Battle of Britain II

Do you mean the difference between the civilian American FAA and the military radar pointed at an enemy recognized as such? The drug smugglers are taking advantage of a system designed to control commercial flights, not to track enemy attack. A complete different set of objectives. Mexico isn't likely to attack the USA with flights of bombers or fighters, neither is Canada. The old DEW line pretty much covered the Northern Hemisphere from attack by the Soviets.

This "drug smuggling" low flying planes is one of the "gaps" in our defensive air monitoring, but hardly without being able to be understood. Unless one is focused on flaws of civilian air monitoring rather than the obvious possibility of the same system in a military situation. At one time the USA had "offshore" islands much like offshore drilling rigs which were devoted to only sea level radar coverage during the "cold war". When the satellite observation and "down-looking" radar became more efficient, the offshore radars off the US coasts were abandoned.

 

Oh, nearly forgot...

At it's height Castle Bromwich, the largest Spitfire factory, was producing 320 aircraft per month - or ~ten a day It produced over half the Spitfires manufactured, 12,129 out of 20,351...or 59%. So if we factor in 41% production elsewhere, or another 4 per day....

That makes a total of 14 Spitfires a day.

Max Beaverbrook formed and Lord Nuffield ran the Civilian Repair Organisation, a group of 43 small aircraft and automotive companies, repaired or reassembled some 79,000 aircraft during the war - for example, 36.5% (3,285) of all (UK) Heavies issued in 1944 were sent to units from the CRO.

So, if you take an average day's number of new builds...14....and then ADD In another ~37% as being damaged aircraft returned to full operational service by the CRO OUTSIDE the RAF chain...that brings the number up to - virtually TWENTY A DAY entering service!

That's round about a full operational squadron roster-worth of Spitfires, including spare aircraft...every day....

 

This thread is getting better every day. I hope our asker is still following along...
phylo: How many trained pilots come along with 20 Spits/day?

 

Radar chains are not always effective, in 1968 NATO radars failed to detect the massive build up to the Czech "invasion".

But let's look at it from an attrition standpoint.
- Planes: The soviets, contrary to the 1940 Germans, are very good at mass producing weapons, British factories, that are likely to be bombed as well, cannot keep up, add in Canadian and US factories and it becomes a very different story-.
- Pilots: We must assume the British will get a lot of "volunteer" highly trained pilots from occupied Europe, including Germans, Galland will finally get his Spitfire squadron , the Commowealth and the US, unlikely the Soviets will get the advantage there.
- Fuel: Even with bases in the Biscay Bay I doubt the Soviets will be more effective than the Germans at blockading he British Isles, their sub fleet is still small at the scenario dates and even if the Iran and Iraq oil fields are lost, as is likely, Soviets are already in Iran and Iraq is at the end of a logistical nightmare, they are not as critical as they would be today.



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This is something I'm not aware of...by 1945 at least, I only have some knowledge of the 1940 situation - and of course by the end of the war, the training of pilots and aircrew in the UK, Canada, and the Empire was a HUGE going concern compared to the Empire Flying Schools just getting into the swingh of things in 1940.

HOWEVER - there are a number of things that the British can do, and quickly -

1/ comb out the HUGE establishment of Bomber Command for pilots; this was done inn 1940, although not to as great an extent as could have been done...because Bomber COmmand was performing sterling service nargebusting and attacking the German buildup.

2/ By 1945-6 however there's another reservoir of pilots available to the RAF - the thousands of pilots in Coastal Command!

3/ AND there's the hundreds of transport aircrew, glider tug aircraft aircrew, target tug crew.....

4/ and don't forget the Fleet Air Arm!

And of course - this IS 1946.....

How many demobbed pilots get recalled from reserve status???

 

THAT depends on -

A/ the Russians actually knowing AND destroying ALL the factories and shadow factories, and...

B/ the daily rate of attrition of RAF aircraft

Yes it does - as in what happens if the U.S. decides to assign the thousands of combat aircraft that never left CONUS during the war to the new ETO???

...while the defenders of the UK will have the same resource they had in 1940 and through the war - the U.S., and the British holdings in Venezuela.

 

Oh my gosh what wonderful information. Thank you all so much. This discussion is wonderful.

I don't have the time to night to pose more questions but I can allay some sticking points possibly.

The US is not in the picture for other reasons. Western Europe up to the Pyrenees mountains of Spain is in the Soviets hands without much of a fight. If you're interested in how this has played out you can read my blog.

World War III 1946

So I would rather not get into that discussion here.

The issue will not be trained pilots. There were thousands available. I would suggest that the issue will indeed be planes. By May 1946 90% of the US and British production had been converted civilian use. Machine tools, buildings, production lines etc. when from Centurians and B29s to Triumphs and Buicks. In our time frame of three months how much of that industrial capacity be physically and economically transformed back to full time war production. More importantly how much time would be wasted convincing the capitalist owners to once again make the switch and this time with no hope of ever getting paid back. How many factory owners, importers, coal mine operators etc. are going to slit their own throat economically, once again, without first putting up quite a delaying action?

Basically every British firm in existence is more than broke. How could this possibly be fixed in 3 months? Would on May 3rd the US mint start packing up the gold in Fort Knox and ship some to London? Would within days shipyards start pulling freighters out of mothballs to ship the needed resources to Britain from Canada, India (which is in rebellion), Saudi? How many freighters could you have up and running from a mothball state in 3 months?

I would suggest that both the US and Britain would be stuck with what they had in the way of aircraft inventory at the start of hostilities. That the RAF would have approximately 1400 front line fighters and that within weeks of facing up to 10,000 Red Air Force front line air craft, the skies would be swept clean.

This is quite frankly the scenario that the JCS faced and planned for in 1946. Their solution was to cut and run and then bomb them back to the stone age. Every study done predicted that the RAF would last a matter of weeks.

Besides outproducing the Soviets how else would you try and mitigate this outcome in favor of the RAF?

 

This is bunk, and not even decent alternative history. The Soviets would face (in reality) too many walls and logistical impediments to do what you propose. Including Stalin himself. Their air forces were second rate at best compared to their former allies, and their homeland too open to bombing from the west. It ain't gonna fly no matter how you try to morph this scene to the advantage of the Soviets. Let it go.

 

To each his own. I'm having a blast and so are many others. There has been no factual reason anything I have proposed could not have happened. You and a few others have different opinions but that's all they are...opinions. I disagree with your opinions.

If you don't like it then don't participate and let it go.

 

I would suggest that if I were the Soviets I would love to meet the RAF over France or the Channel. The whole point of BOBII from the Soviet side is to destroy the RAF not to actually bomb Britain. Stalin realizes that he cannot hope to invade Britain but he cannot allow it to be used as a base for attacks either. Meeting the V-VS over the Channel would seem to not be a good move as it would negate your AA and their VT fuse.

From what I'm reading the VT fuse was very effective. Would you not want to shoot the Reds down using the AA guns and save your pilots from an uneven fight where they would lose a war of attrition? I would fight them all the way using flak traps and my AA to even the odds.

Any ideas as to what might be the SOP for such a fight?

Another question on radar and low altitude. The US and others developed the B58 Hustler. When the Soviets developed a working SAM they were to be used at ultra low level.

Was the Soviet radar of 1960s so much worse than the RAF radar of the 1940s that the US still thought they could survive better at low level?

 

How many P-51's and F4_U's did the US have that could at least by way of Iceland self ferry from the US to Britain. Then there's all those Hellcat's that can be delivered by how many aircraft carriers? That should take care of the short term.

 

I suspect that the interim approach to Soviet radar was decided by the fact that it is very (if not impossible) to bring AA to focus and target on a very high speed bomber at low level and which was under the strike range of the existing SAM missiles. The guns cannot track and find a solution in time, and the missiles cannot function at that level. This still has nothing to do with the direct post war era being discussed.

 

Even in the "what if" section we must use existing tech for the period. If we don't, we can end up with; "what if the Klingons had time-warped back to the far side of the moon and helped Hitler?"

 

I haven't looked up the other fighters that could have been called upon to help defend the British Isles, other than the mentioned squadrons of P-80 jets in Germany. That said I did find this on the Mustang:

The P-51 was designed as the NA-73 in 1940 at Britain's request. The design showed promise, and AAF purchases of Allison-powered Mustangs began in 1941, primarily for photo recon and ground support use due to its limited high-altitude performance. But in 1942, tests of P-51s using the British Rolls-Royce "Merlin" engine revealed much improved speed and service ceiling, and in December 1943 Merlin-powered P-51Bs first entered combat over Europe. Providing high-altitude escort to B-17s and B-24s, they scored heavily over German interceptors, and by war's end, P-51s had destroyed 4,950 enemy aircraft in the air, more than any other fighter in Europe.

Mustangs served in nearly every combat zone, including the Pacific where they escorted B-29s to Japan from Iwo Jima. Between 1941 and 1945, the AAF ordered 14,855 Mustangs (including A-36A dive bomber and F-6 photo recon versions), of which 7,956 were P-51Ds.


Goto:


Factsheets : North American P-51

Of course there were losses of Mustangs in combat, but if the SU had been aggressive toward the west, neither their production nor the production of other fighters, bombers, and other planes would have been curtailed as it was historically when the Soviet Union began the consolidation their power in their "sphere of influence".

 

We're talking 3 months time. And the scenario I'm proposing the US is busy with it's own plans and does not have the P51 etc. to spare at this time. As stated before the Brits are on their own with what they had or will have in 3 months from the start of hostilities.

There were a few P51s in use by the RAF in our time frame.

 

How high speed are we talking? How fast is too fast to track?

 

What have I proposed that is not existing tech?

 

Again the P80s and most of the Mustangs are not available. It's the RAF vs V-VS.

The Soviets did nothing in this scenario that they did not do in real life up until May 1946 as far as troops movements etc.. I would have them working on more weapon types in secret but no other military moves beside what they historically did. They were very aggressive in real life but Truman could not stop the demobilization. He tried and the troops rioted. Again if you want to know the premise please go to the blog.

I really would like to stay on subject. What could the RAF and Brits do to save their skies from being swept clean in a matter of weeks with the weapons and number of weapons I have described?

 

The P-80s and Mustangs were already stationed in the American zone of the divided Germany by 1946, and I think the French were also supplied with American fighters as well. It simply wouldn't be RAF vs V-VS, there is no way you can make it so.