Chapter 115: Introducing Armored Cars
One of the major problems with the Great War, and why it suddenly ended up in a stalemate where millions of men died for the gain of a single mile in static and brutal trench warfare, was because, to put it simply, military weaponry advanced well beyond the means of transportation.
Trucks and armored vehicles weren't really a thing yet. Those were inventions that spawned from the end of the Great War and throughout the interwar period. Hell, the entire oil industry was really not developed enough to sustain a full-scale motorized form of warfare.
And though Bruno had begun making substantial investments in the oil and natural gas industries, if he was being honest, it would be years before Germany had enough fuel stored to properly make use of such advancements in military transportation.
Frankly speaking, it would be decades before airplanes and cars advanced enough to sustain a functioning logistics network. At this time, railways and horse-drawn carts were the primary means of transportation.
But Bruno wanted to change this. Logistics was a huge part of winning a war, and this was fully realized in the Second World War when, in several critical battles, the Germans ran out of ammo and fuel, ultimately forcing either their retreat or surrender.
Because of this, Bruno had plans to secure oil from Kamerun and Romania to sustain not only the German military's logistics network. Hence, he had begun making investments in such areas. But at the same time, Bruno needed to introduce a truck capable of transporting supplies from the railways to the battlefield.
Hence, he began making use of a design from his past life. The GMC CCKW 2/2-ton 6x6 truck was, by all means, the most vital aspect of WW2 that most people forgot about. Given in significant supplies as lend-lease by the United States to the Allied Powers, including the Soviet Union, this truck was the primary backbone of all Allied Armies.
Without these trucks, it is entirely possible that the Soviet front would have collapsed long before they ever managed to change the tide of the war. In other words, this truck was the unsung hero of the Second World War.
If built in sufficient supply, they could not only ferry supplies to the frontlines but soldiers as well, and carry off the wounded from the battlefield to the railways, where they could be taken to a proper hospital.
It was a gap in technological capabilities that basically ensured, if properly fueled, that the defensive lines Bruno was building in the West would constantly be resupplied. In addition to this, they could secure the offensive supply lines when the time to push into France finally arrived.