What if the Germans won the war

World War II General WWII Discussion
#41

Hmm, maybe because they could, after all they’re german engineers :smiley:
But depending on how the situation developed I would rather think, that going faster and higher is a pretty much obvious choice for aircraft developers. They would get the money if their US collegues get the money, cause if one side feels threatened it’s usually a mutual feeling, meaning if the US thinks of ways to deal with germany so would germany both offensively and defensively.

p.s.
The TA was service ready in 1945, I think there was still room for improvements till 1947, but yes the opportunity window wouldn’t be all to big. But then till 47 we have a pretty sophisticated radar network imho and maybe we have somethink really stylish by then, such as the Horthen IX.
Oh and I meant the max altitude, sorry for the confusion.

#42

I’m a professional engineer, I know the feeling :twisted:

#43

In the last part of the PBS series The War an American GI was talking to a German solder and German solder asked with out a German accent where he (the US GI) lived and he said “in the Northeast” ,the German said “Where in the Northeast” ?, GI “Connecticut”, German Solder “Where in Connecticut” ?,GI “Waterbury” ,German “oh where the Mad river and the Naugatuck river meet” , The US solder just froze and asked "how did you know that " The German said that he worked in the Territory board for the Germans
So Hitler did have his mind set on taking over the USA and Connecticut is not that big
4,845 square miles of Connecticut are land areas and 698 square miles of Connecticut are covered by water.
Length 110 miles
Width 70 miles

http://www.netstate.com/states/geography/ct_geography.htm

#44

If Nazi Germany wouldn’t have been crushed, I cannot help but to think that they would have been a lot like Soviet Union: closed, one-party state. Maybe being more efficient society than Soviet Union - making it pretty scary vision.

And considering Hitler’s pool health, I immediately start to think who would have his successor later… A big difference between a Nazi Germany run by Göring, Himmler, Bormann or Göbbels.

_

#45

I think if Fatherland is a pretty good movie (base on a novel) on what if Germany has won the war. check out that book if you want to.

#46

Second FW, see the Book Fatherland by Robert Harris. A decent thriller what if.

#47

Panzerknacker:
At work at the moment so can’t check, but from memory there were two or three flying prototypes of the Pulqui II. Of these, IIRC two crashed killing one test pilot. Given this and the fact that it had a British engine far more advanced than anything available to the Ta-183 yet had performance inferior to aircraft like the MiG-15, I stand by my opinion it was a dog. As for the comparison between the Pulqui II and the Ta-183, there is a far closer relationship than with the MiG-15 (the Pulqui II was after all designed by Kurt Tank and his team also built it, by and large). Visually, apart from the changes forced by the engine change the two are also far more similar than the Ta-183 and MiG-15 are.

I am aswering in the Argentine military Topic.

#48

also see shattered world in the internet. Its an alternative world war 2 where the allies are fighting a much stronger germany. The Germans are now winning but the allies has created the nuclear bomb first while the first german A-bomb is still years away for Germany. A atomic bomb has dropped in North africa to attempt to kill Erwin Rommel, but all they have accomplished is to destroy a fake military base while erwin is in somewhere else, sound and safe.

#49

That’s certainly a shattered world.

Of all the things to use a nuke on, getting rid of a minor general in a less than critical campaign has to be a long way from the top of the list

#50

It was not so great difference between the Mig-17 and Mig-15 endeed pdf.
Both had a Klimov VK-1 turbojet with centrifug compressor.The only difference was the afterburner in Mig-17.
The service celling of Mig-17 was only 1 km more then the Mig-15 and 70km/h more maximum speed.
So there is no any principal tehnological difference between those subsonic/transonic aircrafts.

Oh, and German wartime jet engines were very, very bad - and it wasn’t just the lack of Nickel and Tungsten. The Soviets tried to build them postwar with unlimited supplies of strategic minerals, with very little success. All their immediately postwar fighters were powered by British designed jet engines, despite their easy access to “superior” German designs.

Yea the germans Jumo-004 engeen was superior.At least in its design.
This was a Axial jet engen that today is the most useful in the jet aviation.
The centrifugal Vk-1 ( Nine II) had worst perspective characteristics. For instance when the first soviet Axial turbojet was ready ( Rd-9 in 1953) - all the soviet fighter from Mig-19 were developed with this type of turbine .

#51

Yeah, the nuke would have been used to get rid of Hitler and his high command…

#52

Afterburner/reheat is actually a critical difference. If you look at the historical record, the MiG-15 was no danger to the B-36 while the introduction of the MiG-17 rapidly brought about it’s retirement. Maximum speed can be traded for altitude in a zoom-climb, where the aircraft is flying beyond it’s rated altitude (i.e. it can use momentum to reach altitudes it can’t stay at, but can reach for short periods).

Ummm… it’s a hell of a lot more complicated than that - I spent several years at university learning all this stuff. Axial flow compressors are great when they can be made to work. The problem is that unless you get to very sophisticated designs (three shaft engines, moving inlet guide vanes, etc.) they work very poorly outside the design condition, break easily, are very heavy and suffer severely from stall & surge. Whittle was well aware of the theoretical superiority of the axial flow turbojet when he developed his engines - A.A. Griffith at the Royal Aircraft Establishment in Farnborough had been banging on about how good they were for years. Whittle’s genius was that he realised it was possible to build a simple, practical and reliable engine using a centrifugal compressor.
In just about everything that counts, for a primitive engine centrifugal compressors are better - better compression ratio, higher mass flows, better balance and much tougher. Axial flow engines are only better if you get them right, and particularly for transonic/supersonic aircraft. Even today, some aircraft (mainly helicopters) use centrifugal compressors, as do all car turbochargers that I’m aware of.

#53

…together with the 500-600 000 of civils in Berlin:)
This is in spirit of the allies hight military command so.
Precision strike…:wink:

#54

I/m not deny the obvious fact of complicated developing of the axial turbojet.Historically the first effective axial jet have appeared later then the centrifugal.The technical and technological problems of the Axial was solved later with the participation of newest alloys and ets. Sure you right.
I just want to notice you that althought the Juno-004 wasn’t so effective in the landing and take-off , but the maximum speed of the Me-262 was already impressive in the mid 1944 and it was OVER 150 km/h more then the Meteor F1/2.
So this is no anu doubts that the brits losed the jet competition till the beginning of the 1945 when germanse simply lost its industry potential.But we consider the situation “if germany won the war”- so there is no any doubt that the Germans were able to create the enought reliable jet engine and improved its jet fighters till the 1947.
However the british jet engines were the best among allies for the first after war time.

#55

Thing is, the limiting speed on the Meteor wasn’t down to the engines. Instead it was down to the design of the cockpit canopy and the engine cowling design. Postwar Meteor designs were substantially faster than the Me-262, with minimal extra installed power.

#56

Yes the Meteror F5 with Rols-Roys Dervent was a best… for the while;)
But i think you will not deny the fact technical progress in Germany that was stoped in the begining of 1945.
And be sure that the improved next modification of jet axial engines and new Me-262-HG2/3 with the Swept wings that Germans first in the world used in mass production of jet aviation.
So it should be at least naive IMO to think that the Germns who during all the war have the technical superiority in aviation would lost it after 1945:)

#57

I’ve gone over the designs of the WW2 German jet engines (not had one to play with, but photos/plans in some depth). They’re a mix of the incredibly advanced with the terminally stupid. The problem they had was that the terminally stupid stuff was integral to the engine, while the incredibly advanced stuff was both not implemented well and used as a sticking plaster fix to get it to work.

The fundamental problem at the time was that while axial turbines were well understood (steam turbines had been around for 60 years at this point), axial compressors were NOT well understood. The Germans made the mistake of assuming that they behaved a lot like axial turbines, thought about the advantages an axial jet gives an aircraft and went for it. Whittle made use of the vast experience which had been gained by the big engine companies in the design of turbochargers/superchargers and used a centrifugal compressor design.
Fundamentally, this meant that the Whittle type engines had a high frontal area but were well behaved, reliable, etc. while the German ones looked good but had cr*p performance (particularly regarding service life and off-design behaviour). As an example of the problems axial compressors give you, the engine which eventually entered service as the Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire in about 1950 started off as the MetroVick F.1 in 1939. Despite always been a far better performer than the Whittle-type engines, it was 10 years before it was considered suitable to enter service simply because reliability and engine behaviour were so poor.

#58

Well, I guess the 250,000 civilians killed in the Battle of Berlin was nicer.:slight_smile:

BTW, they probably would have nuked several German cities like Munich, Vienna and Hamburg…

#59

Sure it is nicer Nick.
At least their kids could survived without radiation fallout.
From 3+ mln of civil population of Berlin. Plus 1 mln of higher the refugees plus 1.5 mln of army- the 250 000 victims is not really much.
Look for instance to Hiroshima where from 400 000 of civil population in the end of the 1945 were killed and died from ilness - about 140 000 i.e one third of population.
But as we peoples continie to dies after the war.
Besides - this is not a fact that the atomic bombing could destroy the Hitler deep bunker.

BTW, they probably would have nuked several German cities like Munich, Vienna and Hamburg…

The total nuclear bombing of Germany would not mean the capitulation or the surrender of German army.
While the Hitler was alive - they would fight.
Coz the firebombing compain did not forced them to the surrender ( untill the our land troops captured thier cities)- there is no any proves that the nuclear compain could do it…

#60

Yes i/m agree.
However you will not dany fact that the Me-262 with axial turbin already WAS suitable for the Me-262 in the 1945?
The flay and shoted down the allies afaircarfts- what else the proves do you need for it.
Besides there is no any doubt thet the Jumo004 could be much improved after the 1945.