I've not got around to reading Richard Overy's latest tome, but if it is true to form, it will be an extremely well researched effort. The immediate Post War US Strategic BombingSurvey was pretty conclusive in it’s findings (sadly the UK could only afford a very small team of researchers to take part in this massive study) about the efficacy of the Combined Bomber Offensive; Speer and Goering, inter alia, spoke at length of the massive disruption to the war effort brought about by CBO. * Overy’s Interrogations contains some useful quotes from the Nuremburg investigations and trials that support these assertions. ‘Bomber’Harris himself quotes Speer in Bomber Offensive, along with the rather interesting observation that when the Allies successfully bombed the Reichsluftministerieaircraft procurement division in an effort to disrupt the administration ofcontracts, productivity rose, counterintuitively!
I think that all researchers accept that to defend the Reich from the CBO drew in massive resources – manpower, materiel - otherwise that could have beendeploy in support of the land forces. Bylate 1943, work on most offensive air systems – with the exception of the V1and V2 – had stopped and almost all aircraft production was directed towardsdefensive fighters. Arguably, then, the CBO effectively stopped Nazi Germany developing a strategic bomber force. The designs were there, but none were put into volume production. Furthermore, because of the disruption to transportation,fuel distribution and aircraft materials, the RLM would have struggled to have produced bombers in any significant numbers.
However, the reviewer does mention the massive economic impact theBritish-led bomber offensive had on the UK economy, and little has been written about this, at least not in recent years. If I recall correctly (as I don’t have the AP athand), by early 1943 one third of the construction industry – equipment andworkers – were employed building or lengthening bomber airfields in the UK, andit was consuming 10% of the war-fighting budget. This led to already acute manpower shortages in other areas – amongst the fighting services, emergency services and in the wider economy. To sense an extent of the resources consumed, the Air Ministry – on behalf of the RAF and the USAAF – was accepting a bomber airfield into service every three days, for three years. Additionally, at any one time, c 50% of airfields were being upgraded (sealed runways, increased hangarage &c).
I don’t recall seeing any work speculating on how these resources could havebetter used, but it might make an interesting ACSC Research Paper..
* As it was conducted by the USAAF, it would say that, of course.
Last edited by Whenurhappy; 26th Sep 2013 at 14:58.