Military production during World War II

During World War II, women worked in factories throughout much of the Western and Eastern United States.

Starving Russian women were working in factories even during the most terrible days of the Siege of Leningrad

Military production during World War II was a critical component to military performance during WWII. Over the course of the war, the Allied countries outproduced the Axis countries in most categories of weapons.

Gross domestic product (GDP)

This chart shows the relationship in GDP between the Allied and the Axis during 1938-1945.

This table shows the relationships in Gross domestic product (GDP), between a selection of Allied and Axis countries, from 1938 to 1945, counted in billion international dollars and 1990 prices.

Country	1938	1939	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	1945
Austria	24	27	27	29	27	28	29	12
France[1]	186	199	164	130	116	110	93	101
Germany	351	384	387	412	417	426	437	310
Italy[2]	141	151	147	144	145	137	117	92
Japan[3]	169	184	192	196	197	194	189	144
Soviet Union[4]	359	366	417	359	274	305	362	343
British Isles	284	287	316	344	353	361	346	331
USA[5]	800	869	943	1 094	1 235	1 399	1 499	1 474
Allied Total:[6]	1 629	1 600	1 331	1 596	1 862	2 065	2 363	2 341
Axis Total:[7]	685	746	845	911	902	895	826	466
Allied/Axis GDP:[8]	2.38	2.15	1.58	1.75	2.06	2.31	2.86	5.02

Notes on the table (remember that the distribution values are rough estimates):

1. ^ France-Axis distribution: 1940: 56%, 1941-43: 100%, 1944: 58%.
2. ^ Italy distribution: 1938-1943: 100% Axis, 1944-1945: 100% Allies
3. ^ Japanese values are included in Axis totals for all years in order to illustrate potential contribution
4. ^ Soviet Union-Allies distribution: 1939: Only 67% due to the pact with Germany, but none to Axis. During 1940 Soviet Union is not counted at all. 1941: 44% is distributed to the Allies (after Operation Barbarossa), 1942-1945: 100%.
5. ^ US values are included in Allied totals for all years in order to illustrate potential contribution & Lend-Lease
6. ^ The Allied total is not the immediate sum of the table values; see the distribution rules used above.
7. ^ The Axis total is not the immediate sum of the table values; see the distribution rules used above.
8. ^ Allied/Axis GDP: This row shows the relation in GDP between the Allies and the Axis; i.e. 2.00 means the Allied production was 2 times larger than the Axis. Please note that only a selection of countries are included in the table. The distribution of values into alliances is described in the previous notes.

Table data source: Harrison, Mark, "The Economics of World War II: Six Great Powers in International Comparison", Cambridge University Press (1998).

Summary of production

System	Allies	Axis
Tanks and SP guns	227,235	52,345
Artillery	914,683	180,141
Mortars	657,318	100,000+
Machineguns	4,744,484	1,058,863
Military trucks	3,060,354	594,859
Military aircraft total	633,072	278,795
Fighter aircraft	212,459	90,684
Attack aircraft	37,549	12,539
Bomber aircraft	153,615	35,415
Reconnaissance aircraft	7,885	13,033
Transport aircraft	43,045	5,657
Training aircraft	93,578	28,516
Aircraft carriers	155	16
Battleships	13	7
Cruisers	82	15
Destroyers	814	86
Convoy escorts	1,102	-
Submarines	422	1,336
Merchant shipping tonnage	33,993,230	5,000,000+
Other:
Pillboxes, bunkers (steel, concrete - uk only)	72,128,141 tonnes	132,685,348 tonnes
Estimate Concrete runways	10,000,000 tonnes

Note that most Battleships and Cruisers were produced before the war and many served through its entirety.

US propaganda during World War II, urging citizens to increase production.

Vehicles and ground weapons

Country	Total tanks and self-propelled guns	Tanks and self-propelled guns [1]	Artillery [2]	Mortars [3]	Machineguns [4]	Military trucks
Soviet Union	105,251	92,595	516,648	200,300	1,477,400	197,100
United States	88,410	71,067	257,390	105,055	2,679,840	2,382,311
United Kingdom	27,896		124,877	102,950	297,336	480,943
Canada	5,678	2150	43,552		251,925	815,729
Other Commonwealth			5,215	46,014	37,983
Germany	67,429	43,920	159,147	73,484	674,280	345,914
Japan	2,515		13,350		380,000	165,945
Italy	2,473		7,200			83,000
Hungary	500		447		4,583

Aircraft

Country	Military aircraft of all types	Fighter aircraft	Attack aircraft	Bomber aircraft	Transport aircraft	Training aircraft
Soviet Union	143,145	63,087	37,549	21,116	17,332	4,061
United States	324,750	99,950		97,810	23,929	57,623
United Kingdom	131,549	49,422		34,689	1,784[5]	31,864
Canada	16,431	1740	1134	2670
France [6]	4,016	1,597[7]	280	712
Other Commonwealth	3,081
Germany	119,307	55,727	12,539	18,449 [8][9]	3,079	11,546
Japan	76,320	30,447		15,117	2,110	15,201
Italy	11,122	4,510		2,063	468	1,769
Hungary	1,046
Romania	1,000

Naval ships

^{[citation needed]}

Country	Aircraft carriers [10]	Battleships	Cruisers	Destroyers	Convoy escorts	Submarines	Merchant tonnage
Soviet Union			2	25		52
United States	22 (141)	8	48	349	420	203[11]	33,993,230
United Kingdom	14 (25)	5	32	240	413	167	6,378,899
Canada				1	303[12]		3,742,100
Other Commonwealth				3	60+		2,702,943
Germany	0 [13]	2		17	23	1,141[11]
Japan	16	2	9	63		167	4,152,361
Italy	0 [14]	3	6	6		28	1,469,606

Large Scale Civil Engineering Construction

Country	Concrete bunkers and pillboxes [15]
United Kingdom	72,128,141
Germany	132,685,348

Concrete runways

10,000,000 tonnes ^{[16][dead link]}

Materials

Country	Coal [17]	Iron Ore[17]	Crude Oil[17]
Soviet Union	590.8	71.3	110.6
United States	2,149.7	396.9	833.2
United Kingdom	1,441.2	119.2	90.8
Canada	101.9	3.6	8.4
Germany	2,420.3	240.7	33.4 [18]
Japan	184.5	21.0	5.2
Italy	16.9	4.4
Hungary	6.6	14.1	3.1
Romania	1.6	10.8	25.0

See also: Swedish iron ore during World War II

See also

• American armored fighting vehicle production during World War II
• Army-Navy ‘E’ Award
• German armored fighting vehicle production during World War II
• Rosie the Riveter
• Soviet armored fighting vehicle production during World War II
• World War II aircraft production
• World War II

Notes

1. ^ Those equipped with main weapons of 75 mm calibre or larger. This number is a subset of the total number.
2. ^ Includes anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons with calibres above 37 mm.
3. ^ Over 60 mm.
4. ^ Does not include sub-machineguns, or machine guns used for arming aircraft.
5. ^ By agreement, the UK drew most of its transport aircraft, excepting converted bombers, from the US allowing it to concentrate on production of bombers
6. ^ France production figures are from 09/39 to 06/40.
7. ^ 542 MS.406 + 437 D.520+ 518 MB.151+ 80 C.714 + 20 VG-33.
8. ^ The number of Nazi Germany bomber aircraft does not include more than 3,172 operational V-2 rockets and approximately 10,000 operational V-1 unmanned aircrafts used by for bombing.
9. ^ 214 Ar 234 + 475 Do 17 + 1,366 Do 217 + 5,656 He 111 + 1,146 He 177 + 9,122 Ju 88 + 466 Ju 188 + 4 Ju 388
10. ^ Figure in parentheses indicates merchant vessels converted to Escort carriers.
11. ^ ^{a b} Wagner, Kennedy, Osborne, and Reyburn. The Library of Congress World War II Companion. pp 202-203.
12. ^ Number of ships in the RCN All escort vessels of the frigate, minesweeper and corvettes classes were built in Canada and 10 Corvettes were supplied to the USN.
13. ^ None completed by the end of the war. Two were in production , Graf Zeppelin and Flugzeugträger B.
14. ^ None completed by the end of the war. Two were in production: see Aquila and Sparviero.
15. ^ Tonnes of steel and concrete.
16. ^ http://energydiscussiongroup.wikispaces.com/file/view/war+tonnages.xls An estimate of the rates of production carried out in WW2 as a guide to how quickly a crash programme of renewables could be built by comparison.
17. ^ ^{a b c} In millions of tonnes (metric ton) (1 tonne = ~7.2 barrels of oil)
18. ^ Including 23.4 synthetic.

References

• GDP values: Harrison, Mark, "The Economics of World War II: Six Great Powers in International Comparison", Cambridge University Press (1998).
• Milward, Alan S., "War, economy, and society, 1939-1945", University of California Press (1979).
• Overy, Richard, "Why the Allies Won (Paperback)", W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (1997).
• Barnett, Correlli, "The audit of war : the illusion & reality of Britain as a great nation", Macmillan, (1986).
• 'Gross Domestic Product' 1940
• "Canada at War" wwii.ca

External links

• Allies and Lend-Lease Museum, Moscow
• Canada's WWII Industry & Production