Why was Germany short on oil?

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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LWD
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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#91

Post by LWD » 17 Aug 2009, 14:16

I think I read elsewhere that the Italians weren't real keen on Germany doing much in Africa until they got into trouble as well.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#92

Post by Guaporense » 08 Oct 2009, 23:44

I have been wondering why germany was short on oil. I know germany had very small reserves of oil and so did austria, but why did germany have oil shortages when Romania had large oil fields?
Well, Romania didn't have a very large production of oil. It was around 5 million tons, while in 1943 germany made 7 million tons of syntetic oil. They would need much more than 5 million tons of imports to function properly (i guess oil imports in the order of 10-15 million tons would be enough to satisfy germany's oil needs).


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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#93

Post by bf109 emil » 01 Dec 2009, 12:45

cortodanzigese wrote:I wonder why actually Hitler didn't send 20-30 divisions to Africa immediately in summer of 1940 when Britain was in disarray. His soldiers would conquer Middle East in few months, and the Germany would be secure for the rest of the war.
Africa was the Italian theatre of Operations not Germany's at this time of the war

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#94

Post by Sid Guttridge » 01 Dec 2009, 13:28

Hi Guys,

I would suggest the thing to remember is that any country has a minimum of domestic requirements for oil that have to be met before the excess can be devoted to war.

This was Germany's problem throughout. Domestic oil production couldn't both satisfy minimum domestic demands and fuel a major war simultaneously. It had to have oil imports to be able to mount the war.

Thus, despite the rise in synthetic oil production in Germany, the loss of Romanian oil in 1944 was a body blow.

Cheers,

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#95

Post by Gothard » 03 Dec 2009, 06:55

Germany was short on oil because the Romanians were too smart to give it to them without payment - they simply couldnt force romania to increase production - the fuel for their motor vehicles and armor was synthetic so it didnt affect that , but the oily fuels like diesel for their ships and the fuel mix part synth and part fossil for planes were key problems. the reason they ran out of gas was the strategic interdiction of the ruhr and the loss of the silesian coal basin to russia in mid to late 44. even if they couldve gotten more from romania they couldnt have moved it in the short time they had before romania turned.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#96

Post by Sid Guttridge » 04 Dec 2009, 16:24

Hi Gothard,

Romania certainly obstructed expansion of its oil production because output was already in decline before the war began and they did not want to over exploit a finite and diminishing resource. The Romanian Foreign Minister, Mihai Antonescu, told Clodius, the German economics envoy, this directly. As Germany never occupied Romania, or even its oil fields, it couldn't do much directly about this.

However, it wasn't Romania's defection that stopped the flow of most of its oil to Germany, but largely US bombing in the summer of 1944. Romania's withdrawal from the Axis in August ensured that that the flow of oil to Germany could not be resumed. I would suggest that without Romanian oil, Germany no longer had a sufficient surplus over its minimum domestic needs with which to wage mechanized warfare - and this despite the rise in synthetic oil production in Germany itself. Again, Allied bombing ensured that increasingly even this could not be distributed towards the end.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#97

Post by wahaneebelly » 05 May 2010, 11:18

Why would germany invade the Soviet union to obtain an oil supply which must be close to 1000miles overland from the Riech and that took them 15 months to reach. In fact, a Southern push wasn't even in the original Barbarossa plan. Oil fields and refineries are far to easy to put out of production, and far too difficult to get back into production during time of war. Witness the NEI (Dutch Shell, East Indies), fields the Japanese captured.
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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#98

Post by Bronsky » 05 May 2010, 12:18

wahaneebelly wrote:Why would germany invade the Soviet union to obtain an oil supply which must be close to 1000miles overland from the Riech and that took them 15 months to reach.


Because there was no closer source, and they didn't know it would take them 15 months to reach it - actually, they never reached the major oil source in the Caucasus, Baku.
wahaneebelly wrote:In fact, a Southern push wasn't even in the original Barbarossa plan. Oil fields and refineries are far to easy to put out of production, and far too difficult to get back into production during time of war. Witness the NEI (Dutch Shell, East Indies), fields the Japanese captured.
The original Barbarossa plan very much included the possibility of getting the Caucasus oil, however the idea was that the Soviet regime would crumble so the Germans wouldn't have to fight for the Caucasus, just occupy it in the middle of the power vaccum caused by the collapse of the USSR.

Further note that at the time they undertook Barbarossa, nobody knew exactly how long it took to restore oil fields to pre-capture capacity. Certainly, the Japanese experience in the NEI, which was still almost a year in the future, wasn't available to the Barbarossa planners!

Finally, the idea was that restoring damaged oil well was possible - a broadly correct assessment - so the Germans would end up with a large source of oil. Again, correct. What wasn't part of the plan was the Wehrmacht being stopped before Moscow and Stalingrad.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#99

Post by Kelvin » 11 Sep 2010, 14:10

Romanian oilfield was of vital importance to German war effort : So German should concentrate on strengthening defence in Romania in August 1944.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#100

Post by Alejandro_ » 03 Feb 2011, 19:07

I have read the topic and it was great, excellent data have been supplied. Some thoughts and questions to avoid opening a new topic.
The answer is very simple - Romania did not produce nearly enough oil to fuel (no pun intended) the whole German war effort. Romania, other minor sources and production of synthetic fuel more-or-less sufficed to to keep Germany at just-above crisis levels, but their position was a precarious one and also left no room for any great expansion of the Luftwaffe or motorised forces. It is clear that the German war effort was significantly hampered by a general shortage of fuel.


I just finished reading Adam Tooze's book "The wages of destruction". This author makes an interesting analysis on Germany's oil, pointing out some economic reasons for the invasion of the Soviet Union:

- There was a risk of Soviet attacks to Romanian oil field.
- The Caucasus oil was needed to fight a long war against the UK -and soon the USA-.

Also, he adds that France's defeat did not improve Germany's position. Romanian oil was needed, and so were the imports from the USSR. However:

- Focusing on the Mediterranean theatre* would not need so much oil as manpower requirements were far lower than in Eastern Front.
- A large stock of fuel was captured from France and other countries. As it has been pointed out, Luftwaffe's fuel consumption was less than expected.

Did Germany need to invade the USSR after a rather short period because of oil or there was some time to try to knock the UK out of the war? opinions?

* See Raeder's proposal for a peripheral' strategy.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#101

Post by Graeme Sydney » 04 Feb 2011, 08:40

cortodanzigese wrote:I wonder why actually Hitler didn't send 20-30 divisions to Africa immediately in summer of 1940 when Britain was in disarray. His soldiers would conquer Middle East in few months, and the Germany would be secure for the rest of the war.
It would have been an option but Hitler was dead scared of Russia and he knew a strategic flanking move to the south of Russia and securing Oil supplies for a long war was an economical and strategic threat to Russia which might have provoked war with Russia when Hitler/Germany wasn't ready. Barbarossa was as much about a preemptive strike as it was about ideology and 'livingroom'.

Gaining of the Middle East would also have required significant military resources to secure it as well. The permanent loss of these military resources would have weaken Germany against Russia on the then anticipated Eastern Front. It would have been and 'either/or' choice. Germany didn't have the military resources to do both.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#102

Post by Guaporense » 05 Feb 2011, 01:50

hauptmannn wrote:I have been wondering why germany was short on oil. I know germany had very small reserves of oil and so did austria, but why did germany have oil shortages when Romania had large oil fields?
Romania didn't have large oil fields. Their oil production was significant only because they were the only country with some oil production in Germany's grasp. But their total oil production was very small, less than 7 million tons of oil per year. The US managed to produce 200 million tons of oil per year.

For comparison, Germany's area of influence produced 360 million tons of coal per year during the war, plus 260 million tons of lignite. Oil always remained an insinificant resource to Germany in terms of it's economic importance, Germany's economy didn't work on oil at the time, as it's supply was too small to affect the overall economy. However, since trucks and tanks and aircraft cannot run on coal, Germany had to acquire oil somehow to supply the Wehrmacht.

The Soviet Union also didn't produce much oil, about 30 million tons in peace time, enough to run an armed forces with the required oil, but it wasn't the amount needed by an industrial nation of Germany's size. Germany would consume over 100 million tons of oil per year if they had the required supply. Historically they consumed less than 10 million.
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#103

Post by Jon G. » 15 Feb 2011, 14:45

Guaporense wrote:
hauptmannn wrote:I have been wondering why germany was short on oil. I know germany had very small reserves of oil and so did austria, but why did germany have oil shortages when Romania had large oil fields?
Romania didn't have large oil fields. Their oil production was significant only because they were the only country with some oil production in Germany's grasp. But their total oil production was very small, less than 7 million tons of oil per year. The US managed to produce 200 million tons of oil per year.
Anyone who bothered to read the multitude of posts between hauptmannn's opening post and yours should be aware of that. And fortunately, anyone wanting more accurate figures need not look any further than this very thread.
For comparison, Germany's area of influence produced 360 million tons of coal per year during the war, plus 260 million tons of lignite. Oil always remained an insinificant resource to Germany in terms of it's economic importance, Germany's economy didn't work on oil at the time, as it's supply was too small to affect the overall economy. However, since trucks and tanks and aircraft cannot run on coal, Germany had to acquire oil somehow to supply the Wehrmacht.
'Area of influence', that is a new definition from you. Anyone wanting more accurate information about coal and what it was used for can go to a handful of coal-related threads in this sub-forum. A majority of those threads provide correctives to theories set forth by you.

As for you, maybe you should read up on the synthetic fuel programme and calculate how much coal & steel was spent on it, and how much oil the Germans got in return. Do not hesitate to post your findings here.
The Soviet Union also didn't produce much oil, about 30 million tons in peace time, enough to run an armed forces with the required oil, but it wasn't the amount needed by an industrial nation of Germany's size. Germany would consume over 100 million tons of oil per year if they had the required supply. Historically they consumed less than 10 million.
That's a remarkably facile comment. It could equally well be argued that if Germany had had the production and the means to consume 100 million tons of oil a year, then WW2 would never have broken out.

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#104

Post by Guaporense » 18 Feb 2011, 00:56

Jon G. wrote:
The Soviet Union also didn't produce much oil, about 30 million tons in peace time, enough to run an armed forces with the required oil, but it wasn't the amount needed by an industrial nation of Germany's size. Germany would consume over 100 million tons of oil per year if they had the required supply. Historically they consumed less than 10 million.
That's a remarkably facile comment. It could equally well be argued that if Germany had had the production and the means to consume 100 million tons of oil a year, then WW2 would never have broken out.
I think it would. WW2 broke out because Germany had the possibility of winning it, with more resources, the incentives for going through war increase. Germany didn't start WW2 because they were poor (as Tooze argued), they started it because they were rich enough to try to crush the existing world order, if they were richer, the probability of winning increased and the incentives of going to war also increased.

Germany didn't start WW2 to get more resources, I think that thesis is wrong now, the capture of natural resources was part of Germany's strategy due to the country's relative poverty in terms of natural resources. Germany started WW2 aiming for the gold. What is the gold? Global supremacy. That was the same goal of Napoleon, Alexander and other cases in history. Usually they fail because the existing world order is though and adaptable, as many countries tend to help the existing maintainers of the status quo. In WW2, for instance, Allied victory required the USSR and the USA. Britain and France, the superpowers of the old order were defeated by Germany in 1940. :P

In other words: wars broke out when there exists a great discrepancy between the countries respective power in the world order and their potential. If WW3 between China and the Western World brokes out, it would not be because China doesn't have resources, but because China has enough resources to challenge the existing world order. :x

This is off topic, but you started it. :D
"In tactics, as in strategy, superiority in numbers is the most common element of victory." - Carl von Clausewitz

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Re: Why was Germany short on oil?

#105

Post by Jon G. » 18 Feb 2011, 06:09

Guaporense wrote: [Snip baloney]
This is off topic, but you started it. :D
No, you started it by making a facile remark that Germany would have consumed 100 million tons of oil/year if only they had had the supply. Which is like saying that if I had 20 fingers instead of 10, I would type twice as fast: it might be true, but there is no way of verifying it, and, more importantly, it doesn't add anything to the discussion.

As for the rest of your post, I can't be bothered. Your theories are universally idiotic, and in this case, they are off-topic, too. Just as you said.

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