In message , ArtKramr
writes
I am going to outline a real situaitoin that occured during WW II. I would
like to hear opinions and solutions as to how the situation should be handled.
I will give the real solutuion that was imposed during the war after a week or
so when many opinions have been offered.

There was a large factory producing torpedo gyroscopes and timeing devices
for the German submarine service. It was located in the midst of a very
populated area where the highly skilled workers lived with their families.
These workers were near irreplaceable. It took many years to learn the needed
skills, and without these workers production and quality would have been
dramatically down graded. One more point. This factory was not in any country
with which America or England was at war. What would you have done? Remember
these German torpedoes were slaughtering American and British seamen and
denying food and arms to England. What would you have done? Opinions?

I'd investigate the supply route those systems get to Germany by. Is it
along a sea route with anywhere convenient that RN destroyers could make
pointed inspections of neutral shipping, looking for and seizing war
materiel like torpedo gyroscopes? (You rarely get so lucky, but it's
worth checking)

Is there any political leverage that can be applied to persuade this
country to stop selling to a belligerent? (Or are we also buying
important precision components from them? That last confuses issues
badly and limits our more vehement options)

Can we outbid the Germans for those components? Good gyroscopes are
worth having with quite a lot of applications. US torpedoes are having
major depth-keeping problems until about 1944, can we get a solution
made there to keep those expensive neutral workers too busy to make
German components? And do these 'neutrals' make tumble-resistant
gyroscopes? I know there's at least one bombardier who'd really like one
for his Norden

Declaring war on them and bombing the hell out of the city district
where the factory sits is an option to consider, but may have more
problems than benefits.



Offhand I'd guess the factory was maybe in Switzerland, more likely
Sweden, and I think the eventual answer was to grit teeth, bear it, and
sink the U-boats so they never get to fire the torpedoes.

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk