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Technology played a significant role inWorld War II. Some of the technologies used during the war were developed during the interwar years of the 1920s and 1930s. Many were developed in response to needs and lessons learned during the war, and others were beginning to their development as the war ended. Wars often have major effects on peacetime technologies, but World War II had the greatest effect on the everyday technology and devices that are used today. Technology also played a greater role in the conduct of World War II than in any other war in history, and had a critical role in its outcome.
Many types of technology were customized for military use, and major developments occurred across several fields including:
Military weapons technology experienced rapid advances during World War II, and over six years there was a disorientating rate of change in combat in everything from aircraft tosmall arms. Indeed, the war began with most armies using some technology that had changed little fromthat of World War I, and in some cases, had remained unchanged since the 19th century. For instancecavalry,trenches, and World War I-erabattleships were normal in 1940, but six years later, armies around the world had developedjet aircraft,ballistic missiles, and evenatomic weapons in the case of the United States.
World War II was the first war where military operations often targeted the research efforts of the enemy. This included the exfiltration ofNiels Bohr from German-occupied Denmark to Britain in 1943; the sabotage ofNorwegian heavy water production; and the bombing ofPeenemunde. Military operations were also conducted to obtain intelligence on the enemy's technology; for example, theBruneval Raid for German radar andOperation Most III for the German V-2.
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In August 1919 the BritishTen Year Rule declared the government should not expect another war within ten years. Consequently, they conducted very little military R & D. In contrast, Germany and the Soviet Union were dissatisfied powers who, for different reasons, cooperated with each other on military R & D.The Soviets offered Weimar Germany facilities deep inside theUSSR for building and testing arms and for military training, well away from Treaty inspectors' eyes. In return, they asked for access to German technical developments, and for assistance in creating theRed Army General Staff.
The great artillery manufacturerKrupp was soon active in the south of the USSR, nearRostov-on-Don. In 1925, theLipetsk fighter-pilot school was established nearLipetsk to train the first pilots for the futureLuftwaffe.[1] Since 1926, the Reichswehr used theKama tank school inKazan, and testedchemical weapons at theTomka gas test site inSaratov Oblast. In turn, the Red Army gained access to these training facilities, as well as military technology and theory from Weimar Germany.[2]
In the late 1920s, Germany helped the Soviet industry begin to modernize and to assist in the establishment of tank production facilities at theLeningrad Bolshevik Factory and theKharkiv Locomotive Factory. This cooperation would break down when Hitler rose to power in 1933. The failure of theWorld Disarmament Conference marked the beginnings of the arms race leading to war.
In France the lesson of World War I was translated into theMaginot Line which was supposed to hold a line at the border with Germany. The Maginot Line did achieve its political objective of ensuring that any German invasion had to go through Belgium, ensuring that France would have Britain as a military ally. France and Russia had more, and much better,tanks than Germany at the outbreak of their hostilities in 1940. As in World War I, the French generals expected that armour would mostly serve to helpinfantry break the static trench lines and stormmachine gun nests. They thus spread the armour among their infantry divisions, ignoring the new German doctrine ofblitzkrieg based on fast, coordinated movement using concentrated armour attacks, against which the only effective defense was mobileanti-tank guns, as the old infantryantitank rifles were ineffective against the newmedium and heavy tanks.
Air power was a major concern of Germany and Britain between the wars. The trade in aircraft engines continued, with Britain selling hundreds of its best to German firms – which used them in the first generation of aircraft and much improved them for use in later German aircraft. These new inventions led the way to major success for the Germans in World War II.
As always, Germany was at the forefront ofinternal combustion engine development. The laboratory ofLudwig Prandtl atUniversity of Göttingen was the world center of aerodynamics andfluid dynamics in general, until its dispersal after the Allied victory. This contributed to the German development of jet aircraft and of submarines with improved underwater performance. Meanwhile, the RAF secretly developed theChain Home radar andDowding system for defending against enemy planes.
Inducednuclear fission was discovered in Germany in 1939 byOtto Hahn (and expatriate Jews in Sweden), but many of the scientists needed to develop nuclear power had already been lost, due to Nazi anti-Jewish and anti-intellectual policies.
Scientists have been at the heart of warfare and their contributions have often been decisive. AsIan Jacob, the wartime military secretary ofWinston Churchill, famously remarked on the influx of refugee scientists (including 19Nobel laureates), "the Allies won the [Second World] War because our German scientists were better than their German scientists".[3]
TheAllies of World War II cooperated extensively in the development and manufacture of existing and new technologies to support military operations and intelligence gathering during the Second World War. There were various ways in which the allies cooperated, including the AmericanLend-Lease scheme and hybrid weapons such as theSherman Firefly as well as the BritishTube Alloys nuclear weapons research project which was absorbed into the American-ledManhattan Project. Several technologies invented in Britain proved critical to the military and were widely manufactured by the Allies during the Second World War.[4][5][6][7]
The origin of the cooperation stemmed from a 1940 visit by theAeronautical Research Committee chairmanHenry Tizard that arranged to transfer U.K. military technology to the U.S. in case of the successful invasion of the U.K. that Hitler was planning asOperation Sea Lion. Tizard led a British technical mission, known as theTizard Mission, containing details and examples of British technological developments in fields such asradar,jet propulsion and also theearly British research into theatomic bomb. One of the devices brought to the U.S. by the Mission, theresonant cavity magnetron, was later described as "the most valuable cargo ever brought to our shores".[8]
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The bestjet fighters at the end of the war easily outflew any of the leading aircraft of 1939, such as theSpitfire Mark I. The early war bombers that caused such carnage would almost all have been shot down in 1945, many by radar-aimed,proximity fuse-detonatedanti-aircraft fire, just as the 1941 "invincible fighter", theZero, had by 1944 become the "turkey" of the"Marianas Turkey Shoot". The best late-war tanks, such as the SovietJS-3heavy tank or the GermanPanthermedium tank, handily outclassed the best tanks of 1939 such asPanzer IIIs. In the navy the battleship, long seen as the dominant element of sea power, was displaced by the greater range and striking power of theaircraft carrier. The chaotic importance of amphibious landings stimulated the Western Allies to develop theHiggins boat, a primary troop landing craft; theDUKW, a six-wheel-drive amphibious truck, amphibious tanks to enable beach landing attacks andLanding Ship, Tanks to land tanks on beaches. Increased organization and coordination of amphibious assaults coupled with the resources necessary to sustain them caused the complexity of planning to increase by orders of magnitude, thus requiring formal systematization giving rise to what has become the modern managementmethodology ofproject management by which almost all modernengineering,construction andsoftware developments are organized.
In theWesternEuropean Theatre of World War II, air power became crucial throughout the war, both in tactical and strategic operations (respectively, battlefield and long-range). Superior German aircraft, aided by ongoing introduction of design and technology innovations, allowed the German armies to overrun Western Europe with great speed in 1940, assisted by lack of Allied aircraft, which in any case lagged in design and technical development during the slump in research investment after theGreat Depression.
Since the end of World War I, theFrench Air Force had been badly neglected, as military leaders preferred to spend money on ground armies and staticfortifications to fight another World War I-style war. As a result, by 1940, the French Air Force had only 1562 planes and was together with 1070 RAF planes facing 5,638Luftwaffe fighters andfighter-bombers. Most French airfields were located in north-eastFrance, and were quickly overrun in the early stages of the campaign. TheRoyal Air Force of the United Kingdom possessed some very advanced fighter planes, such asSpitfires andHurricanes, but these were not useful for attacking ground troops on a battlefield, and the small number of planes dispatched to France with theBritish Expeditionary Force were destroyed fairly quickly. Subsequently, the Luftwaffe was able to achieve air superiority over France in 1940, giving the German military an immense advantage in terms of reconnaissance and intelligence.
German aircraft rapidly achieved air superiority over France in early 1940, allowing the Luftwaffe to begin a campaign ofstrategic bombing against British cities. Utilizing France's airfields near theEnglish Channel the Germans were able to launch raids onLondon and other cities duringthe Blitz, with varying degrees of success.
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After World War I, the concept of massed aerial bombing—"The bomber will always get through"—had become very popular with politicians and military leaders seeking an alternative to the carnage of trench warfare, and as a result, the air forces of Britain, France, and Germany had developed fleets of bomber planes to enable this (France's bomber wing was severely neglected, whilst Germany's bombers were developed in secret as they were explicitly forbidden by theTreaty of Versailles).
Air warfare of World War II began with the bombing ofShanghai by theImperial Japanese Navy on January 28, 1932, andAugust 1937. The bombings during theSpanish Civil War (1936–1939), further demonstrated the power of strategic bombing, and so air forces in Europe and the United States came to view bomber aircraft as extremely powerful weapons which, in theory, could bomb an enemy nation into submission on their own. The resulting fear of bombers triggered major developments in aircraft technology.
The Spanish Civil War had proved that tactical dive-bombing usingStukas was a very efficient way of destroying enemy troops concentrations, and so resources and money had been devoted to the development of smaller bomber craft. As a result, the Luftwaffe was forced to attack London in 1940 with heavily overloadedHeinkel andDornier medium bombers, and even with the unsuitable Junkers Ju 87. These bombers were painfully slow—engineers had been unable to develop sufficiently largepiston aircraft engines (those that were produced tended to explode through extreme overheating), and so the bombers used for theBattle of Britain were woefully undersized. As German bombers had not been designed for long-range strategic missions, they lacked sufficient defenses. TheMesserschmitt Bf 109 fighter escortshad not been equipped to carry enough fuel to guard the bombers on both the outbound and return journeys, and the longer-range Bf 110s could be outmaneuvered by the short-range British fighters. (A bizarre feature of the war was how long it took to conceive of theDrop tank.) The air defense was well organized and equipped with effective radar that survived the bombing. As a result, German bombers were shot down in large numbers, and were unable to inflict enough damage on cities and military-industrial targets to force Britain out of the war in 1940 or to prepare for the planned invasion.Nazi Germany put into production only one large, long-range strategic bomber (theHeinkel He 177 Greif, with many delays and problems), while theAmerica Bomber concept resulted only in prototypes.
British long-range bomber planes such as theShort Stirling had been designed before 1939 for strategic flights and given a large armament, but their technology still suffered from numerous flaws. The smaller and shorter rangedBristol Blenheim, the RAF's most-used bomber, was defended by only one hydraulically operated machine-gun turret, which was soon revealed to be incapable of defending against squadrons of German fighter planes. American bomber planes such as theB-17 Flying Fortress had been built before the war as the only adequate long-range bombers in the world, designed to patrol the long American coastlines. With six machine-gun turrets providing 360° cover, the B-17s were still vulnerable without fighter protection even when used in large formations.
Despite the abilities of Allied bombers, though, Germany was not quickly crippled by AlliedStrategic bombing during World War II. Accuracy was poor and Allied airmen frequently could not find their targets at night. The bombs used by the Allies were very technologically advanced devices, and mass production meant that the precision bombs were often made sloppily and so failed to explode. German industrial production actually rose continuously. Significantly, the bomber offensive kept the revolutionaryType XXI U-Boat from entering service during the war. Moreover, Allied air raids had a serious propaganda impact on the German government, all prompting Germany to begin serious development of air defense technology—in the form of fighter planes.
The practical jet aircraft age began just before the start of the war with the development of theHeinkel He 178, the first true turbojet. Late in the war, the Germans brought in the first operational Jetfighter, theMesserschmitt Me 262(Me 262). However, despite their seeming technological edge, German jets were often hampered by technical problems, such as short engine lives, with the Me 262 having an estimated operating life of just ten hours before failing.[9] German jets were also overwhelmed by Allied air superiority, frequently being destroyed on or near the airstrip. The first and only operational Allied jet fighter of the war, the BritishGloster Meteor, saw combat against German V-1 flying bombs[10] but did not significantly distinguish from top-line, late-war piston-driven aircraft.
Aircraft saw rapid and broad development during the war to meet the demands of aerial combat and address lessons learned from combat experience. From the open cockpit airplane to the sleek jet fighter, many different types were employed, often designed for very specific missions. Aircraft were used in anti-submarine warfare against German U-boats, by the Germans to mine shipping lanes and by the Japanese against previously formidable Royal Navy battleships such asHMS Prince of Wales (53).
During the war the Germans produced various glide bombs, which were the first "smart" weapons; the V-1 flying bomb, which was the firstcruise missile weapon; and the V-2 rocket, the firstballistic missile weapon. The latter of these was the first step into the space age as its trajectory took it through the stratosphere, higher and faster than any aircraft. This later led to the development of theIntercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).Wernher von Braun led the V-2 development team and later emigrated to the United States where he contributed to the development of theSaturn V rocket, which took men to the moon in 1969.
The Axis countries had serious shortages of petroleum from which to make liquid fuel. The Allies had much more petroleum production. Germany, long before the war, developed a process to makesynthetic fuel from coal. Synthesis factories were principal targets of theOil Campaign of World War II.
The USA addedtetra ethyl lead to its aviation fuel, with which it supplied Britain and other Allies. This octane enhancing additive allowed higher compression ratios, allowing higher efficiency, giving more speed and range to Allied Airplanes, and reducing the cooling load.
The Treaty of Versailles had imposed severe restrictions upon Germany constructing vehicles for military purposes, and so throughout the 1920s and 1930s, German arms manufacturers and theWehrmacht had begun secretly developingtanks. As these vehicles were produced in secret, their technical specifications and battlefield potentials were largely unknown to the European Allies until the war actually began.
French and British Generals believed that a future war with Germany would be fought under very similar conditions as those of 1914–1918. Both invested in thickly armoured, heavily armed vehicles designed to cross shell-damaged ground and trenches under fire. At the same time the British also developed faster but lightly armouredCruiser tanks to range behind the enemy lines.
Only a handful of French tanks had radios, and these often broke as the tank lurched over uneven ground. German tanks were, on the contrary, all equipped with radios, allowing them to communicate with one another throughout battles, whilst French tank commanders could rarely contact other vehicles.
TheMatilda Mk I tanks of theBritish Army were also designed forinfantry support and were protected by thick armour. This suited trench warfare, but made the tanks painfully slow in open battles. Their light armament was usually unable to inflict serious damage on German vehicles. The exposed caterpillar tracks were easily broken by gunfire, and the Matilda tanks had a tendency to incinerate their crews if hit,[citation needed] as the petrol tanks were located on the top of the hull. By contrast theInfantry tank Matilda II fielded in lesser numbers was largely invulnerable to German gunfire and its gun was able to punch through the German tanks. However French and British tanks were at a disadvantage compared to the air supported German armoured assaults, and a lack of armoured support contributed significantly to the rapid Allied collapse in 1940.
World War II marked the first full-scale war wheremechanization played a significant role. Most nations did not begin the war equipped for this. Even the vauntedGerman Panzer forces relied heavily on non-motorised support and flank units in large operations. While Germany recognized and demonstrated the value of concentrated use of mechanized forces, they never had these units in enough quantity to supplant traditional units. However, the British also saw the value in mechanization. For them it was a way to enhance an otherwise limited manpower reserve. America as well sought to create a mechanized army. For the United States, it was not so much a matter of limited troops, but instead a strong industrial base that could afford such equipment on a great scale.
The most visible vehicles were thetanks of World War II, forming the armored spearhead of mechanized warfare. Their impressive firepower and armor made them the premier fighting machine of ground warfare. However, the large number of trucks and lighter vehicles that kept the infantry, artillery, and others moving were massive undertakings also.
Naval warfare changed dramatically during World War II, with the ascent of theaircraft carrier to the premier vessel of the fleet, and the impact of increasingly capablesubmarines on the course of the war. The development of new ships during the war was somewhat limited due to the protracted time period needed for production, but important developments were often retrofitted to older vessels. Advanced German submarine types came into service too late and after nearly all the experienced crews had been lost.
In addition to aircraft carriers, its assisting counterpart ofdestroyers were advanced as well. From theImperial Japanese Navy, theFubuki-class destroyer was introduced. The Fubuki class set a new standard not only for Japanese vessels, but for destroyers around the world. At a time when British and American destroyers had changed little from their un-turreted, single-gun mounts and light weaponry, the Japanese destroyers were bigger, more powerfully armed, and faster than any similar class of vessel in the other fleets. The Japanese destroyers of World War II are said to be the world's first modern destroyer.[11]
The GermanU-boats were used primarily for stopping/destroying the resources from the United States and Canada coming across the Atlantic. Submarines were critical in the Pacific Ocean as well as in the Atlantic Ocean. Advances in submarine technology included thesnorkel. Japanese defenses against Allied submarines were ineffective. Much of the merchant fleet of theEmpire of Japan, needed to supply its scattered forces and bring supplies such as petroleum and food back to theJapanese Archipelago, was sunk. Among the warships sunk by submarines was the war's largest aircraft carrier, theShinano.
The Kriegsmarine introduced thepocket battleship to get around constraints imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. Innovations included the use of diesel engines, and welded rather than riveted hulls.
The most important shipboard advances were in the field of anti-submarine warfare. Driven by the desperate necessity of keeping Britain supplied, technologies for the detection and destruction of submarines was advanced at high priority. The use ofASDIC (SONAR) became widespread and so did the installation of shipboard and airborne radar. The AlliesUltra code breaking allowed convoys to be steered around German U-boatwolfpacks.
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The actual weapons (guns,mortars,artillery,bombs, and other devices) were as diverse as the participants and objectives. A large array were developed during the war to meet specific needs that arose, but many traced their early development to prior to World War II.Torpedoes began to use magnetic detonators; compass-directed, programmed and even acoustic guidance systems; and improved propulsion.Fire-control systems continued to develop for ships' guns and came into use for torpedoes and anti-aircraft fire.Human torpedoes and theHedgehog were also developed.
New production methods for weapons such as stamping, riveting, and welding came into being to produce the number of arms needed. Design and production methods had advanced enough to manufacture weapons of reasonable reliability such as thePPSh-41,PPS-42,Sten,Beretta Model 38,MP 40,M3Grease Gun,Gewehr 43,Thompson submachine gun and theM1 Garand rifle. Other Weapons commonly found during World War II include the American, Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR), M1 Carbine Rifle, as well as the Colt M1911 A-1; The Japanese Type 11, the Type 96 machine gun, and the Arisaka bolt-action rifles all were significant weapons used during the war.
World War II saw the establishment of the reliablesemi-automatic rifle, such as the AmericanM1 Garand and, more importantly, of the first widely usedassault rifles, named after the Germansturmgewehrs of the late war. Earlier renditions that hinted at this idea were that of the employment of theBrowning Automatic Rifle and 1916Fedorov Avtomat in awalking fire tactic in which men would advance on the enemy position showering it with a hail of lead. The Germans first developed theFG 42 for its paratroopers in the assault and later theSturmgewehr 44 (StG 44), the world's firstassault rifle, firing anintermediate cartridge; the FG 42's use of a full-powered rifle cartridge made it difficult to control.
Developments inmachine gun technology culminated in theMaschinengewehr 42 (MG42) which was of an advanced design unmatched at the time[citation needed]. It spurred post-war development on both sides of the upcomingCold War and is still used by some armies to this day including the GermanBundeswehr'sMG 3. TheHeckler & Koch G3, and many otherHeckler & Koch designs, came from its system of operation. The United States military meshed the operating system of the FG 42 with thebelt feed system of the MG42 to create theM60 machine gun used in theVietnam War.
Despite being overshadowed by self-loading/automatic rifles and sub-machine guns, bolt-action rifles remained the mainstay infantry weapon of many nations during World War II. When the United States entered World War II, there were not enoughM1 Garand rifles available to American forces which forced the US to start producing moreM1903 rifles in order to act as a "stop gap" measure until sufficient quantities of M1 Garands were produced.
During the conflict, many new models ofbolt-action rifle were produced as a result of lessons learned from the First World War, with the designs of a number of bolt-action infantry rifles being modified in order to speed production and to make the rifles more compact and easier to handle. Examples include the GermanMauser Kar98k, the British Lee–Enfield No.4, and theSpringfield M1903A3. During the course of World War II, bolt-action rifles and carbines were modified even further to meet new forms of warfare the armies of certain nations faced e.g. urban warfare and jungle warfare. Examples include the Soviet Mosin–Nagant M1944 carbine, developed by the Soviets as a result of the Red Army's experiences with urban warfare e.g. theBattle of Stalingrad, and the British Lee–Enfield No.5 carbine, developed for British and Commonwealth forces fighting the Japanese in South-East Asia and the Pacific.
When World War II ended in 1945, the small arms that were used in the conflict still saw action in the hands of the armed forces of various nations and guerrilla movements during and after theCold War era. Nations like theSoviet Union and the United States provided many surplus, World War II-era small arms to a number of nations and political movements during the Cold War era as a pretext to providing more modern infantry weapons.
Thediscovery of nuclear fission by German chemistsOtto Hahn andFritz Strassmann in 1938, and its theoretical explanation byLise Meitner andOtto Frisch, made the development of anatomic bomb a theoretical possibility. The prospect that aGerman atomic bomb project would develop one first alarmed scientists who were refugees fromNazi Germany and otherfascist countries.[12] In Britain, Frisch andRudolf Peierls, working underMark Oliphant at theUniversity of Birmingham, made a breakthrough investigating thecritical mass of uranium-235 in June 1939.[13] Their calculations indicated that it was within anorder of magnitude of 10 kilograms (22 lb), which was small enough to be carried by a bomber of the day. Their March 1940Frisch–Peierls memorandum prompted the creation of theMAUD Committee to investigate.[14] A directorate known asTube Alloys was established in theDepartment of Scientific and Industrial Research underWallace Akers to pursue the development of an atomic bomb.[15]
In July 1940, Britain offered to give the United States access to its scientific research,[16] and theTizard Mission'sJohn Cockcroft briefed American scientists on British developments. He discovered that although anAmerican atomic bomb project already existed, it was smaller than the British, and not as far advanced.[17] Oliphant flew to the United States in late August 1941 and spoke persuasively toErnest O. Lawrence and other key American physicists about the feasibility and potential power of an atomic bomb.[18][19]
Between 1942 and 1946, the American project was under the direction of Brigadier GeneralLeslie R. Groves Jr. of theUnited States Army Corps of Engineers. The Army component of the project was designated the "Manhattan District" as its first headquarters were inManhattan; this name gradually superseded the official codename, Development of Substitute Materials, for the entire project.[20] The British and American projects were merged with theQuebec Agreement in August 1943, and aBritish mission joined Manhattan Project's sites in the United States.[21]The Manhattan Project began modestly, but grew to employ nearly 130,000 people at its peak.[22] Due to high turnover, over 500,000 people worked on the project.[23] Three entire secret cities were built atOak Ridge, Tennessee,Richland, Washington, andLos Alamos, New Mexico.[24] The Manhattan Project cost nearly US$2 billion (equivalent to about $28 billion in 2024).[25] Over 90 percent of the cost was for building factories and to producefissile material, with less than 10 percent for development and production of the weapons.[26] It was the second most expensive weapons project undertaken by the United States in World War II, behind only theBoeing B-29 Superfortress bomber.[27]
ThefissileUranium-235isotope makes up only 0.7 percent of naturaluranium. Because it is chemically identical to the most common isotope,uranium-238, and has almost the same mass, separating the two proved challenging.[28] Three methods were employed foruranium enrichment:electromagnetic,gaseous andthermal. This work was carried out at theClinton Engineer Works atOak Ridge, Tennessee.[29] In parallel was an effort to produceplutonium, which was theorised to also be fissile, and could be produced by thenuclear transmutation of uranium in anuclear reactor.[30] The feasibility of a nuclear reactor was demonstrated in 1942 at the Manhattan Project'sMetallurgical Laboratory at theUniversity of Chicago with the start up ofChicago Pile-1.[31] A pilot reactor, theX-10 Graphite Reactor, was constructed at the Clinton Engineer Works,[32] and three production reactors were built at theHanford Engineer Works inWashington state.[33]
Work on weapon design was carried out byProject Y at Los Alamos under the direction ofRobert Oppenheimer.[34] The Manhattan Project pursued the development of two types of atomic bombs concurrently: a relatively simplegun-type fission weapon known asThin Man and a more compleximplosion-type nuclear weapon known asFat Man. The gun-type design proved impractical to use withplutonium,[35] so effort was concentrated on the implosion design.[36] A simpler gun-type calledLittle Boy was then developed that usedhighly enriched uranium.[37][38] Atomic bombs werethen employed against the Japan in August 1945.[39]
TheGerman nuclear weapon project failed for a variety of reasons, most notably insufficient resources, time, and a lack of official interest in a project unlikely to yield results before the war ended. The leading nuclear physicist in Germany wasWerner Heisenberg. Other key figures in the German project includedManfred von Ardenne,Walther Bothe,Kurt Diebner and Otto Hahn.[40] TheJapanese nuclear weapon program also floundered due to lack of resources despite gaining interest from the government.[41]
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Electronics rose to prominence quickly.Blitzkrieg was highly effective early in the war, with all German tanks having a radio. Enemy forces quickly learned from their defeats, discarded their obsolete tactics, and installed radios.
Combat Information Centers on ships and aircraft established networked computing, later essential to civilian life. While prior to the war few electronic devices were seen as important to war, by the middle of the war instruments such as theradar andASDIC (sonar) had become invaluable. Germany started the war ahead in some aspects of radar, but lost ground to research and development of thecavity magnetron in Britain and to later work at the "Radiation Laboratory" of theMassachusetts Institute of Technology. Half of the German theoretical physicists were Jewish and had emigrated or otherwise been lost to Germany long before WW II started.
Equipment designed forcommunications and theinterception of communications became critical.World War II cryptography became an important application, and the newly developed machine ciphers, mostlyrotor machines, were widespread. By the end of 1940, the Germans had broken most American and all British military ciphers except the Enigma-basedTypex.
The Germans in turn widely relied on their own variants of theEnigma coding machine for encrypting operations communications, andLorenz cipher for strategic messages. The British developed anew method for decoding Enigma benefiting from information given to Britain by thePolish Cipher Bureau, which had been decoding early versions of Enigma before the war.[42] Later, they also accomplished thecryptanalysis of the Lorenz cipher. The meticulous work of code breakers based at Britain'sBletchley Park played a crucial role in the final defeat of Germany.
German radio intelligence operations during World War II were extensive. The intercept part ofsignals intelligence was for the most part successful but success in cryptanalysis depended in large part on loose discipline in enemy radio operations.
Americans also used electronic computers for equations, such as battlefield equations, ballistics, and more. The Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC) machine was the first general purpose computer, built in 1945.[43] Previously,human computers would spend hours solving these equations. However, there were not enough mathematicians to handle the many ballistic equations that needed to be solved.[44] The resultingVon Neumann architecture later became the basis of general-purpose computers.
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Rocketry was used greatly in World War II. There were many different inventions and advances in rocketry, such as the following.
TheV-1, which is also known as the buzz bomb. This automatic aircraft would be known as a "cruise missile" today. The V-1 was developed atPeenemünde Army Research Center by theNazi GermanLuftwaffe during the Second World War. During initial development it was known by the codename "Cherry Stone". The first of the so-calledVergeltungswaffen series designed forterror bombing of London, the V-1 was fired from launch facilities along the French (Pas-de-Calais) and Dutch coasts. The first V-1 was launched at London on 13 June 1944), one week after (and prompted by) the successfulAllied landings in Europe. At its peak, more than one hundred V-1s a day were fired at south-east England, 9,521 in total, decreasing in number as sites were overrun until October 1944, when the last V-1 site in range of Britain was overrun by Allied forces. After this, the V-1s were directed at the port ofAntwerp and other targets in Belgium, with 2,448 V-1s being launched. The attacks stopped when the last launch site was overrun on 29 March 1945.
TheV-2 (German:Vergeltungswaffe 2, "Retribution Weapon 2"), technical nameAggregat-4 (A-4), was the world's first long-rangeguidedballistic missile. The missile withliquid-propellant rocket engine was developed during the Second World War in Germany as a "vengeance weapon", designed to attack Allied cities as retaliation for the Allied bombings of German cities. The V-2 rocket was also the first artificial object to cross theboundary of space.
These two rocketry advances took the lives of many civilians in London during 1944 and 1945.
Penicillin was firstdeveloped, mass-produced and used during the war.[45] The widespread use ofmepacrine (Atabrine) for the prevention ofmalaria,sulfanilamide,blood plasma, andmorphine were also among the chief wartime medical advancements.[46][47] Advances in the treatment of burns, including the use ofskin grafts, massimmunization fortetanus and improvements ingas masks also took place during the war.[47] The use of metal plates to help heal fractures began during the war.[48]
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