Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!dogie.macc.wisc.edu!uwvax!rutgers!att!cbnews!goofy!Apple.COM!livesey@apple.com From: goofy!Apple.COM!livesey@apple.com (John Livesey) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: Ship armor Message-ID: <6328@cbnews.ATT.COM> Date: 6 May 89 03:37:26 GMT References: <5929@cbnews.ATT.COM> <5981@cbnews.ATT.COM> <6030@cbnews.ATT.COM> <6069@cbnews.ATT.COM> Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA Lines: 54 Approved: military@att.att.com From: goofy!Apple.COM!livesey@apple.com (John Livesey) In article <6069@cbnews.ATT.COM> gahooten@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Greg A. Hooten) writes: > > [a bunch of interesting stuff about the Hood and the > Bismark] Most of the discussion about the Bismark centres around the materiel issues. In some ways this is natural, since it's not every day that a famous, if antique, ship is blown up. However, I find that the strategic issues are just as interesting. In 1918 the German Navy was confiscated by the Allies. Starting from scratch, the German Republic, and later Hitler, rebuilt their surface fleet in a novel way. 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. 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. So single Graf Spees could not be risked in the Oceans. The Scharnhorsts were not fast enough to outrun the WWI era battle cruisers or the British George V fast battleships, and not strong enough to take on even WWI battleships, and when they encountered either of them (the Norway campaign and North Cape) they retreated or were sunk. That left only the Bismarks, because when the war began, work on surface ships was halted in favour of submarines. So the Navy had a choice; either use the Bismarks for commerce interdiction as they were completed, and risk losing them one by one, or suspend surface naval operations until both Bismarks were operational, at which point they would have a fairly serious surface fleet; two Bismarks, two Scharnhorsts, and two or three fast heavy cruisers. A fleet like that could have entered the Atlantic, and forced the RN to assemble task forces of four or five heavy ships, instead of the pairs of ships that they actually did assemble. If the Germans got lucky, and perhaps surprised and overwhelmed one or two of the old battleships that were used for convoy duties, they might even have forced the RN to recall the Mediterranean Fleet, leaving the Italian Navy in control, and making it much easier to supply North Africa, capture Malta and the Suez canal, and cut the supply lines to and from the Far East. It has always seemed to me that the German Navy chose the strategy that had the highest risk and the lowest payoff. Comments? jon.