Escort or Light carriers as WW2 Amphibious assault ships?

Could the USN or RN recognize the strategic value of modifying Casablanca or Bogue class Escort carriers to carry and hold at least several landing crafts (specifically LVT type) while also carrying a very, very small modest air wing (perhaps 6 FM-2 Wildcats and/or 4 TBM Avengers or any suitable substitute) for CAS?
 

SsgtC

Banned
Not unless you're also seriously advancing the development of helicopters. Aviation ships weren't really viable as amphibious assault ships until then. Without a well deck, loading and launching landing craft is a pain in the ass. You'd be better off packing an LST full of Infantry and running it up on the shore.
 
Not unless you're also seriously advancing the development of helicopters. Aviation ships weren't really viable as amphibious assault ships until then. Without a well deck, loading and launching landing craft is a pain in the ass. You'd be better off packing an LST full of Infantry and running it up on the shore.

cannot find a handy source for well deck "history"

have always been fascinated by a hydrofoil the Germans were scheming https://german-navy.de/kriegsmarine/ships/landingcrafts/vs8/index.html
 

SsgtC

Banned
cannot find a handy source for well deck "history"

have always been fascinated by a hydrofoil the Germans were scheming https://german-navy.de/kriegsmarine/ships/landingcrafts/vs8/index.html
Not sure how practical that would have been. The tank is on a pontoon, so it would still need to be run up onto the beach and then unloaded from the pontoon before it could be used. Though I like the idea that the craft had a rudimentary well deck. It was a step in the right direction. But without something like the DD Shermans or USMC Amtracks, you've only got half a concept. Without those two, you're better off with an LST to land armor on an enemy beach.
 
The first ships with a well deck were the USN's Ashland class LSDs, followed closely by the RN's 'Way' class. These were built in America to a design by the RN's Rowland Baker. There were a number of other landing-craft carriers that came into service earlier in the war. The various LSIs and APAs carried, and launched infantry landing craft from davits, while the RN developed a number of extemporised solutions for launching tank landing craft. A number of train ferries were converted to Landing Ship Stern Chutes, launching LCMs down a chute at the stern, while the Landing Ship Gantries were tankers converted to carry landing craft and launch them via a large crane. These made it much easier to transport and land tanks for the early waves of an amphibious assault. LSTs were too vulnerable for an assault, while LCTs/LCMs were not seaworthy enough to travel long distances over open sea, especially when loaded. Craning tanks into a landing craft from a larger transport was slow and dangerous. Being able to transport the LCTs aboard a larger ship and load them at the target meant that the first wave of an amphibious assault could benefit from armoured support.

An early LPD-style vessel is unlikely; it requires you to compromise both halves of the ship for little gain. Landing-craft carriers require a lot of space for the craft, their crews, and the troops to be transported aboard them. Aircraft carriers, even escort ones, require a lot of space for aircraft, fuel and maintenance. Combining the two means reducing the space available to one of these two functions. For the Allies, there is little need for 'half' an escort carrier; if they're carrying out an amphibious operation, they'll have air superiority from land bases or their large carrier fleets. As such, adding six fighters or four strike aircraft, or some combination of the two, isn't necessary. Landing craft carriers are much more in need, but again, by reducing the amount of craft and troops carried by adding a flight deck, hangar and air group, means that it's not as good as a dedicated landing ship. If you built two of these ships, you'd get a force that was inferior to a force of one escort carrier and one landing ship.
 
Not sure how practical that would have been. The tank is on a pontoon, so it would still need to be run up onto the beach and then unloaded from the pontoon before it could be used. Though I like the idea that the craft had a rudimentary well deck. It was a step in the right direction. But without something like the DD Shermans or USMC Amtracks, you've only got half a concept. Without those two, you're better off with an LST to land armor on an enemy beach.

agree with your summary, was unclear just meant looking at a (fairly) small vessel with well deck got me looking at that feature, not that particular ship.
 
Not unless you're also seriously advancing the development of helicopters. Aviation ships weren't really viable as amphibious assault ships until then. Without a well deck, loading and launching landing craft is a pain in the ass. You'd be better off packing an LST full of Infantry and running it up on the shore.
You might be able to tow light assault gliders like the General Aircraft Hotspur off the deck of a Colossus or Independence class CVL behind a fighter. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Aircraft_Hotspur

 
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SsgtC

Banned
You might be able to tow light assault gliders like the General Aircraft Hotspur off the deck of a Colossus or Independence class CVL behind a fighter.
That's pushing it. It would depend how much airspeed the glider and fighter need to get and stay airborne (most late WWII aircraft launched barely above their stall speed without using the catapult, and I don't think launching a tow plane and glider off a cat is a good idea). It would also depend what the minimum safe towing distance is between the two aircraft. Your towing craft could be 3/4 of the way down the deck before the glider starts to move. Then there's the issue of spotting. With a minimally controlled glider, I wouldn't want more than two fighter/glider pairs on deck at the same time.
 
You might be able to tow light assault gliders like the General Aircraft Hotspur off the deck of a Colossus or Independence class CVL behind a fighter. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Aircraft_Hotspur

Possibly (very slightly!) safer to try to convert (somehow!) something like an Avenger into a transport to drop a handful of parachutists from. One escort carrier's squadron could possibly drop a single platoon per lift, so only good for coup de main? Not worth the effort unless part of a large operation.

Although transport Avengers might be useful for airdropping supplies.

Would it be worth developing a carrier-based paratroop transport for, say, a single squad. That way you might be able to drop a reduced company per lift.
 
On the dock issue, it depends what you want to call a dock.

From 'The Watery Maze' by Bernard Fergusson

Page 112/113

The LSD was the brain-foster-child of Hussey's, who had introduced it to an initially sceptical world at a meeting in the Admiralty in September (1941??). He handed round a photograph of a 'Popper' barge transporter, such as was used on the Danube. These flooded like a floating dock, and while so flooded shipped a barge on either side of their superstructure; they then pumped the water out; so that the barges were lifted clear of the water resting on sponsons on either side of the ship. Such a vessel had several advantages. She would be designed to carry two loaded LCTs in a hold, or dock, instead of on external sponsons, as in the Popper barge.

The LSD design went onto become the Ashland class built in the US which the RN had four??? in Lend Lease.

The popper barge carrier could be described as a dock type ship, though a very very basic one.


The dock idea had been around for longer notably in a 1912 French submarine transporter SS Kanguroo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Kanguroo

The issue here was that it needed the bows to be dismantled then rebuilt after the submarine had been loaded.
 
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Only instance I can think of is a situation in the Pacific, where C-47's (or to be more exact, R4D's), are loaded on a CV a la Byrd expedition to make a landing on an airfield. Perhaps a larger Makin raid equivalent, in which the Marine raiders which have arrived by submarine seize the airfield and then R4D's are flown in to bring in reinforcements before arrival of stronger forces? In the picture USS Philippine Sea in Operation High Jump where R4D's were flown off the carrier, AFAIK they did not land on it. I could see also a situation in which some kind of planes, say, modified Avengers, are used to parachute reconnaissance teams or spies into places land based planes can not reach, like @fourthmaninaboat wrote.

As an additonal suggestion, maybe Lockheed Lodestar (C56/R5O) might be able to land as well as take off an carrier? Beechcraft Model 18 (C-45) which is visible on the deck might be able to do so as well, but would it offer really more performance compared to a COD TBM-3R as it would be already carrier suitable and have folding wings?

cv47_4.jpg
 
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Airborne Assault would be difficult but possible. Very time consuming, but could have a Sea Mosquito take off, then swing round catching a balloon and pull a Horsa of the flight deck.
 
Could the USN or RN recognize the strategic value of modifying Casablanca or Bogue class Escort carriers to carry and hold at least several landing crafts (specifically LVT type) while also carrying a very, very small modest air wing (perhaps 6 FM-2 Wildcats and/or 4 TBM Avengers or any suitable substitute) for CAS?


While yes, the use of those Escort Carriers as 'aircraft carriers' is more important than being assault ships - there are only finite ships that can operate aircraft

Meanwhile you can turn pretty much any ship or a liner into an Assault ship relatively easily so unless we are talking about the way in which the RN and 45 Commando conducted 'vertical envelopment' operations at Port Said in 1956 using Helicopters from HMS Ocean and HMS Theseus - then pre-effective Transport Helicopter I don't see the point.
 
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