And many Allied officers would concur with you that while calling Italy a “failure” would be a bit harsh (the Germans still had to defend it, although they were able to do so with less as the terrain was perfect for defensive warfare), that it was a sideshow and a waste of resources. However, we also have to consider that not invading and liberating Italy would have been seen as a ruthless, callous tactic of expediency as the Italian people were ready to uprise against the Germans (and did, in fact the much vaunted, but very rare, “general uprising” did take place in a few Italian cities often forcing the Germans into a hasty withdrawal). Like all issues connected to WWII, it is not a simple cut and dry issue. But it was one of dissent between the US generals that basically wanted to go into France as early as possible, and the British ones, that were reflecting the principles of Churchill (who often meddled in Italy once Ike was transferred to Overlord planning) --that the Mediterranean Theatre was vital, and needed to be secured before France. However, I think history shows that Sicily would have been enough…
To be fair, these numbers of men and material were only rebuilt back up once the USSR was secure from German conquest. Remember, something like 250,000 men, and many tanks and aircraft, were pulled Eastward to defend Moscow in 1942.
And the Imperial Japanese Army in Manchuria was a “hollow army” devoid of any real anti-armor capabilities, artillery, or real tanks. On wide open steppes, they were easy pickings for any army of maneuver…
But inthe 1944 the Allied strength agains Japane were even higher.
And this was not a barier for Overlord.
But the Italy compain was still possible in minds of allied politics?So why the Overlord wasn’t?
RS* already covered this, but the US forces were widely dispersed in an “island hopping” campaign. And suicidal static defense of broken, mountainous or jungle terrain was the one thing the IJA did well. And as amphibious operations are some of the most complex in warfare, I am sure you will appreciate that it took a while. The Red Army/Naval Infantry found this out as well on the Kuril Islands. The island hopping campaign was one of dozens of mini-Overlords with resources spread out as the US and the Brits were fighting a two-front war of their own…
Rising Sun,
For once 
try to undestand what I am saying instead of suspecting the worst.
I am saying that by 1942/1943 due to the circumstqances USSR was put into situation were it was the major Allied country whoos subjective interests by large coinsided with the objective goals of the Allied ations union.
Mate, I’m not trying to be difficult, but I’m not sure what you’re angling at.
I don’t see that there was anything special about the USSR’s effort at any time that was different to the other Allied nations.
Certainly the Soviets suffered things that others didn’t, as did, say, the British, American and Australian POW’s (and much larger numbers of Asian civilians) suffer things that the Soviets didn’t in the war against Japan, which the USSR carefully kept out of until the last few days when Japan was badly beaten.
Then again, the non-Soviet nations didn’t have a non-aggression pact with the Nazis and they didn’t carve up Poland and wipe out its officer corps, or have a secret protocol to give them Baltic territory for keeping out of the war against Britain, which fought alone and against great odds (they have to be great odds if the Soviets faced the world’s greatest military machine in mid-1941) while Britain and its Commonwealth and Empire countries were the only ones slogging away against the Nazis.
Remember Dieppe, anyone???
That was the first try to get the “second front” Stalin wanted so much. Much too early, and a catastrophic blunder…
Read Eisenhower’s biography, and you’ll see the inherent complications that had to be addressed before any new attempt be made to invade Europe.
A reminder (source wiki)
19 August 1942. Over 6,000 infantrymen, predominantly Canadian, were supported by large British naval and Allied air force contingents. The objective was to seize and hold a major port for a short period, both to prove it was possible and to gather intelligence from prisoners and captured materials while assessing the German responses. The raid was also intended to use air power to draw the Luftwaffe into a large, planned encounter.
No major objectives of the raid were accomplished. 3,623 of the 6,086 men who made it ashore were either killed, wounded, or captured. The Allied air forces failed to lure the Luftwaffe into open battle, and lost 119 planes, while the Royal Navy suffered 555 casualties. The catastrophe at Dieppe later influenced Allied preparations for Operation Torch and Operation Overlord.
Major General Roberts was put in charge of the ground troops for the ill-fated raid against Dieppe, on August 19th, 1942. From his post of command aboard HMS Calpe, Roberts had only a vague idea of how the operation was unfolding. It is only when troops were recalled towards their transport fleet that Roberts clearly realized how desperate the situation was: almost no objective had been achieved and two brigades out of three had been decimated. Roberts, who had no part in the planning, was not blamed for the failure of the raid; to the contrary, he was even awarded the Distinguished Service Order.
I will show. I am patient. I learned it by talking to you. 
I don’t see that there was anything special about the USSR’s effort at any time that was different to the other Allied nations.
First of all, I did not talk about effort this time.
Ok I try again. Every country had an agenda (subjective goals) besides the main goal of defeating Axis (Objective goal).
So my point about 1942/1943 with respect to why Overlord did not happen earlier was that at that time USSR was the country whose agenda (selfish interest) was coinsiding most to the main goal of defeatin Axis. I am speaking of the big Allies of course.
Secondly, WHAT??? Which other society did as much and soffered as much in order to defeat Axis? I know you will now get mad bacause you would say that I am being arrogant towards other nation. This is absolutely NOT like that. What I am saying is not denyeing a tiny bit any other nation or group of people of their honor in what they did and suffered. Is not it clear enough without me saying it?
I believe you somehow think that my position is that Soviet people were better than others. Quite contrary so I must say. I said many time that what Soviet people did they did because they were put in those circumstances not so much out of free will.
Maybe you can tell me which other country can beat USSR in amount of casualties inflictec to theenemy AND number people lost both civil and military AND sustained similar hardship on the way?
Yes, there is China where the civil losses approach the Soviet ones. Yes, there is Britain that fought from the beginning to the very end. Yes, USA produced loads of stuff used and eaten all over the world. Yes, there were countries like Poland that got blows from all the sides and lost many-many people and also contribute much. Because we won together. The victory is not Soviet - it is Allied.
Then again, the non-Soviet nations didn’t have a non-aggression pact with the Nazis and they didn’t carve up Poland and wipe out its officer corps, or have a secret protocol to give them Baltic territory for keeping out of the war against Britain, which fought alone and against great odds (they have to be great odds if the Soviets faced the world’s greatest military machine in mid-1941) while Britain and its Commonwealth and Empire countries were the only ones slogging away against the Nazis.
What does it all have to do with my words? I do not get it.
Do you honestly think that my position and objective is to present USSR as a spotless and peace loving country?
Peace and love!
I don’t think this goes anywhere, apart from down tracks we’ve been along before with little result.
We might as well argue about why the USSR chose to sign a non-aggression pact and carve up Poland instead of joining Britain and attacking Germany, which is part of Soviet history during WWII, even if the USSR wasn’t fighting at the time.
That was the USSR in pursuit of its subjective goals. It didn’t have any objective goal at that stage of defeating Germany, while Britain had both an objective and subjective goal of defeating Germany as the only nation fighting it. Britain would not have had either goal unless Germany attacked.
If Germany hadn’t attacked the USSR, the things you’re talking about wouldn’t be an issue as Soviet objective and subjective goals would have continued to be to grab as much as it could of eastern Europe without having to fight Germany. Which is exactly what it did after fighting Germany.
None of that alters the suffering of the Russian people or of, say, the Poles or Lithuanians who had the pleasure of attacks and occupation by both Germany and the USSR, but it’s artificial to impose the objective and subjective distinctions and harmonies you’re putting forward about any nation’s conduct.
Politicians and big businessmen run nations. All politicians and big businessmen are total bastards, so there’s not a lot of worth to be found in their actions. The worth is found in the actions of the people they get to fight their wars for them, and cast aside once the war is over.
With regards to U.S. aircraft production vs British production I have recorded the following numbers of military aircraft built from various sources.
year USA Britain
1939 5,856 7,940
1940 12,804 15,049
1941 26,277 20,094
1942 47,836 23,672
1943 85,898 26,263
1944 96,318 26,461
The allies coulden’t control where the Germans went but deploying forces from other allied nations in the USSR like in France during world war one seems perfectly reasonable. If the Soviets were particularly hostile towards the UK then they still could have used Canadians, Australians, Americans or Indians.
Hi fellas,
Just a few stats on Strategic bombing and the survival rates …
Bomber command…
From the annual totals for the whole war the official history gives 364,514 Sorties dispatched and 8325 aircraft missing, whereas according to data contained in ACM Sir A Harris’ Dispatch a total of 389,809 Sorties of all categories were dispatched during the war and 8655 aircraft went missing. The latter figure includes mining, counter measures and miscellaneous.
The average loss rate, missing aircraft only, on sorties over the whole war period was about 2.0% whereas if ‘crashed’ aircraft are included the rate increases to 2.7%. As a substantial number of aircraft crashing did so as a result of damage sustained on operations it would not be unreasonable in making any analysis, at least as far as risk is concerned, to includes them as operational losses. However it is difficult to do this using available data as it is not detailed enough.
Average Probability of Survival over the whole war, 1939-45.
Accepting Harris’ estimate for the number of aircrew who served in the the command, overall out of every hundred :
40 Survived Unharmed
7 Survived but were wounded
8 Survived but were taken Prisoners of War
38 Killed in Action, or Missing presumed killed
7 Killed in Crashes and Accidents
The official history “Royal Air Force 1939-1945”, Vol III (London,1954) gives the total RAF killed and missing as being 70,253 up to 14th August 1945. It also says 47,293 of these losses occurred on operations with Bomber Command. This figure is rather misleading as the Bomber Command losses given include about 17,000 killed and missing who were from the Dominion & Allied Air Forces, and only about 38,000 were RAF personnel. It would appear that the total figure of 70,253 did not include the Dominion & Allied Air Forces’ losses in other commands
The total weight of bombs dropped by Bomber Command amounted to 988,281 tons, or excluding sea-mines 955,044 tons, of which 45% was dropped on industrial city targets, amounting to some 431,000 tons, 13% on Troops & Defences after D-Day, 14% on Transportation in NW Europe and 10% on Oil Targets.
USAAF
The tonnage of bombs dropped by the USAAF [by all types of aircraft] against all targets " VS Germany" from bases in both the European (ETO) and Mediterranean (MTO) Theaters of Operation amounted to 1,388,000 tons, of this 638,000 tons were dropped by the heavy bombers of the 8 & 9 AAF operating from bases in the United Kingdom.
The combined number of heavy bomber sorties mounted by the 8 & 9 USAAF between August 1942 and May 1945 was 332,904 of which 274,921 were classified as “effective”. A peak numbers of 28,925 sorties were mounted in the month of June 1944. and 31,169 in March 1945.
The number of heavy bombers “lost” by the 8 & 9 AAF amounted to 5,548, of which 2,452 were shot down by enemy fighters and 2,439 by anti aircraft fire. 607 bombers were lost through other causes. 5,324 fighter aircraft of the 8 & 9 AAF were also lost, but it is not clear whether all the fighter losses occurred during protection cover on bombing raids. Because operations were in daylight and losses were observed by other aircraft these figures are probably very accurate…
The overall heavy bomber loss rate for the 8 & 9 USAAF was 1.7%. In 1943 1036 bombers were lost with an average loss rate of 3.8%. A tour of operations was set at 25 missions so that during 1943 the probability of completing a tour of operations was 38%. In October 1943 186 heavy bombers were lost on 2831 sorties, a loss rate of 6.6%. A tour of operations with the 8 & 9 AAF was at first 25 sorties but in the last year of the war this was increased to 40 sorties,
The United States Strategic Bombing Survey states that In all attacks by Allied air power, almost 2,700,000 tons of bombs were dropped, more than 1,440,000 bomber sorties and 2,680,000 fighter sorties were flown. The number of combat planes reached a peak of some 28,000 and at the maximum 1,300,000 men were in combat commands. The number of men lost in air action was 79,265 Americans and 79,281 British. [Note: All RAF statistics are preliminary or tentative.] More than 18,000 American and 22,000 British planes were lost or damaged beyond repair.
By some accounts, The U.S. spent about $27 billion dollars on the air offensive in today’s money, and the British about the same.
Massive overall effort with tragic casualty numbers, but no doubt the combined bombing campaign shortened the war, [would have won it] and probably saved a lot more lives then they lost.
Mate, a great and very informative first post.
Probably the best first post ever.
Welcome to the site. 
Can you elaborate on the big discrepancy between the fairly small loss of aircraft, which is very much smaller than I’d thought, and the relatively large loss of air crew?
I’m assuming that it’s explained by a lot of craft landing with mortally wounded or dead crew aboard and the craft being returned to service?
I suppose there’s also a statistical factor that explains the ratio, being that one bomber has, say, seven men in the crew so that if they lose just one man killed every fourth flight and the plane survives a tour of, say, 30 sorties then the plane has still lost a number equivalent to the whole crew.
I seem to recall that, relative to ops, training flights in England were often more dangerous and there were many casualties from crashes from a range of factors related to inexperience by various crew members and, on occasion, even being mistakenly shot down by their own side because they were where they shouldn’t be or had encountered another green fighter pilot or crew. Do you have any info on that?
Actually Harris greatly overestimated the survival chances of Bomber Command Crews (1939-45). A better analysis was carried out by Middlebrook* (including all air forces - RAF, RCAF, RAAF etc):
Killed on Operations…51%
Killed in Crashes in England…9%
Seriously injured in crashes…3%
POW…12%
Evaded Capture…1%
Survived unharmed…24%
- The Nuremberg Raid - Middlebrook ISBN 0140081143
That’s the figure that seems most often quoted.
Does Middlebrook relate that to a specific raid or for the whole war?
Does this figure distinguish between training crashes and damaged craft returning from raids?
It’s for the whole 1939-45 period, and the 9% is, as far as I can tell, for all operational and training casulaties on/over Britain.
A further breakdown of the 55,000+ Bomber Command casualties has been carried out by Chorley, in his final Volume of Bomber Command Losses (where he lists every single one of these by name, rank, service number, date and unit). However, the quoted Bomber Command Diary figures do differ from the Nuremberg Raid analysis.
He explains the breakdown thus:
Thanks.
That tends to support my recollection that training was very dangerous, as it’s at about the ratio of one in six of total deaths.
On the reasonable assumption that enemy flak over England was fairly minimal :D, it suggests that whatever the causes a lot of people died out of ‘action’.
I suppose one would need to know the people miles flown in training and on ops to garner a fair figure, but I suspect that rather more fuel was available for ops deep into enemy territory than blundering about in English airspace.
Is there a statistic about tail-gunners KIA compared to rest of crews?
I often read that it was the most dangerous place in a bomber…
Hi Rising Sun, thanks for the welcome and kind words.
I think you nailed the answer to your question on casualties vs aircraft lost by the aircraft returning with wounded or dead crew aboard and the craft being returned to service.
Seen doco’s with half the crews being taken off badly wounded or killed, while the bomber ‘‘seems’’ to be in reasonable shape, or at least repairable.
On the Strategic bombing offensive, it seems to still get a bad rap at times for failing to break the morale, or the production rates of the Germans until near the of the war and sometimes is thought as not cost effective and a waste of materials and manpower.
But the U.S. Strategic bombing report done after the war sums it up pretty well, saying in part…
''Allied air power was decisive in the war in Western Europe. Hindsight inevitably suggests that it might have been employed differently or better in some respects. Nevertheless, it was decisive. In the air, its victory was complete. It helped turn the tide overwhelmingly in favor of Allied ground forces.
The German experience suggests that even a first class military power – rugged and resilient as Germany was – cannot live long under full-scale and free exploitation of air weapons over the heart of its territory. By the beginning of 1945, before the invasion of the homeland itself, Germany was reaching a state of helplessness. Her armament production was falling irretrievably, orderliness in effort was disappearing, and total disruption and disintegration were well along. Her armies were still in the field. But with the impending collapse of the supporting economy, the indications are convincing that they would have had to cease fighting – any effective fighting – within a few months. Germany was mortally wounded.’’
It’s probably that the full effects of the collapse had not reached the enemy’s front lines when they were overrun by Allied forces that takes away the full impact of the bombing campaign.
I read an english language bokk; “Air Gunner”, I think, once. It contained some statistics on the matter.
I don´t recall the numbers, but piloting a US strategic bomber should have been a lot safer than being a gunner in the rear fuselage.
(The worst pilot-gunner “kill-ratio” must have been in the IL-2, many (armour protected) pilots survived a series of (much less protected) gunners.
Regarding Survival rates of US strategic bomber crews, I remember reading a passage in a book called my war by Andy Rooney, he was stationed with the 8th airforce in the beginning of the campaign. I think the tour was 24 missions before you were able to go state side and become a instructor. What struck me most while reading that chapter in the book was that due to the losses substained by the 8th airforce at that time it was mathmatically impossible to complete the number of missions required to return to the US. Ronney mentioned that that the high point of losses there were 28-30 year olds Majors and Col. that were leading the squads because there was no one else left. " of the crews returning back home none came from the 8th Airforce".
Kind of makes you wonder