The B-29 Superfortress

[whistlingdeath77]

Airplane guys hate to admit it, but ultimately, in Europe, the Allied ground troops had to finish the war. Many historians have suggested that if the Allied strategic air forces had concentrated on destroying Germany's oil reserves and production, rather than attacking cities and factories, the war might have been shortened. But remember that the Germans fought hard right up to the end. The B-29 would not have been a 'magic bullet' in this case, although it certainly would have been welcome.

Totally agree with you. Without everybody doing their part, the war could have went on for lord knows how long. But the question is, if the B-29 was in active service with trained crews during 42-43, do you think it may have shortend the war a little or may have saved more aircrews lives

[PinecastleAAF]

I always thought crews prefered the B-17 to the B-24 even though the 24 was faster, flew higher, more bomb load etc. so I think crews would take rugged survivability over all else, but that is just my 2 centavos.

As for something available in 1942 that would have made a big difference my vote would have gone for Torpedos that actually blew up when they hit the target, you know like the ones the Japanese had.

[the330thbg]

I always thought crews prefered the B-17 to the B-24 even though the 24 was faster, flew higher, more bomb load etc. so I think crews would take rugged survivability over all else, but that is just my 2 centavos.

As for something available in 1942 that would have made a big difference my vote would have gone for Torpedos that actually blew up when they hit the target, you know like the ones the Japanese had.

Functional torpedoes and long range fighters!

It still drives me nuts to read about the Dauntless crews from Enterprise and Hornet and to hear that out of their flights of 14, 2 came back. or out of the flight of 10, 1 came back.,. where in the hell was the fighter cover.., also all the poor guys who did drop their fish and WOMP.. nada! What a pisser. Those are the guys back home who should have been strung up in the town square.., the ones making shoddy armaments for our boys in harms way.

[Django]

Functional torpedoes and long range fighters!

It still drives me nuts to read about the Dauntless crews from Enterprise and Hornet and to hear that out of their flights of 14, 2 came back. or out of the flight of 10, 1 came back.,. where in the heck was the fighter cover.., also all the poor guys who did drop their fish and WOMP.. nada! What a pisser. Those are the guys back home who should have been strung up in the town square.., the ones making shoddy armaments for our boys in harms way.

There was a movie that came out during the war about a munitions factory that was producing inferior ammunition and the resulting turmoil on the homefront from the investigation. I wish I could remember the name but I can't.

[jmkendall]

I grew up around Mare Island Naval Shipyard, and although no expert on Torpedoes,I have probably heard a thousand stories from "the old guys" back in the 60s.

And, yep, Torpedoes were the number one subject with those old Submariners and Pilots.

However; from all my conversations it was pretty much "common knowledge" that it was not a problem with the manufacturer; rather it was just a really bad design. Hell, it seemed like the ones that did function were the same ones that came back and hit the Sub that launched them!

In fact I remember talking to my Uncle who was a Torpedoman and he said that the old crews actually had to do some pretty dangerous, and unauthorized, modifications to get them to function.

So, just this once, I think we can be nice to the Manufacturers.

Back to the B-29. If a campaign had been waged from the CBI, exclusively, against Japanese refining and fuel storage; it might have made some small difference. Japan was heavily dependent on its Navy. Distruction of Fuel supplies is a large force multiplier. Granted the bomb load would be smaller and the destruction less. But I think the ripple effect would have been larger than most would believe. The so-called butterfly effect. For instance they would have had to put more resources, early in the war to defending the home Islands. They would have been forced to expend more energy to take out those Allied Airfields.

And if fuel allocation becomes tight,do you give it to the Transports or the Escorts???

Who knows?

[tom d. friedman]

while i'm certainly proud of my dad's south pacific service on dutch new guinea, morotai island, & mindanoa philippines, as a captain & rifle company commander company co. I 155TH INFANTRY, 31ST INFANTRY DIVISION i must admit i feel the same way. i hope i'm wrong. dad passed 3 years ago yesterday at 92.

[whistlingdeath77]

I thought that the B-24 really wasn't faster than the b-17, but instead they had to fly it 10mph faster to make it more stable during flight. Something to do with the wing of the 24?

[the330thbg]

The so-called butterfly effect.

As it relates to quantum physics?

[PropsRule]

I read somewhere that one or two B-29s were deployed to the ETO during the war as decoys, to make the Axis powers think that the B-29 was intended for use in Europe. I've never been able to find reference to that again. Does anyone know if it is true?

I'm with the train of thought that says the bombers did much better with effective fighter escort.

[tom d. friedman]

330, does that mean that my dad's contribution as a rifle co. commander's efforts were in vain & a waste of time?? his company liberated countless villages & towns from new guinea, to morotai, to cotobato , malaybalay ( which my dad's company liberated & was the capital) to butuan all major cities in the philippines. point being i'm not taking anything away anything from the air crews, but aerial bombing was not that precision. that's like saying iwo jima okinowa etc was in vain as well w/ out air support. air support was beyond essential in the contribution to victory but couldn't floss out every enemy encampment, occupation, island etc. same goes for europe times 20.

[the330thbg]

330, does that mean that my dad's contribution as a rifle co. commander's efforts were in vain & a waste of time?? his company liberated countless villages & towns from new guinea, to morotai, to cotobato , malaybalay ( which my dad's company liberated & was the capital) to butuan all major cities in the philippines. point being i'm not taking anything away anything from the air crews, but aerial bombing was not that precision. that's like saying iwo jima okinowa etc was in vain as well w/ out air support. air support was beyond essential in the contribution to victory but couldn't floss out every enemy encampment, occupation, island etc. same goes for europe times 20.

330th "The Airplane guys know for a fact that it beat Japan without an invasion. The airplane dropped atom bombs did that without a mainland troop invasion by US troops"

That is what you 'read' into my comment?

Why?

What I was stating was that your dad and the majority of his comrades might not be here without the bomb drop on Japan. A mainland invasion was next after Okinawa. The casualty rate would have been abysmal.

I would never imply that ground troops were not pivotal to any war.

Without the islands for these bombers to fly missions from there would be no B-29. The islands paid at a huge human cost.

[Stephan Wilkinson]

...without a mainland troop invasion by US troops...

I don't know why, every time this endless argument comes up--atom bomb versus invasion--nobody mentions the perfectly viable third option: blockade.

Japan's home islands produced almost nothing, in terms of natural resources. No oil or coal for fuel. No ores for metal and manufacturing (which is why they were importing scrap metal from the U. S. even as Pearl Harbor was in process). Very little food, other than rice and what fish they could catch. No rubber.

So ring the islands with an iron curtain of U. S. warships. We could have set up a blockade so tight that not a trawler could have penetrated it. Yes, the few Japanese aircraft remaining would attack the ships, but soon they'd be gone. Japan's sub fleet would try the same, with the same result. It might have taken until 1947, say, but eventually the Japanese people would have gotten tired enough of eating paper and wood that they'd have done something about the militarists who controlled the government (who themselves were probably pretty tired of eating paper and wood). There would be no gasoline, no new production of weapons, no ordnance produced, nothing to eat.

The downside for some might have been that even more Japanese would have died of starvation than died of atomic weapons, but very few Americans would have died in a blockade.

It's exactly what the Germans planned to do to the Brits, after their attempt at invasion was ended by the Battle of Britain. They then hoped to cut the British Isles off from all imports of food, fuel and military goods with their huge U-boat fleet--assuming they won the Battle of the Atlantic. As it happened, they lost that battle. But the U. S. definitely wouldn't have lost a Battle of the Blockade of Japan.

[shrike]

By the time the decision was made to drop the bombs, a defacto blockade already did exist. The transportation infrastructure of Japan was destroyed, Hokkaido, with most of the agricultural produce (ie. food) was already cut off from Honshu, with most of the population (ie, mouths) by the destruction of practically every Japanese hull on the water.

A state of siege already existed, not only with nothing getting in or out, but nothing moving internally either. It has been projected that the deaths by starvation on Honshu by the beginning of winter 1945 would have been an order of magnitude greater than the casualties of the war to that date.

Unfortunately, heroically enduring a siege and it's hardships are a theme throughout practically every culture. (Masada, Alamo, Battle of Britain, Stalingrad et c.) Even knowing that the siege would end tragically, the Japanese were prepared to stick it out, literally to the death, before surrendering.

Without the game-changing shock of the atom bombs to create an opening, the end to your blockade scenario would not have come quickly.

Add the possibility - or probability that the Soviets, seeing an opportunity, may have taken Hokkaido in addition to Sakhalin, depriving Japan of the chance of ever being anything but a dependent orphan.

[Stephan Wilkinson]

the end to your blockade scenario would not have come quickly.

Never said it would come quickly. 1946, 1949, 1952...just saying that "a million U.S. deaths if we invaded" was not the only choice aside from the bomb. I'm sure there were plenty of Marines and infantrymen who wouldn't have cared -how- long a blockade would have to have been maintained.

[JDK]

I read somewhere that one or two B-29s were deployed to the ETO during the war as decoys, to make the Axis powers think that the B-29 was intended for use in Europe. I've never been able to find reference to that again. Does anyone know if it is true?

One, true. Mentioned in this current / recent thread on Key, with lost of other material which relates to the original question.

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showth ... p?t=112571