Options German Pacific fleet 1914
- Thread starter Carl Schwamberger
- Start date
Be afraid. Be very,very afraid.
I’m sorry! Please call off the emu hit team!
According to the Wikipedia article the French destroyed the coals supplies at Tahiti when the German arrived (regardless, I agree the Germans seem to have coalers and plenty of coal supply when they approached the Falklands). The article notes the supplies of ammo shot up in the bombardment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardment_of_Papeete
I still wonder if keeping the two AC at Rabaul would have been better. (Yes the Australia is around, but its only 1 BC), It will be hard to get at the German ships in the inner harbor, land some guns + men to help the defense. (The Nuremberg could detach for raiding independently). (The Leipzig is on the west coast of America and could raid independently)
http://www.navy.gov.au/history/feature-histories/capture-rabaul-and-sydneyemden-engagement-1914
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_occupation_of_German_New_Guinea
trajen777
Banned
According to the Wikipedia article the French destroyed the coals supplies at Tahiti when the German arrived (regardless, I agree the Germans seem to have coalers and plenty of coal supply when they approached the Falklands). The article notes the supplies of ammo shot up in the bombardment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardment_of_Papeete
I still wonder if keeping the two AC at Rabaul would have been better. (Yes the Australia is around, but its only 1 BC), It will be hard to get at the German ships in the inner harbor, land some guns + men to help the defense. (The Nuremberg could detach for raiding independently). (The Leipzig is on the west coast of America and could raid independently)
http://www.navy.gov.au/history/feature-histories/capture-rabaul-and-sydneyemden-engagement-1914
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_occupation_of_German_New_Guinea
Interesting .. U could have fortified w Whig guns, but this would in the end have ended in the loss of the entire unit with little british loss. So a break up and massive surface raid with each taking down 10 plus Brit merchant ships, then going to neutral port might be best .
Ibuki was a more likely antagonist, being engaged in the chasse for Spee OTL
Spee's concern was that he could not get coal in the Indian Ocean, but could get coal in South America.
Emden alone captured about 20,000 tons of the stuff - maybe half the good Cardiff brand, the other half more lousy local brown coal.
It's roughly equidistant from Tsingtao to Argentina as Tsingtao to South Africa. If Spee goes for Argentina he's basically taken himself off the chess board for a couple months, and if the Royal Navy isn't playing Keystone Cops there really should be a welcoming committee there better than what Craddock alone could bring to the party, (the British had no business arriving at Coronel with the inferior force and there is a case Churchill should have been sacked for that debacle instead). OTOH, if Spee goes to the Indian Ocean he could conduct a fairly dangerous campaign there - he had sufficient strength to attack major ports and expect results. Best case scenario, he captures enough coal to enter the Atlantic. If not, he will have to lay up his AC's in East Africa and join forces there, after breaking the Konigsberg out.
It was one of the best trained units in the German navy and I disagree other than sinking Craddocks obsolete ships - it did bugger all to disrupt Entente shipping or further Germany's cause in the grand scheme of things before dying
I would have scattered the fleet and done as much damage as possible before the inevitable
When Emden attacked Pedang and sank the light cruiser Zemchug, he lacked the combat power for a major assault on the shipping choking the harbor. But Spee's whole squadron? Maybe a different story.
SsgtC
Banned
Not as much as you might think. The Is were obsolete and little better than a floating death trap against modern battlecruisers or battleships. So having them miss Dogger Bank is honestly, at worst nuetral for the RN. Maybe even a net gain. And Australia is not much better. She's still a first generation battlecruiser. So really no lose there.
The RN sent the ships they did to hunt down the German East Asia Squadron because they were expendable and they really couldn't be used, and expected to survive, against the HSF. You would have more of a point if the RN had sent Queen Mary or Tiger.
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But then the whole world knows where the wolves are and the hunters will close in - as it was Emden was run to ground 10 days later!
I am not sure why Emden did not attack the shipping in the harbour even to a limited extent? I cannot seem to find an explanation.
Grey Wolf
Donor
South America was the obvious play - sympathetic governments, interned ships that can provide crews or even their ships if they can get out. And the road to home lies up the East coast.
Von Spee had no reason to believe the British had sent battlecruisers to the Falklands. That would have seemed strategically very odd. And in a sense he managed to contrive to attack while they were still there
He could probably have taken on the other ships there and hoped to win, and if any ship was damaged hope to run her aground and get her crew off
Von Spee had no reason to believe the British had sent battlecruisers to the Falklands. That would have seemed strategically very odd. And in a sense he managed to contrive to attack while they were still there
He could probably have taken on the other ships there and hoped to win, and if any ship was damaged hope to run her aground and get her crew off
Md139115
Banned
If I remember, I will.
Problem is that I’m a slow writer, easily distracted, and have three different projects that rank higher in priority.
It could be six months, It could be ten years.
I disagree OTL OOB,
HMS Lion, Tiger, Princess Royal, New Zealand and Indomitable
v SMS Seydlitz, Moltke, Derfflinger and Blucher
Adding more Is will not hurt IMO, unless something goes very wrong the three real German BC have to match off L,T&PR so any more RN ships are just going to fight Blucher or be free to second one of the Germans without reply. Realistically I doubt much would actually change the OTL lack of clear division of targets will be unchanged but the slower ships will anyway not be in place to take a full part but maybe the stronger RN ships will not fixate on Blucher as its obvious that the many Is will do that job anyway, but we are talking Beatty's clear standing orders and flag signals so any F*** up imaginable is realistic?
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Beaty had enough already so why use two older, slower and weaker ships as well? Both HMS New Zealand and Indomitable were unable to stay with the faster HMS Lion, Princes Royal and Tiger, which singlehandedly fought the three German Battlecruisers and their slower consort Blücher. It was a failure the captain of HMS Tiger to target the same targetted ship the flagship Lion was shooting, so one German Battlecruiser remained unopposed, resulting in serious damage to the flagship Lion in return. Had Tiger engaged her assigned target (Moltke), the British already had a serious advantage in firepower. (HMS Tiger's gunnery was horrible during this fight. The hits scored on german ships were few though, except for Blücher, who was engaged by all British battlecruisers at some time. Seydlitz was only hit twice by HMS Lion, though seriously as all know. Derfflinger took one single hit from each HMS Lion, Tiger and Princes Royal, with little damage. Moltke remained undamaged. Blücher took the brunt of British fire and succumbed under a hail of shells (around 70 hits in all) and 7 torpedoes. On the other hand, HMS Lion was struck repeatedly by shells, 17 in all from all German battlecruisers and Blücher. HMS Tiger took 7 hits. HMS Indomitable was hit once by Blücher only.
Given that Fischer was in the Admiralty and had designed the things to hunt down German AC's, Spee had no cause to believe that in the month he spent picking his nose off Chile between Coronel and Falklands, that the British wouldn't send a couple BC's to end his parade.
Emden alone was too weak to tackle the entire port - Muller was relying on surprise.
I'd bet a couple German AC's in the Indian Ocean would draw a couple British BC's in response, after which the iron dice may roll. OTOH, there's so many potential targets in the IO it would probably be tougher to find Spee than while shaving the morning after arrival at Falklands, he pops over the horizon. My bet is that in the IO Spee captures more coal than he think he might, and may still make a break for Germany in November. Damage to the AC's isn't that big a deal - they'll run out of ammunition anyways after which their usefulness is more of the fleet in being variety, and if so, can drop off most of the crew in East Africa while the ship itself might become a floating warehouse in some remote bay or other.