Did the Allies win WW2 mostly due to brute force?

Did the Allies win WW2 mostly due to brute force?

  • Yes

    Votes: 97 27.2%
  • No

    Votes: 99 27.8%
  • To a degree

    Votes: 160 44.9%

  • Total voters
    356
Jan Willhelm had 8000 tonnes of fuel oil that’s about 700 tonnes for each destroyer assuming 90% of it is useable. how much fuel do you think a destroyer holds? there is only 1000 tonnes between the 1934 class standard and full displacement. So they had the fuel required to make the return trip to germany about 600 tonnes according to your source.

You are not reading that right.

1800 nautical miles at 19 knots. Cut that to 1/3 when you are running for your life.

Distance from Narvik to Bremen... 1100 nautical miles.

US destroyer example. SIMs class.

5,600 nautical miles at 12 knots. In BATTLE, (Coral Sea) when they were fighting for their lives it was 1,200 nautical miles at 25+ knots, hence the constant need for Fletcher to refuel almost every one or two days.

I am aware of how this works because I have "some" experience.

But what about British destroyers? They have tanker support, good engines and non-contaminated fuel oil. What do the Germans NOT have?

HMS Glorious was in the mediteranian on the 10th of April 1940 conducting air training with Ark Royal according to Naval History.net and sailed to the Clyde. she was operational in the North sea in April 22nd.

It is in error. 24 April she is off central Norway bombing targets. She spent the week prior embarking planes before that sortie. The math does not add up.

the german zdestroyers were under orders to return to Germany. on the 9 th they could not because of the delays involved in refuelling from one Tanker, they would have been ready on the evening of the 10th unless WL had not attacked.

I have dealt with that error. It is not true they could have made it, even if they were topped off once.

I’ve been mentioning the weather for some time now it was very bad throughout rendering the eventual air attack 50% ineffective two days later and rendering the Concept of close blockade problematic. what do you think the germans chances were of escaping with some of the destroyers in a Snowstorm.

ZERO. I have developed the weather picture for you in detail so that you understand that Warburton Lee thought he could use it to sneak in and do his business and escape, but found out that TWO can play that game. You have also not explained the British light cruiser or the other destroyers mouse-holing the fjord.

it is possible that I lack understanding, on the other hand you seem to be using a ton of Hindsight to Rubbish the achievement of the First VC of the war without understanding the issues involved. Warbuton Lee Knew he was going to be outnumbered but decided to attack anyway. By doing so he caught the Germans at the moment of maximum Weakness. He disabled 5 destroyers in an action,where he got one of his destroyers damaged by one shell. this was an overwhelming victory, he then saw three more ships coming down the Fjord so he decided to retreat. these three destroyers were not handled very aggressively and were not engaging heavily. He was then Suprised by the George Thiel and theVon Arnim the Thiel was handled very effectively and inflicted most of the damage on the British Ships. it was only at this point with WL dead and his destroyer aground the British line fell into confusion. however the Thiel was also rendered combat inefective and 5he three surviving British Ships escaped down the Fjord. intercepting the german reserve amunition Ship as they left.

The point is that Warburton Lee had that light cruiser and another DESTROYER DIVISION at hand on the scene. He went in and left them behind. Can you not see the obvious?

so no the british destroyers had not lost contact and were navigating independently because they had to change course when WL’s destroyer went aground.
They were yakking on the radios at each other asking each other's position so as to not shoot each other. FOG.

Petty officer Rice the pilot of the swordfish does not mention Flares.

Not unusual. PBYs at Midway when they spotted Kondo don't mention they illuminated to be sure and received heavy return fire, but they did.

“With floats on a Swordfish you couldn’t carry a torpedo. What we carried was 250lbs armour piercing bombs, two 100lb bombs and an anti-submarine bomb. I decided to use the two armour-piercing bombs.”

The Germans stated it was a 125 kg depth charge. And THEY MENTION THE STRAFING RUN.

Warspite Ian Ballantine

there were no other british Forces at the mouth of the Vestfjord when WL attacked. he was ordered to Vestfjord at 06:26 on the 9th 10 minutes after Renown lost contact with Sharnhorst and Gneiseau. Penelope was not ordered to Vestfjord until 06:00 on the morning off the 10th

Within support distance to cover extraction. Not possible that you do not see the error here?

the germans did some Repairs between the 10th and the 13th

Not according to your first iteration.

Warbiton Lee was ordered to the mouth of the Vestfjord and arrived there to discover that the Germans had already arrived he had to decide to attack or not, he decided to attack he destroyed or damaged 6 german Destroyer for the loss or damage of three of his own, in a destroyer fight at 2:1 odds that’s an excellent performance.

Support was mere minutes away. He did not whistle it up. The Germans did have one picket, so that is two more errors.

it’s interesting to note that in the later attack with Warspite and 10 destroyers the British lost two destroyers the same as WL

One aground and one to ambush (again). That British admiral was incompetent. (My opinion, YMMV.)

fundamentally I don’t see how he did badly. And I think he carried out a model attack on a defended harbour.

You want an example of how to do it right?

Crutchley did it better at Ostend in WW I and the British sure did it better when they destroyed the drydock at St Nazaire.
 
The Battle of Midway resulted in an American victory despite them being outnumbered and operating with a crippled carrier due to a combination of luck and generally better conduct before during the battle—the Japanese not committing the 5th cardiv into the fight due to plane losses (Zuikaku, at the least, could have made do with some plane and pilot transfers, but the Japanese never thought of that) while the Americans repaired Yorktown in 24 hours, Nagumo's vacillating compared to Spruance's decisiveness, damage control differences, (Yorktown tricking Hiryu into wasting multiple airstrikes on her and not damaging the other American carriers while Kaga died to literally a single bomb), etc. That's not even to mention the pre-battle shenanigans, like the American codebreaking or the rather pointless diversionary Japanese attack on the Aleutians.

I have to be fair.

At the point of contact, Nagumo was outnumbered by aircraft and sheer airpower about 1.4 to 1. Midway's air garrison was roughly equivalent to 2 aircraft carriers. Even if Zuikaku had made it to the fight, I doubt that Nagumo would have won.

1. Yorktown took 3 days to ready.
2. The Americans struck first.
3. The Japanese mishandled the reconnaissance battle.
4. Intelligence told Nimitz when the Japanese would show up, and like Zhukov at Kursk, he could prepare the birthday party for Nagumo, but once battle was joined and surprise was blown, it would be up to those officers tactically commanding to handle events. Spruance and Fletcher used American battle drill and still almost lost, despite superiority in airpower, winning the recon battle and using a superior battle doctrine that scatters carriers instead of putting them all near each to be sunk at one go. The disparity in experience and training between the two opposing air forces was also shocking as to its impact. Also, if Nagumo was not too good at the aircraft carrier battle art, he was at least served by a first rate air staff who could organize a strike with precision. Spruance was green and was saddled with an incompetent Halsey trained air staff WHO WERE CLUELESS.
5. Operation AL was a Japanese army tack-on they demanded of the IJN to protect Hokkaido. It was not a "clever diversion" that was more cleverly seen through by Navy crypto experts. It was a Japanese inter-service politics "compromise" run amok that the IJN naval staff wanted nothing to do with, but Tojo insisted on it and so a service already known for frittering away its schwerepunkt and assigning too many objectives to too weak forces too far apart to support to support each other; just made the USN's job even easier.
6. Finally, Yorktown was not a decoy. She just happened to be in clear weather unfortunately when she was bounced twice. Spruance and Fletcher tried to hide whenever they could under clouds or inside the local weather fronts. But to strike, one has to run into the wind and that means out into the open. Just the breaks. Yamaguchi's Hiryu fliers found the same carrier twice because they searched the same ocean area twice. It never occurred to the Japanese that other US carriers were not where they found Yorktown, a huge mistake and reconnaissance error that really won the battle for Spruance at that crucial moment.

Sometimes the enemy exposes his neck to you and says; "Here's my throat, cut it!" Yamamoto offered and Nimitz obliged him. It was a rather dull knife he used.
 
To add another perspective, the armies of WW2 were all planning to fight a better version of WW1 ( ok for the US it’s a better version of the Spanish American War the Soviets the Civil war)

In that context the German structure is a better version of 1914 for which they start mobilising in the late 30s And it works. Whatever else they do defeat a peer army in the French and what by WW1 or interwar standards what would be considered tough opponents in Poland and Yugoslavia in rapid decisive wars.

And Barbarossa does exactly what it says on the tin. It does destroy the Soviet frontier armies ( all 3m of them) in a mobile campaign within 600km of the border. The existence of the other 2/3 of the Red Army is a problem but not one you can lay on the operational and tactical level.

At the time they are doing it there is also a disconnect that the germans exploit ( well two but one is by chance). The chance one is Germans hit a sweet spot in terms of the date of the war after their introduction of large numbers of fairly heavily armoured tanks and before the general introduction of 37-47mm AT guns especially in France. The conscious one is the massive advantage to mechanised forces over horse drawn armies and by concentrating their mechanise forces they are able to exploit that to maximum effect.

The criticism is that they failed vs the British and the Russians but then persisted in following the same model long after its sell by date, which is the history of 42 and have no conception of the how to fight a defensive war where the rate of allied advance is limited by their own logistics.

But the allied advances are not simply bludgeoning forward. Bagration is an overmatch, but that’s caused by the German choice of deployment prior to the deception operations, over the course of around six months. And concentrating on that ignores the Ukraine operations, where the Soviets do not have massive superiority. Diadem where the Allies do not have massive superiority, until they manoeuvre to make it so. Normandy ditto or the German failures for example in Lorraine where the Germans have a local superiority.

Both of these are wars of choice on the part of the Germans which they could not bring to conclusion in the manner of their choosing and they cause casualties. The fact that the Allies then proceed to fight the war of their choosing is eminently predictable.

The solution, don’t invade Poland in the first place. The idea that you can win a quick decisive campaign and end the war exists only in a very selective reading of European military history from Rapallo onwards.
 
The solution, don’t invade Poland in the first place. The idea that you can win a quick decisive campaign and end the war exists only in a very selective reading of European military history from Rapallo onwards.

But 19th century Prussia shows otherwise, which may be the fundamental problem.
 
But 19th century Prussia shows otherwise, which may be the fundamental problem.

As I said, selective reading, but of the most modern wars so not entirely stupid. Until it comes to betting national survival on your ability to carry away the army of a first class power like a cat in a sack. Especially is your opponents are an Island your army cannot reach and a land power which you have decided for once is not a steamroller.
 

hipper

Banned
You are not reading that right.

1800 nautical miles at 19 knots. Cut that to 1/3 when you are running for your life.

Distance from Narvik to Bremen... 1100 nautical miles.

US destroyer example. SIMs class.

5,600 nautical miles at 12 knots. In BATTLE, (Coral Sea) when they were fighting for their lives it was 1,200 nautical miles at 25+ knots, hence the constant need for Fletcher to refuel almost every one or two days.

I am aware of how this works because I have "some" experience.

But what about British destroyers? They have tanker support, good engines and non-contaminated fuel oil. What do the Germans NOT have? a p

I see, you started out asserting that the Germans had no fuel, I pointed out they had a tanker the. it was only Ballast fuel or that they had to top up with Deisel. now you are saying that even if the German destroyers were fully fuelled they could not have made it to safety at maximum speed.

well Perhaps the german Destroyers had lousy range but they had made it to Narvik. so they could sail home. or to any german owned port in Norway.

However WL had no information of their fuel state range or anything else. this is all arguing from Knowledge not available To WL at the time. when he went into the Fjord S&G could have been there or German Destroyers could have had diesel engines and be good for 10000 miles. there was no way he could assume the Germans were trapped due to fuel shortages.



for interest the german Destroyers had a maximum fuel load of 740 (metric) tonnes however they had to keep 30% of their fuel load in the tanks or Suffer stability issues so they only needed 530 tonnes to top up each german destroyer. - Whitley german Destroyers

(Quote)
It is in error. 24 April she is off central Norway bombing targets. She spent the week prior embarking planes before that sortie. The math does not add up.(/Quote)

I don’t believe the timeline is in Error

3rd to 9th - The ARK ROYAL in company with GLORIOUS carried out flying exercises off Alexandria during the day and returned to harbour at night.
[Late on 9/4/40 Vice Admiral Wells received a signal from the Admiralty ordering immediate return of the ARK ROYAL and GLORIOUS to the UK. This was because of the German invasion of Norway]
10th - At 0600 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS with the destroyers BULLDOG and WESTCOTT sailed from Alexandria.
At 0730 ARK ROYAL and Glorious commenced landing on their Swordfish squadrons from Dekheila.
After all the aircraft were landed on course was set for Gibraltar at 25 knots.
11th - At 1200 the force was in position 35-26N, 16-59E.
At 1630 the destroyers HMAS STUART and WATERHEN joined from Malta.
At 1645 the GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT and BULLDOG detached to Malta to refuel.
Overnight to the south of Sicily the ARK ROYAL carried out night flying exercises.
12th - At 0630 the GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT and BULLDOG joined from Malta.
At 0700 the WATERHEN was detached to return to Malta.
At 1200 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART were in position 37-44N, 8-21E.
13th - At 1200 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART were in position 36-29N, 2-45W.
At 1830 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART arrived at Gibraltar.
14th At 2100 the flag of Vice Admiral, Aircraft Carriers transferred from ARK ROYAL to GLORIOUS.
[The admiralty ordered the GLORIOUS to join the Home Fleet with all despatch. At 2130/14/4/40 the GLORIOUS and the destroyers STUART, VELOX and WATCHMAN sailed from Gibraltar for Greenock. ARK ROYAL was ordered to remain at Gibraltar to continue with flying exercises]
14th Passage to Clyde with HM Australian Destroyer STUART for deployment with
Home Fleet off Norway (Operation RUPERT/R4).
19th Nomination for cover of Trondheim landings (Operation HAMMER) cancelled.
21st Sailed from Clyde to rejoin Fleet.
22nd . Embarked RAF GLADIATOR aircraft, previously based at Filton, Bristol.
23rd Took passage from Scapa Flow with HMS ARK ROYAL, HM Cruiser BERWICK
HM AA Cruiser CURLEW, screened by HM Destroyers FEARLESS, FURY, HASTY,
HEREWARD, HYPERION and JUNO to relieve HM Aircraft Carrier FURIOUS
Narvik (Operation DX)
(Note : HMS CURLEW was fitted with aircraft warning radar equipment.
This was the first RN multi-carrier operation).
24th Commenced air operations in support of military.
GLADIATOR aircraft flew off to establish airfield on frozen lake in Romsdal valley.

ZERO. I have developed the weather picture for you in detail so that you understand that Warburton Lee thought he could use it to sneak in and do his business and escape, but found out that TWO can play that game. You have also not explained the British light cruiser or the other destroyers mouse-holing the fjord.
The point is that Warburton Lee had that light cruiser and another DESTROYER DIVISION at hand on the scene. He went in and left them behind. Can you not see the obvious?

i’ll make 5he point again Warbuton Lee Was ordered to the Vestford with 5 destroyers he was A flotilla leader Captain (D) Penelope was not in Sight or under his command when he decided to attack

Penelope with Renown Repulse and another 5 destroyers patrolling 30 miles out to sea. they were worried about S&G turning up. having 5 destroyers escort 2 battleships seems unexceptional and loitering off the mouth of the Fjord would be an invitation to submarine attack.
Penelope should have been sent in support of WL earlier but that decision was not Warbuton Lee’s to make. he had to decide to attack or not with the ships he had available at the time.


They were yakking on the radios at each other asking each other's position so as to not shoot each other. FOG.

in 1940? no British destroyer was equipped with VHF voice radio at that point, it was Flags or Signal light.

Anyway Ive said enough on this. given the Situation WL decided to attack, to engage the enemy more closely.
Waiting on higher authority for more support is not generally the path to success.

regards
Hipper
 
it was pretty much the red army winning WW2, end of story

Ok....and I would claim that the RAF and Eight Air Force had a slight hand in that effort with a bit of strategic bombing of Germany’s war industries...

It is true that Russia stood alone during Barbarossa and their successful defensive stance culminating with the Battle of Moscow in late 1941 going into 1942, and during the most of the Case Blue invasion to conquer the oil fields of the Caucuses. But by the time Paulus was surrendering, the Western allies strategic bombing campaign was starting to kick in and would affect German war production for the battle of Kursk.

I am also not going to overly credit the soviet invasion of Manchuria in August of 1945 with Defeating the Japanese empire...
 
I see, you started out asserting that the Germans had no fuel, I pointed out they had a tanker the. it was only Ballast fuel or that they had to top up with Deisel. now you are saying that even if the German destroyers were fully fuelled they could not have made it to safety at maximum speed.

I said they did not have the fuel to make it.

well Perhaps the german Destroyers had lousy range but they had made it to Narvik. so they could sail home. or to any german owned port in Norway.

They refueled twice on the way up. How were they to get past the mouse-holing British?

However WL had no information of their fuel state range or anything else. this is all arguing from Knowledge not available To WL at the time. when he went into the Fjord S&G could have been there or German Destroyers could have had diesel engines and be good for 10000 miles. there was no way he could assume the Germans were trapped due to fuel shortages.

If he could not calculate their fuel situation or be advised by someone who could do the math, then he had no business being in command of one of His Majesty's warships.

This is bread and butter for an USN officer. So, he should have been aware.

for interest the german Destroyers had a maximum fuel load of 740 (metric) tonnes however they had to keep 30% of their fuel load in the tanks or Suffer stability issues so they only needed 530 tonnes to top up each german destroyer. - Whitley german Destroyers

This is called ballast and is a defect shared by American destroyers. (Topheavy.)

It is in error. 24 April she is off central Norway bombing targets. She spent the week prior embarking planes before that sortie. The math does not add up.(/Quote)

I don’t believe the timeline is in Error

3rd to 9th
- The ARK ROYAL in company with GLORIOUS carried out flying exercises off Alexandria during the day and returned to harbour at night.
[Late on 9/4/40 Vice Admiral Wells received a signal from the Admiralty ordering immediate return of the ARK ROYAL and GLORIOUS to the UK. This was because of the German invasion of Norway]
10th - At 0600 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS with the destroyers BULLDOG and WESTCOTT sailed from Alexandria.
At 0730 ARK ROYAL and Glorious commenced landing on their Swordfish squadrons from Dekheila.
After all the aircraft were landed on course was set for Gibraltar at 25 knots.
11th - At 1200 the force was in position 35-26N, 16-59E.
At 1630 the destroyers HMAS STUART and WATERHEN joined from Malta.
At 1645 the GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT and BULLDOG detached to Malta to refuel.
Overnight to the south of Sicily the ARK ROYAL carried out night flying exercises.
12th - At 0630 the GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT and BULLDOG joined from Malta.
At 0700 the WATERHEN was detached to return to Malta.
At 1200 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART were in position 37-44N, 8-21E.
13th - At 1200 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART were in position 36-29N, 2-45W.
At 1830 the ARK ROYAL, GLORIOUS, WESTCOTT, BULLDOG and STUART arrived at Gibraltar.
14th At 2100 the flag of Vice Admiral, Aircraft Carriers transferred from ARK ROYAL to GLORIOUS.
[The admiralty ordered the GLORIOUS to join the Home Fleet with all despatch. At 2130/14/4/40 the GLORIOUS and the destroyers STUART, VELOX and WATCHMAN sailed from Gibraltar for Greenock. ARK ROYAL was ordered to remain at Gibraltar to continue with flying exercises]
14th Passage to Clyde with HM Australian Destroyer STUART for deployment with
Home Fleet off Norway (Operation RUPERT/R4).
19th Nomination for cover of Trondheim landings (Operation HAMMER) cancelled.
21st Sailed from Clyde to rejoin Fleet.
22nd . Embarked RAF GLADIATOR aircraft, previously based at Filton, Bristol.
23rd Took passage from Scapa Flow with HMS ARK ROYAL, HM Cruiser BERWICK
HM AA Cruiser CURLEW, screened by HM Destroyers FEARLESS, FURY, HASTY,
HEREWARD, HYPERION and JUNO to relieve HM Aircraft Carrier FURIOUS
Narvik (Operation DX)


(Note : HMS CURLEW was fitted with aircraft warning radar equipment.
This was the first RN multi-carrier operation).
24th Commenced air operations in support of military.
GLADIATOR aircraft flew off to establish airfield on frozen lake in Romsdal valley.

Could be my brain-fart. Furious was off Trondheim. 24 hours away by the way. And air support 16 hours away. IOW WL could wait a day.

i’ll make 5he point again Warbuton Lee Was ordered to the Vestford with 5 destroyers he was A flotilla leader Captain (D) Penelope was not in Sight or under his command when he decided to attack

She and the other destroyers covered the extraction so what is going on? That is no more than one hours steaming, no more than 30 nautical miles. You see the problem with your claim?

Penelope with Renown Repulse and another 5 destroyers patrolling 30 miles out to sea. they were worried about S&G turning up. having 5 destroyers escort 2 battleships seems unexceptional and loitering off the mouth of the Fjord would be an invitation to submarine attack.

Penelope should have been sent in support of WL earlier but that decision was not Warbuton Lee’s to make. he had to decide to attack or not with the ships he had available at the time.

30 miles is 30 minutes and that decision is not acceptable, nor does it make any sense. Warburton Lee had enough PULL to make the call. And even if he did not, he could request it.

in 1940? no British destroyer was equipped with VHF voice radio at that point, it was Flags or Signal light.

Morse code key radio transmitter and receiver. Yak is colloquial, and the British did use radio IN THE FOG, because the Germans tracked them by RDF. Read my account again. Especially the citations within it.

Anyway Ive said enough on this. given the Situation WL decided to attack, to engage the enemy more closely.
Waiting on higher authority for more support is not generally the path to success.

regards
Hipper

When time is clearly on your side, you delay for the reinforcements. Especially when the reinforcement is 30 minutes away. This is not hard to figure out. WL screwed up from the start. Mass your forces, define your single objective and seek decision. First thing you learn in naval op-art.

Regards back at you.

McP.
 
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Not sure what this discussion about Narvik is about, but for what it's worth, Churchill (The Second World War, Volume I, 'The Clash at Sea 1940' (1950 edition)) describes the weather of April 10th as '...mist and snowstorms...' (page 538) and indicates that Penelope was '...searching for enemy transports reported off Bodo...' (page 543) shortly before Penelope ran ashore.
 
Not sure what this discussion about Narvik is about, but for what it's worth, Churchill (The Second World War, Volume I, 'The Clash at Sea 1940' (1950 edition)) describes the weather of April 10th as '...mist and snowstorms...' (page 538) and indicates that Penelope was '...searching for enemy transports reported off Bodo...' (page 543) shortly before Penelope ran ashore.

Worst case 6-10 hours. Still within support. Bodo sits southwest of the bay that leads to Vestfjord.

Narvik-4.png


Close blockade obviously.
 
(1) If he could not calculate their fuel situation or be advised by someone who could do the math, then he had no business being in command of one of His Majesty's warships.

This is bread and butter for an USN officer. So, he should have been aware.

(2) She and the other destroyers covered the extraction so what is going on? That is no more than one hours steaming, no more than 30 nautical miles. You see the problem with your claim?



30 miles is 30 minutes and that decision is not acceptable, nor does it make any sense. Warburton Lee had enough PULL to make the call. And even if he did not, he could request it.


When time is clearly on your side, you delay for the reinforcements. Especially when the reinforcement is 30 minutes away. This is not hard to figure out. WL screwed up from the start. Mass your forces, define your single objective and seek decision. First thing you learn in naval op-art.

McP.

(1) That Warburton-Lee had incomplete intelligence is a Historical Fact! He simply did not know what German Forces where even in Narvik Fjord. Suggesting that he could make exact calculations without knowing what forces he was facing is just plain ridiculous.
He could undoubtedly have made the calculations for his own ships in moments, but for enemy vessels and especially since he simply did not know how many there were, or when they had last re-fuelled, or what tanker support they had?

(2) 30 Nautical Miles in 30 minutes:confused:. I don't know what experience you have of Naval Warfare but that's an average speed of 60 Knots!!!
The maximum speed of an Arethusa class light cruiser was 32 Knots. And see above for the probability that Penelope was actually about 188 Nautical Miles away from Narvik on the 10th.

Please stop making such an obvious fool of yourself. You are obviously failing to understand the situation correctly.

And...
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/the-battle-of-narvik-crippling-the-kriegsmarine/
Did you actually read the above article you previously used as a source to support your argument, because it clearly endorses Warburton-Lee's actions and the simple fact that he was engaging a force of unknown strength and uncertain disposition.
You're defeating your own argument.
 
(1) That Warburton-Lee had incomplete intelligence is a Historical Fact! He simply did not know what German Forces where even in Narvik Fjord. Suggesting that he could make exact calculations without knowing what forces he was facing is just plain ridiculous.
He could undoubtedly have made the calculations for his own ships in moments, but for enemy vessels and especially since he simply did not know how many there were, or when they had last re-fuelled, or what tanker support they had?

1. My mistake I should have written 60 minutes. Happens.
2. The British with their intelligence services at work, were knocking over German tankers heading from Russian ports to Narvik. So were the Norwegians. The British knew about it, since they were headed there for NARVIK themselves to cut off Swedish steel shipments from the port. It was how the Swedes shipped the iron to Germany. There is a railroad from the iron mines to Narvik. (See map. From Kiruna to Narvik.) They had a good idea about what was German going on at Narvik too. Or they should have, because the Norwegian patrol boats; Kelt, Senja, and Michael Sarz, bumped into the Germans. One of those patrol boats got off a radio warning to the Norwegian coast defense ship, Norge. And why would Warburton Lee head for Narvik if he did not know these details about his German opponents? He should have had at least a Brassey, or Conway's available to describe the German Model 1934 destroyer, no? And he should have had some contacts to at least navigate the fjords and to describe what he should find? You know, pilots to guide him into the fjords?

Please stop making such an obvious fool of yourself. You are obviously failing to understand the situation correctly.

3. I think you need to read the article, again, amend your assumptions, and think it through. What the article suggests was a proper decision, does not make any sense to me at all. Not when the British were massing to strike themselves.

I may have made a simple math transit error and aircraft carrier ID error; but you seem to have incomplete information about what the British knew or why they did what they did or where they were and when.

And if WL did not know what he headed for, and charged in blind, as you suggest, then what does that say about him? Not even I have made that claim, because I believe he did know what to expect.
 
1. My mistake I should have written 60 minutes. Happens.
2. The British with their intelligence services at work, were knocking over German tankers heading from Russian ports to Narvik. So were the Norwegians. The British knew about it, since they were headed there for NARVIK themselves to cut off Swedish steel shipments from the port. It was how the Swedes shipped the iron to Germany. There is a railroad from the iron mines to Narvik. (See map. From Kiruna to Narvik.) They had a good idea about what was German going on at Narvik too. Or they should have, because the Norwegian patrol boats; Kelt, Senja, and Michael Sarz, bumped into the Germans. One of those patrol boats got off a radio warning to the Norwegian coast defense ship, Norge. And why would Warburton Lee head for Narvik if he did not know these details about his German opponents? He should have had at least a Brassey, or Conway's available to describe the German Model 1934 destroyer, no? And he should have had some contacts to at least navigate the fjords and to describe what he should find? You know, pilots to guide him into the fjords?



3. I think you need to read the article, again, amend your assumptions, and think it through. What the article suggests was a proper decision, does not make any sense to me at all. Not when the British were massing to strike themselves.

I may have made a simple math transit error and aircraft carrier ID error; but you seem to have incomplete information about what the British knew or why they did what they did or where they were and when.

And if WL did not know what he headed for, and charged in blind, as you suggest, then what does that say about him? Not even I have made that claim, because I believe he did know what to expect.
On your point 2 given that it is known that multiple tankers were dispatched and there are multiple German ships in harbour, why would WL assume that the Germans ( the VC citation says 6 DD and a sub) could not be refuelled?
 
1. My mistake I should have written 60 minutes. Happens.
2. The British with their intelligence services at work, were knocking over German tankers heading from Russian ports to Narvik. So were the Norwegians. The British knew about it, since they were headed there for NARVIK themselves to cut off Swedish steel shipments from the port. It was how the Swedes shipped the iron to Germany. There is a railroad from the iron mines to Narvik. (See map. From Kiruna to Narvik.) They had a good idea about what was German going on at Narvik too. Or they should have, because the Norwegian patrol boats; Kelt, Senja, and Michael Sarz, bumped into the Germans. One of those patrol boats got off a radio warning to the Norwegian coast defense ship, Norge. And why would Warburton Lee head for Narvik if he did not know these details about his German opponents? He should have had at least a Brassey, or Conway's available to describe the German Model 1934 destroyer, no? And he should have had some contacts to at least navigate the fjords and to describe what he should find? You know, pilots to guide him into the fjords?



3. I think you need to read the article, again, amend your assumptions, and think it through. What the article suggests was a proper decision, does not make any sense to me at all. Not when the British were massing to strike themselves.

I may have made a simple math transit error and aircraft carrier ID error; but you seem to have incomplete information about what the British knew or why they did what they did or where they were and when.

And if WL did not know what he headed for, and charged in blind, as you suggest, then what does that say about him? Not even I have made that claim, because I believe he did know what to expect.

How are you getting "Charged in Blind"?

What I, other posters, the accepted history and the citation for Warburton-Lee's VC are telling you was that he made the correct decision with the information he had. The article clearly says that Warburton-Lee was sceptical of the intelligence he had received from the Admiralty, and he was right to be since only one German Ship was reported by them so he sent a party ashore to Tranoy Lighthouse. Unfortunately no one aboard his ships spoke Norwegian, and none of the Light-Men were fluent in English, but from local intelligence he was able to determine that the German force contained at least 6 Destroyers and a U-Boat. So he believed that he was outnumbered, but not decisively so. (As a key point the Local Pilots were all in Narvik under German control)

What he then conducted was effectively a Reconnaissance-in-Force. As Napoleon said "You can ask me for anything except time", Warburton-Lee was convinced that decisive action immediately applied was more important that a measured response later. Not to attack would be to gift the enemy time, which is an unforgiveable military error. Yes greater British Forces were on their way, but if the enemy had time to prepare they would have had a much harder fight. Even an inadequate action at the right time is better than a perfect response too late to matter. His attack was carried out with surprise and careful timing, at the Dawn High Tide, to provide maximum sea room and passage over a potential minefield, as 1934 Model Destroyers had mine-rails this was a sensible precaution. Waiting 60 minutes would have cost any attacking force this advantage!!!

Warbuton-Lee knew that Narvik had been attacked, but by a force of unknown size and strength, and he could not know its future intentions or capabilities. "If you do not know the size, strength and intent of your enemy, then attack, and you will surely find out"
 
The Russians had to survive to get there to 1944, didn't they? And 1943 was the fulcrum year where the combat odds were fairly equal. Losing population, production and manpower manhour productivity equivalent to the US east of the Mississippi (overrun territories the Germans seized in 1941-1942) and coming back from that deficit is what the Russians did.
And the Russians never would have lasted long enough to recover from the initial blow if their country didn't have such massively superior 'brute force' capabilities; if the Germans had dropped the ball as badly as the Russians did in 1941, there would have been no Germany left. Obviously you can fault them for picking a fight with such huge and powerful coalitions, but that doesn't change the fact that the Allies probably couldn't have won without such vastly greater resources.
 

hipper

Banned
Lt Stanning went ashore at Tavoy and has some interesting Comments and identified Warbuton Lee’s Dilema clearly

He had been ordered to attack on inteligence that only small forces were At Narvik. He had new intelligence that the forces were Greater but still manageable odds.

So the Question is to attack or not. Edgeworthy makes an excellent point about Decisive action now being better than a measured response later. I’m sure they say something like that at Naval War College.

We could see the inhabitants, mostly men, coming down to the pier, but there did not seem to be any Germans as they were all strolling along in the most nonchalant fashion. After getting fairly near to them we found we were on an island separated from the land by about fifty yards of sea, so we had to call up the boat again and go to the pier in it. We went ashore at the pier and walked up to the crowd of about twenty to thirty men and boys, some of whom spoke English to a certain extent. We asked them whether they had seen any Germans and they said they had seen five German destroyers going towards Narvik that morning; when asked how large they were they said: ‘Larger than that one’, pointing at Hardy

“Another man then said he had seen a submarine go up towards Narvik and that he was sure the place was mined. A small boy said he had seen six destroyers not five as the other man had said. It never crossed our minds then that they could have been six and five, making eleven in all. They asked if we intended to attack Narvik and when we gave a non-committal answer, said we ought to go and get some more ships before we tried. On our way back I saw we had four ships with us and found that ‘Hostile’ had arrived. When we got on board we explained the situation to ‘Wash’ and discussed the thing thoroughly in the chart house. “It was a most thorny situation. We had been told to attack Narvik and therefore must do so unless there were urgent and very strong reasons against it. Although the Admiralty obviously had no idea how strong the enemy forces were in Narvik, to ask for further instructions would be delaying the operation to an unreasonable extent; and we also had a feeling that possibly our operation at Narvik had been timed to fit in with some other undertaking further down the coast, and any delay on our part might possibly prejudice someone else’s success or even safety. But whether the Admiralty would consider the extremely grave risk of five modern destroyers justifiable in view of the new information seemed doubtful. On the other hand, our information was not necessarily reliable and as the Admiralty had given us specific information, it was reasonable to suppose they knew better. We already had experience of the unreliability of local information when we were in the South Atlantic; when one day we (‘ Hardy’ and two destroyers) were variously reported as two tankers and a submarine, six destroyers and two cruisers. Someone reminded ‘Wash’ of this.

Poor ‘Wash’ was in a quandary. If he decided to attack the place and failed, perhaps with the loss of several ships, he would be told by the Admiralty that he was mad to go in when he knew there was considerable opposition. If, on the other hand, he had decided to withdraw, he would be asked why he did so on unreliable information of small boys when the Admiralty had given him specific intelligence which he should have had no reason to doubt. He spent a most unhappy half hour in which, to my mind, he more than earned his V.C.”

 
On your point 2 given that it is known that multiple tankers were dispatched and there are multiple German ships in harbour, why would WL assume that the Germans ( the VC citation says 6 DD and a sub) could not be refuelled?

Because the tanker in question, with them, was a converted whaling ship carrying the wrong kind of fuel. I imagine he did not know that much, but he sure did know that the Germans had to refuel at least once on the run home, and that means a tanker has to meet them about Alesunde which is just about where the Germans could get a tanker to them from their home base in Germany.

norway-map.gif



And the Russians never would have lasted long enough to recover from the initial blow if their country didn't have such massively superior 'brute force' capabilities; if the Germans had dropped the ball as badly as the Russians did in 1941, there would have been no Germany left. Obviously you can fault them for picking a fight with such huge and powerful coalitions, but that doesn't change the fact that the Allies probably couldn't have won without such vastly greater resources.

Why would one even argue such a thesis? How about 1 Russian in 9 dead? How is that brute force superiority? Besides; the Germans in 1944 did drop the ball as badly as the Russians did in 1941. The Russians had this little party planned called "Bagration".
 
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How are you getting "Charged in Blind"?

This is what another poster suggests is what I imply. I have written nothing of the kind. I wrote he had to know from his own training and from British naval intelligence a bit of what was inside the fjord. I wrote THAT.

What I, other posters, the accepted history and the citation for Warburton-Lee's VC are telling you was that he made the correct decision with the information he had. The article clearly says that Warburton-Lee was sceptical of the intelligence he had received from the Admiralty, and he was right to be since only one German Ship was reported by them so he sent a party ashore to Tranoy Lighthouse. Unfortunately no one aboard his ships spoke Norwegian, and none of the Light-Men were fluent in English, but from local intelligence he was able to determine that the German force contained at least 6 Destroyers and a U-Boat. So he believed that he was outnumbered, but not decisively so. (As a key point the Local Pilots were all in Narvik under German control)

Not all the fishermen were under German control.

What he then conducted was effectively a Reconnaissance-in-Force. As Napoleon said "You can ask me for anything except time", Warburton-Lee was convinced that decisive action immediately applied was more important that a measured response later. Not to attack would be to gift the enemy time, which is an unforgiveable military error. Yes greater British Forces were on their way, but if the enemy had time to prepare they would have had a much harder fight. Even an inadequate action at the right time is better than a perfect response too late to matter. His attack was carried out with surprise and careful timing, at the Dawn High Tide, to provide maximum sea room and passage over a potential minefield, as 1934 Model Destroyers had mine-rails this was a sensible precaution. Waiting 60 minutes would have cost any attacking force this advantage!!!


1. The tides and currents precluded effective minelaying.
2. The destroyers were used as APDs. They could not possibly carry mines.
3. The destroyers were not going anywhere. WL could have played the role of cork and forced them to come to him.

Warbuton-Lee knew that Narvik had been attacked, but by a force of unknown size and strength, and he could not know its future intentions or capabilities. "If you do not know the size, strength and intent of your enemy, then attack, and you will surely find out"

Be killed, and someone else will have to finish the job you failed to do. QES.
 
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