bobmcc@tcs.com (Bob McCormick) (10/24/90)
From: bobmcc@tcs.com (Bob McCormick) Earlier this month someone asked about navigation and attack terms for WWII subs. I just finished reading an excellent book, which has a pretty good description of this (although it is not a tutorial on the technical issues). Wahoo - The Patrols of America's Most Famous WWII Submarine by Richard O'Kane (Rear Admiral, Retired) ISBN: 0-89141-301-4 Published by Presidio. Includes battle charts, photos, glossary, index, and a diagram of a submarine approach, explaining angle-on-the bow. Another interesting item is how the author trained to accurately call angles-on-the-bow. He had a ship model mounted on a lazy susan over a large dial with bearing marks (like a compass dial). An assistant would move the ship around, and the officer would look at the model through a reversed pair of binoculars. This would make the model appear farther away, for realism. After his eyes bugged out, they would switch places. By the way, O'Kane was the highest scoring (I assume in number of ships sunk, or maybe tons) WWII sub commander, I believe. Cmdr Morton, who is largely the focus of the book, was second. ---------------------- Separate issue....... The unreliability of the Mk18 electric torpedo is described at the end of the book. Did these torpedos ever get fixed before the end of the war? Was it a minor fix or a major redesign? One hopes it was fixed quickly, after the problems with the exploders on the Mk14 steam torpedos. Bob McCormick bobmcc@tcs.com
welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty) (10/29/90)
From: welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty)
In article <1990Oct24.151528.16305@cbnews.att.com>, Bob McCormick writes:
*By the way, O'Kane was the highest scoring (I assume in number
*of ships sunk, or maybe tons) WWII sub commander, I believe.
*Cmdr Morton, who is largely the focus of the book, was second.
O'Kane's book on his own experiences as CO of Tang is
_Clear the Bridge_. it's a very good read, well worth
looking up. I don't know if O'Kane scored most tonnage,
but he certainly got most ships; he averaged twice as many
per patrol as Wahoo, and Wahoo was second by a very large
margin. Edward Beach (_Submarine!_) suggests that the
agressive patrolling of O'Kane was partially due to the desire
to revenge the loss of Morton and Wahoo; his old skipper and
sub were lost shortly before he took Tang out on her first
war patrol.
as skippers, both Morton and O'Kane believed in making
their own opportunities. neither of them ever `sat around'
waiting for the enemy. this was probably a large reason
for their success. both subs were lost in high-risk areas
of the Pacific; the agressive are always in the most danger
too (and before anyone asks how O'Kane could write a book
after his sub was lost, he was one of 9 survivors of the
loss of Tang and subsequent imprisonment by the Japanese;
Tang was sunk in shallow water while making a night surface
attack -- the last torpedo she launched ran circular and hit
her in the engine room.)
richard
--
richard welty 518-387-6346, GE R&D, K1-5C39, Niskayuna, New York
welty@lewis.crd.ge.com ...!crdgw1!lewis.crd.ge.com!welty
``We're in a road movie to Berlin, can't drive out the way we drove in''
-- They Might Be Giantsr_anderson@clyppr.enet.dec.com (Rick Anderson) (10/30/90)
From: r_anderson@clyppr.enet.dec.com (Rick Anderson) In article <1990Oct29.034219.11504@cbnews.att.com>, welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty) writes: > From: welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty) > > In article <1990Oct24.151528.16305@cbnews.att.com>, Bob McCormick writes: > O'Kane's book on his own experiences as CO of Tang is > _Clear the Bridge_. it's a very good read, well worth > looking up. I don't know if O'Kane scored most tonnage, > but he certainly got most ships; he averaged twice as many > per patrol as Wahoo, and Wahoo was second by a very large > margin. Edward Beach (_Submarine!_) suggests that the > agressive patrolling of O'Kane was partially due to the desire > to revenge the loss of Morton and Wahoo; his old skipper and > sub were lost shortly before he took Tang out on her first > war patrol. Another excellent book on submarine tactics and strategy is by Vice Admiral Charles Lockwood, COMSUBPAC during WWII, called: "Sink 'em All!". The book focuses on the strategy and problems encountered during the submarine war of WWII. The book also goes indepth into the cause of each sinking of U.S. submarines. The book also spends a good amount of time concerning the torpedo problems that occurred early in the war and the efforts it took to fix the problem (even though the British and Germans had already fixed the same problems many years earlier!). It is a very good book - I highly recommend it. Warning: the book was written in 1951 and contains some very out-dated views of the future (from a 1951 point of view) of submarine technology and strategy. Remember, 1951 was before the age of nuclear subs! Enjoy! Rick ********************************************************** * Rick Anderson * Digital Equipment Corporation * * 603-884-4284 * Database Systems Division * * Mailstop: NUO 1-1/F12 * 55 Northeastern Boulevard * * "My timing is Digital" * Nashua, NH 03062 * ********************************************************** * UUNET: ...{decwrl|decvax}!nova.enet.dec.com!r_anderson * * Internet: r_anderson%nova.enet.dec@decwrl.dec.com * **********************************************************