doveton sturdee
Drachinifel
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Comments by "doveton sturdee" (@dovetonsturdee7033) on "Bismarck and the James Cameron Expedition - What it actually says vs what you hear on the internet" video.
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@hajoos.8360 I do not understand what you are trying to say. Your posts generally seem to assume a vast amount of knowledge was available to both sides which actually wasn't. I assume you know that Prinz Eugen's War Diary believed that PoW was actually King George V, for example, or that the most recent information, from 20 May, Lutjens had from Group North was that Hood, Prince of Wales, & Victorious were still in Scapa Flow?
Indeed, later on 22 May, Group North confirmed this information, based on a Luftwaffe visual observation which seems to have confused two dummy battleships for Hood and PoW, which had, by then, sailed. Furthermore, Group North had reported to Lutjens that Force H was en route for Crete, when it was actually in Gibraltar.
In short, Lutjens had no reason, based on the faulty intelligence he had been given, to suspect that there were any British capital ships anywhere near the Denmark Strait, and the appearance of two must have come as a considerable shock. Furthermore, his instructions, as they had been for Operation Berlin, were to seek out British supply convoys, and to avoid action with heavy ships.
Certainly, Lindemann did wish to attempt to pursue PoW, but Lutjens needed to consider the wider picture, which was that PoW might have been discontinuing the action in order to withdraw on the support of other British capital ships also in the area. In any case, Bismarck's damage had reduced her speed, and left her short of fuel. After the action, Lutjens realised that Rheinubung was a dead duck, and that his only remaining option was to make for St. Nazaire for repairs. A quixotic charge in pursuit of PoW was not even remotely worth considering.
Basing your criticism of Lutjens on facts of which he was unaware is not only unfair, but unjustified. Lutjens did make a number of mistakes during the Operation, but his supposed failure to pursue PoW was not one of them.
I did, by the way, ask you one question in my earlier post. I observe that you have not answered it.
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@hajoos.8360 'You consider that the Brits had better intelligence than the Germans.' Please do not attempt to put words into my mouth. I simply told you what Group North had told Lutjens about the whereabouts of the Royal Navy's heavy ships.
I do not agree that there was not much difference between PoW & KGV. KGV was a fully worked up battleship, the flagship of the Home Fleet, whereas PoW had only arrived at Scapa a month or so earlier. On 31 March, she had been classified as 'completed,' and she only carried out her full power trials on 8 May. Indeed, civilian workmen were still aboard, working on her main turrets. In WW1 John Jellicoe required a new battleship to go through an intensive working-up period of at least six months before he would even allow her to join a Grand Fleet Battle Squadron. PoW was a raw recruit, to say the least.
The Admiralty were in a difficult situation, in that had Bismarck and Prinz Eugen reached the wider Atlantic, they would have been much more difficult to track down. A similar situation had applied to Operation Berlin, of course. Thus, PoW was attached to Hood, in the hope that Hood would bear the brunt of any action. In the event, the decision was justified, as Lutjens abandoned his mission as a result of PoW's hits on Bismarck.
'A considerable shock sighting Holland's squadron is off limits for a midshipman, but not for an admiral.' What does that even mean? The appearance of two capital ships in the Denmark Strait, when intelligence had identified them as being in Scapa, would have been a shock for Nelson had he been placed in a similar position, let alone Lutjens.
Lutjens detached Prinz Eugen because he hoped still to salvage something from his abandoned operation. Eugen could still operate as a lone raider, if she could be safely despatched, and Wake-Walker would hardly follow her if it meant dividing his force. Bismarck was the main prize, not a lightly armoured heavy cruiser.
You think that Bismarck, still under observation by Wake-Walker, and with Tovey's force approaching, would have had time and space to refuel from a tanker? Moreover, what happens if Bismarck, for whatever reason, missed the tanker? Running out of fuel in mid-Atlantic was hardly desirable, I suggest.
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@hajoos.8360 The Hippers were far from the best heavy cruiser class ever built. Overweight, lightly armoured, and with unreliable machinery, one might have had the edge on a (ten years older) County, built within the 10,000 tons limit of naval treaties, but the more modern US heavies were vastly superior. Put your prejudices aside for a moment and compare Prinz Eugen with USS Baltimore, for example.
Are you seriously suggesting that Prinz Eugen could have towed Bismarck back to St. Nazaire (not Brest, by the way)? What would Tovey have done whilst this was happening? Simply watched and allowed it to happen? The protective Luftwaffe bomber zone? What protective zone? At the time the Luftwaffe did not even have an operational torpedo bomber, and in the whole of WW2 it sank no RN warship larger than a light cruiser.
At least, by detaching Prinz Eugen (which, of course, promptly developed engine problems) Lutjens, though inadvertently, saved her from being sunk as well. You say that air defence would have been more effective? Mere supposition, and again you are using hindsight. How could Lutjens possibly know that aircraft from Ark Royal would appear? Group North had told him that Force H was off Crete, hadn't it?
Lutjens, by the way, was not so much splitting his squadron, as detaching a ship still capable of fulfilling a role, from one which was no longer capable of so doing.
Sorry, but much of your post is less than coherent, and you seem to be arguing simply for the sake of it. When judging the actions of commanders in wartime, it is never wise to base opinions on what historians subsequently know about a situation, but to consider what information those commanders actually had available to them at the time.
Would, for example, Nagumo have acted as he did at Midway if he knew the true position of Sprunce's ships?
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@hajoos.8360 Thank you for educating me. Until this moment, I was totally unaware that Roma was a Royal Navy warship!
You really know little about Baltimore, do you? She carried 9 x 8 inch guns,and 12 x 5 inch DP guns. She had a belt of 4-6 inches, and deck armour of 2.5 inches. Her speed was 33 knots, and she displaced 14,700 tons.
The Hippers had 8 x 8 inch guns, and 12 x 4.1 inch AA guns. Their belts were 2.8 to 3.1 inches, and decks 1.97 inches at their strongest points. They could manage 32 knots. They displaced 17800 tons.
Oh, and the broadside of a Baltimore was 3015 lbs. That of a Hipper 2152 lbs.
Thus, despite displacing 3000 tons less, Baltimore outclassed Eugen at every point of comparison. You say 'So, where is the advantage?' Read the above again, I suggest.
You seem to have missed the point about Lutjens. He detached Eugen because he was still trying to carry out at least part of his mission. Again, you back project what later happened to criticise earlier decisions. Moreover, two ships means double the number of targets, or hadn't you considered that?
Doenitz didn't 'send several subs out.' There were only two anywhere near the action, one of which had expended all her stock of torpedoes. It hardly matters what Kampfgeschwader 77 was or was not doing, as it was out of range.
You seem to be posting largely irrelevant, disconnecte, comments without making any particularly relevant arguments. I have better things to do than simply correct your more obvious errors, and I certainly don't feel inclined to spend my time dealing with the gaps in your knowledge. I am happy to let people read these posts and draw their own conclusions.
I will not, therefore, reply again.
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@hajoos.8360 Don't you remember posting this? :- 'the Hipper-class was maybe the best heavy cruiser class ever built.' Clearly not accurate. The tonnage difference between Counties and Hippers is not relevant to your absurd claim. One thing you might note, though, is that the Counties had much more arduous and successful war careers than the Hippers.
Oh, and Baltimore actually had six TWIN five inch DP mountings as her secondary armament. Each 8 inch gun of Baltimore fired a 335 lb shell. Each 8 inch gun of Eugen a 269 lb shell. Cannot you even use reference books competently?
To install three or four turrets is not a philosophical issue. A three triple turret gun ship needs less length, which means either lesser displacement or greater armour. In the case of the Baltimores greater armament.
Perhaps you might read up on what Lutjens' actual mission, and his orders, actually were. I would have thought you might have done it before now, but evidently not.
Indeed, HMS Mashona was sunk, actually the day after Bismarck, and because she, and HMS Tartar, had been detached because of their lower fuel states, to follow a more direct route which, unlike Tovey's main force, brought them within bombing range. A battleship is, indeed, easier to hit than a destroyer.
Odd, then, that the Luftwaffe consistently failed to achieve either with much frequency. However, the deck armour of, for example, KGV or Rodney, was designed to cope with German 15 inch shells, weighing 1764 lbs each. I leave you to research for yourself the heaviest bomb which could be carried by an aircraft such as a Ju88 flying at maximum range. I assure you, you will be disappointed. Not that it is relevant in any case, as Tovey's heavies were always out of range.
You might ask yourself this :- Even if Eugen managed to get a tow across to Bismarck, what speed would you expect the ships to achieve as they made for St. Nazaire, and what would expect Tovey, with Rodney, KGV, Renown, Ark Royal, and several cruisers to do when he arrived?
Your immature and silly wehraboo comments are becoming tedious, by the way.
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@abntemplar82 Try again little chap. The first battleship to be fitted with radar was HMS Rodney, with a Type 79m set, in January, 1939. Bismarck did indeed have radar, Fumo 23, which was used to target HMS Norfolk on the evening of 23 May. The concussion of her forward guns disabled her own forward radar, which was out of action for the rest of her short life.
As to her advanced construction. Firstly she was built with incremental armour, inferior to that fitted to every US battleship since Navada in 1912, and to that fitted to the Nelsons and the KGVs. Secondly, she had four twin turrets, at a time when other navies had moved on to multiple gunned turrets. This increased her length and displacement significantly. Thirdly her secondary armament was the more or less useless 5.9 inch low angle gun, when the US and RN had moved to DP weapons in their latest designs. Fourthly, her internal communications were above her main strength deck, and were disabled early in her final action.
'Further it is not just an American, British and Japanese ideology to keep shooting till your enemy is incapable of returning fire.' But that wasn't what I said, was it?
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