Originally posted by Covert_Shores
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this, IMHO, is what differentiates the US/UK from the continental empires/powers of the past...and present.
Germany had extreme difficulty with logistics across 800-1000 miles on the Eastern Front (much of that with a dense industrial rail network), while our boys were lavishly equipped across thousands of miles of the Pacific.There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov
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Outside milhistory nuts & military personnel who are educated in this stuff the logistical achievements of the Western Allies - and especially the US - in WW2 are poorly understood. Mores the pity. They were spectacular. The US moved cities full of people across the Pacific & kept logistic pipelines running across all 3 oceans. Behind it all was an industrial machine without parallel. I recall being surprised the first time I read that the US actually began scaling back production of a lot of stuff - especially shipping - by mid-1944. In 3 years it had produced most of what it would ever need.sigpic
Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C
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the really mind boggling thing for me was that there was so much equipment left after the war, most of the world (outside the USSR/warsaw pact, of course) was using ww2 American military surplus for a generation afterwards.There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov
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Originally posted by astralis View Postthe really mind boggling thing for me was that there was so much equipment left after the war, most of the world (outside the USSR/warsaw pact, of course) was using ww2 American military surplus for a generation afterwards.
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Asked this question on a different thread but I suppose twice the charm.
Have anyone of you professionals ever seen route books? They were pocketbooks used by armies in the 19th Century for marching in a known area, and contained detailed marching plans that provide azimuth bearing, map coordinates for waypoints, topographical information, and estimated movement time for each stage. Each pocket book is concerned with moving from a major land base to a point of strategic value where combat with OPFOR is foreseen.
It would appear to me that they are rather rigid and of limited value to 20th Century mechanized forces which moved faster and could do so off-road. So what replaced them in military planning?All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
-Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.
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HyperWar: The Big 'L'--American Logistics in World War II
Covert Shoes, try this link. It is my go to when researching and discussing World War 2 logistics.
You may also may want to try Supplying War by Martin Van Creveld
Others have heard me talk of the miracle of mobilization in World War 2. But it was not a miracle. It was decades of planning executed with shrewd ruthlessness when the resources became available. Coming out of the debacle of World War 1, where US industry faield to provide a single gun or airplane for the Doughboys to use in France, the US Army started the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. There the best and brightest middle grade officers (senior captains and majors) along with managers from industry and some from academia learned about the industrial capacity of the US, studied mobilization and rehearsed what would be executed in 1940 - 1945. Each year the class would do a project: how to mobilize the country in case of total war. They then produced a study annually which laid out exactly how to mobilize based on the current economy. It was updated by each subsequent class.
When France fell in 1940, the US Congress passed a suplamental defense appropriations bill which gave the Army more funding in one chunk than it had received in all budgets 1920-1940 combined. Marshall, Arnold & Stimson literally pulled the ICAF Class of 1940 plan of their shelves and started to figure out how to spend the money. They used it as seed money to start American industry retooling.
That is how they knew that Smith-Corona could switch from making typewriters to making M1 carbines & rifles as well as M1919 .30 caliber machine guns, Ford & GM could bild B-24s and TBFs & FM-2s and American Optical could make bomb & gunsights. That the empty hotels in Miami were perfect to house the thousands of new airmen for their ground schools.
It was all in the book.
Geoffrey Perret's There's A War To Be Won & Winged Victory each have a chapter or two which tell the story of mobilization very well.“Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
Mark Twain
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Thanks, good source on the WW2 logistics. Tou point out the fall of France as a trigger point, it's firtubate that it wasn't already too late.
France's own industrial buildup prior to the war is interesting. The general view of people like Churchill was that the communists among the French workforce scuppered any chances of equalling Germany's output. Some in the defense industry feel similarly about nationalization and unions in postwar France.
One thing which I keep coming across in my own research is that the engineers who designed many systems were not adequately rewarded after the way. And even during the war some people in procurement were, well, corrupt, putting their own financial interests before those of the war effort.
My own smaller contribution, which you may all already know, is the Charles Minard's famous Sankey diagram of Napoleon's invasion of Russia. Would love to see the logistics version across the pacific.
Please excuse typos, am on a phone...
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I cannot figure out how to edit my post, but in case the image isn't working, here's the link Charles Joseph Minard - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Originally posted by Albany Rifles View PostHyperWar: The Big 'L'--American Logistics in World War II
Covert Shoes, try this link. It is my go to when researching and discussing World War 2 logistics.
You may also may want to try Supplying War by Martin Van Creveld
Others have heard me talk of the miracle of mobilization in World War 2. But it was not a miracle. It was decades of planning executed with shrewd ruthlessness when the resources became available. Coming out of the debacle of World War 1, where US industry faield to provide a single gun or airplane for the Doughboys to use in France, the US Army started the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. There the best and brightest middle grade officers (senior captains and majors) along with managers from industry and some from academia learned about the industrial capacity of the US, studied mobilization and rehearsed what would be executed in 1940 - 1945. Each year the class would do a project: how to mobilize the country in case of total war. They then produced a study annually which laid out exactly how to mobilize based on the current economy. It was updated by each subsequent class.
When France fell in 1940, the US Congress passed a suplamental defense appropriations bill which gave the Army more funding in one chunk than it had received in all budgets 1920-1940 combined. Marshall, Arnold & Stimson literally pulled the ICAF Class of 1940 plan of their shelves and started to figure out how to spend the money. They used it as seed money to start American industry retooling.
That is how they knew that Smith-Corona could switch from making typewriters to making M1 carbines & rifles as well as M1919 .30 caliber machine guns, Ford & GM could bild B-24s and TBFs & FM-2s and American Optical could make bomb & gunsights. That the empty hotels in Miami were perfect to house the thousands of new airmen for their ground schools.
It was all in the book.
Geoffrey Perret's There's A War To Be Won & Winged Victory each have a chapter or two which tell the story of mobilization very well.
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Originally posted by Triple C View PostAsked this question on a different thread but I suppose twice the charm.
Have anyone of you professionals ever seen route books? They were pocketbooks used by armies in the 19th Century for marching in a known area, and contained detailed marching plans that provide azimuth bearing, map coordinates for waypoints, topographical information, and estimated movement time for each stage. Each pocket book is concerned with moving from a major land base to a point of strategic value where combat with OPFOR is foreseen.
It would appear to me that they are rather rigid and of limited value to 20th Century mechanized forces which moved faster and could do so off-road. So what replaced them in military planning?
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Michelin guides were very popular in the HQs of the US Army during the pursuit through France.
Back on subject, once read a very amusing history of British Army sanitation and medical practices during the Arrow War (Opium War redux) that focuses mostly on how cleanliness of barracks and physical discipline were enablers of imperial power projection.All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
-Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.
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