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PaperclipPerfector  19d ago (text post)   28162 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 2, 2024

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Then please step me through how these horses and mules built something to the tune of 100K aircraft - roughly the same number that the Brits did. Did the Germans use some Aryan über-mules, or were the Brits fake-industrialized as well?

What is there to step through? Nothing in the design of a Messerschmitt precludes fueling it from the back of a horse-cart.

I would imagine that the sheer scale implies the use of some sort of mass transportation system, like a railway, to deliver the raw resources needed for their production. Also factories. But if Tooze says it's mules all the way down, I guess I better trust the experts.

Its not that they didn't have cars, trucks, or locomotives at all. It's that they had so few of them.

And yes a good part of the blame goes to the the steel shortage described by @WestphalianPeace but the simple facts remain.

Amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics.

So I'll go right back to the raw production numbers I cited, and point out they were roughly on-par with Britain. They obviously ultimately lost, but the run for the money that they gave to Europe + US would indicate that they weren't backwards or low-tech. Either that, or everyone else was as well, which makes those descriptors meaningless.

Also re: locomotives in particular, you can tell where Prussia used to end, and where the Russian Empire began, just by looking at the railway map of Europe. To be clear: not the 1930's and 40's map - the one from current year. Like, I don't know if you realize how tall the order of "Germany was a backwards low-tech economy" is.

Britain was also very primitive. They were still eating their old mine and shunting ponies in the 50s, because all through the war all their railyards were using horses. (They also didn't get the post-war infrastructure rebuild that Europe got, which accelerated their decline.)

Germany was in the situation where the vast majority of their divisions were exactly as maneuverable as in WW1 the second they got off trains and hitched their anti-tank guns to the horse teams.
My dad had an older artilleryman friend who said they were jealous of the panzer units heading east, but very grateful for the horses on the way back west because you can't eat a tank.

I'd propose that if we're calling the literal global hegemon of the time "very primitive", maybe it's time to take step back and reassess if we're using the right standard.

If you want to say that the tech-level of the time allowed for more advanced solutions, yes I agree. The problem is that it takes time for these advanced solutions to get the required infrastructure to support it, that's why you see horses being used in Europe well after the war (into the 60's in poorer countries, and even into the early 90's behind the Iron Curtain - I still remember seeing quite a lot of them when I was a kid). Not being able to instantly snap that infrastructure into existence is not a sign of primitiveness (though taking your sweet time until the 90's probably is).

Germany was in the situation where the vast majority of their divisions were exactly as maneuverable as in WW1 the second they got off trains and hitched their guns to the horse teams. My dad had an older artilleryman friend who said they were jealous of the panzer units heading east, but very grateful for the horses heading back east because you can't eat a tank.

Here I'll just quote my response to Hyperion:

I mean, even there that's not particularly backwards and low-tech for that era. Especially if you look at the amount of infrastructure in the east, and the German's chronic problems with just finding enough oil, it might even start looking like a rational choice.

But in any case, the reason I did a double-take, and an now at the stage where I'll die on this hill, is that they were talking about the economy, not army logistics.

The Germans had trains and barges to connect the mines and factories in their own territories and move goods and people. This doesn't help your army on the march.

I mean, even there that's not particularly backwards and low-tech for that era. Especially if you look at the amount of infrastructure in the east, and the German's chronic problems with just finding enough oil, it might even start looking like a rational choice.

But in any case, the reason I did a double-take, and an now at the stage where I'll die on this hill, is that they were talking about the economy, not army logistics.

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