Did France have the industry to outproduce Germany in ww2?

[Narwhal]

Wrong
It was much more famous for its bunker busting capabilities then for its anti tank usage in the Wehrmacht in France. It was used heavily on the offensive.

Also the SDKZ 8 12t was used in France too with a shielded gun.

Never saw that before either ; according to Wikipedia only 10 of them ever though. Surprised they managed to keep 3 of them until Q1 1943.

 

[Kovax]

The 8.8cm AA gun is only useful in static defenses. You cant use the thing offensively since its an unarmored carriage. Even something as low caliber as a light machine gun could probably destroy a 8.8cm gun by poking holes into its barrel and chamber.

A machinegun isn't going to put more than a few small dings in the barrel or chamber of massive pieces of steel like that, for the same reason that a machinegun won't poke holes in heavy tank armor. On the other hand, those machinegun rounds WILL poke lots of neat little holes in the unprotected gun crew. The gun shields were able to stop most small-arms rounds, but an armor piercing round significantly larger than .30 caliber or 8mm would most likely go straight through, potentially creating all kinds of jagged shrapnel in the process.

There was a 75mm anti-tank gun displayed at one of the North Atlantic Aviation Museum's annual "WWII Weekend" shows (first full weekend of June every year) at Reading, PA a few years ago. A sizable projectile (around 50-80mm) went through the gun shield, knocking a large triangular piece off the hardened outer shield as it shattered, followed by a round hole through the softer metal containment layer behind. A few pieces of shrapnel left visible score marks along that side of the gun's firing chamber, and I pity anyone who was behind it when it happened. A bullet would probably have done only about as much to the barrel as the bits of shrapnel.

 

[Sunforged General]

A machinegun isn't going to put more than a few small dings in the barrel or chamber of massive pieces of steel like that, for the same reason that a machinegun won't poke holes in heavy tank armor. On the other hand, those machinegun rounds WILL poke lots of neat little holes in the unprotected gun crew. The gun shields were able to stop most small-arms rounds, but an armor piercing round significantly larger than .30 caliber or 8mm would most likely go straight through, potentially creating all kinds of jagged shrapnel in the process.

There was a 75mm anti-tank gun displayed at one of the North Atlantic Aviation Museum's annual "WWII Weekend" shows (first full weekend of June every year) at Reading, PA a few years ago. A sizable projectile (around 50-80mm) went through the gun shield, knocking a large triangular piece off the hardened outer shield as it shattered, followed by a round hole through the softer metal containment layer behind. A few pieces of shrapnel left visible score marks along that side of the gun's firing chamber, and I pity anyone who was behind it when it happened. A bullet would probably have done only about as much to the barrel as the bits of shrapnel.

id bet money a browning.50 cal would probably tear holes in it, or at least dent the barrel too much to fire. But you are right in that my last post was incorrect since last time i said a light machine gun, which wouldn't cut it.

 

[Kovax]

Repeated hits with a .50 cal. would probably inflict enough stress to do some damage. Not sure if even that would be enough, though, unless you hit directly from a side angle. Those are some pretty thick pieces of a rather sturdy and resilient alloy. A normal copper jacketed lead bullet won't do much of anything to it.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

id bet money a browning.50 cal would probably tear holes in it,

At closer range it might, if the .50 cal has AP ammo rather than just ball, shoots at the tank barrel sideways and manages to land a square hit on it (barrel, even sideways, being somewhat difficult to land such hit on due to rounded shape).

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Jeeez I can imagine them in the Pentagon.

"Karl, lets scrap the 8,8 AA gun because a LMG bullet might damage it."
"Well look Sam, we can install a thick splinter shield for that"
"Better but still a cal 50 can damage it"
"Unlikely but then lets make a reinforced one"
"Alright but what if tanks attack our AA gun Karl ?"
"Well we could mount a telescopic sight which allows our AA gun to fight ground targets"
"Karl ?"
"Yes Sam ?"
"Tanks are rather mobile and might flank it"
"Flank our AA gun ?"
"Yes Karl"
"I guess we can make it mobile with tracks and such"
"There is still the infantry problem, what about close quarters fighting ?
"Against our AA gun ?"
"Yes Karl, urban combat is a thing and after all we use them to defend urban targets or not ?"
"Well we could mount one or two machine guns for infantry defense for close quarters defense"
"But what if they bring snipers ?"
"Well some kind of armored frame ?"
"Sure but what if they bring AT rifles ?"
"More armor ?"
"They have some nasty AT guns ya know"
"Ok super duper armor with tracks and machine guns"
"Hmm sounds reasonable , how shall we name our AA gun ?"
"Tiger"

 

[Andre Bolkonsky]

Jeeez I can imagine them in the Pentagon.

"Karl, lets scrap the 8,8 AA gun because a LMG bullet might damage it."
"Well look Sam, we can install a thick splinter shield for that"
"Better but still a cal 50 can damage it"
"Unlikely but then lets make a reinforced one"
"Alright but what if tanks attack our AA gun Karl ?"
"Well we could mount a telescopic sight which allows our AA gun to fight ground targets"
"Karl ?"
"Yes Sam ?"
"Tanks are rather mobile and might flank it"
"Flank our AA gun ?"
"Yes Karl"
"I guess we can make it mobile with tracks and such"
"There is still the infantry problem, what about close quarters fighting ?
"Against our AA gun ?"
"Yes Karl, urban combat is a thing and after all we use them to defend urban targets or not ?"
"Well we could mount one or two machine guns for infantry defense for close quarters defense"
"But what if they bring snipers ?"
"Well some kind of armored frame ?"
"Sure but what if they bring AT rifles ?"
"More armor ?"
"They have some nasty AT guns ya know"
"Ok super duper armor with tracks and machine guns"
"Hmm sounds reasonable , how shall we name our AA gun ?"
"Tiger"

. . .

"And then we need it to fly"
"Fly"
"Yes, and it should be shaped like a mouse, with big ears to make it sail in the wind as it glides to a landing. With many attachments to make it viable in any environment"
"A flying mouse"
"Yes, Fledermaus!"

 

[Pzt_Kami]

I have never seen that vehicle before. Ever.

Learn something new every day!

I learnd about this vehicle when playing a mod for Close Combat V (I think the name of the mod was something like Meuse 1940). Some german units had access to them and they were quite lethal. Never saw them in any game again until War Thunder !

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

I learnd about this vehicle when playing a mod for Close Combat V (I think the name of the mod was something like Meuse 1940). Some german units had access to them and they were quite lethal. Never saw them in any game again until War Thunder !

They are in WinSPWW2 too, together with large collection of German ersatz-y vehicles.

 

[Kovax]

I learnd about this vehicle when playing a mod for Close Combat V (I think the name of the mod was something like Meuse 1940). Some german units had access to them and they were quite lethal. Never saw them in any game again until War Thunder !

"Quite lethal" perhaps. Quite scary to operate as well, I'm fairly certain. I saw footage of a smaller gun tractor (SdKfz. 7?) firing a 75mm AT gun mounted on it as a makeshift AT platform. The whole half-tracked vehicle jumped completely off the ground from the shock and recoil when the gun was fired. I can picture the SdKfz. 8 leaping backwards half a meter or more through the air every time the 8.8cm gun is fired.....

They obviously need a bigger gun on it to turn it into an ersatz Fliedermaus.

 

[Swuul]

You can't do anything with an outgunned, almost unarmored FT17 that goes below 10 km/h.

Not entirely correct.

Finland had during the Winter War 32 FT17's, of which 14 had the 37mm gun and 18 had just machineguns. Finns knew just how bad the armour of tank was, and used them mostly as ad-hoc bunkers in rapidly dug in positions. The 14 FT17's with 37mm guns succeeded to get 31 confirmed tank kills vs the soviets, while the 18 with just machineguns got 2 confirmed tank kills The main tank of soviets during Winter War was the T-26 (although they also had the heavily gunned T-28 and other tanks too).

8 Finnish FT17's in all were lost during the Winter War. Most of them were abandoned after technical failures, and had to be left behind for the advancing soviets to capture.

The 24 remaining FT17's took part in the beginning of Continuation War in July 1941. They saw combat, but performed extremely badly in offensive war against the KV-1's and T-34's soviets were now using. During the next year most of the FT17's were knocked out or were used as parts for the last remaining four with 37mm guns, until even they were withdrawn from service in summer 1942 (with no FT17's having got a confirmed tank-kill during 1941-1942). One of the last four has survived until these days, and is in mint condition in Parola armour museum.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Finland does not count. they are to ww2 what the Mongols are to the medieval era. They had a different ruleset.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

Finland had during the Winter War 32 FT17's, of which 14 had the 37mm gun and 18 had just machineguns. Finns knew just how bad the armour of tank was, and used them mostly as ad-hoc bunkers in rapidly dug in positions. The 14 FT17's with 37mm guns succeeded to get 31 confirmed tank kills vs the soviets, while the 18 with just machineguns got 2 confirmed tank kills The main tank of soviets during Winter War was the T-26 (although they also had the heavily gunned T-28 and other tanks too).

Jaeger Platoon website seems to have different story? https://www.jaegerplatoon.net/TANKS1.htm

Seems like they were almost unused, even as makeshift bunkers, with as far as I understood correctly this battle their sole combat use? With only five ever participating in combat in any capacity. It worth emphasizing how absolutely crap that low velocity 37mm was, even with the "AP" you needed to get close enough to hit them with your sword.

 

[Narwhal]

Possibly the FT-17 were mixed with the Vickers the Finnish had ?

Though the Vickers were totally wasted by the Finns, as well, just like everyone they were learning tank warfare, but had no reserve to actually do something from what they learned from their mistakes.

 

[Swuul]

Jaeger Platoon website seems to have different story? https://www.jaegerplatoon.net/TANKS1.htm

Seems like they were almost unused, even as makeshift bunkers, with as far as I understood correctly this battle their sole combat use? With only five ever participating in combat in any capacity. It worth emphasizing how absolutely crap that low velocity 37mm was, even with the "AP" you needed to get close enough to hit them with your sword.

Hmmm.. I have the official booklet from Parola museum, and it may be I have misunderstood the phrase "varmistettu vihollistankki" in the list.I took it to mean "confirmed tank kill", but could it mean "hostile tank captured" instead, it the Jaeger platoon site has correct numbers (they always do, afaik) ?

 

[Henry IX]

The answer to the OP is: it depends.

France had a slightly smaller industrial base than Germany and it was much less efficiently arranged for maximising wartime production. So to that extent it was going to start behind, but it had a few major advantages that could tip the industrial war in their favour:

1. They had access to the world market. It was possible for the French to concentrate on manufacturing a limited range of items in massive quantities (similar to what the Soviet Union did) and simply import anything they needed that they were not producing. For example, they Soviet Union virtually stopped producing trucks and locomotives in favour of tanks, and simply acquired the additional items they needed from the world market (U.S.) Germany had to be basically self sufficient in every category of industrial material, so they simply could not specialise in the way the Soviets did and the French could. In addition, the Germans were running on borrowed time in terms of manpower and resources so the French could likely out produce Germany in 1942 simply be having a functioning economy.

2. They had not cannibalised their civilian economy. As other posters have pointed out the German economy was hopelessly overheated and unbalanced in 1939-1940 a fact that was only disguised by the plundering of France and the Low Countries. The German level of industrial production was unsustainable and steel would have to be redistributed to allow the economy to survive. This would inevitably lead to a decrease in armament production.

So, IF France survived past 1940 and IF they were able to optimise their economy and IF the U.S. remained a friendly power willing to sell/lend huge amounts of material then there is a good chance that France could have significantly out produced Germany by 1941/42 in key armaments. If France retained its pre-war economic organisation (or lack thereof), which was certainly possible given the chaotic state of the 3rd Republic's politics, then it would probably never overtake Germany in production (barring the collapse of the German economy, which was more than an outside chance).

 

[Sunforged General]

The answer to the OP is: it depends.

France had a slightly smaller industrial base than Germany and it was much less efficiently arranged for maximising wartime production. So to that extent it was going to start behind, but it had a few major advantages that could tip the industrial war in their favour:

1. They had access to the world market. It was possible for the French to concentrate on manufacturing a limited range of items in massive quantities (similar to what the Soviet Union did) and simply import anything they needed that they were not producing. For example, they Soviet Union virtually stopped producing trucks and locomotives in favour of tanks, and simply acquired the additional items they needed from the world market (U.S.) Germany had to be basically self sufficient in every category of industrial material, so they simply could not specialise in the way the Soviets did and the French could. In addition, the Germans were running on borrowed time in terms of manpower and resources so the French could likely out produce Germany in 1942 simply be having a functioning economy.

2. They had not cannibalised their civilian economy. As other posters have pointed out the German economy was hopelessly overheated and unbalanced in 1939-1940 a fact that was only disguised by the plundering of France and the Low Countries. The German level of industrial production was unsustainable and steel would have to be redistributed to allow the economy to survive. This would inevitably lead to a decrease in armament production.

So, IF France survived past 1940 and IF they were able to optimise their economy and IF the U.S. remained a friendly power willing to sell/lend huge amounts of material then there is a good chance that France could have significantly out produced Germany by 1941/42 in key armaments. If France retained its pre-war economic organisation (or lack thereof), which was certainly possible given the chaotic state of the 3rd Republic's politics, then it would probably never overtake Germany in production (barring the collapse of the German economy, which was more than an outside chance).

Well the French were able to organize their economy and outproduce Germany in WW1 (they ended the war with far far more tanks and steel helmets than Germany did for example.)
Their politics were unstable during the first war too. I dont believe the instability of the government would have affected war time production too much, and hell, id argue that the politicians and people would rally together to defend France, rather than squabble over politics.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

Hmmm.. I have the official booklet from Parola museum, and it may be I have misunderstood the phrase "varmistettu vihollistankki" in the list.I took it to mean "confirmed tank kill", but could it mean "hostile tank captured" instead, it the Jaeger platoon site has correct numbers (they always do, afaik) ?

They have figures for 47 T-26 captured and repaired and 34 actually issued at start of Continuation War. In addition two T-28 were captured during Winter War. This is in total, not to any specific cause.

I'm not sure what's up with the numbers you posted, they are specifically about Renault FTs right? With those numbers they'd have done much better than the Vickers tanks.

Anyway I found a video (in Finnish) from Parola museum about the Battle of Honkaniemi, which was the sole Finnish tank battle of Winter War (for Vickers, and according to Jaeger Platoon, the only bunker FT-17 that saw combat were deployed in this area as well):

 

[Dave Consiglio]

france had the highest rate of collaboration with th Germans of any occupied country in Europe during WW2, They pimped the most Jews and fellow country men to the Gestapo than any other occupied European country in WW2. france didn't have any heavy industries in 1940 when the Germans thrashed them militarily

 

[Narwhal]

france had the highest rate of collaboration with th Germans of any occupied country in Europe during WW2, They pimped the most Jews and fellow country men to the Gestapo than any other occupied European country in WW2. france didn't have any heavy industries in 1940 when the Germans thrashed them militarily

I really wonder what is a "rate of collaboration". Given the 2 other items are also incorrect, I assume you just made that up as well.