Would earlier British rearmament have changed 1939

Astrodragon

Biggest winner would have been the RN, with far more modern units available (and the older units they replaced ideally rebuilt for specialised roles, ie older destroyers as A/S escorts)

Rather than a faster reamament in the air and on land, it would have been better to invest a bit more in development, so for example a much better tank would have been available in 1939, and more money on training and excercises to improve doctrine.
Its very unlikely the UK would hav ebuilt a bigger army, that just wasnt the way their defence philosophy worked.

Faster air rearmament doesnt make much sense until around 1936, as the new designs werent available (and the RAF knew they were coming); however some decent carrier planes would have been nice.

Whether it would have made much difference to Germany is debatable. By 1939 the German economy was fast heading for a rather large cliff, so if they want a war they really cant wait much longer. The main UK advantages would be at sea (where they were already overwhelming anyway, so probably wouldnt have made much difference to German thinking), and possibly better equipment and doctrine, which again are difficult to quantify and again might well have been ignored.
 

ahunter951

Would earlier rearmament have changed 1939

The answer to the question above is Yes. Re-armament does not just consist of more aircraft, tanks, aircraft carriers, destroyers etc, it is a fundamental shift in priorities and a will to commit to improving your defensive and offensive capabilities. This would include an expansion of the army, raising second battalions or even third battalions, re instating retired regiments and all the costs associated with that. Training of pilots and navigators took up to two years. The fast tracking of pilots at the Battle of Britain led to far higher casualties simply because we didn't have the luxury of training them properly. To build up an effective military force as required in WW2 took several years. So by starting the process in 1934, your personnel required to operate the new equipment are in place, your infrastructure to manufacture new equipment is allocated, built and in place and your skilled workforce are rapidly developing better techniques to ramp up manufacturing when the balloon finally goes up.

Hitler was a gambler, he gambled that the allies would not kick him out of the rhineland in 1936, not intefer when he marched into Austria or the Sudetenland in 1938. Because we hadn't started the process of rearmament in 1934 we could only offer appeasement via Chamberlin at Munich. All Chamberlin could do was try and buy time for Europe. Had Britain responded more aggressively in 1936 having started re-arming in 1934 then WW2 might have been averted or certainly taken place later with potentially a completely different outcome
 

AdA

Munich

When Chamberlain pushed for a peace agreement in 1938 he did so partly because the Armed Forces claimed they weren't ready to go to war and would need at least a year. Just speeding the British war preparation one year would have given a much greater chance of war in 1938, and with what we know now, that would have given the Allies a much better starting position.

This thread can go two ways. We can assume that acelerating rearmement will mean more weapons at the same development cycle, or we can assume that a faster program will acelerate the development of new weapons. That makes a lot of diference...
 

AdA

Aircraft

Had a quick look at the MS406, Bf109,Hurricane development cycle. If we stay in OTL development cycles more production before 1938 only adds soon to be obsolete types... Wich means that early rearmmemt on the air will only pay off if war starts in 1938 or earlier. (apart from the obvious advantages off growing from a wider base with more trainned personell, that would be outweighted by the lack of money spent earlier) At that time the russians, with their huge number of I16 would have had a big advantage.
If RR had gotten the Merlin in production by 1936, the RAF could have had hundreds of Hurricanes in the summer of 1938, instead of 200 by years end. Same with the DB601. The french could have gotten the MS406 in srvice much earlier, since the Hispano was being developed earlier than the Merlin, and gotten an advantage by summer 1938, if Hundreds of Moranes had been facing the existing few Jumo engined Bf109B/C/D in Germany France would could gain air superiority in 1938...
 

Dave Collins

War production basis in March 1939?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernle_Chatfield,_1st_Baron_Chatfield

"In March 1939 Chatfield urged an increase in munition production: "Would it not be possible to put industry on a war production basis immediately, not necessarily at the expense of our export trade but by curtailing internal consumption?" However the President of the Board of Trade, Oliver Stanley, objected: "Such a step would be almost revolutionary, and must be proved absolutely essential before introduction"."

Assuming wikipedia is accurate (it quotes Barnett - The Collapse of British Power), does anyone have any thoughts on how likely is it that Chatfield's advice would have been taken, and how much of a difference it would have made at that stage?
 

AdA

war stance

Mobilizing to that level would have been sen as a virtual declaration of war. Might have been seen as such by the Germans, leading to less risk being taken in the dealings with Poland. Migh also have lead to an earlier and more efective german industrial mobilization. If WW2 starts as OTL, the main issue with the allies in 1939 1940 wasn't shortages of material, but bad decisions. The greater impact would have been a better prepared RAF for Battle of Britain, and more escorts avaible earlier on the Atlantic.
 

Just Leo

What munitions would they be increasing production of at an earlier date? It was not until their lack was felt that such items as anti-aircraft guns were considered important. The lack of constant speed propellors until the actual advent of war is an indication that there wasn't a great amount of foresight going on.
 

chris N

It is very probable that if additional money was available then a lot more weapons might have been available. In addition to a shortage of modern fighters the British army also was short of equipment when the war broke out. It lacked enough Bren guns, field Artillery, antitank guns. The same story was true. Why did this happen . The answer was the Chancellor of the Ex- checker objected to additional spending on the military. One of the people to hold that office was the man who would be Prime Minister when the war broke out.
 
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