Bismarck and Tirpitz canceled for more Scharnhorst-class

As said many times earlier, the Deutschland class cruiser was not a good combatship for fight against other warships, that were shooting back at her. Her value was politcal only. As a weapon there were much better ships in the German Navy, that were more ballanced in design. The larger Hipper class heavy cruiser was a better fighting ship, with better guns for engaging ships and more speed, if the enignes did not wreck themselves. The much larger Scharnhorst class battleship too was a better fighting ship, though not capable to engage an enemy capital ship, due to her smaller guns. (She was build to take a serious punishment though, like any battleship.)

Uhm... Hippers vs Deutschlands, well, at least let me be unsure about your claims. First, the engine: the diesels wrecking themselves? Okay, those were somewhat experimental, borderline revolutionary but still, the length and duration of the voyage taken by either the AGS or the AS at least have to be impressive and the propulsion worked fine. They had problems, of course, but IMHO, they were far, far away from wrecking themselves.
Especially in comparison to the Hippers. Correct me, if im wrong, but all of them have serious machinery problems pretty much all the time. And alltogether, the Hippers were bigger, almost 10 year later designs and with a hindsight, accomplished not much - as raiders, if i remember correctly, close to nothing. The Deutschlands IMHO at least led to the AGNA and made sorties at least embarassing the RN.
And yes, guns and political value. Pretty much anything naval had and have a political value and its an important thing. Indeed the difference between 28 cm and 20 cm guns are not that much, and at the same time, enormous: potentially dangerous to anything, deadly to the cruisers - Exeter was wrecked up pretty good at the battle - and their existence pre-war and during it at least messed with the thinking of the RN: the hunt for the AGS comperable to the hunt for the Bismarck in resources committed.

Anyway, long story short, i do not think, that the Hippers were better than the Deutshlands, with a hindsight :)
 
Uhm... Hippers vs Deutschlands, well, at least let me be unsure about your claims. First, the engine: the diesels wrecking themselves? Okay, those were somewhat experimental, borderline revolutionary but still, the length and duration of the voyage taken by either the AGS or the AS at least have to be impressive and the propulsion worked fine. They had problems, of course, but IMHO, they were far, far away from wrecking themselves.
Especially in comparison to the Hippers. Correct me, if im wrong, but all of them have serious machinery problems pretty much all the time. And alltogether, the Hippers were bigger, almost 10 year later designs and with a hindsight, accomplished not much - as raiders, if i remember correctly, close to nothing. The Deutschlands IMHO at least led to the AGNA and made sorties at least embarassing the RN.
And yes, guns and political value. Pretty much anything naval had and have a political value and its an important thing. Indeed the difference between 28 cm and 20 cm guns are not that much, and at the same time, enormous: potentially dangerous to anything, deadly to the cruisers - Exeter was wrecked up pretty good at the battle - and their existence pre-war and during it at least messed with the thinking of the RN: the hunt for the AGS comperable to the hunt for the Bismarck in resources committed.

Anyway, long story short, i do not think, that the Hippers were better than the Deutshlands, with a hindsight :)


All you actually did was repeating what I mentioned. I wonder why?

As combat ships, combat is a fight between two, or more combattants, not a single handed one sides slauchter of an armed warships against an unarmed merchantship. So all engagements by Admiral Graf Spee, except the last one at Montevideo, were not real combat situations, since the attacker faced no opposition (Merchants in the first year of WW2 rarely carried any armament). As a combat ship, One German cruiser facing three British cruisers was too much to handle for the German ship. (Though technically the superior gunnery of the German ship would have hold them at bay in theory, though not in reality.) The so called superiority in calliber and range did not pay off against theoretically inferior ships wit weaker armeaments, resulting in critical damage to one British and one German ship in the end. One other British cruiser was moderately damged and one unscatched. Graf Spee herself was left unseaworthy and more critically, almost depleted of ammunition.

As for a comarrison between an Admiral Hipper and a Deutschland (the two operated in tandem during the illfated Battle of the Barentzsea) Hipper performed better, scoring some hits on several destroyers and a minesweeper, while Lutzow (ex Deutschland) did nothing at all, inspite of her so called superior guns. The higer rate of fire of the 8 inch gun was compensating for the heavier shot of the 11 inch gun, while both had inferior rate of fire to the British 6 inch weapon. A Hipper also rivaled a Deutschland in gunneryrange, besides considered to be more accurate, mostly due to the higher musclevelocity. In other words: the less bulky 8 inch gun could fire faster and more accurate at longer times, than the heavier 11 inch gun. Since both were about simmilar in protective scheme, with teh Hipper having somewhat more of her hull covered by armor, the volume of shot produced would be critical, which favours the eight gun armed Hipper more than the slower rate of fire six gun ship. As such the Hipper wins with her hands down in a one vs one fight, as her changes of scoring a hit were much higher than a Deutschland.
 
Just a thing but Exeter had only been in action for a few minutes before an 11" shell hit and badly damaged B turret and the fwd magazines were flooded as a precaution effectively reducing poor old Exeter to her single aft twin 8" which had to be fired under local control.

However according to most resources I have read on the battle Exeter had already scored the important hit near to the AGS's funnel impacting her fuel supplies.

Also Achilles and Ajax reported that AGS's fire was accurate but erratic and 405 shells fired over the 80 odd minutes of the main engagement is about 5 RPM (assuming that all are fired in that time) which implies that AGS was not firing anywhere close to 2.5 salvos a minute!

Anyway got to go more on this later


yes this is true, Langsdorff was a torpedo flotilla leader before AGS command and was obsessed with the torpedo threat even though the range was extreme for torpedo success. Worse he was wounded early by shrapnel and some believe his judgment impaired. His erratic course changes throwing off his own gunnery is sited by some German posters . Some even claim the shooting was the worse 'cruiser shoot' during the war and may have contributed to the claim he was going to be sacked when he returned to Germany.
 
All you actually did was repeating what I mentioned. I wonder why?



As for a comarrison between an Admiral Hipper and a Deutschland (the two operated in tandem during the illfated Battle of the Barentzsea) Hipper performed better, scoring some hits on several destroyers and a minesweeper, while Lutzow (ex Deutschland) did nothing at all, inspite of her so called superior guns. The higer rate of fire of the 8 inch gun was compensating for the heavier shot of the 11 inch gun, while both had inferior rate of fire to the British 6 inch weapon. A Hipper also rivaled a Deutschland in gunneryrange, besides considered to be more accurate, mostly due to the higher musclevelocity. In other words: the less bulky 8 inch gun could fire faster and more accurate at longer times, than the heavier 11 inch gun. Since both were about simmilar in protective scheme, with teh Hipper having somewhat more of her hull covered by armor, the volume of shot produced would be critical, which favours the eight gun armed Hipper more than the slower rate of fire six gun ship. As such the Hipper wins with her hands down in a one vs one fight, as her changes of scoring a hit were much higher than a Deutschland.

The effects of 8" hit are minor compared to 11" shell which spelt BB to most sailors of the day. It should be noted that Lutzow skipper was timid to say the least and was afraid to risk engagement in a very confusing squalled battle. This was contrasted with aggressive solid leadership from Bennett on the British side. It didn't help the German side that heavy restrictions were imposed by fleet due to Hitler's micromanagement of operations. For example after the battle, Raeder was sacked and Hitler ordered that all large warships be scarped.
 
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FBKampfer

Banned
I feel like most would agree that AGS and Lutzow were commanded remarkably poorly.

And more to the point, they were outnumbered, in a situation in which any significant damage to anything important at all was effectively a mission kill.

Could a Cleveland class out fight Exeter and two light cruisers and not suffer a mission kill? Absolutely not.

Could an Admiral Hipper? Again no.

Could a New Orleans or a Baltimore? Nope.

The question of whether or not the Deutschlands could have fought off superior numbers is a little ridiculous. Anything but a capital ship would have had the same thing happen.
 

SsgtC

Banned
I feel like most would agree that AGS and Lutzow were commanded remarkably poorly.

And more to the point, they were outnumbered, in a situation in which any significant damage to anything important at all was effectively a mission kill.

Could a Cleveland class out fight Exeter and two light cruisers and not suffer a mission kill? Absolutely not.

Could an Admiral Hipper? Again no.

Could a New Orleans or a Baltimore? Nope.

The question of whether or not the Deutschlands could have fought off superior numbers is a little ridiculous. Anything but a capital ship would have had the same thing happen.

The Alaskas probably could have. But they were specifically built as cruiser killers.
 
Would the second pair have 15" guns? That would make it a bit more interesting
I'd say no, since they'll be tasked with taking on convoys, mostly defended by cruisers or destroyers, so the higher ROF of nine 11" over six 15" gives a greater advantage. If the convoy is escorted by a Revenge class battleship, the Scarnhorst class can stay out of its range and either pummel it with plunging 11" shells, or withdraw.

Instead of heavier guns, I'd want vastly longer endurance, greater magazine capability, improved accommodations for extended missions, and higher speeds, including high efficient or cruise speeds (perhaps bulbous bows?). Also improve the aviation capability with Fa 330 or ideally the Fl 265 instead of Arado floatplanes that necessitate stopping the ship.
 
yes this is true, Langsdorff was a torpedo flotilla leader before AGS command and was obsessed with the torpedo threat even though the range was extreme for torpedo success. Worse he was wounded early by shrapnel and some believe his judgment impaired. His erratic course changes throwing off his own gunnery is sited by some German posters . Some even claim the shooting was the worse 'cruiser shoot' during the war and may have contributed to the claim he was going to be sacked when he returned to Germany.

He was out numbered 3 : 1 - by 'British' Cruisers that were commanded brilliantly and very aggressively.

To be fair to Ludendorff regardless of the outcome - unless he somehow managed to sink all 3 Crusiers while taking little or no damage himself his command was effectively doomed and his mission over as the Cruisers could have kept him under observation until heavier units could arrive.

And at worst his location is now known and he would be unlikely to escape the convergence of the other hunting groups from both the RN and French Navy while conversely all allied shipping would alter course etc making it very unlikely that AGS would sink any more Merchant ships for a while!

The effects of 8" hit are minor compared to 11" shell which spelt BB to most sailors of the day. It should be noted that Lutzow skipper was timid to say the least and was afraid to risk engagement in a very confusing squalled battle. This was contrasted with aggressive solid leadership from Bennett on the British side. It didn't help the German side that heavy restrictions were imposed by fleet due to Hitler's micromanagement of operations. For example after the battle, Raeder was sacked and Hitler ordered that all large warships be scarped.

Don't dismiss the effect of 6" shells on AGS even a non penetrating hit and near misses are going to cause problems as not everything is under armour and the continual effect of being under fire would be 'detrimental' to the crew and the operation of the ship as a result - the British kept her under fire for the entire battle while the 2 light Crusiers for much of the engagement were not.

So the Crew is under constant concussion/shock from multiple near misses and several hits and her targets are maneuvering Cruisers travelling at 30 odd knots - I'm not surprised that her gunnery was 'poor'.

While Exeter didn't really get an opportunity to fire that many rounds (and most of them from Y turret under local control) those that did hit AGS caused her all sorts of problems.
 
Friedman suggests that at the Barents Sea battle KM unwillingness to use radar to locate the RN , since it would give away KM position was obsolete thinking, since the RN had adapted plotting boards to info from radar & HF/DF etc [AIO] giving them simple situation awareness allowing them to resolve the 1/2 dozen separate actions into a larger picture . This in turn allowed them to fiend off attacks by the HIPPER & LUTZOW , with separate counter attacks from DD flotilla & Cruisers.

KM had 1/2 dozen DD with each cruiser but left them to trail behind instead of scouting ahead. With out the central AIO, the German skippers were afraid they would risk shooting at their own ships.
 

FBKampfer

Banned
He was out numbered 3 : 1 - by 'British' Cruisers that were commanded brilliantly and very aggressively.

To be fair to Ludendorff regardless of the outcome - unless he somehow managed to sink all 3 Crusiers while taking little or no damage himself his command was effectively doomed and his mission over as the Cruisers could have kept him under observation until heavier units could arrive.

And at worst his location is now known and he would be unlikely to escape the convergence of the other hunting groups from both the RN and French Navy while conversely all allied shipping would alter course etc making it very unlikely that AGS would sink any more Merchant ships for a while!



Don't dismiss the effect of 6" shells on AGS even a non penetrating hit and near misses are going to cause problems as not everything is under armour and the continual effect of being under fire would be 'detrimental' to the crew and the operation of the ship as a result - the British kept her under fire for the entire battle while the 2 light Crusiers for much of the engagement were not.

So the Crew is under constant concussion/shock from multiple near misses and several hits and her targets are maneuvering Cruisers travelling at 30 odd knots - I'm not surprised that her gunnery was 'poor'.

While Exeter didn't really get an opportunity to fire that many rounds (and most of them from Y turret under local control) those that did hit AGS caused her all sorts of problems.



Basically the Germans were screwed before the start, but gave a good showing of themselves under adverse circumstances.

Basically reflective of the whole war.
 
To be fair to Ludendorff regardless of the outcome - unless he somehow managed to sink all 3 Crusiers while taking little or no damage himself his command was effectively doomed and his mission over as the Cruisers could have kept him under observation until heavier units could arrive.

Or not. German surface raiders did repeatedly manage to break contact with pursuers under age-old conditions: night and bad weather. The Hipper damaged the Berwick and then disappeared in a squall.
Radar did change things over the course of this war - but not yet at the time of Langsdorff's misfortune.

And at worst his location is now known and he would be unlikely to escape the convergence of the other hunting groups from both the RN and French Navy while conversely all allied shipping would alter course etc making it very unlikely that AGS would sink any more Merchant ships for a while!

North-Eastern Atlantic was teeming with hunting groups in the last days of the Bismarck, and yet the Prinz Eugen made it away unscathed. The ocean is a big place.
As to allied shipping altering course, on the one hand, yes, it prevents sinkings by that raider, on the other hand it wreaks havoc on convoys and timetables. In the case of the Graf Spee's demise, also, there were no ocean-going German submarines around to exploit such a scattering, but later in the war such a situation would have been the exception, not the rule. I do not think that the Tirpitz even sighted one of the cargo ships of PQ17, yet we know what was the outcome of that convoy scattering to avoid the Tirpitz: a slaughter.
 
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Or not. German surface raiders did repeatedly manage to break contact with pursuers under age-old conditions: night and bad weather. The Hipper damaged the Berwick and then disappeared in a squall.
Radar did change things over the course of this war - but not yet at the time of Langsdorff's misfortune.



North-Eastern Atlantic was teeming with hunting groups in the last days of the Bismarck, and yet the Prinz Eugen made it away unscathed. The ocean is a big place.
As to allied shipping altering course, on the one hand, yes, it prevents sinkings by that raider, on the other hand it wreaks havoc on convoys and timetables. In the case of the Graf Spee's demise, also, there were no ocean-going German submarines around to exploit such a scattering, but later in the war such a situation would have been the exception, not the rule. I do not think that the Tirpitz even sighted one of the cargo ships of PQ17, yet we know what was the outcome of that convoy scattering to avoid the Tirpitz: a slaughter.

That's a fair one - the 'removal' of AGS as a threat did free up about 30-40 ships that were in the hunting groups for other tasks after her scuttling

The scattering of PQ17 was a mistake but one made with the knowledge of that moment
 
The scattering of PQ17 was a mistake but one made with the knowledge of that moment

The decision could be criticized, or justified, but that was not my point. The point is that the reaction to the presence of a surface raider is not without its own costs. Even if the reaction to the presence of a Deutschland-class warship would probably not be as panicky as that to the presence of Bismarck-class warship, the reaction would still come at the cost, expecially if opportunistic predators were around. And here we're talking about the Scharnhorst class, not as heavy as the Tirpitz, but not as light as the Graf Spee either.
 
The decision could be criticized, or justified, but that was not my point. The point is that the reaction to the presence of a surface raider is not without its own costs. Even if the reaction to the presence of a Deutschland-class warship would probably not be as panicky as that to the presence of Bismarck-class warship, the reaction would still come at the cost, expecially if opportunistic predators were around. And here we're talking about the Scharnhorst class, not as heavy as the Tirpitz, but not as light as the Graf Spee either.


Ahh I see what you mean.

Well I would have to say that the Twins are Battleships in virtually every respect except in that their Guns are 'only' 11" which is scant relief if you are engaging them and are not yourself in a modern or modernised Battleship

Engaging a Scharnhorst would require pretty much the same level of fire power as engaging a Tirpitz would require with only other consideration being the return fire would be more dangerous from the 15" armed vessel - with likely the same results - at North Cape had it been Tirpitz and not Scharnhorst (with the exception that HMS Norfolk might be sunk and not 'merely' badly damaged)

But to put it all into context what you are suggesting is that the reaction for a Modern Battleship would be different to that of a Heavy Cruiser......well yes of course it would!

A heavy Cruiser could be hunted down by other Cruisers - A Modern battleship in 1939/40 requires another Battleship (or 2)

My personal belief is that the Germans should not have tried to match the British and have simply built ships that could have won them the Battle of the Atlantic

So fast long range cruisers and lots of them - principally armed for Commerce raiding and fast enough to escape Allied hunting groups - I would settle on 4 x twin 5.9" guns as the main armament - enough to fend off a determined attack and allow the ship to escape.

Increased numbers of U-boats (over OTL) capable of operating in the Atlantic and around the coast of the UK from 1939 - expect to have a 3rd of them on Patrol at any given time and build accordingly

Fast Mine layers - that can get into UK Coastal waters by night and rapidly lay a minefield and be 'gone' before dawn

Lots of merchant ships built (as per OTL but more of them) capable of being quickly modified into Merchant Cruisers with the Armaments and mines etc set aside for them

Purchase existing Merchant Cruisers close to the expected start of the war - such as those used by Spain and Italy.

Pre Position many supply ships to enable surviving raiders to stay at sea for longer.

Have as many of these ships at sea (as far as possible ) at the declaration of war and expect most of them to be lost in the first year of the war but in the mean time cause all sorts of issues for the allies - hell the war might even be over by Christmas

None of this requires a Bismarck or a Scharnhorst (or a Panzerschiffe or a Hipper for that matter or even Destroyers!) - the only reason you would build those is to score political points!
 
HSK can pick off as much shipping as you like...up to 20 large diesel merchants were drafted into the fleet in the first year of the war and there was 186x 6" guns in storage from WW-I, but that's 20 x 300-350 crew.

The surface raiders were to attack & break up convoys neutralising the escorts so wolf pack could have easier time at it. To do that they needed to beat expected convoy escorts, which means you end up with AGS as minimum requirement, since its the smallest ship that has the speed and endurance to get there and the armor & firepower to attack.
 
HSK can pick off as much shipping as you like...up to 20 large diesel merchants were drafted into the fleet in the first year of the war and there was 186x 6" guns in storage from WW-I, but that's 20 x 300-350 crew.

The surface raiders were to attack & break up convoys neutralising the escorts so wolf pack could have easier time at it. To do that they needed to beat expected convoy escorts, which means you end up with AGS as minimum requirement, since its the smallest ship that has the speed and endurance to get there and the armor & firepower to attack.


The purpose of the HSK was not just sinking tonnage, but more disturb it, by threatening it in remote parts of the world, rather than attack the main, well escorted convoy routes. As such the number is not necessarily large, just a few at sea at a given time would be enough, complemented by a larger number of U-Boote in wolfpacks on the main trade and supply routes. As a backing, just to keep the Royal Navy in their home bases a powerfull enough potential threat force of captial ships was needed, or otherwise the Royal Navy could send out a great lot more ships elsewhere to hunt the HSK's and other threats at sea (from Allies of Germany).

Thus the theoretical Kriegsmarine would be..... Just as historically mostly, with a few powerful warships, lurking in home waters, or occupied countries, a large force of U-Boote, Equally a large force of light coastal forces adn a number of HSK's rading the ocean at will. This demanded the presence of a few very large and powerful battleships (and/or aircraft carriers as you will), a small number of cruisers and a large and powerfull force of U-Boote for offensive duties, though the surface fleet would just be retained as a Fleet in Being in reality, never comming out in the open sea. The use of purpose build warships as raiders was to be avoided, since the ships were more powerfull and more effective as a fleet in being.

As capital ships the Bismarck class, or something of simmilar size wsa the minimum size of battleships, simply because they were a threatforce powerful enough to bind a lot of British naval power in their homewaters. The Scharnhorst class was too leightweight in power to do the same. The Panzerschiffe were also good as potentially powerful raiders in the cruiser group, as were the Hippers, though why have both. If money restriction was urgently needed, skip the Hipper class as such and put more resources in U-Boote.
 
https://archive.org/stream/ReviewOfGermanCruiserWarfare19141918#page/n1/mode/2up

You need to study the above , basically for every raider at sea in WW-I ,the Germans sank 10 enemy merchants, while the allies needed 10 warships to hunt them down . So 20 raiders is 3 times better than historical, demanding 3 times the Wallie response....especially at the beginning when they had small U-boat fleet.

During rearmament every one in the KM agreed that U-Boat wolf packs were the only way to go in any 'up coming war'. Anything that detracted from this had to be weight against the loss of U-Boat production. To that end Wallie convoy escorts were seen as a problem , so when it was proposed to build dozens of Pocket Battle Kreuzers, it looked like a worthwhile detour. However BB were Raeder's delusional phantasy forced on the KM as a compromise against Hitler's demand that the surface fleet be nothing more than a coastal defence force. Get as much tonnage to sea as fast as possible.

If you remove that detour the KM could have built couple dozen PBK to support on going U-Boat wars.
 

hipper

Banned
https://archive.org/stream/ReviewOfGermanCruiserWarfare19141918#page/n1/mode/2up

You need to study the above , basically for every raider at sea in WW-I ,the Germans sank 10 enemy merchants, while the allies needed 10 warships to hunt them down . So 20 raiders is 3 times better than historical, demanding 3 times the Wallie response....especially at the beginning when they had small U-boat fleet.

During rearmament every one in the KM agreed that U-Boat wolf packs were the only way to go in any 'up coming war'. Anything that detracted from this had to be weight against the loss of U-Boat production. To that end Wallie convoy escorts were seen as a problem , so when it was proposed to build dozens of Pocket Battle Kreuzers, it looked like a worthwhile detour. However BB were Raeder's delusional phantasy forced on the KM as a compromise against Hitler's demand that the surface fleet be nothing more than a coastal defence force. Get as much tonnage to sea as fast as possible.

If you remove that detour the KM could have built couple dozen PBK to support on going U-Boat wars.

What do you think the chances were of a British and French military response if they had say been building a pair of PB's and a Score of submarines every year from 1933

Which is the response to all german Naval build ups.
 

hipper

Banned
The purpose of the HSK was not just sinking tonnage, but more disturb it, by threatening it in remote parts of the world, rather than attack the main, well escorted convoy routes. As such the number is not necessarily large, just a few at sea at a given time would be enough, complemented by a larger number of U-Boote in wolfpacks on the main trade and supply routes. As a backing, just to keep the Royal Navy in their home bases a powerfull enough potential threat force of captial ships was needed, or otherwise the Royal Navy could send out a great lot more ships elsewhere to hunt the HSK's and other threats at sea (from Allies of Germany).

Thus the theoretical Kriegsmarine would be..... Just as historically mostly, with a few powerful warships, lurking in home waters, or occupied countries, a large force of U-Boote, Equally a large force of light coastal forces adn a number of HSK's rading the ocean at will. This demanded the presence of a few very large and powerful battleships (and/or aircraft carriers as you will), a small number of cruisers and a large and powerfull force of U-Boote for offensive duties, though the surface fleet would just be retained as a Fleet in Being in reality, never comming out in the open sea. The use of purpose build warships as raiders was to be avoided, since the ships were more powerfull and more effective as a fleet in being.

As capital ships the Bismarck class, or something of simmilar size wsa the minimum size of battleships, simply because they were a threatforce powerful enough to bind a lot of British naval power in their homewaters. The Scharnhorst class was too leightweight in power to do the same. The Panzerschiffe were also good as potentially powerful raiders in the cruiser group, as were the Hippers, though why have both. If money restriction was urgently needed, skip the Hipper class as such and put more resources in U-Boote.

The AGNT was designed to prevent such a Jeune Ecole fleet from coming into existence.
 
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