British rearmament earlier and more effectively in the 30s

[PMN1]

The British had no 75mm or even a 57mm tank gun ready in 1940

Might have been possible to have a 6pdr a bit earlier.

Death by Design…Peter Beale

During the period when the two-pounder was being developed and mounted in tanks (as well as being used for ground-mounted anti-tank equipment), the thickness of armour on all tanks was rising steadily. There was clearly a case for a heavier gun. Col. Campbell Clarke was deputy Chairman of the Ordnance Board in 1937, and he had urged the then Director of Artillery, Maj Gen H. A. Lewis, to order a tank gun which could deal with tanks armoured to the 78mm standard of the Matilda. Lewis said that the General Staff did not consider it necessary. On 1 April 1938 Campbell Clarke succeeded Lewis as Director of Artillery, and on handing over Lewis said to Clarke, ‘Now you can get on with your gun’. Clarke proceeded to do just that.

The prime cause of this work was the field anti-tank gun rather than the tank gun; but from the start the possible future use of the gun in tanks was allowed for. Clarke called for general exploratory work on a six-pounder anti-tank gun in April 1938 ‘following generally the specification which governs the production of the two-pounder’. This request was made by the Design Department; but that department was understaffed and busy with other guns, and Clarke could not get General Staff priority.

Because of the shortage of design resources and the priorities given to them, designs for the six-pounder was not available until autumn 1939. The attention of the Director of Mechanisation, Maj Gen A.E. Davidson, responsible for the provision of tanks to the armoured forces, was drawn to the new gun at an early stage. But he was even less interested in a six-pounder tank gun than a six-pounder anti-tank gun; thus when a gun was available for trial in April 1940, and was approved, subject to testing, a tank and anti-tank gun, it was not specifically adopted for use in tanks.

In June 1940 the six-pounder passed its test at Shoeburyness. In July 1940 the Ministry of supply was asked to make fourteen pilot models, and in October they increased this to 50. At about this time Clarke read in an Ordnance Board minute that the Churchill tank currently being rushed through the design and manufacturing process was still to mount a two-pounder. Clarke protested vigorously to the Assistant Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir G.N. Macready and to his own boss, the Director General of Munitions Production, Sir Harold Brown. Clarke had already pointed out that the Germans, having investigated the Matildas left behind at Dunkirk, were very likely to increase the strength of both armour and the armament on their tanks – which they did.

Clarke also pressed the Director of Mechanisation to adopt the six-pounder in his tanks. Maj Gen Davidson pointed out that there was no General Staff requirement for a more powerful gun on tanks, and that ‘it was no part of the Director of Mechanisation’s duties to dictate to the General Staff when they had already decided their policies; the new Churchill tanks were designed to mount the two-pounder; and the size of the six-pounder would involve radical enlargement of the hull and turret’.

Macleod Ross records that: ‘On Clarke’s remonstrance Adm Sir Harold Brown (the DGMP) immediately ordered 2,000 six pounder anti-tank guns and 2,000 six-pounder tank guns. Unlike the D of M he did not care whether the General Staff approved or not, action which might be termed “the Nelson touch”.

The orders were there, but was the manufacturing capacity? Production was allowed to start only in a new factory at Radcliffe near Bolton because of War Office insistence that the production of two-pounders in existing factories should not be compromised.

 

[PMN1]

Related to this subject

http://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=292624

 

[uk 75]

There were of course wrong decisions that could have been taken in the 1930s.
Rearmament was far from popular. Many argued that money would be better spent on the domestic economy. There was also a somewhat naive faith in the League of Nations to provide "collective security'.
So Britain might have found itself in 1938 equipped with a modest biplane RAF, a rusting battlefleet RN and a colonial peacekeeping army.
The argument in favour of strategic bombing might have drawn resources from Fighter Command giving the RAF a bomber force perhaps larger than in actual history but probably no more capable while losing us the Battle of Britain.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Part of the Opening Post.

Could Britain have rearmed earlier and more effectively in the 1930s?

Yes and yes had there been enough public support for it. However, as you wrote in Post 44.

Rearmament was far from popular. Many argued that money would be better spent on the domestic economy. There was also a somewhat naive faith in the League of Nations to provide "collective security'.

The title of the thread is "British rearmament earlier and more effectively in the 30s". Does that mean it can start as early as 1st January 1930?

 

[uk 75]

Nazi Germany was not the only threat to Britain. Mussolini''s Italy and Imperial Japan were also challenges. So yes, if public opinion had been better informed rearmament could have begun in 1930.
But whether it would have been effective is another matter?

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Nazi Germany was not the only threat to Britain. Mussolini's Italy and Imperial Japan were also challenges. So yes, if public opinion had been better informed rearmament could have begun in 1930.

Earlier than 1930 would turn this into a "Britain didn't disarm in the first place" thread.

However, Italy didn't become a threat until 1935, Germany didn't become a threat until 1933, before that Japan was the only Great Power HMG thought was a potential enemy and to be fair to Ramsay MacDonald & Co they couldn't have foreseen a lunatic that looked like Charlie Chaplin taking control of Germany and plunging the world into the most destructive war in history.

But whether it would have been effective is another matter?

It depends upon the definition of effective. In the Opening Post you wrote...

"could it have either prevented war or defeated Hitler earlier?"​

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

...a lunatic that looked like Charlie Chaplin...

Which comes from this...

dad's army the deadly attachment - Google Search

 

[JWilly]

Specifics:

1. It was known when the Matilda II was designed that the next generation of tank/AT guns would be the six pounders. The turret ring of the Matilda II should have been large enough to eventually accept a new turret with that gun.

2. There was no logical reason why the frontal profile of the Matilda II had to be an un-castable geometry, so achieved with massive amounts of grinding-away of hard metal. AFV designers always should consider production capabilities. Lots of time- and therefore cost-savings there.

3. Vickers offered the Army in the 1930s an adequately functional tracked lightly armored tub-vehicle with a single pom-pom. That ready-to-manufacture vehicle, armed with the updated HV version of the pom-pom and alongside a vehicle-version with a triple high-ROF-20mm mount, should have been bought in great numbers.

4. Britain should have been more aware of the costs of NIH syndrome. They should have contracted with France's Edgar Brandt company for advanced AP projectiles for the two and six pounders, to be manufactured at a British Brandt factory. And, as noted in another thread here recently, they should have moved past the .303 (too light) and 20mm (too physically large) aircraft armament and instead adopted the Belgian Fabrique Nationale 13.2mm version of the Browning .50 inch caliber aircraft HMG, with FN Herstal's advanced HEI / HEI-T ammo...all to be manufactured at a British FN factory.

5. There was no good reason (only a bad reason, i.e. already-disproved doctrine) why the tank and AT two pounders were not issued HE shells...minimally effective though they would have been, they still would have been much more efficient than AP.

6. Absent the loss of equipment at Dunkirk, there would have been large numbers of eighteen pounder artillery pieces available as the 25 pounders were fielded. They could have been mounted to retired A9/A10 and later A13 chassis, behind a Marder-like fragment-shield superstructure and equipped with direct fire sights, to fire a version of the 75mm HEAT / multi-purpose shell that Edgar Brandt had ready to go in early 1940. Such a vehicle on infantry-tank chassis would have filled a line-of-sight fire-support role for the infantry, and on cruiser-tank chassis, added to defensive and assault fire for armored elements.

7. The later Kangaroo concept should have been obvious as a cheap means to obtain APCs better protected than UCs.

8. Far too many under-powered, under-armored cruiser tanks were built. It should have been obviously false economy to field rapidly-lost tanks, resulting in failed missions and lost personnel. Much better to field 1/3 as many tanks that win their engagements with low losses.

9. The Army certainly believed in putting lots of semi-aimed suppressive bullets downrange, with their excellent MMGs and their mad-minute doctrine. There was no good reason for the semi-automatic-rifle debacle, given that the US, Germany, France and Belgium all made good progress on semis by 1940.

 

[Lascaris]

Since we are resurrecting the thread, the British insistence on a 2nd London naval treaty when it was pretty clear none of the potential opponents was going to comply to one always made little sense to me.

 

[Tony Williams]

Britain should have been more aware of the costs of NIH syndrome. They should have contracted with France's Edgar Brandt company for advanced AP projectiles for the two and six pounders, to be manufactured at a British Brandt factory. And, as noted in another thread here recently, they should have moved past the .303 (too light) and 20mm (too physically large) aircraft armament and instead adopted the Belgian Fabrique Nationale 13.2mm version of the Browning .50 inch caliber aircraft HMG, with FN Herstal's advanced HEI / HEI-T ammo...all to be manufactured at a British FN factory.

To be fair, Britain showed little evidence of NIH when it came to MGs and autocannon. The following were purchased:

.303 Bren (Czech), 7.9 BESA (Czech), 15mm BESA (Czech), 20mm Oerlikon (Swiss), 20mm Hispano (French), 40mm Bofors (Swedish).

*And the .303 Browning, of course!

An alternative aircraft gun would have been the Oerlikon FFL in 20x101RB calibre, as adopted by the Japanese Navy as the Type 99-2: the muzzle velocity was about the same as the .303 at 750 m/s so there would have been a trajectory match (aim with the .303, fire the cannon when on target), rate of fire was slightly lower at 500 rpm (increased during WW2 to 620 rpm, then 720 rpm at the end), belt feed was introduced, and the gun weighed only 33 kg (Hispano = 50 kg). The gun was also debugged and available to purchase, unlike the Hispano which was not ready when it was needed most for the BoB.

 

[uk 75]

Something which crops up throughout the 30s is the confused British attitude towards France.
On the one hand its large army and air force are seen as allowing us to concentrate on the RN and home defence.
On the other hand there are doubts as to the effectiveness of the French.
Appeasement makes matters worse as the UK seems to undermine French support for the Czechs and Poles.
Somewhat mirrored by post Cold War attitudes to France and even now in Ukraine.
Essentially the British General Staff believe in the 18th Century concept of blockading the Continent and letting our allies do the bulk of the fighting.
This ignores the fact that we were forced to develop a large army to fight Germany in WW1 and Germany used its U boats to blockade us.
But the biggest hole was the absence of the US. Its decisive role in WW1 had given way to isolation and pious homilies on peace from Washington.
Those who accuse post war British politicians of being too reliant on the US forget this period at their peril.

 

[Hood]

I agree that the Oerlikon FFL seems an obvious what-if choice for aircraft, especially since the other two Services used Oerlikons. Indeed over at the Wesworld naval RPG I selected the FFL for the RAF in lieu of the Hispano.

Tank design is all well and good but having commanders who think that charging 88s over open terrain is like Balaclava all over again is leading to the road of ruin whatever trusty steed they are having shot from under them.

Its perhaps a shame British tank designers didn't get closer to a T-34-esque design sooner. Instead in the rush for diversification during the rearmament panic tank design was farmed out to automotive and locomotive companies leading to cool ideas like putting the Covenanter's radiator on the front glacis...

Historians today point and laugh knowingly at Germany wasting resources on 1,347 Tigers compared to gigatons of SherT34s but 1,771 useless Covenanters and 500 marginally less useless Cavaliers is hardly a glowing endorsement of British tank production - remember only 950 Centaurs and 3,066 Cromwells were built. Without Shermans we would have been in a stickier position in 1944.

 

[uk 75]

Not to mention the M3 Lee Grant which helped us out too.
In the twenty years between World Wars the US had taken over as the main source of allied tanks.

 

[Elan Vital]

There is a case to be made for rearmament entering the true "panick/buildup" phase shortly after Munich instead of after the occupation of Czechoslovakia many months later. For example the conscription laws and Terries reinforcements didn't happen until mid 1939 and tank orders for the early Cruisers remained low instead of being ramped up to provide an actually large stopgap fleet pending the arrival of Covenanters and Crusaders.

If most of the mid 39 orders and mobilization laws had happened right after Munich, then we could truly say Chamberlain was trying to buy time.

In the same context I would add ordering Valentine in late 1938 instead of 1939 for the same reasons. With those decisions it would be possible to make the BEF relevant way earlier in 1939 and 1940, potentially strong enough that the French officers in favor of a reinforced British role finally overcome Gamelin's obstruction to reallocate French ressources to the reserves or their main fronts.

By May 1940, the BEF may reach levels intended for late 1940 which would make the BoF much more painful for the Germans.

 

[uk 75]

Like most of the alternate history threads here the big change needed to get kit into service was a different political leadership.
Chamberlain's dogmatic belief that he could avoid war was the main obstacle to effective rearmament. Replace him with even Halifax let alone Churchill and more would have been done earlier.

 

[riggerrob]

" ... 9. The Army certainly believed in putting lots of semi-aimed suppressive bullets downrange, with their excellent MMGs and their mad-minute doctrine. There was no good reason for the semi-automatic-rifle debacle, given that the US, Germany, France and Belgium all made good progress on semis by 1940."

The devil is in the details. The biggest limitation to Britain adopting a semi-automatic, full-bore rifle was the rim on their standard .303 ammunition. That little rim makes it more difficult to feed through magazines, because it has a n annoyin ghabit of snagging on the rim of the next round. Yes, we know that Bren LMGs fired rimmed .303 ammo, but those bulky, curved Bren magazines were far from ideal for a semi-auto rifle. In the long run, most armies decided that 20 rounds was about the maximum practical magazine for a foot-soldier.
There were many prototypes and attempts at designing a British semi-auto rifle. For example, the Canadian engineer Huot built a few automatic rifles based upon the Ross rifle. You can see the Huot detailed on www.forgottenweapons.com.

As an aside, Ross Rifles jammed in the trenches because they were built too precisely and the Canadian factory learned about looser tolerances in British cartridge factories too late. Ross eventually learned how to ream out chambers to accept sloppier British ammo, but the update came too late. Another tid bit that I learned from forgottenweapons

 

[riggerrob]

" Specifics: ....

4. ... they should have moved past the .303 (too light) and 20mm (too physically large) aircraft armament and instead adopted the Belgian Fabrique Nationale 13.2mm version of the Browning .50 inch caliber aircraft HMG, with FN Herstal's advanced HEI / HEI-T ammo...all to be manufactured at a British FN factory. .... "

We can agree that .303 was good at destroying fabric-covered biplanes, but was too light for the faster, mostly-metal with a bit of armor monoplanes of WW2. But we will have to disagree that a Browning .50 calibre (12.5mm) or bored-out FN 13.2mm was ideal.
During the late 1930s, (see Justo Miranda's book "Enemy at the Gates, Panic Fighters of World War 2), most nations were struggling to build 1,000 horsepower engines and that was barely enough to loft a single 20mm cannon. Hispano-Suiza, Klimov and Daimler-Benz were all developing engines that could accommodate a single 20mm motor cannon firing through the prop hub. Post WW2, most jet fighters are armed with fuselage-mounted 20mm auto-cannons.
By 1943 or 1944, all British fighters (Spitfire, Hurricane, Typhoon, Tempest, Beaufighter, Mosquito, etc.) were armed with 4 or more 20mm auto-cannons.

The devil was in the details. A matter of a few thousandths of an inch in head-spacing ruined American efforts at building a 20mm cannon for aircraft. This production delay forced Americans to turn to Browning .50 cal. heavy machine guns because John Browning's American factories had already de-bugged their mg designs and could pump them out by the thousands. American .20 cal. production was so prolific that they mounted one on top of every tank, truck, etc. they sent to Britain under lend-lease. Their primary role was anti-aircraft, but since the Luftwaffe ranks had been thinned by 1944, they served more in ground roles. Ask Audie Murphy how good .50 cal. was against German infantry. In Normandy 1944, British tankers removed .50 cals from atop their turrets to reduce their silhouette.

Browning .50 cal. was valuable in the small numbers of turrets (e.g. Lancaster) that were built in Britain to accommodate a pair of .50s. But we have already agreed that turreted, heavy bombers suffered too many casualties and the effort would have been better applied to making more Mosquito bombers.

 

[riggerrob]

Specifics: ...

7. The later Kangaroo concept should have been obvious as a cheap means to obtain APCs better protected than UCs. ... "

Good point.
Kangaroo APC was invented in response to a bloody lesson re-learned by Canadian infantry during June and July of 1944 in Normandy. They suffered 40 percent casualties from mortar and plunging artillery fire (air bursts) before advancing to within sight of the enemy. Some Canadian infantry regiments (e.g. Black Watch of Montreal) suffered 350 percent casualties during WW2!
It would be amusing to see Kangaroos based upon obsolete Cruisers, Valentines, etc. in a similar vein as all of the German SP guns based upon obsolete tank chassis. I am trying to picture an APC based upon a Valentine Archer. But they really needed armored roofs to survive all the shrapnel delivered by German mortars.

 

[Elan Vital]

I also wouldn't really count it as "earlier rearmament", but it could have been pretty neat if Britain bought a Christie tank for evaluation in 1934 or before when they were trying to find a suitable suspension for the Fast Medium Tanks (A7) rather than buying one in 1936 based on Martel's observations of Soviet tank maneuvers. This could have allowed the British to skip A9 and A10 straight for the A13 for production in 38/39 and depending on when requirements for A13 Mk III were needed (were they just based on lessons from A13 and could they then be sent after the same time, or were they due to events in 1937-8 specifically and couldn't be made earlier?) , one could also see Covenanter and Crusader being further ahead in development by 1940, if not already in service.

I'm also slightly curious about Matilda II's engine choice. Did they really choose low power bus engines because they did not want to pay for a higher P/W ratio, or did they just pick available engines when the option of developping a purpose-made engine like the Meadows DAV was too expensive or hadn't been thought of at the time?

 

[Schneiderman]

Like most of the alternate history threads here the big change needed to get kit into service was a different political leadership.
Chamberlain's dogmatic belief that he could avoid war was the main obstacle to effective rearmament. Replace him with even Halifax let alone Churchill and more would have been done earlier.

He did not become PM until May 1937, by which time rearmament, for aircraft at least, was in full swing and would continue to accelerate.

 

[EwenS]

In the same context I would add ordering Valentine in late 1938 instead of 1939 for the same reasons. With those decisions it would be possible to make the BEF relevant way earlier in 1939 and 1940, potentially strong enough that the French officers in favor of a reinforced British role finally overcome Gamelin's obstruction to reallocate French ressources to the reserves or their main fronts.

Well first of all you need to get Vickers and the War Office to see eye to eye about the "Valentine" design in 1938.

In March/April 1938 when Vickers presented their private venture tank design to the WO, they were insisting on using their own design of 40mm gun with an autoloader in a two man turret. Even after being told that was not acceptable they still produced a mock up with those features!

The WO wanted a 3 man turret, as every tank was to be equipped with a radio, with the standard 2pdr and a commanders cupola.

A year later in April 1939 the WO accepted a two man turret but with the standard 2pdr. And even then it was still cramped. But that acceptance was on the basis that production could begin rapidly.

So in 1938 Vickers believed production could start in April 1939. In 1939 they thought production could begin in April 1940. Orders were placed from 3 companies at the end of June 1939, and the first trials tank ww2 delivered in April 1940.

But there were also problems with the Ministry of Supply overestimating the production capabilities of British companies.

So the changed political situation forced a compromise by both parties to the transaction.

Taken from "Into the Vally. The Valentine Tank and Derivatives 1938-1960" by Dock Taylor.

 

[Elan Vital]

In the same context I would add ordering Valentine in late 1938 instead of 1939 for the same reasons. With those decisions it would be possible to make the BEF relevant way earlier in 1939 and 1940, potentially strong enough that the French officers in favor of a reinforced British role finally overcome Gamelin's obstruction to reallocate French ressources to the reserves or their main fronts.

Well first of all you need to get Vickers and the War Office to see eye to eye about the "Valentine" design in 1938.

In March/April 1938 when Vickers presented their private venture tank design to the WO, they were insisting on using their own design of 40mm gun with an autoloader in a two man turret. Even after being told that was not acceptable they still produced a mock up with those features!

The WO wanted a 3 man turret, as every tank was to be equipped with a radio, with the standard 2pdr and a commanders cupola.

A year later in April 1939 the WO accepted a two man turret but with the standard 2pdr. And even then it was still cramped. But that acceptance was on the basis that production could begin rapidly.

So in 1938 Vickers believed production could start in April 1939. In 1939 they thought production could begin in April 1940. Orders were placed from 3 companies at the end of June 1939, and the first trials tank ww2 delivered in April 1940.

But there were also problems with the Ministry of Supply overestimating the production capabilities of British companies.

So the changed political situation forced a compromise by both parties to the transaction.

Taken from "Into the Vally. The Valentine Tank and Derivatives 1938-1960" by Dock Taylor.

Wait what do we have confirmation of the autoloader in a two-man turret? I get the in-house 40mm since Tetrarch proto also had that.
Do you happen to have pictures of the mock-up?

 

[EwenS]

Like most of the alternate history threads here the big change needed to get kit into service was a different political leadership.
Chamberlain's dogmatic belief that he could avoid war was the main obstacle to effective rearmament. Replace him with even Halifax let alone Churchill and more would have been done earlier.

He did not become PM until May 1937, by which time rearmament, for aircraft at least, was in full swing and would continue to accelerate.

And for the RN. KGVs laid down from 1 Jan plus Illustrious class carriers etc.

 

[EwenS]

I also wouldn't really count it as "earlier rearmament", but it could have been pretty neat if Britain bought a Christie tank for evaluation in 1934 or before when they were trying to find a suitable suspension for the Fast Medium Tanks (A7) rather than buying one in 1936 based on Martel's observations of Soviet tank maneuvers. This could have allowed the British to skip A9 and A10 straight for the A13 for production in 38/39 and depending on when requirements for A13 Mk III were needed (were they just based on lessons from A13 and could they then be sent after the same time, or were they due to events in 1937-8 specifically and couldn't be made earlier?) , one could also see Covenanter and Crusader being further ahead in development by 1940, if not already in service.

I'm also slightly curious about Matilda II's engine choice. Did they really choose low power bus engines because they did not want to pay for a higher P/W ratio, or did they just pick available engines when the option of developping a purpose-made engine like the Meadows DAV was too expensive or hadn't been thought of at the time?

But without the A9 & A10 orders Vickers don't have the basic running gear design for the Valentine.

 

[JWilly]

4. ... they should have moved past the .303 (too light) and 20mm (too physically large) aircraft armament and instead adopted the Belgian Fabrique Nationale 13.2mm version of the Browning .50 inch caliber aircraft HMG, with FN Herstal's advanced HEI / HEI-T ammo...all to be manufactured at a British FN factory. .... "

(...) But we will have to disagree that a (...) FN 13.2mm was ideal.

FN did extensive development work to create their 13.2mm HE / HE-T. My understanding is that their pre-war marketing literature said that they had test data, supposedly obtained with actual hulk aluminum-construction aircraft on their test ranges, indicating that the smaller amount of skin and structure damage caused by an individual 13.2mm hit compared to 20mm, was more than offset by the greater number of such hits in an equal-time firing instance due to the higher RoF of the 13.2mm.

Plus, the 13.2mm having a higher RoF was much more suitable for quicker gunnery situations, as opposed to leisurely saddling up on a target's six and pre-establishing aim. ("...aim with the .303, fire the cannon when on target...")

 

[EwenS]

In the same context I would add ordering Valentine in late 1938 instead of 1939 for the same reasons. With those decisions it would be possible to make the BEF relevant way earlier in 1939 and 1940, potentially strong enough that the French officers in favor of a reinforced British role finally overcome Gamelin's obstruction to reallocate French ressources to the reserves or their main fronts.

Well first of all you need to get Vickers and the War Office to see eye to eye about the "Valentine" design in 1938.

In March/April 1938 when Vickers presented their private venture tank design to the WO, they were insisting on using their own design of 40mm gun with an autoloader in a two man turret. Even after being told that was not acceptable they still produced a mock up with those features!

The WO wanted a 3 man turret, as every tank was to be equipped with a radio, with the standard 2pdr and a commanders cupola.

A year later in April 1939 the WO accepted a two man turret but with the standard 2pdr. And even then it was still cramped. But that acceptance was on the basis that production could begin rapidly.

So in 1938 Vickers believed production could start in April 1939. In 1939 they thought production could begin in April 1940. Orders were placed from 3 companies at the end of June 1939, and the first trials tank ww2 delivered in April 1940.

But there were also problems with the Ministry of Supply overestimating the production capabilities of British companies.

So the changed political situation forced a compromise by both parties to the transaction.

Taken from "Into the Vally. The Valentine Tank and Derivatives 1938-1960" by Dock Taylor.

Wait what do we have confirmation of the autoloader in a two-man turret? I get the in-house 40mm since Tetrarch proto also had that.
Do you happen to have pictures of the mock-up?

No photos of that mocknup in the book.

 

[Elan Vital]

I also wouldn't really count it as "earlier rearmament", but it could have been pretty neat if Britain bought a Christie tank for evaluation in 1934 or before when they were trying to find a suitable suspension for the Fast Medium Tanks (A7) rather than buying one in 1936 based on Martel's observations of Soviet tank maneuvers. This could have allowed the British to skip A9 and A10 straight for the A13 for production in 38/39 and depending on when requirements for A13 Mk III were needed (were they just based on lessons from A13 and could they then be sent after the same time, or were they due to events in 1937-8 specifically and couldn't be made earlier?) , one could also see Covenanter and Crusader being further ahead in development by 1940, if not already in service.

I'm also slightly curious about Matilda II's engine choice. Did they really choose low power bus engines because they did not want to pay for a higher P/W ratio, or did they just pick available engines when the option of developping a purpose-made engine like the Meadows DAV was too expensive or hadn't been thought of at the time?

But without the A9 & A10 orders Vickers don't have the basic running gear design for the Valentine.

It was an outgrowth of Matilda I's and Vickers 6-ton's susp with a differeng wheel arrangement so a slightly longer dev maybe but not much.

 

[GTX]

He did not become PM until May 1937, by which time rearmament, for aircraft at least, was in full swing and would continue to accelerate.

Indeed, and while people might like to 'beat up' on Chamberlain, one has to also remember that neither Ramsay MacDonald or Stanley Baldwin before him were big advocates of it either. More to the point though, I believe they were dealing with the economic situation and a hope to avoid another major war so soon after the 1914 - 1918 conflict. In the case of Baldwin, I believe the following comment from him to Chamberlain in 1938 sums up well some of the thinking: "If you can secure peace, you may be cursed by a lot of hotheads but my word you will be blessed in Europe and by future generations".

​

 

[EwenS]

I also wouldn't really count it as "earlier rearmament", but it could have been pretty neat if Britain bought a Christie tank for evaluation in 1934 or before when they were trying to find a suitable suspension for the Fast Medium Tanks (A7) rather than buying one in 1936 based on Martel's observations of Soviet tank maneuvers. This could have allowed the British to skip A9 and A10 straight for the A13 for production in 38/39 and depending on when requirements for A13 Mk III were needed (were they just based on lessons from A13 and could they then be sent after the same time, or were they due to events in 1937-8 specifically and couldn't be made earlier?) , one could also see Covenanter and Crusader being further ahead in development by 1940, if not already in service.

I'm also slightly curious about Matilda II's engine choice. Did they really choose low power bus engines because they did not want to pay for a higher P/W ratio, or did they just pick available engines when the option of developping a purpose-made engine like the Meadows DAV was too expensive or hadn't been thought of at the time?

But without the A9 & A10 orders Vickers don't have the basic running gear design for the Valentine.

It was an outgrowth of Matilda I's and Vickers 6-ton's susp with a differeng wheel arrangement so a slightly longer dev maybe but not much.

In early 1939 Vickers were using an A10 heavy cruiser chassis weighted to 16 tons alongside a wooden mock up to demonstrate their new tank.

 

[uk 75]

The problem with Chamberlain's cautious approach to rearmament and emphasis on appeasement was that despite the continued expansion of the RAF and some improvements to the RN and Army there needed to be someone willing to contemplate modern war on the scale of Spain and Abyssinia.
Given the background of the prevailing view that World War 1 had been a great mistake and widespread pacifism such a politician was hard to find.
But Chamberlain despite his stuffy image was a determined and even arrogant politician who stifled all opposition in the Cabinet.
As Churchill and Eden recognised Hitler could not be appeased.
There was also Chamberlain's personal animosity to Roosevelt that blocked any influence in Washington.
The farcical attempt to bring Soviet Union into the alliance with France and Britain by sending a military mission by sea was one of many examples of Chamberlain's dead hand.

 

[Archibald]

And Daladier was no better. He actually sunk France, twice. At Munich first, and also with his constant and strong support to that asshole Gamelin, France very own Cadorna military genius.

France was trapped in a deadly spiral.
1- Late era 3rd Republic was crippled by political instability
2- Daladier's Parti Radical had made itself unavoidable for both moderate right and moderate left
3- So no stable coalition without Daladier and his party
4- As long as Daladier was in a government, Gamelin was secure - all the way from 1935 to May 19, 1940.

Case in point: Reynaud on March 21, 1940 threw Daladier from the PM job. Daladier immediately came back like a boomerang, and got yet another ministry - as his party was essential to Reynaud coalition. Hence Reynaud, despite serious doubts related to Gamelin, could not fire him, try as he might.

The Daladier - Gamelin axis was perhaps the worst thing happened to France after 1935. We should have Mola-Sanjurjo-ed them to a plane crash.

 

[Schneiderman]

The problem with Chamberlain's cautious approach to rearmament and emphasis on appeasement was that despite the continued expansion of the RAF and some improvements to the RN and Army there needed to be someone willing to contemplate modern war on the scale of Spain and Abyssinia.
Given the background of the prevailing view that World War 1 had been a great mistake and widespread pacifism such a politician was hard to find.
But Chamberlain despite his stuffy image was a determined and even arrogant politician who stifled all opposition in the Cabinet.
As Churchill and Eden recognised Hitler could not be appeased.
There was also Chamberlain's personal animosity to Roosevelt that blocked any influence in Washington.
The farcical attempt to bring Soviet Union into the alliance with France and Britain by sending a military mission by sea was one of many examples of Chamberlain's dead hand.

Yet Chamberlain was not slow to sack Swinton from the Air Ministry when progress on shadow factories was poor. You blacken the man's character too far. Churchill would probably have struggled to do much better in those late pre-war years, he excelled once a national government was assembled and he could draw on a broader pool of political experience but stuck with just the Conservatives things may have been very different.

 

[PMN1]

The problem with Chamberlain's cautious approach to rearmament and emphasis on appeasement was that despite the continued expansion of the RAF and some improvements to the RN and Army there needed to be someone willing to contemplate modern war on the scale of Spain and Abyssinia.
Given the background of the prevailing view that World War 1 had been a great mistake and widespread pacifism such a politician was hard to find.
But Chamberlain despite his stuffy image was a determined and even arrogant politician who stifled all opposition in the Cabinet.
As Churchill and Eden recognised Hitler could not be appeased.
There was also Chamberlain's personal animosity to Roosevelt that blocked any influence in Washington.
The farcical attempt to bring Soviet Union into the alliance with France and Britain by sending a military mission by sea was one of many examples of Chamberlain's dead hand.

Chamberlain does get a bad press, he didn't want to bankrupt the country, something which was going to happen to Germany without its land grab and it didn't hurt Churchill one bit to have Chamblerlain seen as soft on Germany.

 

[Foo Fighter]

Speaking of tanks, the production of tanks at the time was limited in another very important factor. Very few highly trained welders and they were working in shipyards. Companies wanting to get involved with tank production basically told the management that "We want to join in but if we do, the tanks must be of bolted/riveted construction".

 

[uk 75]

As you have pointed out even before becoming PM Chamberlain had supported the idea of rebuilding the RAF.
But as you also mention he did so because he thought it was an affordable way of deterring Germany.
I should make clear I am only "removing" Chamberlain so we can look at other options for rearming Britain in the 1930s.
Archibald has described the biggest handicap for Britain which even Churchill could not have overcome.. Daladier and Gamelin.

 

[HoHun]

Hi,

FN did extensive development work to create their 13.2mm HE / HE-T. My understanding is that their pre-war marketing literature said that they had test data, supposedly obtained with actual hulk aluminum-construction aircraft on their test ranges, indicating that the smaller amount of skin and structure damage caused by an individual 13.2mm hit compared to 20mm, was more than offset by the greater number of such hits in an equal-time firing instance due to the higher RoF of the 13.2mm.

I'm going to disagree with the FN marketing literature here The Germans did similar tests with defined amounts of explosives placed in the aircraft structure, and subsequently developed the 20 mm mine shell to maximize the anti-structural effect. The standard 20 mm shells didn't have enough capacity for optimum effectiveness against aircraft structures, so I really doubt a 13.2 mm shell could be superior.

(And when the Luftwaffe actually introduced a heavy machine gun with had explosive shells in the form of the 15 mm MG151, they very quickly switched production to a 20 mm variant of the same gun, even providing replacement barrels so units in the field could convert their existing guns.)

Another effect when comparing damage is that it's far worse to have a single big hole in the aircraft skin, compared to several smaller holes in random locations. (And random distribution was pretty much what you'd get from rapid-fire weapons, especially when they were wing-mounted.)

Plus, the 13.2mm having a higher RoF was much more suitable for quicker gunnery situations, as opposed to leisurely saddling up on a target's six and pre-establishing aim. ("...aim with the .303, fire the cannon when on target...")

If the quick gunnery situation provides a time window T, you'll get a probability of a kill Pk = n_Guns * rate_of_fire * Pk_per_round * T. I'd argue that the best weapon for quick gunnery situations is the one that gives the greatest Pk, regardless of rate of fire. In an aircraft design context, this will come down to comparing entire batteries of equal mass, not single guns, and realistically, the dominant factor here is energy-to-mass ratio of the ammunition, which favours larger calibres (even with conventional 20 mm shells, as would have been available to the British).

I wouldn't disagree with the idea that the FN 13.2 mm machine gun would have been a very useful improvement over the 0.303" Browning machine guns the RAF historically had, but I'd say the Oerlikon FF in any form would have been an even more useful weapon.

The trajectory match of the Oerlikon FFL specifically with the 0.303" Browning Tony pointed out seems quite irrelevant to me, as when the cannon hit, you don't need to care where the machine gun fire goes ;-) It was generally bad practice to use tracers for aiming, so I'd expect the idea to use the machine guns for "finding the range" for the cannon wouldn't find approval by the RAF's gunnery experts anyway.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

 

[Tony Williams]

It was generally bad practice to use tracers for aiming, so I'd expect the idea to use the machine guns for "finding the range" for the cannon wouldn't find approval by the RAF's gunnery experts anyway.

Hi Henning! Long time no hear from

We have to bear in mind that in Europe in general, and the Battle of Britain in particular, there were two types of aerial combat: fighter vs fighter, and fighter vs bomber. In the first case, I agree that there would be no time to mess about with tracers, but in the second case the targets were a lot bigger, generally the range was greater, and the bombers were a lot slower and didn't manoeuvre very much, so there would be more time for fighters to aim at them..

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Post 45 in full.

Part of the Opening Post.

Could Britain have rearmed earlier and more effectively in the 1930s?

Yes and yes had there been enough public support for it. However, as you wrote in Post 44.

Rearmament was far from popular. Many argued that money would be better spent on the domestic economy. There was also a somewhat naive faith in the League of Nations to provide "collective security'.

The title of the thread is "British rearmament earlier and more effectively in the 30s". Does that mean it can start as early as 1st January 1930?

Part of Post 47 which includes part of Post 46.

Nazi Germany was not the only threat to Britain. Mussolini's Italy and Imperial Japan were also challenges. So yes, if public opinion had been better informed rearmament could have begun in 1930.

Earlier than 1930 would turn this into a "Britain didn't disarm in the first place" thread.

However, Italy didn't become a threat until 1935, Germany didn't become a threat until 1933, before that Japan was the only Great Power HMG thought was a potential enemy and to be fair to Ramsay MacDonald & Co they couldn't have foreseen a lunatic that looked like Charlie Chaplin taking control of Germany and plunging the world into the most destructive war in history.

If the Point Of Departure was 1st January 1930 the most that could have been done during the first half of the 1930s was to bring the Deficiency Programme in the First Report of the Defence Requirements Sub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence which was published in February 1934 forward four years. That's the most that I think public opinion would accept, the public finances could sustain and that the potential threats justified.

For example full-scale rearmament wasn't financially feasible until the National Debt was rescheduled in the early 1930s. The average expenditure on National Debt Services for the 15 financial years ending 31st March 1933 was £342.8 million per annum. From the financial year commencing 1st April 1933 it was reduced to £224.0 million per annum. That's a difference of nearly £120 million a year.

And I think full-scale rearmament couldn't be justified politically and militarily until 1935 at the earliest and more realistically not until 1936. That is not until Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments fails, Germany denounces the Treaty of Versailles & officially declares that it is rearming, Italy invades Abyssinia and Japan & Italy withdraw from the Naval Treaty system.

 

[Hood]

Speaking of tanks, the production of tanks at the time was limited in another very important factor. Very few highly trained welders and they were working in shipyards. Companies wanting to get involved with tank production basically told the management that "We want to join in but if we do, the tanks must be of bolted/riveted construction".

Yes this was another the drawbacks I was going to mention for the Covenanter but omitted for brevity.

The Shadow scheme for aircraft and tanks had a lot of teething troubles due to available industrial skillsets and cross purposes when it came to production (one supposes the War Office thought tanks are heavy metal + locomotives are heavy metal = same firm can build both).
Even assuming that it was possible to begin the schemes earlier or at least widen their application sooner, churning out another 1,000 Battles or 800 A12s doesn't take us anywhere but realistically what else could they build?
A better choice would be greater investment in the armaments manufacturers - in this Britain didn't lack for companies or space (Chadderton being Europe's largest single building), but more could probably have been done.

The post-Munich panic probably wasn't that detrimental given most early-war kit was already by then well in the design phase. The post-Dunkirk panics that saw Beaverbrook put the brakes on all but the six key types, threw everything behind .303in production, existing 2pdr production - in fact churn out everything then on the factory floor - did have serious knock-on effects post-1941. Luckily cash and carry and then Lend Lease made up for this in part, but even then there was duplication (did we really need Ansons, Blenheims, Bothas, Beauforts, Beaufighters and Hudsons for Coastal Command example?).
There is always a tension whether to produce what you have in mass or interrupt and retool for a new model - 1938-39 we probably got it right in the main in terms of timing - but in other threads we have lamented Merlins tied up in Battles for example - but of course choosing a duff design like Botha or Covenanter locked in industrial resources to mass produce sub-par kit. Luckily they could be used for training to release other (better) types for frontline use, but that was a silver lining and not the original intent.

 

[Foo Fighter]

Just a little side idea, were there any anti aircraft guns suitable for tank use at the time? Navy or Army? My memory twlls me the Royal Navy had a lot of gun types in the range being discussed and it might have saved a few Bobs while improving the situation. Sorry Bob.