The Germans increase Panzer production in the Summer of 1940

[Aida1]

I think we've lost something with Guderian.

Actually Guderian is very relevant as his memorandum in 1943 adresses the real issue . You need more tanks but not more Pz Div.

I'm out

Silly comment. The real issue is deciding how many Pz you want in a Pz Div, how many pz Div you want for the mission that is theirs and then you need to produce enough tanks and spare parts to equip them and sustain them given the losses you will have. From that viewpoint Germany certainly needed more production of tanks and spare parts in 1940. The end result was a seriously diminished panzer force by 1942 as production was not enough to replace the losses and in spite of that new divisions were set up. Guderian had to adress that issue in the beginning of 1943 and made some sound proposals The reasoning behind these would have been relevant in 1940 too.

It is the opposite :the real issues are
1 how many tanks and spare parts can you produce , how many crew can you train ( FYI : tanks without crew are useless )
2 what are your options ( choices or forced options )
3 is the present tank division composition satisfying ? ( the answer in 1940 was negative )
4 if your choice implies the need of more PzD ( what it was,Barbarossa or no Barbarossa ) and you can't produce more tanks and there is no need for more tanks,the conclusion is very simple : more mobile units with less tanks .
5 Guderian did not complain in 1941 that his PzD did not have 400 tanks each ( it was the half ) ,thus he had no reason to propose tank divisions of 400 tanks after Stalingrad .
6 There was no need for such divisions, there was no possibility for such divisions and such divisions would be suicidal : NO ONE had tank divisions with 400 tank after August 1941 ,thus why should Germany have such divisions ?
7 After Stalingrad Germany did not need more tanks, but more motorized artillery .

Wrong. You start by working out a strategy and what is required to implement it. Then it needs to be determined whether it is possible to supply these requirements and this depends also on the global allocation of resources between the different components of the armed forces and the civilian economy.
Guderian is far more component than you to judge how many tanks a Pz Div needed to be a Pz Div in the true sense of the word. Germany needed not more Pz Div starting with the end of Barbarossa. It needed to make the existing ones stronger and use them only in their proper role. His memorandum in 1943 was essentially correct.

[ljadw]

1 You do not start by working out a strategy and than looking what is required,
2 The requirements from Guderian were impossible ro supply .

[Aida1]

1 You do not start by working out a strategy and than looking what is required,
2 The requirements from Guderian were impossible ro supply .

1) Ridiculous as that is the only way to know what the needs are.
2) Difficult but not impossible. Even Guderian was aware of that

[Richard Anderson]

Now we're onto the fifth page of "poopy pants!" versus "no, you're poopy pants!", but Guderian will save the day. Amazing addition to the deep research and analysis of this subject.

[Aida1]

Now we're onto the fifth page of "poopy pants!" versus "no, you're poopy pants!", but Guderian will save the day. Amazing addition to the deep research and analysis of this subject.

When you talk about more tanks then one inevitably ends up with discussing Guderian for whom user ljadw has an intense irrational hatred.

[TheMarcksPlan]

This thread contains a lot of good research and analysis. Sad to see it become the transcript of a freestyle rap battle in the dementia ward.

[Richard Anderson]

This thread contains a lot of good research and analysis. Sad to see it become the transcript of a freestyle rap battle in the dementia ward.

Happy that every once in a while we can still agree.

[Terry Duncan]

Can people please try to avoid making comments about other posters, it will only degenerate and may come to the attention of senior staff who take a dim view of such behaviour. As to opinion posts or posts with little to no actual content, you can always ignore them, no matter how tempting they are to reply to.

Terry

[historygeek2021]

The great equalizer was agriculture: in the UK it employed 925,000 - 1,048,000 people during the war, whereas in Germany it employed 10,687,000 - 11,301,000 people.

What about raw materials production? Germany had to employ a substantial portion of its labor and capital goods in producing synthetic raw materials, whereas Britain could rely on labor in its colonies to harvest them and import them. Other than domestic coal mining, how much of the domestic British economy did the "raw materials" sector take up?

Also, how much did Britain have to export? Germany had to devote a considerable portion of its economy to exports in order to obtain raw materials, whereas Britain could dominate trade with its colonies and obtain raw material imports for much cheaper.

And of course, Britain could obtain imports from the United States under lend-lease without upfront payment.

[ljadw]

During the war,most of British raw materials were produced at home .To save MV capacity.

[historygeek2021]

German weapons spending by sector.png

This thread focused on the proportion of weapons production by sector, but I think people were confused between weapons spending and overall armaments spending. Weapons spending was only a subset of overall armaments spending. To get the breakdown of overall armaments spending by sector, this is the chart you want:

German spending by sector.png

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id= ... up&seq=196

[TheMarcksPlan]

Revisited Tooze's Wages of Destruction recently, found this quote:

As we have seen, authorized profits under the existing guidelines were not in fact calculated as a percentage of costs, but as a percentage of capital employed.43

Re upthread discussion of German failure to use multiple shifts in panzer (and other) production, this could explain much industrialist behavior.

Profits determined by % of capital employed could mean no increase in profit if, using the same capital (machine tools and other plant), a firm produces more with more labor in more shifts. Depending on the details of the contractual scheme, more production may imply increased overhead and recurring costs (e.g. electricity) for no or negative marginal benefit (to the firm).

Details will depend on contract specifics; maybe I'll get my hands on actual contracts one day and improve my German sufficiently to interpret contract provisions.

This thread focused on the proportion of weapons production by sector, but I think people were confused between weapons spending and overall armaments spending.

I certainly was confused by this, later reached your conclusion.

I remain confused about the definitions of "weapons" vs. ammo. Particularly in the naval context, it can't be that Germany spent so much on naval weapons unless torpedoes and mines are included under weapons instead of ammo. But then is an aerial torpedo a weapon and an aerial bomb ammunition (LW ammo spending makes no sense unless it includes bombs, even with Flak ammo)?

Anyone have any insights?

[ljadw]

German weapons spending by sector.png

This thread focused on the proportion of weapons production by sector, but I think people were confused between weapons spending and overall armaments spending. Weapons spending was only a subset of overall armaments spending. To get the breakdown of overall armaments spending by sector, this is the chart you want:

German spending by sector.png

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id= ... up&seq=196

Wagenführ as source ?

[Natter]

AFHRA = Air Force Historical Research Agency...home of the numbered USAAF/AF studies and the von Rohden collection of Luftwaffe documents, some of them online

Are you sure about this, do you have any references?

Attached is the answer I got from AFHRA after an inquery about the Van Rohden collection:

[Richard Anderson]

AFHRA = Air Force Historical Research Agency...home of the numbered USAAF/AF studies and the von Rohden collection of Luftwaffe documents, some of them online

Are you sure about this, do you have any references?

Attached is the answer I got from AFHRA after an inquery about the Van Rohden collection:

I should have been more specific. The Numbered Historical Studies are on the AFHRA website. https://www.afhra.af.mil/Information/St ... l-Studies/. The German papers in the Numbered Studies were largely derived from the Von Rohden collection, which was originally at Karlsruhe before moving to Maxwell sometime in the 1950s/1960s? They were microfilmed and then deposited with the NARA, which I believe then returned the German originals to Germany, where I imagine they are now held by BAMA. In any case, the microfilms - not always of the highest quality - are at Maxwell/AFHRA and have been digitized as PDFs. They just don't call them that any more I guess? Somewhere I have the link to the online finding aid...I have to go for a couple of hours but will see if I can find it later.

Okay, here its http://airforcehistoryindex.org/ Note the site is not affiliated with the USAF, but it is about the only records index for Maxwell I'm aware of other than going there. You can search - for example Rohden - and you get 11 hits. Then if you got and hit the PDF symbol for each, you get an index card with all the information you need to order copies from AFHRA. Luftwaffe yields 582 hits. Last time I ordered docs they just sent me a CD with the microfilm roll the document was in, so it included a bunch of other stuff as well. IIRC they didn't charge me for it either. Note however the PDF of the microfilms vary in quality and can be quite hard to read. They are also not well indexed and the index card for the roll is at the end of the PDF and was usually pretty perfunctory.