adrian@uunet.UU.NET (Adrian Hurt) (05/12/89)
From: Adrian Hurt <mcvax!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian@uunet.UU.NET> In article <6328@cbnews.ATT.COM> goofy!Apple.COM!livesey@apple.com (John Livesey) writes: > > Finessing the issue of rebuilding an >all-purpose surface Navy, they started with three heavily armoured >cruisers, the Graf Spees (often called pocket battleships) which were >intended for commerce interdiction, an activity which requires an >extensive network of supply ships, and warships which are either fast >enough to evade cruisers, or strong enough to defeat them. Then they >bult a class of two small battleships, the Scharnhorsts. Finally, they >started two heavy battleships, the Bismarks. The Graf Spee type were first classed by the Germans as "Panzerschiff" (armoured ship). Later they were redesignated "heavy cruisers". The Versailles Navy Treaty limited the Germans to a maximum ship displacement of 10000 tons, which these ships were supposed to comply with. In fact they did not; they were 13000 tons. One of them, the "Deutschland", had a different configuration from the others; its control tower was different, more like that of some other cruisers, and its catapult was in front of the funnel. Hitler later renamed it "Lutzow" because he didn't want to risk the Allies getting the propaganda of sinking Deutschland. The Graf Spee was sunk; the other two went in for refits, which involved giving them more angled bows, and the "Admiral Scheer" got a new control tower more like that of the "Lutzow". (Source: "Pocket Battleship" by Theodor Krancke - the captain of the "Scheer".) >It turned out in practice that the pocket battleships were neither fast >enough to outrun British cruisers, nor strong enough to defeat pairs of >them. They were designed to have a high cruising speed, to enable them to strike, then get out of the area. Few ships could maintain the same speed as them over a long distance. As for the cruisers, one account I've heard asks why the "Graf Spee" didn't try to move away from the British ships. They would have outrun her, but she would have kept at long range for more time. This would have been significant as her 11" guns easily outranged the "Exeter's" 8" guns, never mind the other ships' 6" guns. [mod.note: I'll submit that to do so, Graf Spee would have been forced to leave her fore turret wooded, losing half her 11" firepower. Three guns don't make for much shooting accuracy. - Bill ] >Scharnhorsts were not fast enough to outrun the WWI era battle cruisers >or the British George V fast battleships In fact they were. In the Battle of North Cape, "Scharnhorst" had almost got away when a 14" shell damaged her engines. >It has always seemed to me that the German Navy chose the strategy >that had the highest risk and the lowest payoff. Comments? At first, the German Navy was headed by Grand Admiral Raeder, who might very well have done some of those things. But after a battle near Russia involving the "Lutzow", the "Hipper" and some smaller ships vs. some British ships led by the "Sheffield", none of which had anything bigger than 6" guns, things changed. During that action, the "Lutzow" lurked in the background and might as well not have been there, and the "Hipper" got rammed by a British destroyer. Hitler went into one of his rages, declared surface ships useless, sacked Raeder and replaced him with Doenitz, who was much more a U-boat man. Thereafter, the surface ships got very little priority. (Disclaimer: I may have details on that last section wrong, as I'm trying to quote from memory. I don't have any sources available at the moment. But I do have "Pocket Battleship", so if anyone wants to ask me about the "Scheer", and in particular about her voyage which included the sinking of "Jervis Bay", do so.) "Keyboard? How quaint!" - M. Scott Adrian Hurt | JANET: adrian@uk.ac.hw.cs UUCP: ..!ukc!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian | ARPA: adrian@cs.hw.ac.uk
adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk (Adrian Hurt) (03/28/91)
From: adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk (Adrian Hurt) May I widen the discussion a little? What did the Germans call the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau? For comparison, what the Allies called "pocket battleships", the Germans called "Panzerschiffe" - literally, "armoured ships". And in the book "Pocket Battleship" by Theodor Krancke and H. J. Brennecke, the Admiral Scheer (one of these ships) is always referred to as a "heavy cruiser" (except for a few quotes of what some British people said). Krancke was the commander of the Admiral Scheer, and Brennecke one of its officers, so they should know what they were talking about. (Although perhaps the translator didn't). Also, where did the term "E-boat" come from? The German word for their motor torpedo boat was "Schnellboot", or "S-Boot" for short. Please reply by email, to save the moderator unnecessary effort - if there is enough interest, I'll post a single follow-up myself. [ Thank you --CDR] Adrian Hurt | JANET: adrian@uk.ac.hw.cs UUCP: ..!ukc!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian | ARPA: adrian@cs.hw.ac.uk