Battle of Britain

[Tolkemec]

Hello everybody,

As I have never reached august 1940, I was wondering if the battle of britain was modelled in GWX.

The RAF would be unable to escort convoys from July - August to October, so there would be little to no danger from the skies. There would also be Lufftwaffe attacks to convoys in Der Kanal, and it would be cool to see squadrons of messerschmitts, stukas, JU88, etc... in the skies.

That would be quite a sight!

[Pebble Monkey]

Dunno about the Battle of Britain, but I was leaving Wili on my third patrol and saw flying overhead a flight of about 12 HE111's in diamond formation. Looked amazing!

[K-61]

Actually, the type of aircraft that protected the channel shipping was fighters. Coastal Command used bomber or scout type planes to patrol for U-boats. They would be useless for protecting channel shipping as the Stukas, Heinkels and Junkers would be escorted by ME-109's and would have made mincemeat of any Hudsons or Sunderlands sent to protect shipping.

The great tragedy of the Battle of the Atlantic was that only about 200 aircraft earlier in the war could have won the battle much sooner. Bomber Harris jealously hoarded any planes capable of bombing Germany for his zealous pursuit of strategic bombing. A handful of planes like the VLR Liberator were instrumental in turning the tide against the U-boats. Bomber Command was a vast waste of aerial resources compared to how much materiel and life was lost to U-boats due to lack of patrol planes.

[Patkins1983]

I think you will find bomber command tied up lots of 88mm guns and men as anti air defenses.

If those guns had been free to be used elsewhere, the Russians would have got a kicking as their tanks would have been smashed to pieces.

Then there is all the ammo used for air defense of Germany, the resources used for that could have been used elsewhere and the war may not have gone the way it did. Wonder how many tanks, planes, ships and U-boats could have been supported by the resources used to defend against the 'threat' of bomber command.

The bombing offensive might not have achieved any measurable goals for a long time but it tied up German factories and men.

To be fair, Harris should have left Berlin and deep German targets well alone as he wasted so many men and aircraft for jack all damage. IT might also have helped if he hadn't been sporting and sent the raids down the same routes night after night :(

edit- Just remembered that Harris also liked to send the raids near German night fighter bases. The u-boats got a kicking due to technological advances later on in the war, Bomber command lost lot of men and aircraft by relying on duff wind predictions form the Met office, so either way, life for the crews of the u-boats and bombers sucked.

If I can find the book I read on the subject of bomber command during the war, I will post it up here. Its a sizeable read and very depressing in places.

[K-61]

According to "The Third Reich at War" by Richard J. Evans, the Allied bomber offensive tied up one million personnel and most of the Luftwaffe's fighters. The redeployment of fighters from Russia to Germany was one factor in the resurgence of the Red Air Force, superior production of aircraft and pilots being the other. As well, many 88's, as mentioned above, were sent back to Germany, which could otherwise have been used against Russia's tanks. Still, once the long barrelled 75mm gun on the Mark IV panzer was introduced, as well as the Tiger and Panther tanks, the 88's were no longer needed to the same extent, but still, they would have been a great boost to the Wehrmacht's antitank gun capabilities.

However, the bombing campaign did not really become effective until after the war against the U-boats had already been decided. A few hundred bombers allocated to Coastal Command in 1941 to 1942 would have been greatly more effective to the war effort than from being used to drop bombs five miles from their target in Germany, not to mention how many thousands of airmen's lives were lost on those raids. One bomber over a convoy was all it took to force a U-boat to break off contact. Many a convoy was saved in just this way. Clay Blair in his two volume set about the U-boats effectively makes this argument. The war materiel delivered by one freighter saved from loss by the presence of a bomber would inflict more damage against Germany than the bombs dropped on land by that same bomber. Too late did the Allies realize this and once they allocated a few hundred bombers to hunting U-boats their losses dropped appreciably on a per U-boat basis. True, the Germans sent more U-boats to sea and the total tonnage of shipping sunk increased, but over time, the tonnage sunk per U-boat dropped off, thanks to the increasing presence of aircraft over convoys. As well, the hindrance of U-boats in the Bay of Biscay also degraded their efficiency, as their transit to patrol zones was delayed. A U-boat that was damaged by a plane also had to spend more time in dock to be repaired, again reducing its combat effectiveness.