USA and UK Played a Minimal Role in Defeat of Nazi Germany During WW2

In the past couple of weeks, some of you might have seen YouTube trailers and other types of advertisement for an Apple TV+ show set in WW2 called “Masters of the Air”. It is based on a 2007 book (same name) by Donald L. Miller and follows the the 100th Bomb Group, a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber unit in the Eighth Air Force during World War II. While the show is bit closer to the unpleasant reality than most bullshit representations of the WW2 Anglo-American bombing campaign of Germany usually shown in generic Hollywood movies and TV- it still misses a very important fact about WW2 in the Europe. The thing is.. all of those Anglo-American bombing campaigns, code-breaking, radar development etc had little effect on the course of war- specifically the defeat and surrender of Nazi Germany.

Yes.. you heard that right and it get worse. Even if the D-day landing and subsequent land invasion on Western Front had never occurred, Nazi Germany would have still lost the war in 1945. Confused? Let me explain. See.. ever since Hitler implemented his bright idea of invading USSR in June 1941, about 70-80% of the German war effort and production (vehicles, ammo, personnel etc) was used up on the Eastern front. In other words, it was USSR who defeated Nazi Germany. Opening the western front in mid-1944, after the D-day landing, likely shortened WW2 in Europe by 8 months- but that is it. If you don’t believe, just compare the loss of German soldiers and material on the Eastern front to that on the Western Front. All of That Hollywood celebration of the Anglo-American role in “defeating Nazi Germany” is feel-good propaganda.

But let us get back to the issue of whether strategic bombing of Germany during WW2 had any serious role in winning the war. Let us begin with one the easiest metric to measure- accuracy. Based on multiple analyses of their bombing accuracy conducted by USA and UK, it is clear that the accuracy of both day and night bombing was pretty bad. While the numbers improved a bit over the course of war, even at the very end- the accuracy of strategic bombing was quite poor with the vast majority of bombs (well over 90%) not hitting within 50 m of their intended targets. There were various reasons for this.. ranging from cloud cover, poor weather conditions, fire from German flak batteries and fighter planes and generally low level of experience and competence among bomber crews. But it gets worse..

Then there is the issue of whether all that bombing, which was very expensive as measured by number of planes destroyed and damaged by Germany as well as killed and captured airmen, had any worthwhile effect on the German war machine. The simple and indisputable fact is that production of everything from guns and tanks to aircraft and missiles in Germany kept going up until the final six months of WW2. In fact 1944 was the year of peak industrial output for the Nazi war machine. It was only after USSR conquered most of eastern Europe and Anglo-American alliance conquered France that the ability of Nazi Germany to produce weapons and vehicles started to collapse. It took two successful land invasions, extremely heavy attrition on eastern front and a series of dumb decisions by the Nazi military command to finally have a serious effect on their ability to wage war. Let that sink in..

To put it bluntly, the vast majority of equipment loss and casualties suffered by the American and British Airforce during their strategic bombing campaigns was both useless and unnecessary. At this point, some of you might say that the loss of German pilots and aircraft during such raids as worthwhile “compensation”- except it wasn’t. By 1943, Germany had already started investing much more in ground-based aircraft interception (better AA guns, automated gun laying, early warning and tracking radar networks etc) than aircraft interceptors. This is not to say that production of aircraft was reduced. But even in 1943, it was obvious to them that defense of Germany from Anglo-American bombing would require extensive ground-based defenses, which is why they also started developing the first SAM missile systems.

To summarize- Anglo-American strategic bombing caused, at best, a 15 % reduction in production of war material in Germany, until the last six months of WW2. In case you are wondering, the collapse of industrial production during last six months of WW2 (in Europe) has everything to do with rapid advances by the armies of USSR and Western Allies in areas close to and within Germany. WW2 (in Europe) was, therefore, largely a land war fought and won on the Eastern Front.

What do you think? Comments?