Actually number 3, the destruction of railways, was mostly Typhoons and P-47 interdicting rail traffic...
Oli, no Oli, the P-47 and Typhoon could destroy rolling stock, but they couldn't destroy a marshaling yard, it took aprox. 4 hours to repair a section of track hit by a 500 lb. bomb, it took weeks to repair a switching yard after a heavy strike, you have to move your stock to make the deliveries, and the Germans took to moving their stuff only at night, the P-47 and Typhoon could not operate at night, I don't belittle the tactical, I have great respect for the tactical pilot,but he could not achieve the Strategic, look at the Germans in the battle of France, they had full tactical, but they lacked strategic, and the British evacuated Dunkirk, won the Battle of Britain, and continued the war, and developed their strategic forces and with the Americans destroyed the Third Reich.
Was this related to the closed "Burma road" /construction of the "Lido Road" re-connect? Note Burma Road is back in the news and important again - see my thread: "Burma Road with trucks again." No. Kohima was a rail head. Ledo/Lido Road is farther north.. Mostly constructed by Black Americans as a matter of interest.
Not the only reason.. America produced from vast numbers of aircraft and had limited time training of crews.. especially navigators.. Thus daylight flying Follow that plane ( usually a brit )
But the quote states "bring one single railroad train across the Rhine" i.e. destruction of rolling stock, not marshalling yards - therefore TacAir.
I'd say the most pivotal battle of World War II was the Propoganda Battle, and winning over the media and press........clearly our experience since has shown this to be central to winning a war.
That old WWII guy did admit that sometimes they missed "a little," but only because the weather guys gave them the wrong wind data.
Oli Have you ever looked at the rail maps of any country, they all hub at cities, taking a train across the country is not like driving a car, they have to be scheduled, so there aren't two trains on a single track going in opposet directions. The rolling stock have to be loaded, bundled, and staged on the proper sides for the Engines to pick them up. And then they are headed out to the lines, and on to the next yard. At the next yard, they unload, switch cars for other destinations, pick up new cars for their next destination, and the situation is the same as I described above, as to the loading, bundling, and staging, And it is still a fact that to effectively stop rail transportation, you have to destroy the Marshelling yards, yes you can intrdict the lines, but that is a simple repair for the repair crews, a single track, at most 2 or 3 , a area of 15 to 20 yards of line. In a yard if you care to look are hundreds of lines side by side, hundreds of switching points, hundreds of switches, the repaire yards, the turn tables to help the engines change direction, the loading areas and ramps, the unloading areas, and a masisve ammount of material on rolling stock, and in short term storage prior to shippment. And it still is a fact that from the Middle of 1944, June, that all production of the Third Reich fell preciptiously, and the reason for that was the steadly increasing stratigic bombing of the German means of production, at the end of the war the industries of Germany had ceased to produce anything.It is something that you don't whish to understand, you don't win a war all at once, it is a process, of many small, and continous, and cordinated thing that finally result in victory, and the ability to provide the gass, oil, and material to move and supply your troops in the field, to win a war all of these things have to be accomplished, and at the same time, in cordanation, so that is my point that all of the battles in WWII were pivitoal, and that everything that was developed, tactics and materials, was needed to win the war. http://www.anesi.com/ussbs02.htm#tgwe The Attack on Oil Further Dividends From the Oil Attack All of this was as a result of Stratigic Bombing, and Stratigic Bombing affected the out come of the fighting on the front lines.
Oli And if you also read the books it didn't take long for the Germans to switch to moving their trains only at night, and the Germans had hundreds of thousands of slave laborers to repair the tracks in hours, stationed around occupied Europe and Germany, and it took Hundreds of thousands of personnel to repair the marshalling yards,and weeks to repair the damage, again yes the Tac Air kept thing from moving during the day, but it took Strategic Air to keep it from moving at all, or have anything worth moving.
Oli Hay your learning! So how to stop the movement at night? hit the marshalling yards, and nothing moves, day or night, and that takes strategic heavy bombers.
Oli 1, You have the numbers to prove this, a cost analysis? please provide such? 2, Wars are not fought as a cost effective enterprise, they are fought to win at any cost, if you want to win you pay the cost. 3, We won the war by doing exactly what we did, and how we did it, that is a proven fact and your and anybody else's after the fact, monday morning quarterbacking don't mean jack shit, your is the might have been, not the as it was done successfully, by people with far more experience than you will ever have in solving the problems of winning a war.
Actually found the book: Britain 1939-1945: The Economic Cost Of Strategic Bombing, guy called Fahey. He applied actuarial methods to the whole bomber campaign and concluded that not only was it ineffective cost-wise (money, men and material) but that it also destroyed the British economy and held back post-war recovery. That's about as brief a summary I can provide of the 500 pages he wrote. I believe there is the pdf available on the net somewhere if you want to read it. Actually that's crap - at the time no-one had the requisite experience, otherwise we'd have done far far better. Most of the war effort was ad-hoc reactions to the situation at the time. If it wasn't so we'd have been far better prepared...
Oli No your assertions is crap, you are trying to refight a successful battle with no proof that your way would win, and the funny thing is that since WWII no one has won a war with tactical bombing, we didn't do it in Vietnam, the Russians didn't do it in Afghanistan, the Israeli didn't do it in Lebanon, the closest was in Korea, and their we use strategic bombing, and we won a peace, but once we stopped strategic bombing it became a stale mate. As for Mr.John Fahey, he included many thing that weren't involved in the strategic bomber mission, such as, Firms Financed by Government Capital SchemesCumulative Total of Capital Commitment for Buildings, Officers Mess, Nissan Hut, Water Tower, British Tanker Losses 1939-1945, Registered Heavy Goods Vehicles in Britain, 1937-1945 all of these would either have been expended because of the need for 4 mediums to replace one heavy, or what is the connection of British Tanker Losses with the cost of the Bomber war? those tankers would have been lost any way, and what would this have to do with the bomber war at all?
No we're saying that cost of the bombing effort outweighed its advantages.. Because all of those things were needed for the strategic bomber effort.. he looked at THE OVERALL COST to the country of mounting the bomber campaign. Read the damn book. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Nonsense, He was talking about Germans tanks etc had to move at night or under overcast because fighter bombers would interdict movement. You are talking about interdicting movement by rail. Don't cherry pick comments you are knowledgeable enough to not have to do that.
Oli All of those thing would be required to run a war anyway, I have read large amounts of the book over night and this morning, his numbers and conclusions are crap, as to much of what he list as cost would have been expended any way, and to accomplish the destruction necessary to the enemy with mediums and tactical air would have required 4 time the numbers of mediums and tactical aircraft to do the job, so were its the cost saving? Two mediums use more fuel on a long mission with less bomb load than One heavy does on a longer mission and with more throw weight. I will talk about the Bomber War on Oil, Manufacturing, Military supply points, what ever you wish to bring up, but it is still the same, mediums, and tactical, didn't have the range, or the bomb load to destroy the oil production capability, manufacturing centers, or transportation facilities of the German Home land, and to defeat Germanys forces in the field we had to interfere in the Manufacturing, of their fuel supplies, war material, and their deliver and distribution systems, they could not reach Germany with a use full bomb load. Please explain how not interfering with the production of oil would help end the war, if the Germans had uninterrupted fuel supplies they would have had the fuel to use all of those Fighters, and Tanks, move their troops in the field, and produce the ammunitions and explosives, needed by their forces in the field, They would have had enough gas to increase their pilot training programs, keep their fighter over the front line, to intercept the Tactical and Medium Bomber over the front lines, and keep them from interfering with the trains, oil production, manufacturing, the reason that the tactical fighters were so successful was the fact that much of the German air force was occupied with trying to stop the Heavy Bombers, The fact is most of the German Luftwaffe was committed to stopping the Heavy Bomber forces, and protect the oil and manufacturing centers, and transportation centers, to be able to contest the tactical fighters effectively, we spread them to the point were they couldn't cover all of the points of attack, and the final pay off was after June of 1944 the Germans ran out of fuel, That made it imposable for them to put Aircraft into the air, Move their tanks, move their Troops, re-supply their troops, move manufactured war supplies to their troops in the field, and the destruction of the rail yards meant that they couldn't load those supplies, switch the trains to get to their destinations, around the country, or even have the rolling stock to do so, repaired that rolling stock for use, because the repair facilities are at the yard, and the heavy bombers had totally destroyed those targets, it all was needed to defeat the Germans, it was all necessary, and if you want to you can after the fact prove that anything could be done better, but the problem is that you are doing so after the Fact, as a Monday Morning Quarterback, who already knows the out come of the War, now lets see you do it under the gun, with the war and the deaths, and the destruction going on around you every day, every hour, of the war, under the pressure of the now not at your leisure with all the facts known. The fact is that the War was won with the method we instituted, and your is the might of been, a wet dream that you have that you could have done better, the fact is that you can't even prove that your method would have won the war, and in the years after WWII their hasn't been a war that has bee won with Tactical Air, they all have been draws, or just held in abeyance until one of the party's is ready to resume the war again, so all of your squawking is just bull shit, because you have no real world examples to prove that your wet dream would win a war.
