The fuel issue sounds reasonable. I entered the USN when we were converting from NSFO to JP-5. I had forgotten that in the 1940's the Navy used a fuel even less refined than NSFO, Bunker-C. Carrying bunker-c, avgas, and diesel would have been logistically burdensome. I don't think an I.C.E. could be built for bunker-C so it had to be avgas.

What about american manufacturing back then--could we mass produce diesel engines as quickly and with consistent tolerances as gassers?

B