Fun thought experiment: modern jet, old war

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Ran this scenario by a friend of mine and we had some fun with it.

It's Jan. 1, 1943. You are an Allied commander, and you have the ability to reach forward in time to 2017 America and bring back an F-15E Strike Eagle to help the war effort -- but only for ONE mission.


Rules:

- You get ONE F-15E -- NO other planes, satellites, radars, etc.
- It can have ANY configuration and loadout available to it as of 2017, EXCEPT nuclear weapons.
- It comes with a fully competent pilot and WSO.
- It comes with all necessary ground support personnel and related materiel for ONE mission.
- You can make the whole package appear at ANY FRIENDLY air base that could accommodate it (hangar, runway, etc.).
- You can can have it at any time on any date from 1/1/1943 on, BUT the mission HAS to be flown between 24 and 48 hours after you get it.
- After the mission, EVERYTHING that remains -- plane, crew, personnel, fuel, weapons, etc. -- goes back to 2017 America.


Given all that:

1. What's the configuration and loadout?
2. Where would you fly it out of?
3. What mission would you fly?
 
Obviously you'd try to kill Hitler, but that depends on knowing where he is, and a modern jet isn't going to help that.
 
Not sure I know what ordinance to use, but I think I would have gone after the Romanian oil fields. They produced about 60% of the crude used by Nazi Germany. Their tanks, planes and other vehicles would grind to a halt.

But frankly, I'm not really sure I'd want to mess with anything looking back.

Europe might have been a different place if the Soviets could have marched across Germany and perhaps into France before the Western Allies were ready to assault the mainland.
 
Originally Posted By: mk378
Obviously you'd try to kill Hitler, but that depends on knowing where he is, and a modern jet isn't going to help that.


Actually, I think that is the worst idea. With Hitler gone, competent generals may have made the war drag out longer, if not actually result in an outcome where Nazi Germany was not defeated, but the Allies fought to a stalemate. Or nukes were used on the Germans as well as the Japanese...
 
Attacking a large military propaganda rally would have a 'shock and awe' psychological effect for a few days. Then they'd be right back at it. The limiting factor being a futuristic fighter plane loaded with conventional weapons. Not much different than sending in a WWII fighter plane, damage wise.
 
Originally Posted By: javacontour
Originally Posted By: mk378
Obviously you'd try to kill Hitler, but that depends on knowing where he is, and a modern jet isn't going to help that.


Actually, I think that is the worst idea. With Hitler gone, competent generals may have made the war drag out longer, if not actually result in an outcome where Nazi Germany was not defeated, but the Allies fought to a stalemate. Or nukes were used on the Germans as well as the Japanese...

Agree. Hitler was a terrible strategist. But his early gambles often worked out. The western countries initially felt sorry for the Germans because they had treated them so badly in the Treaty of Versailles that they let them get away with a lot of stuff.

In about mid 1941 the war would have been unlose-able if Hitler had let his general staff manage the military strategy.

And guess who wouldn't let the Germans develop their jet interceptor, literally for years, until the engineers slyly put bomb racks under the wings so it "could be a dive bomber". Hitler really really wanted a dive bomber (the original demand was for a 4-engine heavy dive bomber) and said no more new plane development until I get one.

The Germans weren't that far behind the allies in developing nukes either - and even had an unstoppable delivery vehicle (the V2). With a second stage they might have been able to reach New York. The odd nuclear bomb on London or New York, and a negotiated peace might start to sound like a reasonable idea.

The eastern front might have worked out differently with a better and more consistent strategy (and ongoing air superiority wouldn't have hurt either).

With jets keeping the bombers away from Germany and occupied Europe, who knows what might have happened.
 
Originally Posted By: javacontour
Not sure I know what ordinance to use, but I think I would have gone after the Romanian oil fields. They produced about 60% of the crude used by Nazi Germany. Their tanks, planes and other vehicles would grind to a halt.

Java, I would contradict you on that:
-US and some british Airforce actually did bomb pretty good those fields/facilities.... and some around them too...
 
Highly doubtful that one mission and one aircraft would make any difference in a war effort of the size of WWII.

Flying around Berlin at top speed in hopes that the German command and Hitler would notice, and then claiming it were aliens that are on Allied side, would probably accomplish more than shooting at any specific target/persons.
 
Originally Posted By: pandus13
Originally Posted By: javacontour
Not sure I know what ordinance to use, but I think I would have gone after the Romanian oil fields. They produced about 60% of the crude used by Nazi Germany. Their tanks, planes and other vehicles would grind to a halt.

Java, I would contradict you on that:
-US and some british Airforce actually did bomb pretty good those fields/facilities.... and some around them too...


I think the results were mixed. What I read, somewhere between 80 and 90% of the ordinance landed outside the facilities.

Any damage done could have been repaired in days.

My thoughts are a modern fighter might have been able to get in there and drop a bomb on some part where it would take months or over a year to put the plant back into production.

But, probably couldn't carry enough ordinance to really do that with one modern fighter....
 
Originally Posted By: javacontour
Originally Posted By: mk378
Obviously you'd try to kill Hitler, but that depends on knowing where he is, and a modern jet isn't going to help that.


Actually, I think that is the worst idea. With Hitler gone, competent generals may have made the war drag out longer, if not actually result in an outcome where Nazi Germany was not defeated, but the Allies fought to a stalemate. Or nukes were used on the Germans as well as the Japanese...


Agreed. Later in the war, Hitler was the best ally the Allies had.
 
It would be hard to guess the unintended consequences. The prediction in "The Man in the High Castle" couldn't be more wrong from the reality of today. German got split and Japan end up being under our "control", and China went its own version communism, yet Soviet being our biggest cold war rival.

One mission with future or alien technology is like one nuke dropped to shock the world, hard to predict the chain reaction down the road. Except that Afghanistan will always be graveyard of empires, then and now, and future.
 
I don't like the idea of changing the past. Too many variables to account for that can alter the flow of our history. Too much Star Trek: TNG for me I suppose.
 
In this hypothetical amendment to history, use the F-15E to take out the Hugo Boss factory. Made all the German military uniforms during the war.

Entire German military would no longer be as well dressed and this would have a bad effect on morale in general and probably wear on Hitler and his top generals enough to sufficiently distract them into catastrophic strategic blunders that would bring about an earlier end to the war in Europe, possibly without need for the USSR to help take Berlin and thus eliminating the whole East/West berlin East/West Germany problem post-war.
 
Loving this conversation so far.
thumbsup2.gif


One of my friend's thoughts was to take out the Reichstag while Hitler and his inner circle were in it. Arguments about the effect on the war aside, I think the building would have to be leveled for that kind of strike to work, and I realized I have no idea if a single Strike Eagle can carry enough ordnance for that. Anyone know?

What was especially interesting for our barely-amateur brains was to think about the moment-to-moment of the mission. Would the Nazis be able to detect it and marshal a defense of any kind? We thought it might be able to avoid a lot of Nazi AA by just flying above it, but what about on the bomb run? If the pilot came across any Nazi aircraft on the way to or from the target, how much of a rampage could it go on?
 
I think I'd attempt to support Anzio and hopefully cut off more Germans in Italy. I don't think an F-15 carries enough to make a huge difference. Maybe take out Krupps ?

I'd rather an A-10 or B-52 in this experiment.
 
This is how all you attack Germany take out Hitler guys go. The F15 has a malfunction and the plane crash lands inside Germany and the German reverse engineer the the F15.
That's why you don't do such things when history already played in your favor.
Me though I would go after Stalin. Kill Stalin if for no other reason than he needs to be killed. Prevent a cold war and possibly have Russia emerge as a friendly country towards the United States.
 
Originally Posted By: Wheel
I'd rather an A-10 or B-52 in this experiment.

Or a B-1B, or a B2. Any of those would make this a much more straightforward scenario. :]

I'm actually more interested in the scenarios where the answer is less obvious. Like, what could someone in 1943 do with one sortie in an F-16? An F-22? An SR-71?
 
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