of his work.

However, I would like to spark a few questions for those who are economists on the forum. As I recall, Tooze focused a lot on the personalities of the Reich and statistical analysis of the economy to back up his conclusions. Do you think economic theory can be applied to Tooze's works to rightly prove that Germany really could not have produced enough to overpower the international movement? (E.g. tariffs, wages, unemployment and the likes) Also, how can we use World War 2 as a model to predict the results of future clashes from an economic standpoint?

Look forward to any input.

It seems fair that after arguing with others around the edges of your question that I should answer it directly:
No, Tooze's work is flawed because he tries to approach the German war economy simply through statistical analysis, which leaves out a tremendous part of the story. I've read critical reviews, but sadly cannot find a link currently to post about his work.
Simply put Tooze was trying to sell books. He wanted to create controversy, which he did, and ultimately established himself in a saturated field of economic history.
His model doesn't hold up in analyzing the German war economy and won't for other war economies.

The problem with creating predictive models is that there are too many factors to analyse, many of which are unknowns until after the fact to truly be predictive.

I personally think that production alone isn't enough to judge whether a nation could or should win a war; look at Vietnam or Afghanistan. In wars between major powers it is more important, but still not definitive. Germany IMHO could have produced more than they did and were pretty inefficient early on due to a badly constructed, overlapping bureaucracy, which was a central tenant of the Nazi ideology. Whether that was enough to win the war is unclear, though doubtful all else remained the same. Had Germany a different set of personalities, like say Göring out of the picture and General Wever surviving, then I think they had a shot, but much would be different to alter the entire course of the war to the point that it would be vastly different from our version of WW2.

The point is that so long as the Nazi system with the historical personalities of the Nazi leadership (not just Hitler) in place, then Germany loses even with US levels of production.

[Jon G.]

What part of : I think it's better to adjourn permanently , was not understood? I'm out of this discussion.
By the way apologies to Cannae for going off topic.

Leaving the discussion does not give you any special permission to insult other forum members. As a courtesy, I sanitized your message, rather than remove it completely, my apologies if any part of that went misunderstood.

[Cannae]

Hello to all,

As of lately my historical research has been confined to the World War 2 period in a quest of knowledge relative to military history. Most of you know that the decisive factor in the conflict pertained to the economic resources brought to bear in the multiple theaters. If I may, most scholarship on the topic was jejune in concluding insight up until Tooze's Magnus Opus known as The Wages of Destruction. Tooze speculated on many theories, such as the ineffectiveness of the allied bombings, the Holocaust events, and procurement in German industries. The historians' excellence amid the use of German archives and other literature backed up his sentiments to a great extent. To date, arguably, there has been no tolerable challenge of his work.

However, I would like to spark a few questions for those who are economists on the forum. As I recall, Tooze focused a lot on the personalities of the Reich and statistical analysis of the economy to back up his conclusions. Do you think economic theory can be applied to Tooze's works to rightly prove that Germany really could not have produced enough to overpower the international movement? (E.g. tariffs, wages, unemployment and the likes) Also, how can we use World War 2 as a model to predict the results of future clashes from an economic standpoint?

Look forward to any input.

It seems fair that after arguing with others around the edges of your question that I should answer it directly:
No, Tooze's work is flawed because he tries to approach the German war economy simply through statistical analysis, which leaves out a tremendous part of the story. I've read critical reviews, but sadly cannot find a link currently to post about his work.
Simply put Tooze was trying to sell books. He wanted to create controversy, which he did, and ultimately established himself in a saturated field of economic history.
His model doesn't hold up in analyzing the German war economy and won't for other war economies.

The problem with creating predictive models is that there are too many factors to analyse, many of which are unknowns until after the fact to truly be predictive.

I personally think that production alone isn't enough to judge whether a nation could or should win a war; look at Vietnam or Afghanistan. In wars between major powers it is more important, but still not definitive. Germany IMHO could have produced more than they did and were pretty inefficient early on due to a badly constructed, overlapping bureaucracy, which was a central tenant of the Nazi ideology. Whether that was enough to win the war is unclear, though doubtful all else remained the same. Had Germany a different set of personalities, like say Göring out of the picture and General Wever surviving, then I think they had a shot, but much would be different to alter the entire course of the war to the point that it would be vastly different from our version of WW2.

The point is that so long as the Nazi system with the historical personalities of the Nazi leadership (not just Hitler) in place, then Germany loses even with US levels of production.

Hello stg,

In response to the bold, it is my personal opinion that after about 2 weeks all wars become attrition based, i.e. the one with the most weapons, ammo, tanks, etc. wins. Obviously the Vietnamese won the war all in all but in a way they did have a greater manpower and other attrition advantages that the United States didn't enjoy because of political constraints. Other examples can be discussed (Ancient warfare being my expertise) but the reason why I asked the question is to get an understanding of the economics involved from a world war 2 perspective, which in turn shows how economics affected the attrition results of world war 2.