Yes, but Altmark was a freighter and could blend in quite easily to the merchant traffic. Graf Spee was a pocket battleship and therefore would stand out quite a bit. I'd say that the odds are more like 10%.
Graf Spee escapes - the triumph of Raeder
- Thread starter Gudestein
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Yes, but Altmark was a freighter and could blend in quite easily to the merchant traffic. Graf Spee was a pocket battleship and therefore would stand out quite a bit. I'd say that the odds are more like 10%.
Did some check and the Graf Spee had been refueled on November 26th and Altmark still had extra fuel so no need for the maybe too lucky capture of fuel supplies.
The 10% Odds of escaping the south Atlantic are simply too low. IOTL Bismarck, even when successfully intercepted managed to elude her followers. The carriers are the more dangerous ones after her ITTL and they just cant cover the space of the South Atlantic. Furthermore, the British units cannot match Graf Spees cruise speed.
Please remember IOTL Graf Spee got caught because she didn't know when to stop. That is the POD ITTL.
No, I meant a 10% chance of making back to Germany. And a quick glance at Wiki shows that Graf Spee's top speed was 29 knots. Exeter was faster, as was Renown.
The way back
Following the unknowingly narrow escape and capture of a British freighter, Graf Spee changed east to sail south of Trinidad and then turned north towards Ascension.
Langsdorff anticipated correctly that any units looking for him would scout the coast of South America or Africa (Britwanks please notice the size of these areas to look in) where commercial traffic would be the heaviest and decided to go between these two approaches.
The radio intercept did receive encoded British radio traffic indicating the presence of naval units to the west . Langsdorff was starting to get happy with his decision to turn back.
Graf Spee passed 300 km west of ascension on the 19th and east of St. Paul on the 21st. Graf Spee would now enter the North Atlantic.
Following the unknowingly narrow escape and capture of a British freighter, Graf Spee changed east to sail south of Trinidad and then turned north towards Ascension.
Langsdorff anticipated correctly that any units looking for him would scout the coast of South America or Africa (Britwanks please notice the size of these areas to look in) where commercial traffic would be the heaviest and decided to go between these two approaches.
The radio intercept did receive encoded British radio traffic indicating the presence of naval units to the west . Langsdorff was starting to get happy with his decision to turn back.
Graf Spee passed 300 km west of ascension on the 19th and east of St. Paul on the 21st. Graf Spee would now enter the North Atlantic.
The Graf Spee is due to return home anyway. Its January 1940 and dark in the Northern Approaches most of the time. Not as much radar. Germans probably make it home.
She would go into a refit then. Perhaps the Germans may abort that and use her in Norway. Of course this may butterfly the whole Altmark incident and perhaps the Norway invasion away.
She would probably go raiding again in the Fall of 40 like Scheer and Hipper.
Dramatic changes could occur if:
a) With this one less loss Germans decide to just raid with these medium ships and keep Bismark and Tirpitz as a fleet in being to keep the British from forming as many hunter groups.
b) Without this loss Hitler becomes less cautious with the navy and something like the Battle of Barents turns into a victory instead of a defeat and there is no scrap the fleet order.
She would go into a refit then. Perhaps the Germans may abort that and use her in Norway. Of course this may butterfly the whole Altmark incident and perhaps the Norway invasion away.
She would probably go raiding again in the Fall of 40 like Scheer and Hipper.
Dramatic changes could occur if:
a) With this one less loss Germans decide to just raid with these medium ships and keep Bismark and Tirpitz as a fleet in being to keep the British from forming as many hunter groups.
b) Without this loss Hitler becomes less cautious with the navy and something like the Battle of Barents turns into a victory instead of a defeat and there is no scrap the fleet order.
Just extrapolation from similar threads ....... perhaps the biggest smiley in the universe was also required a mixture of
Also these Nazi wank threads hardly ever pay more than the faintest bit of lip service to the atrocities that their timelines would add to, otl was horrific enough without giving the Third Reich extra time to run the death camps etc etc etc.
Archibald's initial post was quite funny and a good send up of unrealistic German-wanks (which by the way may not have been the OPs initial intent). However, you went off track when you got serious. People proposing Naziwank TLs don't need to be lectured about Nazi atrocities and how worse things would have been if the TLs actually happened. We all know that and that is often part of the fictional fascination with Evil and why TLs that feature Confederate, Nazi, Japanese, Soviet, Draka, Imperialist British, etc victories over the "good guys" are far more popular than Tls that imagine a sweet and better world where we all respect each other.
According to the website for the RFA Cherryleaf: 10 December 1939 off St. Pauls Rocks at 3 00N 31 00W met HMS HERMES and Force X during the hunt for the Graf Spee.
So there's a good chance that Graf Spee avoids Harwood and bumps into Force X instead, or at least a plane from Hermes.
And I'm rather offended by the casual insult to people who point out that the chances of Graf Spee making it all the way home were not very high.
There's another issue here - after the Bismarck chase the RN expended quite a lot of effort sweeping up the remaining German tankers, and pretty much got the lot - crippling any future German raiding sorties. If that happens earlier ITTL (and it's a plausible butterfly) any future German raiding sorties are toast.
ummmm not quite........hms Cumberland cruised from the falklands to the river plate at 30 knots......that would be faster than graff spees top speed on trials.And according to the ever reliable wiki Hms Cumberland could cruise at 31.5 knots for a mere 3100 nautical miles
Now lets add the lovely barnicles on graff spees bottom and the wear and tear on her reciprocating engines and if my memory serves correct at the time her top speed was 26 knots.Then we should not forget that having avoided contact by accident there is no apparent reason for her to depart as fast as possible,so would more than likely linger in the target rich environment of the river plate........so the noose tightens with 2 heavy and 2 light cruisers and possibly ark royal ,renown and a few more cruisers on the way.
"They" may know that but "They" hardly ever write about it in their timelines, I can't name one Nazi-wank which explicitly discourses on the additional human suffering which would occur when the proposed pod extends the reign of Third Reich.
The OP has already served up a successful Sealion and Nazi spy running MI5/6 , shades of Green and Overon
Deleted member 1487
Calbear has admited a degree of handwavium to set the scene foe the Anglo/American Nazi War to allow 1950's tech to used so not a Naziwank in my understanding but if you want to call that TL a naziwank then yes that's one that does.
Mr Bluenotes TL I've not read but it's from 2004
So what is the ratio? One every 5 years
Mr Bluenotes TL I've not read but it's from 2004
So what is the ratio? One every 5 years
Thanks for this info. It is assumed that this force would have moved South-west to hunt for Graf Spee at its lost known position. The time are 9 days apart and with Graf Spee cruising at 20 knots that's thousands of miles.Its possible, but not likely. There are other risks which is why a granted a 50/50 chance of sinking it. Having broken into the Atlantic that has already increased.
And yes, sorry about the wank comment, but please look at the opposition I got at a time when I had only stated a POD where Graf Spee changed its course.
I will maintain there is nothing unrealistic/implausible so far and the comments that this could never work and so forth should be able to take a few friendly comments. There will be ample chance to criticize potential butterfly effects later on. That criticism will be most welcome to help keep the timeline in check. We obviously will see some down-stream effects and they should be -if not the only possible outcome - then at least possible.
And BTW, I do appreciate the criticism so far as well, I just didn't want to take it all lying down.
That is a good point and if this happens the Germans will need a good response to maintain efficient raiding.
ummmm not quite........hms Cumberland cruised from the falklands to the river plate at 30 knots......that would be faster than graff spees top speed on trials.And according to the ever reliable wiki Hms Cumberland could cruise at 31.5 knots for a mere 3100 nautical miles
Now lets add the lovely barnicles on graff spees bottom and the wear and tear on her reciprocating engines and if my memory serves correct at the time her top speed was 26 knots.Then we should not forget that having avoided contact by accident there is no apparent reason for her to depart as fast as possible,so would more than likely linger in the target rich environment of the river plate........so the noose tightens with 2 heavy and 2 light cruisers and possibly ark royal ,renown and a few more cruisers on the way.
Try measuring the distance from the Falklands to the River Plate.
The speed you can find quoted as between 25 and 29.5 knots with most hits at 28. That is find with hundred-thousands of miles in advance and a changing course.
Also, she did expect she was being chased and decided to turn home (see POD). No lingering, no noose.
Not to belabor a point that is tangental, I will note that CalBear's "naziwank" describes the racist brutality of the momentarily sucessful Nazi domination of Europe.
But I don't really see that this matters. It seems to me that you are very close to implying the OP and others who have interest in military naziwank TLs are in some way apologists because they don't mention the murder of additional millions that a longer 3rd Reich would mean. I do not agree. I prefer to believe they are people interested in alternate military outcomes, period.
I think we all need to keep in mind that basically nothing has happened yet, so jumping all over the OP for making a Naziwank is more than a little premature. Let's just let the man write and judge the events as they come. I honestly have no idea how this is gonna add up to anything significant, but I'm open to finding out.
Saphroneth
Banned
More like they'd be SOL in trying. They can't exactly sneak out another load of fuel tankers... if they could, they'd have done it OTL instead of doing the Channel Dash, right? Raiders raiding is more useful than raiders in Kiel/Wilhelmshafen/Bergen.