German mega defense

[Destroyer500]

Why shouldn't I take it seriously, since you are the one who raised the notion that a conspiracy might explain why the Japanese report was incorrect?

Thinking out loud is fine, and we all do it, but don't get in a huff if someone reacts to it. I can only analyze what you write down, since I can't read minds.

I knew youd say this.Well youre right and i said the same to myself but lets just leave it behind because at this point it aint going nowhere.

What "missile theme"? The Germans never developed a practical antiaircraft missile system and neither did the Japanese, so whatever "missile theme" there might be is irrelevant to wartime antiaircraft defense.

Yes they did not exist but ive tried to somewhat make a mix between guns and missiles for defensive and offensive purposes and ive wrote a giant paragraph about it.I mostly want you to challenge it.

[Richard Anderson]

Yes they did not exist but ive tried to somewhat make a mix between guns and missiles for defensive and offensive purposes and ive wrote a giant paragraph about it.I mostly want you to challenge it.

Why should I take the time and effort to challenge something that did not exist and could not exist?

[Destroyer500]

Actually, it is possible to build a missile system that is difficult to impossible to jam. For example, you use more than one acquisition radars on dispersed frequencies making it hard to jam all of them. Add in higher power for 'burn through' and the plane(s) can't carry powerful enough jammers. Then you can use radar systems that are difficult to jam by their operation such as a monopulse beam and using a beam riding missile. Many early SAMs used this sort of system (British Thunderbird, Swiss RBC, as two examples) for just that reason.

Another is to use a system that doesn't make the target aware it is under attack. Nike and Talos could do this to one degree or another. Both guided the missile in flight to the target using a separate radar that tracked and guided the missile only on a ballistic flight path. This was mostly done to make the flight energy efficient to give greater range. But it also meant that the target didn't know it was being engaged as the target illumination radar didn't have to paint it until the missile was terminal. Another advantage of this system was the missile engaged the target from above, not below, as it was falling on it in a ballistic flight path.

The biggest advantage of missiles is engagement time. For guns, their engagement time is very short, minutes at most. So, they have to be placed close to potential targets or in locations the enemy aircraft must fly over. Missiles on the other hand have ranges anywhere from tens to hundreds of miles and can engage aircraft for much longer periods of time.
This means you are potentially shooting down aircraft after aircraft and more batteries of missiles can engage the enemy while the batteries themselves can be better dispersed to cover more potential targets.

Of course, you might also put an ARM (Anti-Radiation Missile eg., radar homing missile) that homes on jamming or radar the plane is carrying in the mix. Cross-coupling the radar information between batteries would also make things more difficult for the attacker. Here, one battery is jammed but can use radar from another battery that isn't to track and fire on targets.

It really isn't the radar that's the weak spot in all this, it is the range and time of engagement. For guns, the practical limits are out to maybe 6 to 10 miles and about 35,000 feet with the time of engagement getting shorter as altitude and speed of the aircraft goes up. As the late 1950's- early 60's BOMARC SAM shows for a missile it's possible to get one that can engage targets to 80,000+ feet at ranges of well over 200 miles.

The result is that your SAM screen can be well forward of any potential targets and engage enemy bombers for an extended period. Since losses on the order of 6 to 10% are prohibitive, achieving those is far more doable with a guided missile than any gun. Once you make losses prohibitive--that is the attacker can't replace the losses as fast as they are occurring and the cost is to high to sustain production at--that means the attacker will have to radically change tactics and / or equipment to overcome those losses and reduce them.

You seem to know a lot of things about that kind of tech.Modern missiles can surely do a lot but the thing is what was available back then.Ive read almost the entire Flak Alone Blasts Allies Out Off The Sky and the people there never reached a conclusion about weather there were good operational SAM systems in Germany of the time and if they could have developed in advance something.Thats why i proposed some very simple version were the missiles just fly upwards and try to explode near bombers.That would require a big enough explosion though to deal any damage.It would be a very braindead missile flak like system but thats something that on a V1 (and a bit bigger) scale could at least be amased.

[Destroyer500]

Why should I take the time and effort to challenge something that did not exist and could not exist?

If thats how you see it then ok i accept it

[T. A. Gardner]

You seem to know a lot of things about that kind of tech.Modern missiles can surely do a lot but the thing is what was available back then.Ive read almost the entire Flak Alone Blasts Allies Out Off The Sky and the people there never reached a conclusion about weather there were good operational SAM systems in Germany of the time and if they could have developed in advance something.Thats why i proposed some very simple version were the missiles just fly upwards and try to explode near bombers.That would require a big enough explosion though to deal any damage.It would be a very braindead missile flak like system but thats something that on a V1 (and a bit bigger) scale could at least be amased.

The Germans never reached having an operational SAM system. The closest they came was with the Bachem Ba 249 Natter. Yes, the Natter is for all intents, a manned SAM system where the pilot is the fire control system. The Natter launched vertically and was steered by autopilot to within visual range of the target. The pilot then took over and performed the final close with the target and launched the rockets that were to shoot the target down.
The Natter was then steered into a dive where the engine would separate for recovery and the pilot would bail out, parachuting to the ground. The engine was intended for reuse, along with the pilot.

[Destroyer500]

The Germans never reached having an operational SAM system. The closest they came was with the Bachem Ba 249 Natter. Yes, the Natter is for all intents, a manned SAM system where the pilot is the fire control system. The Natter launched vertically and was steered by autopilot to within visual range of the target. The pilot then took over and performed the final close with the target and launched the rockets that were to shoot the target down.
The Natter was then steered into a dive where the engine would separate for recovery and the pilot would bail out, parachuting to the ground. The engine was intended for reuse, along with the pilot.

That thing was a joke.It killed the first test pilot and was immediatly canceled.If more testing was done and some higher quality materials were used it may have somewhat worked but its already too late by 1945 to do anything but pray a meteorite rain shoots down all B17s in existence

[T. A. Gardner]

That thing was a joke.It killed the first test pilot and was immediatly canceled.If more testing was done and some higher quality materials were used it may have somewhat worked but its already too late by 1945 to do anything but pray a meteorite rain shoots down all B17s in existence

It was dangerous but it wasn't a joke. The Germans made several successful launches with a pilot, and recoveries, along with a number of unmanned launches that were successful. As a SAM it would have worked, but how well is open to question. It certainly could have been launched on a bomber formation and it's likely a successful intercept could have been made some of the time. What sort of kill probability is open to question, but even at a 10% success rate it would have made the system worthwhile. That would be far better than relying on flak alone.
I would think a single Natter site getting say 1 to 3 kills while in range of a bomber formation could be expected. Pilot loss due to injury or death would likely be 30 to 50%, but if the Germans accepted that the system would work.

[Peter89]

If we take a look at the German rocket programs, they put their best minds and resources behind offensive weapons and not behind defensive weapons. The same idea prevailed through the whole development field. This is a common ww2 fallacy; Germany didn't choose to defend, it was forced to defend. And even then, they often attacked with incredibly pathetic means, like when they "attacked the Soviet industry". These weapon systems required years to be developed, and Germany didn't realize its grave situation before 1943. There was simply no time to develop new defensive technologies from scratch.

Also... if the Germans would be more successful in defending the Reich's airspace with AA/SAM that would mean they'd send their air units to the peripheries. Every fifth of the new planes would crash in ferry flight...

Again I doubt that if Harris didn't ruin German cities the war lasted any longer.

[Destroyer500]

It was dangerous but it wasn't a joke. The Germans made several successful launches with a pilot, and recoveries, along with a number of unmanned launches that were successful. As a SAM it would have worked, but how well is open to question. It certainly could have been launched on a bomber formation and it's likely a successful intercept could have been made some of the time. What sort of kill probability is open to question, but even at a 10% success rate it would have made the system worthwhile. That would be far better than relying on flak alone.
I would think a single Natter site getting say 1 to 3 kills while in range of a bomber formation could be expected. Pilot loss due to injury or death would likely be 30 to 50%, but if the Germans accepted that the system would work.

Unless it came a lot earlier and had higher probabilty of working then i personaly wouldnt consider it.In 1945 its already too late for anything but something like nukes to save them

[Destroyer500]

If we take a look at the German rocket programs, they put their best minds and resources behind offensive weapons and not behind defensive weapons. The same idea prevailed through the whole development field. This is a common ww2 fallacy; Germany didn't choose to defend, it was forced to defend. And even then, they often attacked with incredibly pathetic means, like when they "attacked the Soviet industry". These weapon systems required years to be developed, and Germany didn't realize its grave situation before 1943. There was simply no time to develop new defensive technologies from scratch.

Also... if the Germans would be more successful in defending the Reich's airspace with AA/SAM that would mean they'd send their air units to the peripheries. Every fifth of the new planes would crash in ferry flight...

Again I doubt that if Harris didn't ruin German cities the war lasted any longer.

They were confident at first and sucess was what they were getting.Barbarossa ruined them.The best choise would be taking N Africa and the Middle East and knocking Britain out resource wise.Then even if the UK didnt surrender a better and most propably sucessfull Barbarosa would occur.Offense isnt bad as long as you dont lose momentum and as long as you can continiou doing it.
Im not proposing that they wake up in 43 and say "Well time for defense" but rather put all those minds and resources from the time the new goverment takes control to make a countrywide defense possible but Maginot Line like.Of course some anexes and maybe an invasion will happen here and there but as carefully as possible.If Britain is pulled in then playing def till they dont want to take more loses will be the only option.

[T. A. Gardner]

If we take a look at the German rocket programs, they put their best minds and resources behind offensive weapons and not behind defensive weapons. The same idea prevailed through the whole development field. This is a common ww2 fallacy; Germany didn't choose to defend, it was forced to defend. And even then, they often attacked with incredibly pathetic means, like when they "attacked the Soviet industry". These weapon systems required years to be developed, and Germany didn't realize its grave situation before 1943. There was simply no time to develop new defensive technologies from scratch.

Also... if the Germans would be more successful in defending the Reich's airspace with AA/SAM that would mean they'd send their air units to the peripheries. Every fifth of the new planes would crash in ferry flight...

Again I doubt that if Harris didn't ruin German cities the war lasted any longer.

I would say that it likely would have been possible for the Germans to deploy a very basic SAM late in the war if their efforts in that field were more coordinated than they were. If early on in the programs they had they'd chosen one or two of the most promising and pushed forward with those as simple beam riders with command detonation they might well have gotten one system into limited deployment by the end of the war.

[ThatZenoGuy]

Nice pictures man,is that mechanism there to help you lift the shell or what ?

If it's like any other loading assist, you and a buddy lift the huge shell onto the tray, and it loads it into the gun for you. Basically saves you 60%+ of the effort.
Lifting something? Not excessively hard.
Manhandling a giant shell into a weird position and shoving it into a breech? Hard!

[Peter89]

If we take a look at the German rocket programs, they put their best minds and resources behind offensive weapons and not behind defensive weapons. The same idea prevailed through the whole development field. This is a common ww2 fallacy; Germany didn't choose to defend, it was forced to defend. And even then, they often attacked with incredibly pathetic means, like when they "attacked the Soviet industry". These weapon systems required years to be developed, and Germany didn't realize its grave situation before 1943. There was simply no time to develop new defensive technologies from scratch.

Also... if the Germans would be more successful in defending the Reich's airspace with AA/SAM that would mean they'd send their air units to the peripheries. Every fifth of the new planes would crash in ferry flight...

Again I doubt that if Harris didn't ruin German cities the war lasted any longer.

They were confident at first and sucess was what they were getting.Barbarossa ruined them.The best choise would be taking N Africa and the Middle East and knocking Britain out resource wise.Then even if the UK didnt surrender a better and most propably sucessfull Barbarosa would occur.Offense isnt bad as long as you dont lose momentum and as long as you can continiou doing it.
Im not proposing that they wake up in 43 and say "Well time for defense" but rather put all those minds and resources from the time the new goverment takes control to make a countrywide defense possible but Maginot Line like.Of course some anexes and maybe an invasion will happen here and there but as carefully as possible.If Britain is pulled in then playing def till they dont want to take more loses will be the only option.

The more I study the subject, the more I believe it is a literary invention based on a few snaps from Mussolini, Raeder and a few others who had little to no understanding of the strategic situation.

First of all, the North African and Middle Eastern theatre was not a very good place for Germany to fight Britain. Logistics and other military items are just one thing, but in reality the whole area was hardly kept under control and experienced a population boom that lasts to this very day. And the indication that the German alignment was better than the British or French would not last long either; there were serious signs that these countries craved independence and not another colonial overlord. It is also questionable whether Germany did or did not possess the capability to project power on the wrong side of the sea, and the answer is probably no. And wartime Germany was in no position to placate these nations with good trade offers; let alone to develop them. Hitler (and half the Orientkenner diplomats) was all but hesitant to give full support for Arab nationalism. They saw it as a tool to weaken the British (they did the same with India in WW1).

Second, there were no raw materials in the NA / ME that would knock the British out of the war. In fact it was Churchill's decision to give battle to the Axis in this region because he realized this is an ideal battleground for the British / Commonwealth forces and a nightmare to the Axis forces. Interservice cooperation, logistics and a keen diplomatic touch were all the weak points of the Axis and the strong points of the British. It is also very much likely that the British sacrificed a disproportionate amount of forces (naval forces included) to maintain their positions in the theater, so if the British lose the MTO, they most likely don't lose Singapore and the Japanese could hardly break into the Indian Ocean.

In my opinion (consistent with many historians like Citino) the German army would continue to attack until ten past midnight, until it exhausted itself. They did this in every campaign (sometimes victory came sooner than exhaustion). They never really gave a thought about good management and rationalization. If they would allocate resources to something, it would be offense (even in the form of retrbution) and not defense.

[Peter89]

If we take a look at the German rocket programs, they put their best minds and resources behind offensive weapons and not behind defensive weapons. The same idea prevailed through the whole development field. This is a common ww2 fallacy; Germany didn't choose to defend, it was forced to defend. And even then, they often attacked with incredibly pathetic means, like when they "attacked the Soviet industry". These weapon systems required years to be developed, and Germany didn't realize its grave situation before 1943. There was simply no time to develop new defensive technologies from scratch.

Also... if the Germans would be more successful in defending the Reich's airspace with AA/SAM that would mean they'd send their air units to the peripheries. Every fifth of the new planes would crash in ferry flight...

Again I doubt that if Harris didn't ruin German cities the war lasted any longer.

I would say that it likely would have been possible for the Germans to deploy a very basic SAM late in the war if their efforts in that field were more coordinated than they were. If early on in the programs they had they'd chosen one or two of the most promising and pushed forward with those as simple beam riders with command detonation they might well have gotten one system into limited deployment by the end of the war.

I've heard about these project from you for the first time about a good year ago. Since then I looked into the matter, and correct me if I'm wrong, but they needed at least a year or so more to develop them into useful solutions. And given that in mid-1944 the game was already over in other aspects of the war, I doubt that anything fruitful would come out of this without a major alteration in the course of events.

[Destroyer500]

The more I study the subject, the more I believe it is a literary invention based on a few snaps from Mussolini, Raeder and a few others who had little to no understanding of the strategic situation.

First of all, the North African and Middle Eastern theatre was not a very good place for Germany to fight Britain. Logistics and other military items are just one thing, but in reality the whole area was hardly kept under control and experienced a population boom that lasts to this very day. And the indication that the German alignment was better than the British or French would not last long either; there were serious signs that these countries craved independence and not another colonial overlord. It is also questionable whether Germany did or did not possess the capability to project power on the wrong side of the sea, and the answer is probably no. And wartime Germany was in no position to placate these nations with good trade offers; let alone to develop them. Hitler (and half the Orientkenner diplomats) was all but hesitant to give full support for Arab nationalism. They saw it as a tool to weaken the British (they did the same with India in WW1).

Second, there were no raw materials in the NA / ME that would knock the British out of the war. In fact it was Churchill's decision to give battle to the Axis in this region because he realized this is an ideal battleground for the British / Commonwealth forces and a nightmare to the Axis forces. Interservice cooperation, logistics and a keen diplomatic touch were all the weak points of the Axis and the strong points of the British. It is also very much likely that the British sacrificed a disproportionate amount of forces (naval forces included) to maintain their positions in the theater, so if the British lose the MTO, they most likely don't lose Singapore and the Japanese could hardly break into the Indian Ocean.

In my opinion (consistent with many historians like Citino) the German army would continue to attack until ten past midnight, until it exhausted itself. They did this in every campaign (sometimes victory came sooner than exhaustion). They never really gave a thought about good management and rationalization. If they would allocate resources to something, it would be offense (even in the form of retrbution) and not defense.

Many people on the internet and this forum have discussed the N.A.,M.E. campaign posibilty and even though its not a walk in park it definitely is better than Barbarossa and helps make Germany a lot stronger.Ocupation forces wouldnt be that much of a problem and in the end the hardest part would be sea supply lines due to the British navy.But the British navy is not god and lets not forget that the Italian navy although not an equal to the RN had no fuel to do its job,in this scenario this changes.A sucessfull ME and NA campaign secoures the oil the Axis needs and possibly brings Tourkey to the play,supply line can also be built through the Balkans and Greece.Then if a Russian campaign is to comence Baku can be grabed in a far easier manner and possibly from the start of that said campaign and if they do get it selling some oil to the Japs would be possible.Japan then could maybe coordinate better with its European allies and open a third front in a future Russian campaign.
Of course im not going to write 1000 pages of why this can happen,if the axis that almost won at Russia cant win over some ill equiped Arabs and British early one then what can they do ? I think that people in this forum underestimate Germany of the 40s too much.Even with that funny Africa Korps of theirs they were really sucessfull and if Rommel had what he needed far far earlier then what stops Egypt from falling ?
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