DBWI-Bismarck Not Sunk by Fleet Air Arm

Lost Freeway

Banned
On May 26, 1941, the German battleship Bismarck was sunk by torpedo bombers from the HMS Ark Royal and HMS Victorious, becoming the first battleship in history to be sunk by carrier-based aircraft at sea.

What if that didn't happen? Suppose the first wave of aircraft sent against Bismarck gets lost and doesn't deliver the attacks that crippled her and left her open to the second wave. How would that affect the war?
 
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Carl Schwamberger

Sticking to the DBWI.. there are several outcomes.

1. Second wave finds the target & still sinks it.

2. 2d wave cripples the target, the surface fleet catches & sinks it, perhaps taking some damage in return.

3. 2d wave failes to sink or cripple, surface fleet still catches the Bismarck & battle ensues.

4. 2d wave fails & target escapes to port.

In order of probability 4, 2, 1, 3

With four capitol ships in French ports the Germans have a theoretical threat against the British sea cargo routes. If in theory the submarine fleet is surged to sea in a maximum effort coordinated with the surface ships, and in theory if there is a similar maximum effort to fly air recon in support, then in theory a lot of damage can be done to the British or Commonwealth.
 

SactoMan101

Sure, it may have been more "exciting" to see the Bismarck sunk by the guns from British battleships, but what happened was that the first wave of Swordfish attacks from the Ark Royal essentially crippled the ship, and the second wave of attacks started a major fire on the ship, which spread to one of the weapons magazines on the ship and after a big explosion, the Bismarck sank pretty quickly. The losses among the Swordfish planes attacking the Bismarck was 50%, but it did sink the battleship.

Like the raid on Taranto a year before, the sinking of the Bismarck heralded the end of the age of the battleship as a primary naval weapon.
 

Lost Freeway

Banned
Do you think all six of the Iowa-class battleships would enter service? IOTL, only Iowa and New Jersey were completed as battleships-the rest were converted into the Reprisal-class aircraft carriers during construction.
 
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Lost Freeway

Banned
Also, without the example of the Bismarck, the Royal Navy might not have provided air cover for Force Z. Who knows how the Pacific War would have been affected.
 

Just Leo

It never would have happened without the new Torpex explosive and the sorted out magnetic detonators. It's a shame about the loss of HMS Sheffield. Sometimes, good torpedoes aren't a good thing.
 
Simon

Simon

Lost Freeway said:
Also, without the example of the Bismarck, the Royal Navy might not have provided air cover for Force Z. Who knows how the Pacific War would have been affected.
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You mean still send HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse but without HMS Indomitable? Just wanted to clarify as the suggestion does seem somewhat odd, verging on bonkers, is the best way I can describe it. I think that's fairly unlikely, even before the sinking of the Bismarck it was already pretty obvious the way things were moving.

OOC: Hindsight and assumptions, both modern and period, can be fun. :)
 

Richter von Manthofen

Well Bismarck might have made it to Brest to repair the damage susutained in the battle against Hood. - them what? the RN would have kept watch and it would have been bottled up in Brest just like Gneisenau and Scharnhorst.
 
Insider

Insider

Banned
Actualy IMHO Bismark was doomed when Lutjens decided to stick with original plan. The ship was to be sunk by either naval aviation, bombers, torpedo attack or battleships. It was just a mater of time. In some way Lutjens just made himself as a commander completely redundant. Germans could replace him with automat that simply read orders from punched card.

If he got back to Norway/Germany after sinking Hood, and sinking or crippling POW, he would be hailed as hero, and perhaps his actions would push British command to do something utterly stupid. I mean, Galipoli stupid.
 

Lost Freeway

Banned
Just Leo said:
It never would have happened without the new Torpex explosive and the sorted out magnetic detonators. It's a shame about the loss of HMS Sheffield. Sometimes, good torpedoes aren't a good thing.
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Wasn't Sheffield sunk by a U-Boat?

OOC: I thought we established that the accidental attack on Sheffield didn't happen, as the pilots found Bismarck the first time.
 
GarethC

GarethC

Bismarck will probably get to Brest. Then it will be bombed, a little at a time, until the British get one of those wacky ideas that properly writes him off as a TCL, just like Tirpitz - miniature subs, or ramming the drydock with an explosive-packed four-stacker, or have a bouncing bomb bounced into the dock or...

The KM might not spend so much effort on GZ and Seydlitz though, without so compelling an object lesson.

Indomitable's Fulmars found the Kota Bharu invasion convoy - if Force Z doesn't have an attached carrier, then it might not meet Ozawa and so survive at least until Java Sea. With RN capital ships still in-theatre, then maybe Malaya can hold? Yamashita was so short on supplies, that even a single additional convoy of the same order of magnitude of the Club Runs and Operation PEDESTAL would let Singapore survive until the monsoon, if the RN is enough to escort them in.

I think Parshall & Tully's Lion, Eagle, and Rising Sun that suggests that Kimmel only really considered base air defence after Bismarck was sunk, and then pressured Clark to look at his radar and ground control procedures with the Hawaiian Air Force staff who had been liaisons in the BoB - prior to that he agreed with Clark that the major threat to Pearl was sabotage. Just imagine if Yamamoto's gamble had caught the Pacific Fleet at peacetime stations instead of all those drills for a Taranto-style raid?
 

Lost Freeway

Banned
GarethC said:
Indomitable's Fulmars found the Kota Bharu invasion convoy - if Force Z doesn't have an attached carrier, then it might not meet Ozawa and so survive at least until Java Sea.
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Yeah, it was pretty embarrassing to have the RN's newest flagship get sunk by a bunch of WW1 battlecruisers-one of which had actually been built in Britain. Though I don't see how taking away the Indomitable increases Force Z's chances of survival-her air wing was vital to defending the capital ships from air attack.
 

Cockroach

Lost Freeway said:
Yeah, it was pretty embarrassing to have the RN's newest flagship get sunk by a bunch of WW1 battlecruisers-one of which had actually been built in Britain.
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That a common misconception, all too heavily influenced by the movie... the initial encounter between the British and the Japanese was actually firmly in Force Z's favour. Kongo had been badly damage and in OTL was only saved by being run aground and quite a few transport were destroyed. It was the arrival of the cruisers and the Long Lance hits on POW that turned the tide... if they'd arrived an hour later then Force Z would have withdraw and the Battle of Kota Bharu would have been a major British victory.
 

Zheng He

GarethC said:
Bismarck will probably get to Brest. Then it will be bombed, a little at a time, until the British get one of those wacky ideas that properly writes him off as a TCL, just like Tirpitz - miniature subs, or ramming the drydock with an explosive-packed four-stacker, or have a bouncing bomb bounced into the dock or...

The KM might not spend so much effort on GZ and Seydlitz though, without so compelling an object lesson.

Indomitable's Fulmars found the Kota Bharu invasion convoy - if Force Z doesn't have an attached carrier, then it might not meet Ozawa and so survive at least until Java Sea. With RN capital ships still in-theatre, then maybe Malaya can hold? Yamashita was so short on supplies, that even a single additional convoy of the same order of magnitude of the Club Runs and Operation PEDESTAL would let Singapore survive until the monsoon, if the RN is enough to escort them in.

I think Parshall & Tully's Lion, Eagle, and Rising Sun that suggests that Kimmel only really considered base air defence after Bismarck was sunk, and then pressured Clark to look at his radar and ground control procedures with the Hawaiian Air Force staff who had been liaisons in the BoB - prior to that he agreed with Clark that the major threat to Pearl was sabotage. Just imagine if Yamamoto's gamble had caught the Pacific Fleet at peacetime stations instead of all those drills for a Taranto-style raid?
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Well beyond that, what would have been in port for the Japanese to feast on? The combination of Bismarck sinking and the Taranto raid caused FDR to order the battleship back to San Diego because everyone realized they were nothing but targets at Pearl. I know it is a stroke of luck that the Pacific Fleet's carriers were not in port and Yamamoto was gambling that they would be so when the KB's planes arrived overhead they not only met a prepared defense but the only targets in port were a few cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and auxiliaries. Sure Nagumo's pilots took their measure of what was there and they shot down a lot defending fighters but they got chewed to pieces as well.
 

Lost Freeway

Banned
Zheng He said:
Well beyond that, what would have been in port for the Japanese to feast on? The combination of Bismarck sinking and the Taranto raid caused FDR to order the battleship back to San Diego because everyone realized they were nothing but targets at Pearl. I know it is a stroke of luck that the Pacific Fleet's carriers were not in port and Yamamoto was gambling that they would be so when the KB's planes arrived overhead they not only met a prepared defense but the only targets in port were a few cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and auxiliaries. Sure Nagumo's pilots took their measure of what was there and they shot down a lot defending fighters but they got chewed to pieces as well.
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Yeah, who knows how the Pacific War would go without the old Standards.
 

jsb

Lost Freeway said:
Yeah, who knows how the Pacific War would go without the old Standards.
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Might have been far better had they sank in Pearl, at least that way they would have avoided trying to send them to relief the Philippines after MacArthur publicly called out the navy for not helping the army fight the Japanese.

Scraping them in PH would have killed a lot less men, especially trained men that would have helped out the manning and training shortages early in the war.
 

Cryhavoc101

Cockroach said:
That a common misconception, all too heavily influenced by the movie... the initial encounter between the British and the Japanese was actually firmly in Force Z's favour. Kongo had been badly damage and in OTL was only saved by being run aground and quite a few transport were destroyed. It was the arrival of the cruisers and the Long Lance hits on POW that turned the tide... if they'd arrived an hour later then Force Z would have withdraw and the Battle of Kota Bharu would have been a major British victory.
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And it was a lucky hit at that - even more annoying given that the Long Lance was not the 'decisive weapon of war' that the Japanese had hoped it would be during WW2.

Still as it was the damage the Kongo and her sisters suffered shocked their commanders and the 3 survivors even after being repaired and refitted were never risked vs a peer or more modern battleship again.

Kongo was so badly damaged that she was deemed an operation write off and used as a AAA Hulk after being re floated and towed back to the Home Islands.
 
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