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It would have helped but it wouldn't have changed the basic equation - running out of military age able bodied men for the Wehrmacht and inability to come close to matching the US industrial juggernaut. The US on its own was capable of greater output than Germany, including occupied Europe - and both Britain and the USSR were also quite significant producers of military materiel. In terms of manpower Germany (including Austria and the Sudetenland) had roughly 80 million people - men, women, children, elderly. By the end of the war 2.3 million German soldiers had died in action, another half million of non combat causes, 2 million MIA, 1.7 million crippled. That does not include POW's or those out of action at any given moment due to non-crippling injuries.  It is actually pretty stunning to think that a major factor in both WWI and WWII was running out of people due to the massive casualties.
by MarekNYC on Sat Feb 25th, 2006 at 02:22:52 PM EST
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