Could the Me-262 and Ar-234 be so history-changing?

[dracos]

Hello all,

I am a frequent browser at the alternatehistory.com forums. One thread has me wondering, and I thought the people here could give useful opinions. It concerns a better-managed introduction of the Me-262 and the Ar-234, and how they halt the Allied armies.

Thread title is "Can it carry bombs?", at:

http://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=115713

I admit to a few things here. My Western Allies sensabilities are irritated. I know I'm looking for reinforcement of my own views here. Hopefully I can get past my own views if the facts show my views are wrong. I understand completely if you all desire to ignore this thread.

A couple of things that bug me. The US and Commonwealth armies halt on the Seine River for months starting in September of 1944? Between Patton, Bradley, and Montgomery alone, there is bound to be a river crossing in the fall of 1944.

Is aerial recon as powerful as is portrayed? Would the air and land wars change so dramatically?

Thanks,
dracos

[curmudgeon]

In 1940 (later part), 1941 and 1942 the western allies had excellent intelligence (reconnaissance, code breaking) of German strategic and tactical plans ... and it really made little significant difference because they lacked the power to do anything with the knowledge. By mid 1944 the Germans were in the same position.
Oil disappearing, army glued to the eastern front. Western capacity to freeze German forces in place by use of tactical airforces. The Germans abandoned the Seine line and retreated to the Rhine under minimal pressure ... The Seine was not set up as a defensive line ... it was a feature

[Kutscha]

Dracos I didn't read all the thread you linked to but if you didn't know the British had Wellington AWACS. This was in late 1944 and was used to locate He111s carrying V-1s flying out of Holland. The Wellington flew a 'race course' pattern over the North Sea and when contact was made would direct a Mossie for the intercept. The He111s would fly almost at SL and pop up to ~1500' to release the V-1.

[Red Admiral]

I think that in any realistic scenario, the Me 262 and Ar 234 will not have any effect. For the Ar 234, there just aren't that many of them available. I don't see how they are going to stop a couple of million Russians advancing from the East either.

[GregP]

Hi Dracos,

In spite of the fact that Hitler meddled in the Me-262 and Ar-234 programs, he didn't, in point of fact, make much difference.

The real reason the Me-262 was delayed for so long was lack of suitable flight-ready engines. The Jumo and BMW jets were simply NOT ready for squadron use.

So, if Messerschmitt had said, "No" to the "can it carry bombs" question, the engines would not have been ready any sooner ... unless the Germans had funded the development of jet turbine engines by Hans Pabst Von Ohain with some purpose 5 - 8 years earlier than they did.

Lest we consider this a fault of Hitler or "the Germans," the British did the exact same thing to Frank Whittle and suffered the same early jet teething troubles, so the Germans were not alone in inititally ignoring the jet turbine.

The USA was worse, ignoring the entire subject until we discovered it, and then caught up by asking the British, who were in desperate need of our assistance, for the technology. They supplied it since national survival was at stake, but my bet is that it wasn't exactly with friendly intent. If British good will were blood in 1941, we might have died, very probably with some considerable justification.

Once developed, the basic German turbojets were VERY well suited for development. The BMW -003 was developed later, after the war, into the ATAR engine that powered generations of French jet fighters very successfully.

So ... my stance is that, all the hype aside, the Me-262 and Ar-234 would NEVER have been developed any earlier than they were without considerable money having been made available for jet development just when the Nazis didn't HAVE any money. They also didn't have a lottery or a Sugar Daddy Bigbucks to fund the development, either.

If you want a plausible alernate history, let's say that Hitler had never attacked the Soviet Union, But rather made them into tacit allies of Nazi Germany or even another member of the Axis. So all his divisions and Luftwaffe fighters would have been available to fight the British. If they had survived until the USA could get into the fray, the Germans still might have won with all their strength concentrated in the western front.

Jets ... earlier, I don't THINK so. But the notion is worth a fiction novel at the minimum. But wait, Nazi victory has BEEN the subject of countless novel since WWII! Still, it didn't happen. But fiction is FUN, huh?

[curmudgeon]

In all our many discussions on the Me262 (wonderfully romantic, practically useless IMNSHO) we don't ever seem to have considered pilot conversion. Until 1945 the Me262 seems to have been in experimental units with both development and conversion problems.
The Brits were not manufacturing Meteors with any urgency (Mk Is in 1944, Mk IIIs at the end of '44 and into '45), but had an easy capacity to increase this or to advance the dH Vampire. This tardiness was because of the piston engined fighters in service being held to be adequate to finish the war.
An important unregarded feature is that both Meteors and later Vampires were regarded as joys to fly and 616 squadron (the first combat ready, in service, jet fighter outfit) was converting Spitfire pilots to jets in a few days. The relative ease of converting pilots and of flying these aircraft must have been worth something when looking at 'alternative histories', especially when the impact of the lengthened tail pipe (identified early 1945) is considered.

[Red Admiral]

With the lengthened nacelles to increase critical Mach number, the Meteor IIIs were fairly competitive with the Me 262/ He 162. Without them and there's about a 30-60mph speed advantage depending on altitude, with the Meteor restricted to 500mph maximum. On the other hand, the Meteor enjoys better climb, maneuverability and altitude performance.

[ChrisMcD]

The Me 262 and Arado 234 are good but too late.

Looking at Heinkel's autobiography he has the He 280 doing trials against the Fw190 in April 1941. He also comments that the He S 8 engine "seemed near the mass production stage".

Now Heinkel seems to have managed to piss off both Udet and Milch simultaneously, and he was more than a bit prone to exageration when it came to claiming successes. So in reality he was nobbled time and time again. But turning to the "what ifs".

Heinkel is claiming that the He 280 was at least a year ahead of the Me 262 - and with a much smaller and lighter aircraft that was able to get decent performance from the lower power of the available engines.

So, it would have been possible that the B 17's of the 'Mighty Eight' would have met a small jet fighter, capable of over 500 mph and with three 20 mm cannons in 1943.

It was short on range, but so what. With a tricycle undercarriage from the start and a decent ejector seat it really was an effective bomber destroyer - particularly if the P 51's are not yet on the scene.

Now a serious challenge to the "round the clock bomber offensive" really would have protected the Reich's manufacturing base and allowed them time to produce more tanks etc to hold off the red hordes!

So the 'What if scenario" really does have legs.

AFAIK the Meteor was rather short on range, so it would be left to the Vampire to do the escort work.

Anyone got any opinions on an He 280 versus Vampire match?

[curmudgeon]

So, it would have been possible that the B 17's of the 'Mighty Eight' would have met a small jet fighter, capable of over 500 mph and with three 20 mm cannons in 1943.

It was short on range, but so what. With a tricycle undercarriage from the start and a decent ejector seat it really was an effective bomber destroyer - particularly if the P 51's are not yet on the scene.

Now a serious challenge to the "round the clock bomber offensive" really would have protected the Reich's manufacturing base and allowed them time to produce more tanks etc to hold off the red hordes!

So the 'What if scenario" really does have legs.

AFAIK the Meteor was rather short on range, so it would be left to the Vampire to do the escort work.

Anyone got any opinions on an He 280 versus Vampire match?

Wrt the Meteor - there is a good article at http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1955/1955%20-%200728.html from the 'Flight' archives ... Not mentioned is the reason for objecting to British engines going over enemy lines: Rolls Royce had inserted a plate in the jet flow that stabilised thrust and that largely prevented engine surge. This would have taken a few hours to fabricate and install on German engines and would have markedly improved their reliability and performance.

Wrt the Vampire: production was very slow to get started as de Havilland were fully committed to Mosquitos and Hornet development (legs in the Pacific). It eventually ended up with English Electric. Had a jet fighter had high priority then the Vampire should have been able to be advanced to early 1944 (it was easier to manufacture than the Meteor, and only required one engine). Post war the RAF decided the Meteor would be the interceptor, and the Vampire the ground attack aircraft ... numerous later pundits argue they got that wrong.

The Vampire prototype exceeded 500mph at most altitudes. The 'plane was very easy to fly (teste my first year maths lecturer who had had one to fly as a personal aircraft until he was bowler-hatted from Cranwell - an obsolete Vampire was cheaper than paying him out, he had trained as an actuary). The F Mk1 had a range of about 300 miles. The long-legs were added by increasing the size of the wing tanks (F3 1948, range ~ 800 miles on internal fuel), this could have been done much earlier if there had been any urgency. The FB Mk5 had a range of just over 1200 miles in essentially the same airframe ... but perhaps with drop tanks ...

The F Mk1 is reputed to have been very manoeuvrable.

[dracos]

Interesting replies, thanks guys.

I wonder how early the He-280 would really have been available, and how soon it could appear in squadron strength? With the Me-262, were there experimental and prototype aircraft flying before the production airplane, and for how long? The same question goes for the Allied jets. How much time with experimental planes was needed before combat-ready jets could enter service?

Were jet engines just a different type of powerplant that was easy to design a plane around, or did they require a different way of designing planes?

[Ricky]

The topic there is interesting, but suffers from a number of flaws.

The main one, not related to aircraft, is that Hitler, after making one 'rational' decision (for good reasons which were not present in reality) goes on to make rational decisions about a whole host of other things, which is unlikely to say the least.


I just popped in to have a look round, and got sucked in.;)

[curmudgeon]

The topic there is interesting, but suffers from a number of flaws.

The main one, not related to aircraft, is that Hitler, after making one 'rational' decision (for good reasons which were not present in reality) goes on to make rational decisions about a whole host of other things, which is unlikely to say the least.


I just popped in to have a look round, and got sucked in.;)
Problem is Hitler did make a rational decision - he needed bombers able to penetrate the allied airforces at the beach-head. If the invasion of western Europe wasn't stopped on the beaches then German forces would be ground down and destroyed in battles of material attrition. Interceptors were romantic but irrelevant (and Me 262s turned out not to be that great as interceptors ... ). No wonder he was so upset on finding there were no bombers and that he lashed out at those who had let him down.
OTOH Me262s also proved less than adequate as bombers ...

[Ricky]

I was actully meaning his rational decision in the alternative history to allow for a more flexible defence on the Russian Front.