General WWII stuff

[Sea Skimmer]

Simon, I am very doubtful the British could have put a much stronger fleet in the Pacific. They still needed to guard their homeland. Which means they need to leave a fleet behind powerful enough to deal with the Germans should they try something, as well as a fleet to deal with the Italians should they try something. Quick reinforcements are not possible, especially not when Gibraltar may be shut down by the Spanish with mines.

Not a serious threat; the water off Gibraltar is too deep and the water current too strong to be easily mined with any type of naval mine in use in WW2. A custom type of mine which was T a monster, more like a small submarine in scale would do the job. That water is up to 3,000ft deep! Mines being water depth limited to usually less then 500ft is also why you didn't see the Germans trying to lay mines 300-500km offshore of the the British isles in the western approaches, even though they knew that big British convoys would have to pass through certain areas. The high water current of the also made submerged submarine attacks very difficult to accomplish around Gibraltar, nearly impossible in fact. If Spain joined the war then the main threat to closing the waterway would be motor torpedo boats and Spanish shore batteries, air power being dependent on what Hitler gives Franco. Enough air power and nothing else matters; but Spain would take Gibralter anyway and the Med would just become the secondary theater it always should have been. invading Italy to attack Hitler over the Alps never made sense.

Anyway the British planned a fleet of 18 modern battleships and 13 aircraft carriers built or building by 1944; this was the British 1936-37 building plan in real life. It was much modified in reality, but it also was the plan they had before they even had that much evidence of an extensive KM surface fleet. Germany never had a remote chance of outbuilding someone with such a large head start unless they had another 20+ year long battleship building race. Japan's fleet was a silly joke compared to what the USN could build. Of course neither Axis could afford to delay the war for numerous reasons, though it would have helped if Japan attacked the US in 1940 instead of 1941.

[Sea Skimmer]

Wait, I thought the biggest thing slowing Bismarck down was rudder damage from a torp from one of Ark Royal's aircraft.

If not for earlier 14in shell damage which slowed her down by flooding and reducing her fuel supply (got to go slower to save gas to get to France) Bismarck would have reached Luftwaffer fighter cover and the French coastline before that strike by Ark Royal was ever launched. Ark Royal had to steam north from Gibraltar to get into range which took a few days. Earlier strikes from I think it was Formidiable? scored two torpedo hits, one of which cost Bismarck a boiler room but this loss didn't matter as the bow already slowed her down enough not to need that boiler.

[Simon_Jester]

That wasn't entirely unreasonable- taking a few unwanted 15" shell hits could badly damage a battleship, as demonstrated during at the Battle of the Denmark Strait. By limiting the ship's speed to 20 knots, relatively minor damage from Prince of Wales arguably doomed the Bismarck.

Wait, I thought the biggest thing slowing Bismarck down was rudder damage from a torp from one of Ark Royal's aircraft.

The first thing that screwed Bismarck over was when they got into a gunfight with the British battlecruiser Hood and new-built battleship Prince of Wales in the Denmark Strait. Hood got blown to bits very early in the battle, but the Germans took a few hits from the battleship.

One of them knocked a hole in one of the fuel tanks, and the Germans had to reduce speed from 30 knots to 20 knots to keep salt water from getting into the fuel oil. That made it much harder for them to escape pursuit by the rest of the huge British fleet hunting for them.

The torpedo hit that wrecked their rudder was what took them from "ah crap we're gonna have to go home rather than go on the rampage for weeks" down to "oh shit oh shit we're gonna die." Because with the rudder knocked out they'd never make it home before the British could flatten them.

Of course neither Axis could afford to delay the war for numerous reasons, though it would have helped if Japan attacked the US in 1940 instead of 1941.

How so?

[Simon_Jester]

Ghetto Edit:

I just conferred with a friend who knows way more about naval history than I do. In addition to the five KGVs and the four Lions that were at least laid down historically, the British were planning another four Lions (these were 9x16" battleships), and to use the guns off the obsolete R-class to make another five Vanguards.

Not all this would be ready by 1944, but it gives a sense for the scale of battleship construction the British were planning. Delaying the war so they could build more ships would not work to the Germans' advantage.

[Lonestar]

That wasn't entirely unreasonable- taking a few unwanted 15" shell hits could badly damage a battleship, as demonstrated during at the Battle of the Denmark Strait. By limiting the ship's speed to 20 knots, relatively minor damage from Prince of Wales arguably doomed the Bismarck.

I'm referring to when the the Operation Berlin, when both the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau turned and scampered off, despite outnumbering the Ramilles. Kriegsmarine doctrine(seemed to be) was to avoid conflict with RN capital ships, even if they had the advantage.

[Simon_Jester]

That wasn't entirely unreasonable- taking a few unwanted 15" shell hits could badly damage a battleship, as demonstrated during at the Battle of the Denmark Strait. By limiting the ship's speed to 20 knots, relatively minor damage from Prince of Wales arguably doomed the Bismarck.

I'm referring to when the the Operation Berlin, when both the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau turned and scampered off, despite outnumbering the Ramilles. Kriegsmarine doctrine(seemed to be) was to avoid conflict with RN capital ships, even if they had the advantage.

Yeah, I know. As I said, that wasn't entirely unreasonable of them. The British had naval superiority; if one of their battleships got damaged it limped back to port to be patched up and everything would probably be OK. If a German battleship (or any ship, really) suffered serious damage, it probably wasn't coming home.

But at the same time, the British didn't want to assume that the Germans would refuse to fight their capital ships even when they had the advantage; that would be tempting fate.

[Thanas]

That wasn't entirely unreasonable- taking a few unwanted 15" shell hits could badly damage a battleship, as demonstrated during at the Battle of the Denmark Strait. By limiting the ship's speed to 20 knots, relatively minor damage from Prince of Wales arguably doomed the Bismarck.

I'm referring to when the the Operation Berlin, when both the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau turned and scampered off, despite outnumbering the Ramilles. Kriegsmarine doctrine(seemed to be) was to avoid conflict with RN capital ships, even if they had the advantage.

Yeah, a standard tactic that has been in place for naval history since...well, since forever, especially if you cannot replace capital ship losses. Their value was more in creating a fleet-in-being than anything else. I cannot find a Navy in history which did not act in the same manner when faced with overwhelming numerical superiority.

[Lonestar]

Yeah, a standard tactic that has been in place for naval history since...well, since forever, especially if you cannot replace capital ship losses. Their value was more in creating a fleet-in-being than anything else. I cannot find a Navy in history which did not act in the same manner when faced with overwhelming numerical superiority.

You're arguing that it is the international standard tactic that, when equipped with two modern BBs/BCs vs. one elderly unmodernized BB, the two modern capital ships are t turn and run?

[Mr. Coffee]

Wait, I thought the biggest thing slowing Bismarck down was rudder damage from a torp from one of Ark Royal's aircraft.

If not for earlier 14in shell damage which slowed her down by flooding and reducing her fuel supply (got to go slower to save gas to get to France) Bismarck would have reached Luftwaffer fighter cover and the French coastline before that strike by Ark Royal was ever launched. Ark Royal had to steam north from Gibraltar to get into range which took a few days. Earlier strikes from I think it was Formidiable? scored two torpedo hits, one of which cost Bismarck a boiler room but this loss didn't matter as the bow already slowed her down enough not to need that boiler.

Well I'll be damned. You really do learn something new everyday...

[Sea Skimmer]

Of course neither Axis could afford to delay the war for numerous reasons, though it would have helped if Japan attacked the US in 1940 instead of 1941.

How so?

Japan would have been weaker in 1940, but the US was not mobilized at all nor trying to do so until after the Fall of France in 1940. If Japan had attacked not long after that event, it would have had a weaker position in some respects, but the US would have been almost a year and a half further behind the curve in mass armaments production, the two ocean navy, and fielding a proper army. That's an extra year and a half Japan would retain a significant advantage and can fortify its position. In mid 1940 places like Wake Island had ZERO garrison and the Philippines Army was still a paper concept. Japan on the other hand had a few less major warships and had not yet seized Indochina, but its still a way better time to go to war. All the more so since they don't have a six carrier attack fleet and would more likely open the war with an absurdly easy attack on the Philippines. No one will have fully realized what air power can do to formations of ships because Crete hasn't happened yet either, and Norway mostly saw small numbers of ships being subject to hundreds of sorties. This means the American fleet might blunder into a very unpleasant air-sea battle early in the war.

[Sea Skimmer]

You're arguing that it is the international standard tactic that, when equipped with two modern BBs/BCs vs. one elderly unmodernized BB, the two modern capital ships are t turn and run?

The Germans didn't and couldn't know what the true British strength was and if another battleship was around also covering the convoy, they are limited to what they can see after all. Langsdorff disobeyed strict orders to avoid engagement with enemy warships at the first opportunity he had, and it cost him his ship and his life. He had also thought he was engaging an inferior force, two destroyers and one cruiser instead of three cruisers. If the Germans had known just how much of a range advantage they had they might have engaged; but as it was 15in guns could defeat the armor on the German ships pretty well, while 11in gunfire cannot defeat the belt on an R class outside about 15,000 yards, target angle could quickly reduce this even lower. I believe it can only beat the deck outside about 30,000 yards with any reliability, a rather broad zone of protection for the British ship to fight in.

Really this just points out the stupidity of using battleships as commerce raiders at all. Off North Cape was the only place that could really be justified, and Murmansk would and should have been captured overland in the first place if Nazi planning didn't suck so badly. The radio made the fast warship commerce raider an obsolete concept, it just took the Germans about 35 extra years to figure it out.

[Thanas]

You're arguing that it is the international standard tactic that, when equipped with two modern BBs/BCs vs. one elderly unmodernized BB, the two modern capital ships are t turn and run?

If the loss of even one ship effects the Navy that much more than the other, then yes.

Really this just points out the stupidity of using battleships as commerce raiders at all. Off North Cape was the only place that could really be justified, and Murmansk would and should have been captured overland in the first place if Nazi planning didn't suck so badly.

?

Was there ever a serious attempt to capture Murmansk? Could it be done? My understanding is that the logistical situation made such an operation incapable.

The radio made the fast warship commerce raider an obsolete concept, it just took the Germans about 35 extra years to figure it out.

To be fair, the cruises by Admiral Scheer and other surface raiders, as well as Scharnhorst/Gneisenau raiding were quite effective.

[Sea Skimmer]

Was there ever a serious attempt to capture Murmansk? Could it be done? My understanding is that the logistical situation made such an operation incapable.

Its not a question that an attack can be mounted over that terrain, because the Russians did so in 1939 against the Finns (against very weak opposition) and again in 1944 when they swept all the way into northern Norway
http://www.cgsc.edu/carl/resources/csi/ ... bhardt.asp

Now in 1941 the Germans did make a major attempt to capture Murmansk, but the commander of the German mountain corps charged with the German offensive operation wanted a single all out attack to take the city. The Finns didn’t like that idea for various reason, so the planned operation became an attempt by the German mountain corps to take the city alone, while the Finns would and did make two attacks much further south to cut the railroad. The problem is the Finns then stopped, and the Russians meanwhile built a near 200 mile long bypass track around the piece of captured track within months.

The German attack on Murmansk was very poorly planned, as telegraph wires were mistaken for roads on Russian made maps, and some other errors were made particularly concerning the strength of Russian forces. No one was able to check this on aerial recon even though hundreds of recon overflights were made prior to the outbreak of war, because recon flights were only allowed with a small force of Ju86 bombers that could fly most fighter ceilings in 1941. They all flew further south. No one seems to have been willing to risk using anything else over Murmansk even though a navigational error would have been far easier to explain here then over the middle of the Ukraine. Anyway it meant things went bad from the first hours.

Once the attack began, the Germans gained a fair bit of ground advancing basically as riflemen and machine gun teams and little else, and might still have won using air power to make up for an inability to move even 75mm artillery ammunition across the terrain in suffcient strength, but all air support was withdrawn not far into the war. If the Germans had been able to push even further they would have reached the actual Russian road network, meaning that logistics would not have gotten any worse. The total distances involved aren’t even that big, to the tune of 50km, it was just this was totally trackless wilderness with swamps, lots of rock outcroppings, and creeks and lakes and forests. Given proper engineering support they could have simply built roads, these needed to be roads that could take horse drawn wagons and sleds after all, not tanks or heavy trucks, but such engineering support was also lacking. A German Mountain Division had precious few heavy engineering assets for obvious reasons, you can’t haul that stuff up a mountain slope. Nor was any effort made to simply mobilize Finnish civilians for the task for political reasons.

Basically, the Germans could have taken Murmansk easily enough, but it would have required a plan and specialist assets that did not assume certain Nazi victory by winter. If Germany was going to win by winter then Murmansk wasn’t that important anyway. In fact the main reason they attacked Murmansk at all in 1941 was NOT to cut off allied supplies, but to reduce the Soviet naval threat to the export of Finnish nickel ore from Petsamo. Soviet coastal guns could actually fire on the ore ships as they left port at very long range; and did so for most of the war from a besieged position on the Srendnii Peninsula. The Germans mostly dealt with that by installing a IIRC 17cm naval shore battery to fire counterbattery missions when ships left, and making most arrivals and departures under cover of darkness.

To be fair, the cruises by Admiral Scheer and other surface raiders, as well as Scharnhorst/Gneisenau raiding were quite effective.

Not even remotely effective for how much money those ships cost and how many men it took to man them, not to mention the scarce dockyard effort used to maintain and repair them in Germany and France during the countless months in-between sorties. Operating together Scharnhorst and Gneisenau sank or captured 115,600 tons of merchant shipping. Admiral Scheer sank or captured 113,000 tons meanwhile, and yet the mere armed merchant cruiser Atlantis got 145,700 tons, Pinguin 154,600 tons, Thor 96,000 tons. Several other disguised raiders took out over 60,000 tons apiece. The utter lack of economy is apparent. But it gets worse, because while a disguised raider could carry months of supplies and 30,000 miles of fuel, the proper warships had far less endurance and needed many more supply ships. Bismarck for her worthless sortie had four tankers in support, I believe the RN sank or captured three of them. Scharnhorst and Gneisenau needed a similar scale of support, neither could go over 10,000 miles even at an economical cruising speed and high speed cruising could quadruple fuel consumption. Neither was very seaworthy either but that’s its own problem.

The result is many of the large fast merchants and tankers that could have been turned into disguised raiders instead ended up as disguised supply ships, which were forbidden from attacking allied merchant ships least they be lost, and with them the warship they needed to fuel. Thousands of trained German sailors were required to man these ships and yet with usually only two 15cm guns they had only no hope of surviving an allied attack.

The only thing the battleship operations had going for them is they caused the allies to divert convoys away from the area of operations. That was useful… except it meant nothing unless it happened every week. The ships would steam away from England for a few days, then turn back and deliver the cargo anyway. The allied war effort and shipping effort simply had more then enough flexibility to accept these short term disruptions, and after mid 1941 more extensive air cover made surface operations in the North Atlantic impossible anyway. If the allies had paid more attention to the topic prewar such air cover easily could have existed in 1939.

Outside the North Atlantic the allies did not extensively use convoys except for troop transports (which always had heavy warships for escort), and so a battleship’s ability to destroy a number of targets rapidly was meaningless. A disguised raider could sink a lone and usually unarmed merchantmen 95% as well as a battleship could.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah, a standard tactic that has been in place for naval history since...well, since forever, especially if you cannot replace capital ship losses. Their value was more in creating a fleet-in-being than anything else. I cannot find a Navy in history which did not act in the same manner when faced with overwhelming numerical superiority.

You're arguing that it is the international standard tactic that, when equipped with two modern BBs/BCs vs. one elderly unmodernized BB, the two modern capital ships are t turn and run?

When those are the only two modern BCs in your navy, yes.

Remember, the ship's mission does not begin or end with that fight. Assume, for the sake of argument, they sink Ramilles. For starters, there's the risk of the battleship getting in a lucky shot and blowing one of the German BCs to bits, as happened to a lot of British battlecruisers over the years- German ships were tougher than that, but not bulletproof. Bad luck could still kill them. And losing Scharnhorst is much worse for the Germans than losing Ramilles is for the British, because if they lose Ramilles they can say "well shit, we weren't really using that ship for anything important anyway."

Assuming both ships survive, an action like that takes time- several hours during which their position is absolutely known, allowing the British to vector in their many capital ships, including carriers (which can find your ships and keep them found, if they coordinate with the cruisers that will shadow you as they shadowed Bismarck). You're at a lot more risk than you would if you made a hit-and-run attack against a convoy.

Moreover, it is totally unbelievable that you could sink the battleship without taking some damage- at least a few nice big 15" shell hits are going to land. If any of those hits causes your ship to reduce speed, that ship will almost certainly be caught by the British, who have plenty of thirty-knot ships to hunt you with.

Not even remotely effective for how much money those ships cost and how many men it took to man them, not to mention the scarce dockyard effort used to maintain and repair them in Germany and France during the countless months in-between sorties. Operating together Scharnhorst and Gneisenau sank or captured 115,600 tons of merchant shipping. Admiral Scheer sank or captured 113,000 tons meanwhile, and yet the mere armed merchant cruiser Atlantis got 145,700 tons, Pinguin 154,600 tons, Thor 96,000 tons. Several other disguised raiders took out over 60,000 tons apiece. The utter lack of economy is apparent.

Er. The cost-ineffectiveness is obvious for the battlecruisers and cruisers. Did you mean to say that Atlantis and her sisters were uneconomical too?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

When those are the only two modern BCs in your navy, yes.

Remember, the ship's mission does not begin or end with that fight. Assume, for the sake of argument, they sink Ramilles. For starters, there's the risk of the battleship getting in a lucky shot and blowing one of the German BCs to bits, as happened to a lot of British battlecruisers over the years- German ships were tougher than that, but not bulletproof. Bad luck could still kill them. And losing Scharnhorst is much worse for the Germans than losing Ramilles is for the British, because if they lose Ramilles they can say "well shit, we weren't really using that ship for anything important anyway."

Assuming both ships survive, an action like that takes time- several hours during which their position is absolutely known, allowing the British to vector in their many capital ships, including carriers (which can find your ships and keep them found, if they coordinate with the cruisers that will shadow you as they shadowed Bismarck). You're at a lot more risk than you would if you made a hit-and-run attack against a convoy.

Moreover, it is totally unbelievable that you could sink the battleship without taking some damage- at least a few nice big 15" shell hits are going to land. If any of those hits causes your ship to reduce speed, that ship will almost certainly be caught by the British, who have plenty of thirty-knot ships to hunt you with.

The two German ships had pretty decent fire control, and if they really wanted to, they would have. Any battle is a question of risk, otherwise, the ships would have been pointless otherwise. Firing at range and making use of their superior speed would have helped reduce the chance of a shell hit too.

As it turns out, Scharnhorst was sunk in no small part because of the excellent fire control on the Duke of York.

[LaCroix]

I get a feeling here that Germany actually could have won the war on land, but lost it on sea.

Because they couldn't secure the Channel and Atlantic, Britain was reinforced. Because of this, they couldn't invade Britain.
Also, they had a problem securing raw materials from Scandinavia.

Britain still in the game meant that the Mediterranean Sea was disputed, and they couldn't properly reinforce Africa, while the British could. With an undisputed Mediterranean, oil would not have been such a concern for German warfare.

The fact that they couldn't properly control the (east)Atlantic and invade Britain meant that they couldn't prevent Britain to become the much needed rallying point for an invasion.

Being in control of the (east) Atlantic would have helped the Japanese as it would have bound American forces. Especially as the Americans would have needed to move all the supplies for an African theatre across under own protection.

As far as I can see, the war was already lost at the beginning, since the Kriegsmarine couldn't rival the RN. No matter what wonder weapons and tactics they would have fielded on ground, without a proper navy, they had no chance to win. (Except for maybe a 'wonder-weapon' ship killer missile analog to what we have now.)

[Thanas]

As it turns out, Scharnhorst was sunk in no small part because of the excellent fire control on the Duke of York.

And because one side had functioning radar, the other did not.

[Spoonist]

As far as I can see, the war was already lost at the beginning, since the Kriegsmarine couldn't rival the RN. No matter what wonder weapons and tactics they would have fielded on ground, without a proper navy, they had no chance to win.

I think that the rationale was that an invasion wasn't necessary. Instead the UK would seek peace when it was clear it could not win on the continent.

[Sea Skimmer]

As it turns out, Scharnhorst was sunk in no small part because of the excellent fire control on the Duke of York.

And because one side had functioning radar, the other did not.

Also because Scharnhorst was the worst battleship of WW2 and not even able to afford a proper armor deck, not to mention the stupidity of Admiral Bey in dividing his weak force when the enemy could not help but be superior. Scharnhorst would almost certainly never been lost if she'd had her destroyers with her to run interference and fire star shell to support her gunfire; though by this stage of the war arguably the destroyers had more value to the Nazi German Empire as naval units anyway.

I think that the rationale was that an invasion wasn't necessary. Instead the UK would seek peace when it was clear it could not win on the continent.

That rationale was just dreamed up to avoid admitting that an invasion was beyond the resources of Nazi Germany without very extensive preparation, preparations that took one or two years and not two or three months to complete, exactly as was the case with the major allied landing operations. As it was the Germans barely even tried in 1940, they for example only ever made one attempt at a landing exercise in 1940, and it was a complete failure despite not even having simulated opposition. Meanwhile the RN and RAF bombarded the invasion ports so heavily that some of them, such as Cherbourg, had to be abandon as staging grounds because too many of the invasion barges were being sunk. Not a good sign when the RN never used more then a small fraction of the home fleet for its bombardments in the first place!

Hitler and the Nazi high command were fully aware that Britain had fought Napoleon by blockade for some twenty years without ever giving in, I don't think they ever really expected Britain to surrender from anything but total military defeat. They tried to bring that about from the air, it didn't work in 1940, but the Germans did have some reason to think that it would work after they conquered Russia and turned fully to building an air force. They planned a force of no less then 7,000 Ju-88 bombers in 1939 for example, and late war production suggest that at least as far as aero engine numbers and total weight of materials turned into airframes goes (it was all fighters in reality) building that kind of air force was feasible for Germany given several years of building new aircraft factories and no major war campaigns causing constant heavy losses. Problem is of course, carrying out such a long term strategy without fighting the US in the process, and having a means of defeating Russia decently quickly to avoid those losses. Not to mention how massive a fighter-AA-bunker force that could and largely was built up in the British isles while this all happened. The British went more then slightly nuts building aircraft factories underground until mid 1944 for example.

[Sea Skimmer]

Er. The cost-ineffectiveness is obvious for the battlecruisers and cruisers. Did you mean to say that Atlantis and her sisters were uneconomical too?

No just the regular heavy warships; though even for the disguised raiders the utility is very questionable and they also became relatively ineffective after the end of 1941 though decent operations were kept up through 1942. Several of the later ones were sunk before they could score a single merchant hull. The model of the ideal raider should have been super Seedler, not hyper Emden but such is the Nazi Murder Empire. If the resources of even one German heavy ship had gone into the disguised raider program in 1938-1939 (stockpile key equipment, and better guns, they used WW1 surplus ones), the ocean could have been flooded with the things in 1939-1941. German had around 50 merchant hulls which were rated as suitable for conversion in terms of speed and displacement. But the fact is the German heavy surface fleet never needed a rational point; Hitler loved battleships, Hitler drew his own battleships all the time (also bunkers which were often good designs) and he was damn well going to have a surface navy for his thousand year Reich. He realized the utter folly it had been in January 1943, but by then it was too late to even be economical to breakup the hulls and recycle the guns into shore batteries because German dockyards were so overtaxed. Mind you Germany kept building a triple screw destroyer with four diesel engines geared onto one shaft far into 1944 so rationality was never fully engaged.

This doesn't even touch on some of the unbuilt projects the Nazis had brewing like the O and P type cruisers which would have been some of the dumbest warships ever. 38cm guns, 200mm belt armor, 34 knots and a deck on par with designs from WW1 nothing is wrong with this! But we are talking about people who tried to put a twin 15cm turret on a destroyer.

[Simon_Jester]

The two German ships had pretty decent fire control, and if they really wanted to, they would have. Any battle is a question of risk, otherwise, the ships would have been pointless otherwise. Firing at range and making use of their superior speed would have helped reduce the chance of a shell hit too.

"If they really wanted to, they would have" done what?

Would have sunk Ramilles while taking no damage whatsoever? I beg leave to doubt it- that ship was armored to withstand heavy naval gunfire, she wasn't a battlecruiser. Firing from extreme range to avoid return fire from the battleship, I suspect the Germans would have been hard pressed to get enough penetrating hits to put her down with 11" gunfire.

It might have been physically possible, but no one would be wise to rely on it.

I get a feeling here that Germany actually could have won the war on land, but lost it on sea.

Because they couldn't secure the Channel and Atlantic, Britain was reinforced. Because of this, they couldn't invade Britain.
Also, they had a problem securing raw materials from Scandinavia.

Britain still in the game meant that the Mediterranean Sea was disputed, and they couldn't properly reinforce Africa, while the British could. With an undisputed Mediterranean, oil would not have been such a concern for German warfare.

Oil would still have been a major concern for Germany even then. Stuart wrote some fairly extensive posts on this at one point; can anyone remember where?

Being in control of the (east) Atlantic would have helped the Japanese as it would have bound American forces. Especially as the Americans would have needed to move all the supplies for an African theatre across under own protection.

At that point, the Americans would (literally) have pulled their backup plans out of the file cabinet- wait until 1946-47 and start waging an air-atomic war across the Atlantic using transcontinental bombers. Trying to land a major army in Europe across the Atlantic in the face of a competent German navy (even just a heavy submarine force, really, absent British help with ASW) would be very very impractical.

...But the fact is the German heavy surface fleet never needed a rational point; Hitler loved battleships, Hitler drew his own battleships all the time (also bunkers which were often good designs) and he was damn well going to have a surface navy for his thousand year Reich. He realized the utter folly it had been in January 1943, but by then it was too late to even be economical to breakup the hulls and recycle the guns into shore batteries because German dockyards were so overtaxed. Mind you Germany kept building a triple screw destroyer with four diesel engines geared onto one shaft far into 1944 so rationality was never fully engaged.

Random thought:
He may simply have forgotten to cancel the program. Yes, that doesn't speak well for the rationality of the system, but sometimes I suspect a lot of German 'waste of time' projects survived mostly because Hitler ordered them started at a time when it made sense to do so and then had bigger things on his mind when the time to order them stopped came.

This doesn't even touch on some of the unbuilt projects the Nazis had brewing like the O and P type cruisers which would have been some of the dumbest warships ever. 38cm guns, 200mm belt armor, 34 knots and a deck on par with designs from WW1 nothing is wrong with this! But we are talking about people who tried to put a twin 15cm turret on a destroyer.

I think everyone had a few flops: British 18" large light cruisers, Japanese hybrid carrier-battleships...

[Samuel]

Stuart wrote some fairly extensive posts on this at one point; can anyone remember where?

http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic. ... k&start=25

[Sea Skimmer]

]Random thought:
He may simply have forgotten to cancel the program. Yes, that doesn't speak well for the rationality of the system, but sometimes I suspect a lot of German 'waste of time' projects survived mostly because Hitler ordered them started at a time when it made sense to do so and then had bigger things on his mind when the time to order them stopped came.

I highly doubt anyone forgot about such an exotic waste of money, and the entirely new diesel engines which would power it. A more likely reason why it survived under construction so long was it was the only German destroyer in the war with a uniform duel purpose battery. Only took the Nazis until 1942 to figure out that they needed that; but by then it would have been far more rational to equip more converted flakships or rearm existing hulls, or at least use an existing hull design. Though German high pressure steam boilers constantly burst anyway; at times keeping more then half the German destroyer force laid up for repairs. So maybe six diesels wasn’t as stupid as it first sounded.

I think everyone had a few flops: British 18" large light cruisers, Japanese hybrid carrier-battleships...

Did you know the German Navy actually thought so highly of Glorious and Courageous in WW1 that they immediately began designing comparable ships? Not a good sign….

The 18in gun version was stupider then the 15in version in any case, but you could convert between the two. Anyway a big difference exists in my book between dubious tactical concepts, which I wouldn’t necessarily even rate the Japanese hybrids (which is better, worthless battleship or a grossly oversized seaplane carrier?) and a concept which does not physically work. It was not possible to load the guns on the German 15cm destroyers in anything but calm seas, and the ships were so overweight in the bow and so deficient in anti aircraft firepower that most of them traded B mount for a 105mm fairly quickly. All of this would have been blatantly obvious from the onset, and the only remotely rational reason anyone has put forward for the armament is simply that the Germans were seeking yet another wonder weapon to outweigh grossly inferior numbers. Planning to build a 30,000 ton class 'cruiser' with half a battleship armament and no more deck armor then certain Japanese heavy cruisers is not a winning or rational plan; but the thing would have done 34 knots on paper. Too bad aircraft and radios existed making top speed irrelevant for a surface raider. You really would have thought the Germans would have noticed that every cruiser the far stronger HSF had in 1914 being swept from the seas within a few months would have taught a lesson... but no.

Also keep in mind that if you took the pocket battleships and built one of the earlier variants intended for coastal defense you could get a full nine 28cm guns, and a larger anti aircraft battery at the expense of no 15cm guns in exposed open deck mounts (note at River Plate 15cm scored zero hits while taking heavy crew casualties, Ill take another 28cm turret please!). For operations like the assault on Norway the heavier 28cm battery is undoubtedly superior, and also for invading England or bombarding the Soviets. If Germany had gone down this path; I am fully aware this predates Hitler, the Germans might have produced a far more useful fleet for less money and while still maintaining a somewhat threatening fleet in being.

[Simon_Jester]

So what was the 1930s Kriegsmarine smoking, anyway? What was so wrong with them? I find myself morbidly curious...

[Eternal_Freedom]

What if they had not bothered with the battleships at all and focused almost entirely on U-Boat production? Could they hvae had enough operational a the outset to completely stop British shipping?