Maximilian von Spee successful.

[AussieHawker]

After watching this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtGRhK5RCHw) on Maximilian von Spee what changes would be needed for the best case scenario for him and his Squadron and causing damage to the enemy? Would a successful raid on the falklands for supplies allow him to get to a safe port? Or was he basically doomed in his position?

 

[Tocomocho]

I don't think he ever intended to raid the Falklands, did he? His aim was to make his way back to Europe. If he sunk Entente ships on the way as in Coronel, well, welcome that and the more the better.

It's hard to see him succeeding, simply because the closest he gets to Europe the bigger and harder the enemy response will be. So I'm afraid he'll just go down eventually. If not in the Falklands, in St Helena, or in Cape Verde, or the Açores, any other maritime hub.

 

[lhagambia]

The best result for Spee was to seek internship after Coronel. He and his crews would survive the war and he'd return to Germany a hero.

The plan to get back to Europe was nuts.

 

[Derek Jackson]

He surprises the Battle Cruisers fires and close range and two fluke shots cause that class of ship to blow up, as happened at Jutland

 

[jsb]

But with [FONT=Arial,Helvetica]21 cm guns is he really going to do anything ? (v 30.5cm that killed the BCs at Jutland even without mentioning the changes to handling used to speed up rate of fire post [/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Battle of Dogger Bank )

21cm v 30.5cm is 108kg v 405.5kg very different shells to be hit by.
[/FONT]

 

[The Oncoming Storm]

The British don't ground HMS Canopus in Stanley Harbour for use as look out, Von Spee manages to catch Sturdee's force at breakfast and inflicts enough damage to Invincible and Inflexible that they're unable to give chase and he escapes into the Atlantic. As mentioned above he'll almost certainly be destroyed somewhere further north unless he sails to Rio and is interred but it will be another shock to British public opinion and probably more blood on the walls at The Admiralty.

 

[NHBL]

Internment

It was bad luck that he ran into battlecruisers at the Falklands. If they hadn't been there, he could have left--but he's either sinking or getting interred somewhere. It would have been interesting if he'd interred in an American port.

 

[Zheng He]

What if he tries something different and instead heads around the Cape and tries to make for German East Africa? I know he still gets hunted down eventually but it could be interesting.

 

[ghappy1000]

Naval victories and/or political effects needed [excluding British surrender]

Would Japan staying neutral be enough to do the trick? Otherwise, there are so many significant pods to save Graf Spee's Squadron [and make the saga less famous] besides winning or avoiding the Falklands battle:
German naval victory in August to November 1914 [the more significant or destructive to the British, the better].
Breakout of the German battlecruisers and other cruisers to the Atlantic and/or overseas [disposition] [although the ships would be lost as well].
[At least] Italy joining the Central Powers [in 1914].
[Regardless of possibilities, Japan, United States and probably Netherlands and China, doubtful for the latter two.]
France [or Russia] surrendering [assuming Britain stays in the fight, which may need an Entente Great Power to continue fighting until 1915].
Proceeding to German [East] Africa [dubious as well and effectively making the ships useless if they evade the Entente navies in the Pacific].
More commerce raiders and/or blockade runners.
No battles of Coronel and Tahiti [or either one].
[Adequate supply ships?]
More battleships, battlecruisers and armoured cruisers constructed by Germany, Austria Hungary and the Ottoman Empire [if possible].

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

But with [FONT=Arial,Helvetica]21 cm guns is he really going to do anything ? (v 30.5cm that killed the BCs at Jutland even without mentioning the changes to handling used to speed up rate of fire post [/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Battle of Dogger Bank )

21cm v 30.5cm is 108kg v 405.5kg very different shells to be hit by.
[/FONT]

I don't know how much damage those guns can do to the British battle-cruisers.

However, once he is spotted by the British his squadron is doomed regardless of what he does. Therefore if I had been Spee I would have used the element of surprise do as much damage to the enemy as I could before I was overwhelmed.

The damage to the enemy might not be very much, but it would give the light cruisers a better chance of escape. If all 3 of them had escaped, they would have been found and sunk eventually, but it would have tied down even more allied ships than the search for the Dresden did. And while they were at liberty they might have sunk some Allied merchant ships.

How wide and deep is the entrance to Stanley harbour? Could the British ships be stranded there if Spee had successfully scuttled his armoured cruisers in the harbour.

 

[GarethC]

But with [FONT=Arial,Helvetica]21 cm guns is he really going to do anything ? (v 30.5cm that killed the BCs at Jutland even without mentioning the changes to handling used to speed up rate of fire post [/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Battle of Dogger Bank )

21cm v 30.5cm is 108kg v 405.5kg very different shells to be hit by.
[/FONT]

I've read (and dammit, I can't recall either source in detail) both that while S&G scored a number of hits on the I-classes, none of them penetrated, and also contrariwise that Invincible's belt was penetrated by an 8.2" that landed in a magazine but failed to detonate. A quick Google gives a number of non-scholarly references to the Germans being unable to penetrate the British armour, but nothing primary-sourcelike.

-edit - well, Wikipedia references Massie's Castles of Steel saying that a shell penetrated at the waterline and flooded a coal bunker, which has the right feel for what I was trying to remember.

-2nd edit - McNally's Coronel and the Falklands 1914 says that the round hit the bulkhead separating the coal bunker from the magazine for P & Q turrets and failed to explode.

 

[zoomar]

I have gamed Graf Spee's ill-fated raid on the Falklands several times with the excellent NWS PC simulation "Steam and Iron". Based upon this simulation, I believe von Spee would have been far better served if he had closed at high speed with the BCs in harbor and attempted to disable or even destroy them before they fully got up steam. The 8.2 inch guns on his armored cruisers were capable of penetrating the armor of the BCs at close range and, even if von Spee did not achieve a knockout blow, any damage he caused might have reduced the BC's speed and ability to chase him down. Canopus is no real threat. Even if the BCs survived the attack relatively unscathed and eventually destroyed or scattered his force, that is better than being pounded to pieces at long range by ships that can both outrun and outfight him at long range. In reality, von Spee was too cautious - or perhaps overawed by the BCs - he did the very worst thing he could have done...try to outrun a faster and better armed enemy.

As others have said he would probably be hunted down eventually (or find only a temporary refuge in German SW Africa or Cameroon) unless he opted to go to a neutral port and internment once he decided he had done enough damage to British shipping to justify the effective loss of his cruisers to the German war effort. As NHBL says, it would be interesting if he sought internment in the USA.

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

Perhaps it would help if the Germans had not run into storms as they rounded Cape Horn? As I recall, they had to dump about half their coal during this, which likely played a role in Spee's decision to head to the Falklands.

Related question -- if Spee and his ships had managed to make it into the Atlantic, where was he planning to go? Do we know if he was planning to sail straight for Europe, or did his route at least go by Africa?

 

[Coulsdon Eagle]

I've read (and dammit, I can't recall either source in detail) both that while S&G scored a number of hits on the I-classes, none of them penetrated, and also contrariwise that Invincible's belt was penetrated by an 8.2" that landed in a magazine but failed to detonate. A quick Google gives a number of non-scholarly references to the Germans being unable to penetrate the British armour, but nothing primary-sourcelike.

-edit - well, Wikipedia references Massie's Castles of Steel saying that a shell penetrated at the waterline and flooded a coal bunker, which has the right feel for what I was trying to remember.

-2nd edit - McNally's Coronel and the Falklands 1914 says that the round hit the bulkhead separating the coal bunker from the magazine for P & Q turrets and failed to explode.

I can also recall a quote along the same lines as your original pre-edit post but cannot find the source either. The inference was that Invincible only just postponed her fate by 18 months. I have thought about a TL where this actually did occur and the butterflies in terms of the RN's battlecruiser force.

Burt's "British Battleships of World War One" [despite the name it does cover battlecruisers!] mentions at least three 8.2" hits on Invincible and states she "had received 22 hits, including two below the waterline, but sustained no casualties and no serious damage."

 

[Coulsdon Eagle]

I can also recall a quote along the same lines as your original pre-edit post but cannot find the source either. The inference was that Invincible only just postponed her fate by 18 months. I have thought about a TL where this actually did occur and the butterflies in terms of the RN's battlecruiser force.

Burt's "British Battleships of World War One" [despite the name it does cover battlecruisers!] mentions at least three 8.2" hits on Invincible and states she "had received 22 hits, including two below the waterline, but sustained no casualties and no serious damage."

In the latest issue of "The Great War" magazine there is an article written by the Hon. Barry Bingham, V.C., Invincible's gunery officer at the Falklands.

"The Invincible was hit no fewer than twenty-two times, but only twice below the water-line. Of these two hits, one shell penetrated beneath the armoured belt and exploded in a hundred-ton coal bunker alongside the magazine of the midship turret. The extra plating, however, between the two compartments withstood the explosion, and the shell merely expended itself in the bunker, which instantly flooded. To right matters, the corresponding bunker on the other side of the ship had only to be flooded."

My reading of this is that the bunker was outboard of the magazine as protection, and this worked as designed. Assume the hit came when the range was closed to dive beneath the belt.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Had Invincible or Inflexible been destroyed by a fluke hit, does Von Spee get away? Assuming the armoured cruisers now scatter, the surviving battlecruiser could chase down one of the armoured cruisers, but not both.

I have to wonder how Von Spee would have done with an additional pair of ACRs.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

Does
Gibel' mean 'sunk'?

 

[Ramontxo]

Didn’t the light cruisers had torpedoes ? If so a close range attack at the harbour could easily be devastating to the British force.

 

[JLBB]

Didn’t the light cruisers had torpedoes ? If so a close range attack at the harbour could easily be devastating to the British force.

All of Spee's cruisers had torpedos.

 

[jsb]

Didn’t the light cruisers had torpedoes ? If so a close range attack at the harbour could easily be devastating to the British force.

If they can navigate the bend into the harbour ? (cant find the map of where the ships are but don't the Germans have to get past outer harbour with Canopus grounded in it before they can fire at the BCs ?)