Afternoon all.

I'm currently reading "Rockets and the Reich" by Michael Neufeld. OK you ask, so what's that got to do with the price of bread? Well bear with me and I'll explain.

The Nazis spent the equivalent of half a billion dollars (1940 equivalent) over the course of 6 years on rocket research. The result was the A4 (V2) rocket (the "Flying Bomb" V1 was a separate project), which killed approx. 5000 enemy (Allied) people, and rather more slave labourers in it's production. In his book, Mr Neufeld makes the point that this would have allowed the production if diverted, of an extra 24000 fighter planes. The V2 made virtually no contribution to the war for Hitler; in fact it could be argued that the lack of these fighter planes, when the Reich was being bombed to destruction, significantly shortened the war in the Allies favour. Effectively, the half billion dollars, if you factor in the different sizes of the war economies, compares percentage wise with the Allied Manhattan Project (the nuclear bomb - cost 2 billion dollars 1940's values again ). So the Nazis spent a significant part of their war economy coming up with a delivery system without a warhead (the actually high explosive one was too small to be effective in the numbers launched - the logical warhead was an atomic one, but the Germans couldn't afford to develop one, and anyway their atomic research went up a blind alley which led nowhere).

Fascinating you say, but I still don't get the connection?
Well think on this. We are frequently having discussions on Armorama about how careful the Germans were marking/painting/finishing their tanks and other equipment. How far did they go to follow existing regulations when their whole war effort was falling apart. I suggest that they did follow regulations at the point of supply (factory). I think they did prime/paint/apply Zimmerit just as required. I further suggest that units did carefully follow guidelines in the field if at all possible, and that very generally speaking, units attempted uniformity in marking painting and finishing, particularly the elite units like the SS and Panzer forces. Why? It was just in their nature, they couldn't help themselves. In the same way that German equipment e.g Panther and Tiger were continually developed, and the Germans signally failed to find a decent design and just mass produce it (with the possible exception of the Pz IV - but even this had continual changes to armament, armour and peripherals).

Here's another, rather less savoury example. The Nazis needed trains and the rail network to move their horse drawn infantry units and tanks around. They also needed to move raw materials and semi completed parts for assembly. Despite this, they used a large percentage of their railways for "ethnic cleansing", which was not only not conducive to victory but positively counter productive - and all due to a completely irrational phobia about Jews.

Still think they wouldn't waste time painting their tanks? Don't apply logic to the Third Reich. I would suggest that photographic evidence of unpainted/badly painted/tatty tanks etc are the exception that prove the rule, caused by a local difficulty, or the demands of temporary expediency (enemy breakthrough etc). Bear in mind that the textbook application of the post 1943 three colour system could still, depending on medium used, and concentration, provide a bewildering variance of shade and colour. I suggest they were still TRYING to DO IT RIGHT!

Rules & Regulations were very important.
Soldiers got executed for abandoning a hopeless situation (two Germans vs a whole regiment of Soviet troops, one was shot/hanged because he was stupid enough to still have two bullets for his rifle while the other one had gotten rid of his cartridges).
Many people cling to "the rules" simple because there is nothing else left to hang on to.

Comment on the various fancy new projects: Where they stupid? Nope, many engineers were quite realistic: Either you are working on an important new defense project that could turn the war OR you would soon be sitting on a train going to the eastern front. My grandfather was a welder/cutter working on submarines. When Hitler decided that U-boats were less prioritized than the eastern front my grandfather was put on an eastbound train, then Hitler changed his mind and my grandfather was taken off the train somewhere in Poland and sent back to the dockyards near the border to Denmark to build more submarines .... you'd better be doing something very important back home or else ....

/ Robin