this post was submitted on 21 Jan 2024
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The V2 program cost about $500 million - adjusting for Nazi Germany's smaller economy, it took just a barely smaller fraction of their industrial output than the Manhattan project did for the US. Each individual rocket cost more than a Me-262, a cutting-edge jet fighter (~100,000 RM vs 87,400 RM). The program used up one third of Germany's fuel alcohol production, each rocket requiring thirty tonnes of potatoes to distil the methanol - and due to a lack of explosives, some had warheads filled with concrete instead. When it was clear their conventional forces were being overwhelmed, the Nazis poured even more resources into it, diverting them from fighter and tank production just to crank out a few more wunderwaffen.
This is the vaunted 'fascist efficiency'.
And the me262 was a good interceptor(when it was working and not falling apart because it was made by slaves). You know, the thing you really want to have when bomber planes are bombing the shit out of you?
That gave me a sudden thought, so I went back and checked (I'm just using the wikipedia pages for the V2 and Me-262) - in total, there were 1430 262s built, but there were over 3000 V-2s.
They could have tripled their jet interceptor force, something the allies had no answer to (other than just winning the ground war - it wouldn't have turned the tide, but still), but instead they made a strategically insignificant number of Special Expensive Bombs and spent basically all of them on random civilians.
Lmao holy shit i read wages of destruction but i missed how bad this is idk if it was covered well or i was sleepy