Germany had begun the war with the world’s finest combat air force and its second strongest industrial economy. In 1939, the German aircraft industry was second to none. Aeronautic engineers of staggering creativity headed its design studios, and its factory workforce was superbly trained. But even before massive Allied raids on its plants, the industry was prevented from reaching its full potential by three principal factors: gross mismanagement by incompetent Nazi administrators, chief among them Col. Gen. Ernst Udet, Göring’s World War I squadron mate whom Göring had put in charge of the
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