The Luftwaffe and "four engined" bombers

Imagine the Luftwaffe with a force of say 800 four engined heavies, and they are protected with 20mm and 13mm cannon, and had them available by the time Operation Alder took place, also instead of these aircraft operating at 15,000 feet they operated at 28,000 feet and began using their twin engined bombers by day at 15,000 feet and using their four engined heavies at night at 28,000 feet.

The tatic could be that targets like ports, airfields and transport hubs worth be attacked my the mediums, and targets like heavy industry be attacked with carpet bombing at night, Germany's version of round the clock bombing.

It ain't perfect but it could have worked with forward planning, starting say in 1935 or 1936.

 

Given the historic resources ~ 1200 Ju-89 could be built from 1939 to 1940, but this should sustain a force of ~ 400 servicable bombers for fall 1940. If the Germans hold off magnetic mines until stockpiles build up, then by fall of 1940 they could have had 10,000 mines with maybe 1/2 air delivered types. Then in a consentrated compaign roughly 1/3 of the bombers could unload several of the mines each night to each British port. When first released these mines resulted in one ship sunk for every two dozen sown. So this translates into roughly 20 british ships sunk every day. If those are merchant ships thats roughly 100,000 tons shipping lost per day for up to 10 days, due to these bomber delivered mines alone.

Historically monthly bombing rates for LW were only seeing 500 sortie against shipping of which 3/4 were mine delieveries. From this site we can see 151 ships sunk by mines from April to Dec 1940 or about 19 ships lost per month to mines. During that period 878 ships were lost of which airpower accounted for 1/5 of those. So losses to other means were roughly ~90 . Combined air and other attacks could result in 290 ships sunk in a month or 1.5 million tons shipping.

NAVAL-HISTORY.NET

 

I think a large fleet of Fw-200's based in France would have had an impact on the war. I think KP put out some numbers on the amount of war material that an average cargo ship carries in their holds.

If the airforce and navy could have cooperated then anti shipping strikes by air and sub would have hurt the UK and ships going to northern Russia as well as the Med. theatre of operations.

Also they would have had to beef up the Fw-200 structure as I have seen lots of pictures of them with broken backs.

US anti shipping strikes by air and sub really hurt the Japanese during the war.

 

well TA first the KM and the LW needed to get rid of some big named personell, and then it could co-operate as a solid team together something of which they never did, due to pride and ego's

 

Anyway u slice it they just didn't have the resources to develop a 4 engined bomber force a close to the Allies numbers. Developing and manufacturing those bombers would have taken up the same material and man power as the fighters defending German soil.

They'd be better off building 262's.

As far as the U.S. is concerned, even if they were able to field a force of 1000 bombers they'd be little more than a terror weapon. American industry was too vast and the return trip was too far..

Which German fighter aircraft would have been capable of escort? Many Allied escort carriers in the Atlantic had fighters that could have cut them down half way across the pond.

Their bomber force would have been lucky to last 3 weeks.

If they wanted a terror weapon to strike NY, they sub towed V-1 would have been a much better choice

The First Submarine Launched Rockets

Now if they would had significant numbers and appropriate escort during the BoB... it could have been interesting.

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Now you're bringing up something that was in the back of my mind. Even if Germany had long range bombers, It did not have Long Range Fighters for escort duty. Heck, I remember speaking with a Gentleman who took a flight onboard a Luftansa Condor to Argentina. It ducked a few times to avoid American Catalinas that patroled the Southern Atlantic. Not a fun flight.

 

Hmmm...a Catalina trying to shoot down a Condor. Theres a non starter.

One would think that a long range bomber would mean development of long range fighters. But then the Brits & yanks failed to build those until the bombers got beat up. So, one might assume the Germans would make the same mistake?

 

Now... he didn't say the Cat was trying to shoot it down.. I think it's a good policy to avoid recon planes. Their could have been fighters on combat air partol somewhere looking for a vector.

I bet the German solution for an escort fighter would have been a variation of one of their twin engine planes...

 

The Germans did have the planes to take recon photos of the Urals.

The 264 could have taken 3 tons of bombs that far while taking the pictures.

"The Art", this was indeed an art, because even highly trained crews couldnt even get their bombs within a mile most of the time.

The Moscow-Upper Volga region produced 40% (including 60% of T-34 production) of all war material. And 80% of all Russian oil came from the Caucus oil fields, both worth while targets.

Given the intended range of the 262, Chicago, Detriot, and most of the east coast including the bigest tank manufacturing plant in america were within range. There was no plan to have fighter protection set up for the US, and the first raids, as well as night raids would not have needed escort. Carriers would not launch planes to in the Atlantic to intercept Bombers. Not a bad first post though. Welcome.

 

Plus it was a Luftansa Condor, not Luftwaffe. Big difference.

 

Thats a helluva range for the 262.. I never read that b4. Do you have a link I can read? Taking off from which airfield would that be in range? Which route? Greenland? Over the pole?

Thanks for the welcome... i look forward to learning more!

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A book called Luftwaffe Over America. It was good, parts were difficult the author jumps around a bit but good still.

 

Here's a previous thread on a German bombing mission to the US:

http://www.ww2f.com/what-if/20217-hitler-decides-bombing-mission-us.html

 

It makes you wonder why the Germans never perfected "in-flight refueling?" For that matter, why didn't the Americans use it in WWII? They were the ones who perfected it back in the 20's or early 1930's.

 

It was Kesselring that squashed the four engine bomber program in favor of tactical bombers. The Germans had designs and prototypes in the late thirties, Ju89, Ju90 but the RLM was dominated by the tactical support crowd so early on only the Condor Fw-200 gained significant operational status and was deployed with success in the Maritime role. Perhaps others such as the Ju290 and Ju390 would have flourished earlier and been deployed in numbers, instead disasters like the He177 were developed late in the war and resources squandered.

 

I've read that Britain required about 1 million tons of shipping arriving every week. I've also read that the UK consumed 10 million tons imported fuel per year and about 1 million tons was stockpiled at any given time. Thus if the supply of fuel could be cut off for about 5-6 weeks then the British would be left with no fuel for warships or aircraft tanks and vehicles, thereby rendering the country defenseless.

A million tons for 5 weeks is about the same as sinking 900 ships. If indeed the magnetic mines got one ship sunk for every 26 mines deployed for the first few months until the British started to develope counters, then roughly speaking they would need to drop 23,000 magnetic mines in that five weeks.

Historically from Aug to Dec 1940 reportedly 3331 mines were dropped by 1932 Luftwaffe sortie through medium bombers/seaplanes or ~ 5 mines for every 3 sortie, with medium bombers carrying a couple of mines. Multi engined bomber no doubt could double this to 4 mines per sortie.

That means it would require a nightly force of about 166 strategic bombers or mix of 100 LR strategic bombers and 130 SR medium bombers per night. Thats a force of 300 strategic bombers and 400 medium bombers. This would require an annual production of ~600 strategic bombers and ~800 medium bombers to furfill the mission in 1940.

Historically it should take them until the end of 1941 to have produced & hoarded the ~25,000 air launched mines to go with such a campaign.But if we are rethinking the strategic bombing force from late 1930s on with a maximum priority, then it could also have afforded higher priority to air launched magnetic mine production and thus could be ready by 1940.

 

Britain imported 10 million tons of oil in 1942, 20 million tons in 1944.

Stockpiles reached a low point of 4.5 million tons in the summer of 1941. As oil consumption increased throughout the war, I suspect that 4.5 million tons would have lasted about a year with only a little reduction in use.

 

I don't see why Germany should have built anything but a core strategic bombing force. Hitler (and his generals), were hoping for a quick war, not a drawn out war over years. It's a heavy investment in SB's, and when the war is going to be over soon, what was the point? We have to think in terms of what the contemporaries were thinking. IMO, Kesselring was right to decide on tactical bombers, as they were of more use to Wehrmacht operations than any SB's could be. The US/UK build 1000's and 1000's of SB's for their campaigns over Germany, and these were built over years. Germany had no intention for such a program, and it was wise to decide against it. The only use for keeping a 'core' SB force would be to expand it in the situation that America would want to continue the fight, even after the UK and USSR surrendered (that was the plan anyhow).

Besides, from everything I've read, the entire SB offensive by the Allies had only a minimal effect on operations. Yes, there was some heavy annoyances for the germans to deal with, but in no way was this 'decisive'. Tactical bombers, on the other hand, prevented the germans from moving during the daylight during pre and post D-Day operations.

 

They did, but by then their was no need for it.

Oil when the allies bombed Germanies oil production that was the nails in the coffin.

The break out from Normandy was facilitated by strat bombers. Best tactical use druing the war of heavy bombing.

 

Oil was always a problem for the Germans, whether or not the Allies bombed Ploesti. The Allies just aggravated the problem even more. But again, not 'decisive'. Hell, the Allies thought bombing Schweinfurt and its ball-bearings factories would be decisive, and it was nowhere near that. The Germans simply moved as much as they could underground. And those damaged above-ground factories were repaired in record time. Amazing actually, but the same was seen in most countries.