If WW2 ended in 1950+ possible combat aircraft out of service dates

[Arjen]

while the undesirable civvies are still massacred en masse I assume? Those fit enough for work are turned into slaves or soldiers?

A novel way of making friends.

 

[Rule of cool]

This is why ww1 is so much more interesting than ww2, a bit of zig zag actually matters.

 

[Gentleman’s Astronautics]

A novel way of making friends.

too true, I will assume that General Plan: Ost goes into effect in this timeline?

 

[Scott Kenny]

while the undesirable civvies are still massacred en masse I assume? Those fit enough for work are turned into slaves or soldiers?

Probably.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Problem is that those soldiers are unlikely to be motivated if their families are being murdered at home.

Nazi Germany is never going to treat Slavs well, given the entire reason behind Barbarossa is to seize the agricultural areas of Ukraine, Belorussia and Russia west of the Urals, murder or enslave and deport the inhabitants, before settling it with Germans.

 

[Scott Kenny]

Problem is that those soldiers are unlikely to be motivated if their families are being murdered at home.

Nazi Germany is never going to treat Slavs well, given the entire reason behind Barbarossa is to seize the agricultural areas of Ukraine, Belorussia and Russia west of the Urals, murder or enslave and deport the inhabitants, before settling it with Germans.

Assuming that they know about their families.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Assuming that they know about their families.

If they don't receive regular letters etc then they significantly demotivated. If they learn the Germans are murdering their families via rumours, then they will be actively fighting against the Germans, most likely be disappearing from their garrisons and raiding their armouries to help the local resistance.

 

[scorpiodude]

I think we would see a lot of the superprop designs that ended up being too late for WW2 actually see combat. Just off the top of my head you would have the Sea Fury, P-51H, F8F, and even the La-9 able to see wartime service. Maybe we could even see another 'final' generation of piston aircraft to come after those but just end up as prototypes or in limited postwar service. Of course many of the somewhat outdated types like the P-40 that were dumped as soon as the war ended are staying around longer but still gone years before 1950. Mixed power aircraft could also see some combat, at least the FR-1 would have a very good chance. The XF15C and some of the Soviet Motorjets seeing production is also possible. Without the defeat of Germany and gaining the research on swept wings, straight wing designs would have more of a heyday and would stick around longer.

 

[BlackBat242]

I think we would see a lot of the superprop designs that ended up being too late for WW2 actually see combat. Just off the top of my head you would have the Sea Fury, P-51H, F8F, and even the La-9 able to see wartime service. Maybe we could even see another 'final' generation of piston aircraft to come after those but just end up as prototypes or in limited postwar service. Of course many of the somewhat outdated types like the P-40 that were dumped as soon as the war ended are staying around longer but still gone years before 1950. Mixed power aircraft could also see some combat, at least the FR-1 would have a very good chance. The XF15C and some of the Soviet Motorjets seeing production is also possible. Without the defeat of Germany and gaining the research on swept wings, straight wing designs would have more of a heyday and would stick around longer.

The USN would, short-term, keep with the F4U-4s (446 mph) and would get the F7Fs (460 mph) aboard the Midways (especially in the self-contained 2-seat night-fighter form - F7F-4N [fully carrier-certified]) - and maybe the Essexes also.
The F8F-1, with its lower 425 mph speed, would replace other fighters on the CVEs - the 455 mph F8F-2 only entered production in 1948 (due to slow engine development).
The USN would be getting AD-1s (and maybe Maulers) to replace all attack/torpedo aircraft.

The USMC would keep with the F4U-4 & F4U-5 (462 mph) and F7F-3N [land-based] they flew in the late 1940s historically, while getting AD-1s as well.

With Germany hanging on longer, Truman uses the A-bomb for what it was originally built for and nukes something in Germany to force surrender... what targets get the first two B-29 "Instant Sunshine" payloads?


With more resources sent to the European theatre, the war against Japan goes more slowly.

Once the A-bomb is used on Germany, I can't see Congress to authorize invading Japan, so the Pacific is in a holding pattern until some "devices" can be spared, so Japan actually gets a short-term reprieve of at least 2-3 months for the next set of "devices" to be available.

Does Japan get its Nakajima Kikka "enlarged straight-wing Me-262" into service (first flight of the prototype was 7 August 1945 historically, 432 mph but would likely be improved shortly after)?

If so, the USN runs with the FD-1 Phantom (first flight 26 January 1945, first carrier take-off/landing 19 July 1946, 487 mph) to start, then goes with the FJ-1 Fury (first flight 11 September 1946, 547 mph).
They would also try to hurry up the F2D-1 Banshee (historic first flight 11 January 1947, 587 mph) (both were redesignated FH-1/F2H-1 in early 1947).

 

[Scott Kenny]

With Germany hanging on longer, Truman uses the A-bomb for what it was originally built for and nukes something in Germany to force surrender... what targets get the first two B-29 "Instant Sunshine" payloads?

They'd need to be relatively untouched cities, so that the extent of damages per weapon could be assessed.

Did any cities in Germany actually meet that description?

 

[_Del_]

They'd need to be relatively untouched cities, so that the extent of damages per weapon could be assessed.

Did any cities in Germany actually meet that description?

Heligoland.
Yes, it's been cratered and pocked all war long, but, ...
It's still full of bunkers, subpens, and tunnels. The civilians have been moved out by mid- or late-1945. Close enough to the mainland to be seen and felt by the Germans. Close enough to England to easily monitor results with flights from UK. Avoids irradiating prime land in Germany. Won't do a ton of actual damage to the reinforced structures, but should make quite the sight from the mainland.

 

[Justo Miranda]

Among the many causes that could have delayed the end of the war, I will cite a few examples:

If the resources wasted on the construction of the V-2 rockets had been used in the construction of thousands of Focke-Wulf Fw 190 fighters armed with R4M rockets and vertical recoilless weapons SG 500, SG 116 and SG 117, the Eighth Air Force would have had to withdraw with heavy losses and the German oil industry would not have been destroyed, those same aircraft armed with Panzerblitz-2 anti-tank rockets and recoilless cannons SG 113A, could have stopped the Red Army.

The war in the Pacific might have stalled if the Allies had not made the decision to leave behind in their advance numerous islands defended by Japanese willing to fight to the end, or if the Kamikazes had concentrated their attacks on troop carriers causing so many casualties that public opinion anticipated the way of thinking of 1968, or if the Hiroshima bomb had fallen into the hands of the Japanese without exploding and the landing in Tokyo Bay had been destroyed by the typhoon of 1945.

But in my opinion no combination of all these disasters would have succeeded in delaying the end of the war by more than two years.

 

[Elan Vital]

Among the many causes that could have delayed the end of the war, I will cite a few examples:

If the resources wasted on the construction of the V-2 rockets had been used in the construction of thousands of Focke-Wulf Fw 190 fighters armed with R4M rockets and vertical recoilless weapons SG 500, SG 116 and SG 117, the Eighth Air Force would have had to withdraw with heavy losses and the German oil industry would not have been destroyed, those same aircraft armed with Panzerblitz-2 anti-tank rockets and recoilless cannons SG 113A, could have stopped the Red Army.

The war in the Pacific might have stalled if the Allies had not made the decision to leave behind in their advance numerous islands defended by Japanese willing to fight to the end, or if the Kamikazes had concentrated their attacks on troop carriers causing so many casualties that public opinion anticipated the way of thinking of 1968, or if the Hiroshima bomb had fallen into the hands of the Japanese without exploding and the landing in Tokyo Bay had been destroyed by the typhoon of 1945.

But in my opinion no combination of all these disasters would have succeeded in delaying the end of the war by more than two years.

Could Germany man, fuel and maintain all those Fw 190s with the ressources from the V2 program tho?

 

[Gentleman’s Astronautics]

Given the German Army and Luftwaffe's knack for not producing spares for important vehicles, or producing so few that crews had to cannibalise other knocked out vehicles, I doubt they could.

 

[Justo Miranda]

Could Germany man, fuel and maintain all those Fw 190s with the ressources from the V2 program tho?

Between May and September 1944, the US Eighth Air Force made eleven attacks on Leuna-Merseburg, the main production plant for petrol ersatz (synthetic hydrocarbons), stopping its activity. In November the Allies launched a bombing offensive against the hydrogenation plants of Nordstern-Gelsenkirchen, Nordstern-Wesserling, Scholven, Homberg, Wanne-Eickel, Sternkrade, Gastrop, Kamen, Bottrop, Dortmund, Hannover, Hamburg, Misburg, Bohlen, Zeitz and Lützendorf. The RAF Bomber Command launched 13,000 tons of bombs and the Eighth Air Force 14,000 tons. The US Fifteenth Air Force based in Italy attacked the plants located south of the Reich in Florisdorf, Moosbierbaum, Blechhammer South, Korneuberg, Vienna-Lubau and Linz.

By December, German fuel production fell to 151,000 tons of first grade gasoline (Grade C3, 96-octane), aviation base gasoline (Grade B4, 87-octane), gasoline-middle oil (B4 + motor oil) and J2 heavy kerosene for turbojets. Mostly affected production was that of the C3 and B4, that was used in piston engines of the fighters, with 25,000 tons only, compared to the anticipated 107,000 tons. Many small plants, also dedicated to the production of Benzol, were destroyed during the bombing attacks by zone, randomly made by the Bomber Command over industrial areas. During the last year of war in Europe, the RAF attacked 42 hydrogenation plants with 63,000 tons of bombs and the Eighth with 45,000 tons, finally achieving the collapse of the production system.

The piston engine fighters were most affected by the lack of fuel.

The German industrial capacity had been irreversibly eroded by the long naval blockade and continued bombardment. The situation was particularly serious for the piston engine manufacturers, who had already exhausted the chrome and molybdenum reserves needed to harden the steel. Special schmierstoff lubricants and B4 fuel were also lacking.

 

[Scott Kenny]

Heligoland.
Yes, it's been cratered and pocked all war long, but, ...
It's still full of bunkers, subpens, and tunnels. The civilians have been moved out by mid- or late-1945. Close enough to the mainland to be seen and felt by the Germans. Close enough to England to easily monitor results with flights from UK. Avoids irradiating prime land in Germany. Won't do a ton of actual damage to the reinforced structures, but should make quite the sight from the mainland.

As opposed to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which were virtually untouched. (As was Kyoto, but an American Naval Officer had spent his honeymoon there and ran a pretty effective campaign to keep Kyoto off of the target lists since there was basically no military production there)

No, need a place that was less damaged. Plus, I don't think a single nuke would have done a lot of damage to bunkers, sub pens, and tunnels. H and N were mostly wooden construction, so burned very easily.

If Dresden hadn't been firebombed earlier, it would have likely been an A-bomb target.

 

[_Del_]

I don't know why you'd want to nuke a cathedral town with no industry to speak of as opposed to a barren rock.

If you need to kill people, hit Brno, take out the engine factories and give the Soviets something to think about at the same time.

 

[Scott Kenny]

I don't know why you'd want to nuke a cathedral town with no industry to speak of as opposed to a barren rock.

If you need to kill people, hit Brno, take out the engine factories and give the Soviets something to think about at the same time.

It's about seeing just how much damage the Bomb does. H and N are still listed as "test drops" in US Gov documents.