The results of the air attacks on the Ruhr

lljadw

Active member
"Reading contemporary sources,there can be no doubt that the Battle of the Ruhr,marked a turning point in the history of the German war economy,which has been grossly underestimated by post-war accounts"(Adam Tooze in The Wages of Destruction P 597).

What's the opinion of the forum ?
My opinion is :a wrong statement from Tooze,because he used non reliable figures from Wagenführ(chief PR of Speer)

One exemple :monthly German aircraft production :

2nd half of 1942:1341
first half of 1943:1985 (this period was the period of the attacks on the Ruhr)
2nd half of 1943:2172
first half of 1944:2811
 
If that data is to be believed I would have to agree that there was a significant reduction in aircraft production in the second half of 1943 which is possibly a follow on effect from damage caused in the first half of 1943 but without more complete data and knowing what other events may have influenced the drop in production it is impossible to say what the reason was.
 
If that data is to be believed I would have to agree that there was a significant reduction in aircraft production in the second half of 1943 which is possibly a follow on effect from damage caused in the first half of 1943 but without more complete data and knowing what other events may have influenced the drop in production it is impossible to say what the reason was.
I see a continuous increase...
 
There is a continuous increase however the level of increase in the 3rd set of figures is far less than previous or post periods.

If you were to plot those figures you would see a plateau around the 3rd set with a similar increase to the first two in the fourth set.
 
I did set a trap (not fair of me)

From Müller-Hillebrand:the monthly tank production figures: (months are numbered)

1942:

VII:339
VIII:364
IX:325
X:324
XI:309
XII:450

I see no trend,I only see that the Speer armament miracle is unproved


1943

I:257
II:320
III:370
IV:306
V:689
VI:484
VII:511
VIII:458
IX:591
X:662
XI:561
XII:757

Comments ?
 
There is a continuous increase however the level of increase in the 3rd set of figures is far less than previous or post periods.

If you were to plot those figures you would see a plateau around the 3rd set with a similar increase to the first two in the fourth set.


The question is:why would it take months before the attacks had a result ? Why was the production not going down during the attacks ?
 
The question is:why would it take months before the attacks had a result ? Why was the production not going down during the attacks ?

Without seeing a month by month break down it is impossible to tell what is happening though as for all we know the first and last months of 1943 could have produced a high percentage of the aircraft made for the 12 month period with the bombing disrupting the middle months significantly.

As I indicated there is not enough data presented to draw any real conclusions, we would need to see at least month by month figures or better yet weekly production figures to get a better idea of what is going on and even then without knowing what was happening at downstream factories (for example was there a shortage of guns or engines that was restricting production in that period) it will still be hard to make a call.

As for armour production figures I might disagree as just looking at them shows a significant improvement in numbers from April 1943 (I assume that is what is meant by IV 1943) if I had to guess I would assume something happened in Jan 1943 to restrict production which took until March-April to recover but it is 2am and I wont be in a statistical mood for at least 6 more hours.
:)

Having looked at it a little more closely it seems to me that production was static through until December 1942 at which point it began to grow at a significant rate from an average of 350 in Dec 42 to fractionally over 700 in Dec 43.
 
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The following is from a review of "Germany and the Second World War " Vomume VII

On Page 27,Horst Boog writes:

"If one disregards the synthetic fuel plants on the outskirts of a few of its towns,only little was produced in the Ruhr that was of immediate use or essential for the German war effort.Its contribution to arms production amounted to no more than 25 % or thereabouts;in tabk manifacture it was only 10 percent,and there was only one aircraft factory.Furthermore,the machine tools equipping the Ruhr factories were fairly immune to destruction ."

The importance of the Ruhr was much inflated,and,as usual has become a myth.
A saying that the Ruhr was very important.B parotting A and even exaggerating . C is doing the same with B .D idem for C. Etc,etc.
 
Ah so you are trying to argue that the Ruhr industry was not as important as it has been made out to be?
My understanding is that the Ruhr was important before the war and during the early stages but became less important as the war progressed and bombing forced the dispersal and decentralisation of war industry.

As for continuously parroted data well sadly that is the problem faced these days especially since a lot of people think the internet is a good source for research.
 
The increase of the attacks on the Ruhr was mainly due to the effect of the Mustang escorting the American Bombers far more safely to their target.
 
...As for continuously parroted data well sadly that is the problem faced these days especially since a lot of people think the internet is a good source for research.

Personally, I don't think the problem is that people think the internet is a good source for research because, it is a damned good source for research... within limits.
I think the most important thing is that
1. the internet is only as good as the information that someone puts up
2. people are lazy and don't actually bother to find corroborative sources, check the validity of the info or even list their sources and
3. it seems that the general population has lost their ability for 'critical thinking' and they don't bother to analyze the information they are using.

And then we have the crowning glory of the internet - it lets any idiot voice their whacky notions/prejudices/bizarreness and think that someone is listening to them**

Apologies for the rant, I think the internet is an amazing tool for information transfer and it really dismays me to see so many people producing trivial crap info or using it as a soapbox to shout their own myopic view of things.

** and yeah, that includes me too!
 
Personally, I don't think the problem is that people think the internet is a good source for research because, it is a damned good source for research... within limits.
I think the most important thing is that
1. the internet is only as good as the information that someone puts up
2. people are lazy and don't actually bother to find corroborative sources, check the validity of the info or even list their sources and
3. it seems that the general population has lost their ability for 'critical thinking' and they don't bother to analyze the information they are using.

And then we have the crowning glory of the internet - it lets any idiot voice their whacky notions/prejudices/bizarreness and think that someone is listening to them**

Apologies for the rant, I think the internet is an amazing tool for information transfer and it really dismays me to see so many people producing trivial crap info or using it as a soapbox to shout their own myopic view of things.

** and yeah, that includes me too!

I think you are over thinking the issue, the problem is simply that people are too lazy to do anything more than accept the first bit of information they find on a topic.
The result is that they copy it and stick it on their blog/website as fact and that starts a self validating system where the next person finds 2 sites with the same data and assumes it is correct as it is validated by the first site and so they add it to their site and then there were 3 validating sites, rinse and repeat a few more times and you have a corroborated fact.

One day I imagine there will be a vetted section of the internet where you will be able to trust the data but so far I think attempts to implement it with wiki style systems have failed.
 
For a lot of reasons,BC hoped and tried to force victory by one DECISIVE battle,but thiswas an illusion :
they hoped that by stopping the production of the Ruhr,the German economy would collapse,resulting in a German capitulation.

they hoped that by bombing Berlin,the German moral would collaps and that the civilians would revolt against the regime .
 
For a lot of reasons,BC hoped and tried to force victory by one DECISIVE battle,but thiswas an illusion :
they hoped that by stopping the production of the Ruhr,the German economy would collapse,resulting in a German capitulation.

they hoped that by bombing Berlin,the German moral would collaps and that the civilians would revolt against the regime .

Indeed however it was a strange belief given that surely someone noticed that during the bombing of London British morale never collapsed nor did it production cease when industry was attacked in fact it produced the opposite effect in that it galvanised people into trying harder.

In the book "How Wars are Won and Lost: Vulnerability and Military Power: Vulnerability ... By John A. Gentry" he claims that neither Speer nor Milch was entirely concerned about allied bombing until mid-1944 when they attacked synthetic fuel plants, Galland claimed there was no appreciable disruption to the Luftwaffe production until fuel facilities were attacked either.

So I would agree entirely that Bomber Commands assumptions were well off the mark and given the experiences the British had up until that point were almost contrary to what they knew.
 
It is easy for people these days to sit down and say the RAF should have done this or that, but they had to do what they could achieve at the time. Just how many of you have tried to navigate an aircraft at night just working on a compass bearing and the speed of the aircraft. then you have to allow for all sorts of cross winds blowing you of course and factor that in as well, so is it any wonder that in first couple of years most bombs fell five miles away from the target. So to achieve some thing the area bombing became the most effective way of hitting back at Germany. It should also be remembered that in those days there were thousand of small factories and work shops turning out all sorts of military equipment which again were targets them selfs. Also it was the only way at this time we could hit back and tie millions of people just on air defence over Germany. The RAF bomber crews suffered huge casualties and are you now saying that they wasted their time and their lives fighting the only way the know how.
 
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It is easy for people these days to sit down and say the RAF should have done this or that, but they had to do what they could achieve at the time. Just how many of you have tried to navigate an aircraft at night just working on a compass bearing and the speed of the aircraft. then you have to allow for all sorts of cross winds blowing you of course and factor that in as well, so is it any wonder that in first couple of years most bombs fell five miles away from the target. So to achieve some thing the area bombing became the most effective way of hitting back at Germany. It should also be remembered that in those days there were thousand of small factories and work shops turning out all sorts of military equipment which again were targets them selfs. Also it was the only way at this time we could hit back and tie millions of people just on air defence over Germany. The RAF bomber crews suffered huge casualties and are you now saying that they wasted their time and their lives fighting the only way the know how.

But how much harder is it to hit a fuel refinery, synthetic fuel plant or power station than an engine, ball bearing or tank factory?

I would not say RAF bomber crews wasted their lives but I would suggest that maybe they were squandered by a strategy based off seeking revenge rather than an end to the war.

Every top German commentary on the war has seemingly reached the same conclusion in that the war would have been over anything up to two years earlier (Erhard Milch claimed by the end of 1943) had the RAF bombed the power grid and fuel manufacturing instead of focusing on cities.

John Galbraith the head of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey concluded the strategy implemented by the allies actually helped the German war effort by allowing it to be streamlined and materially cost the allies more than the Germans, decades after the war he referred to the allied bombing effort as a "disastrous failure".

I think it notable that many historians have noted that German war production increased right through until the end of 1944 and the decrease after that was not due to bombing but rather the loss of raw material producing areas to the allied advances on land.
 
In those early days it was dam hard to find your target at night. often you could not get a star fix, and the you could not get a fix on landmarks so you where navigating blind and working on Dead Reckoning. There was no radio or radar in the early days you just pointed
the plane in that direction and off you went. Unless you have tried to do this you will never understand just what a job they had.
 
It's the 70th anniversary of the Dambusters raid today. Was it's effect overestimated or underestimated? Could more have been made of it. Documentary on UK TV tonight
Dam Busters: The Race to Smash the German Dams
James Holland presents an analysis of the 1943 air attacks by the RAF, in which 19 Lancaster bombers ventured into the industrial heartland of Germany to destroy three heavily defended dams with the new bouncing bomb. He argues that the raid was the best-executed and most important of all time and explores whether its true impact has been underestimated - and if the result should have been even greater - BBC2 London 11:20pm-12:20am (1 hour ) Thu 16 May
 
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The Dam Busters did more damage than a 1000 bomber raid. Hats off for those crews!

The Luftwaffe was kept out of the air by the lack of fuel, not planes. The allies could not bomb away the genius of Speer, but Speer's genius could not get the fuel they needed.
 
It's the 70th anniversary of the Dambusters raid today. Was it's effect overestimated or underestimated? Could more have been made of it. Documentary on UK TV tonight
My belief is that the raid on Ruhr dams was the way the bomber war should have been fought, depriving Germany of its power and fuel would have caused Germany's collapse far sooner and with far less casualties than it did historically.

I read yesterday that the last surviving pilot of the raid was at the memorial, amazing to think that it wasn't all that long ago that we had WW1 veterans to talk with and now we are running out of WW2 veterans, almost makes me feel old.
:)

Kiwi Dambuster to the fore at anniversary
08:31 Fri May 17 2013
AAP

When New Zealander Les Munro was ordered to fly a Lancaster aircraft just metres above German dams and drop bouncing bombs on the water below during World War II, the dangers of the mission didn't cross his mind.
Despite knowing the difficultly, the risks and the gravity of successfully destroying German dam walls, the former Royal New Zealand Air Force pilot says he only focused on following instructions.
"It didn't concern me," he told BBC.
"I had no particular feelings of worry that we weren't going to carry out the operation."
The 94-year-old is the last surviving pilot from Operation Chastise, known as the Dambusters Raid - an attack on the Ruhr Valley dams carried out on May 17, 1943.
More than a third of the 133 Royal Air Force aircrew involved didn't return home.
The squadron used specially developed bombs by Barnes Wallis which bounced on the water before hitting the wall and sinking before detonating - destroying the dam's walls.
The attack breached the Mohne and Edersee Dams causing severe flooding, while several factories and mines were also damaged.
About 1600 Germans drowned.
On the 70th anniversary of the Dambusters Raid, Munro was flown from New Zealand to attend a flypast over the dam on Derwent Reservoir in Derbyshire which featured a Lancaster bomber, two Spitfires and two Tornado jets.
Of the 19 Lancasters which took part in the operation only 11 bombers returned.
He said despite the mission falling short of its goals, and the loss of 53 men, it was a boost to morale.
"I believe from an operational point of view it was very successful," he said.
"The general feeling was the effect on the British morale was really significant and from that point alone it was justified and can be categorised as successful."
Mr Munro, along with 91-year-old crewman George Johnson, attended a service in Lincoln Cathedral to mark the anniversary. Only three of the squadron are still alive.


http://news.msn.co.nz/nationalnews/8660162/kiwi-dambuster-to-the-fore-at-anniversary
 
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