German sneak attack on British fleet 1 Sep 1939?

Has this scenario ever been discussed here?

Was there any hope of Germany concentrating all of its air and naval forces on the British fleet and delivering the kind of destruction that would have made Operation Sealion feasable?
 

Khanzeer

Banned
No !
"not a hindu's chance in heaven" to quote Ned Flanders okily dokley
with all due apologies to hindu members here o_O

if they concentrate all their naval units then it is a very easy way for FAA , RN subs to harass them and the remainder will be sunk by a squadorn of Home fleet battleships and cruisers
this would be the decisive jutland that eluded the RN in WW1

KM was essentially a coast guard with some really expensive toys compared to RN

secondly german airpower was pathetic in Anti-shipping against warships in 1939-40 period and not much better until glide bombs were introduced.

Please don't let this turn into a sealion WI
 

Deleted member 1487

They did try to bomb the British fleet in September and didn't really achieve much. Same with infiltrating uboats into their bases, but again didn't find much. The surface fleet wasn't going to be able to do much more than die trying.
 
Has this scenario ever been discussed here?

Yes, just a few months ago.

This
They did try to bomb the British fleet in September and didn't really achieve much. Same with infiltrating uboats into their bases, but again didn't find much. The surface fleet wasn't going to be able to do much more than die trying.

Only about 20% of the global fleet was there August 1939. & The Brits sent most of that to sea. In late August.
 
Has this scenario ever been discussed here?

Was there any hope of Germany concentrating all of its air and naval forces on the British fleet and delivering the kind of destruction that would have made Operation Sealion feasible?
Ninjad by @Carl Schwamberger, but twice that I know of in the last 18 months.

This is a link to the most recent.

https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...he-germans-bomb-scapa-flow-during-ww2.457007/

And this is the link to the other one.

https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/the-raid-on-scapa-flow-or-something-else-ahc.428173/
 
You have got in the entire KM fleet as of 1/9/39:

One Scharnhorst-class battlecruiser, with the other still in yard hands for another month after sea trials revealed it wanted to be a U-boat
Two ancient pre-dreadnoughts, which it is pure murder to send anywhere they might meet a real capital ship
Three Panzerschiffe - 1v1 you'd have to back them against any British CA on paper, but that's not what they're going to get, is it?
One CA, Admiral Hipper, with one more (Blucher) still three weeks from commissioning (and wouldn't see active service for another 7 months)
Six CL, of fairly undistinguished design.
Depending how you slice them, 35 or so DD and TB, some obsolete, and none notably well-designed.

That is not much superior in combat power to the French Atlantic and Channel Squadrons (two modern BC, a crap carrier, a heavy and two light cruisers, a dozen DD) never mind the RN

You do have 25 coastal (very coastal) and around 14 seagoing U-boats - rough figures per wiki; I could look up how many were actually capable of deployment, but let's assume optimistically if this is planned it can be all of them. They might accomplish something because RN ASW is not nearly up to speed yet. But they tried in OTL
 
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Two questions:
1- Assuming that the German high command is already contemplating an invasion of the UK (set aside for the moment how unlikely that would be to actually succeed) what should the KM do at the beginning of the war to help such a plan as possible?
2- What should the KM do at the beginning of the war to have the most impact on trying to actually win the war?
 

Khanzeer

Banned
1 strongly advise against it

2 what are the goals for winning ? If it's to tie up RN, the " fleet in being strategy " was not bad at all actually

I personally think Bismarck should have never sortied into the Atlantic at all

Realistically what is even a squadron of battleship likely to achieve so far from their logistical base, it was a matter of pride more than anything else
 
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CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
Two questions:
1- Assuming that the German high command is already contemplating an invasion of the UK (set aside for the moment how unlikely that would be to actually succeed) what should the KM do at the beginning of the war to help such a plan as possible?
2- What should the KM do at the beginning of the war to have the most impact on trying to actually win the war?
Scrap everything heavier than the Hipper class. Build U-boats and destroyers like they're going out of style. Buy the plans for the Shinshu Maru AK and Daihatsu landing boat from the Japanese and start turning them out as quickly as the yards can manage. Subcontract some work to Italian and Swedish yards (you can build a LOT of landing boats with the steel of one Bismarck, but more yards the better).
 
Scrap everything heavier than the Hipper class. Build U-boats and destroyers like they're going out of style. Buy the plans for the Shinshu Maru AK and Daihatsu landing boat from the Japanese and start turning them out as quickly as the yards can manage. Subcontract some work to Italian and Swedish yards (you can build a LOT of landing boats with the steel of one Bismarck, but more yards the better).
Is this a Scapa Flow or a sea lion proposition?
 
Has this scenario ever been discussed here?

Was there any hope of Germany concentrating all of its air and naval forces on the British fleet and delivering the kind of destruction that would have made Operation Sealion feasable?
As per the titel its going to be a surprise attack. Politically far out but if they were planning a surprise attack they could land a single person with a lamp on lamb holm (uninhabited island on the side of the passage that Priem used in otl), and guide in 15 submarines to slaughter the home fleet.
I imagine it to play out the way that Germany stand down after the British guarantee to Poland. Then strike a few weeks later when the home fleet is back in port.
 

nbcman

Donor
^ can german subs of 1939 , keep up with home fleet if they are submerged ?
Nope. Class II subs that are the most numerous German sub in 1939 could do 7 knots submerged and 13 knots on the surface going full out. The old RN R class BBs could make 21 knots and could cruise at almost the full surfaced speed of a sub.
 
No. The top speed of six knots or so is just about enough to keep up with a slow convoy, if you're not worried about running out of battery charge, which every skipper was.
 
As per the titel its going to be a surprise attack. Politically far out but if they were planning a surprise attack they could land a single person with a lamp on lamb holm (uninhabited island on the side of the passage that Priem used in otl), and guide in 15 submarines to slaughter the home fleet.
I imagine it to play out the way that Germany stand down after the British guarantee to Poland. Then strike a few weeks later when the home fleet is back in port.

What was peacetime port security like at this time?
Also, how effective was British intelligence in 1939?
 
1 sub with the KMs best in command just about managed to scrape his way in and sunk the Royal Oak

And then he very nearly buggered it up
 

Khanzeer

Banned
Nope. Class II subs that are the most numerous German sub in 1939 could do 7 knots submerged and 13 knots on the surface going full out. The old RN R class BBs could make 21 knots and could cruise at almost the full surfaced speed of a sub.
exactly so as an anti-warship weapon the subs are useless

except for coastal defence and sneak attacks on poorly or undefended harbors
 
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