Sir John Valentine Carden Survives. Part 2.

All of the individual decisions were sensible in isolation but the cumulative result was that the RN had an absolute mess in the medium calibres that was a problem.
Which had no military effect. A lot was down to a need to get anything built and wartime keeping old ships in commission , the 4.7 was replaced by the 4.5 but had to be kept in production to arm ships to stop a bottleneck in ship construction. Same reasoning with the retention of 4 inch and older marks of gun, obsolete but guns were needed and ammunition still available.
Battleship guns, well the 15 inch was an old gun with none of the planned new ships down to use them ( Vanguard only reused stored turrets to build the ship faster as a wartime expedient ). The 14 inch was down to treaty limitations with all the post treaty designs due to be 16 inch. A later WW2 would have seen fewer 15 inch ships as they were due for replacement once the Lions started commissioning.
 
Not to mention the switch from 15-inch guns to 14-inch for their battleships. A more minor issue, but when every one of your capital ships but 5 of them use 15-inch shells, sounds like a headache for the people in charge of logistics.
Much less of an issue given the limited numbers of ships and guns involved. As others have remarked, the morass of medium calibre weapons in RN service was a classic example of not seeing the wood for the trees. Should have accepted “good enough” performance as a compromise to reduce the number of guns, simplify logistics and improve speed, flexibility and efficiently of building them. That’s a discussion worthy of its own thread though.
 
That finally makes sense; I’ve always wondered why the allies invaded Italy as opposed to a “commando raid that stayed” in Norway. It seemed there would be more benefits to cutting Swedish Iron Ore, helping the Murmansk convoys than invading Italy, should Churchill feel the need to attack a country whose geography is optimised for the defender. (And if the idea was to get an axis nation to turn co-belligerent, wouldn’t Finland be more of an useful ally than Italy?)

Apart from FFO-APOD, I can’t even recall seeing a timeline where “Fortitude North” was launched.
Winston Churchill said:
...It has come to be accepted by us as an axiom that it is impossible to land anywhere against opposition, including air opposition, however limited, without superior air-strength. This is a hard saying, which limits all use of sea-power to the very small portions of the French coast which are under home-based fighter protection, and consequently to those points on the enemy's coasts where his best troops are concentrated and in the highest state of readiness. Without in any way disputing the desirability of having superior air-power and fighter cover, it may be questioned whether it is indispensable if the objective is of sufficient value and there is no other way. The lessons of the Norwegian campaign in the spring of 1940 must not be overstressed. We had practically no anti-aircraft artillery, and we exposed many scores of vessels for a month to the enemy's air attack without any compensating air defence. There were scarcely a dozen anti-aircraft guns available to us on shore. We landed over 20,000 men at Namsos and Andalsnes and brought them off again without undue loss, and the reason we came off was as much the military strength of the enemy as his air-power. It is not intended to press this argument too far, but there is no doubt that even merchant ships which have very powerful Oerlikon and other flak defence can, for a while and for an adequate need, carry out an operation without total destruction. The last Russian convoy was attacked continuously for four or five days with a loss of 20 per cent. It is a question whether it is better to land without fighter cover at a point where the enemy are very weak in armour and troops, or with fighter cover at a point where the enemy are very strong in armour and ground troops. it is a question of emphasis and proportion...
- The Second World War volume IV, 'Strategic Natural Selection' (excerpt from communication from Winston Churchill to General Ismay about 'Operation Jupiter', dated 13th June, 1942)

Reading that, it seems to me easy to see where the PQ17 & PQ18 disasters came from, and Operation Pedestal. Although at least for Pedestal it might be argued that the objective of resupplying Malta was of sufficient value and that there was no other way.

(I think there might have been a comment back in 'volume I' by Churchill that in hindsight he didn't have a clue how dangerous aircraft attack could get to shipping, but I can't remember exactly where the comment was...)
 
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All of the individual decisions were sensible in isolation but the cumulative result was that the RN had an absolute mess in the medium calibres that was a problem.
Not really.

Ever hear of an RN ship having to sail without ammunition?

The USN had 5"/51, 5"/38 and 5"/25 all with differing shell types, 4" guns for the flush deck destroyers and several marks of 3" guns in service in WW2.

USN BB guns had the same spread of size in 16", 14" and 12" with the added complexity of the 16" and 14" guns not all firing the same shells.

People fixate on the RN not standardizing but it was common throughout all of the worlds large naval services.
 
Not to mention the switch from 15-inch guns to 14-inch for their battleships. A more minor issue, but when every one of your capital ships but 5 of them use 15-inch shells, sounds like a headache for the people in charge of logistics.

Why is this an issue only an issue for the RN when the USN had 16" guns that fired different shell types between ship classes, as did some of the 14" guns?
 
The Bismarck??
What a few KM fanboys claim. It wasn't a bad ship but half a generation behind the USN and RN in DP armament and armour design. Good shooting though against Hood but the flaws in the design of fire control runs meant this was vulnerable. And having both front turrets knocked out by one shell doesn't look great either.
 
What a few KM fanboys claim. It wasn't a bad ship but half a generation behind the USN and RN in DP armament and armour design. Good shooting though against Hood but the flaws in the design of fire control runs meant this was vulnerable. And having both front turrets knocked out by one shell doesn't look great either
My goodness, we are off topic, aren't we?
 
Not really.

Ever hear of an RN ship having to sail without ammunition?

The USN had 5"/51, 5"/38 and 5"/25 all with differing shell types, 4" guns for the flush deck destroyers and several marks of 3" guns in service in WW2.

USN BB guns had the same spread of size in 16", 14" and 12" with the added complexity of the 16" and 14" guns not all firing the same shells.

People fixate on the RN not standardizing but it was common throughout all of the worlds large naval services.

The fact that others also got in a pickle is not a defense of the RN. As I said I understand why the RN got into the position it did and enormous resources of the British Empire meant that as you said they never put to sea with empty magazines but the need to keep large stocks of multiple ammunition types probably cost the RN more than if they had "stuck to their guns" and consolidated. The 4.7" is forgiveable but the entire 5.25" saga was idiotic.
 
Didn't they propose American 75mm shells because there was a working supply line for them where there wasn't any production lines in the UK for other 75mm ammo since it wasn't a standard UK calibre?
img528.jpg

https://web.archive.org/web/20121025123006/http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/alt WW2 tank gun.htm
There are 2 elements projectile and case and as I understand it was a bit of mix and match
Left to right
6pdr
US75mm
As the case sizes are similar it is easy to adapt the 6pdr to fire the US 75mm - small adjustments to breech and increase the bore. This gives a small improvement in armour penetration but a much better HE shell
17pdr
77mm
The case for the 77mm is from the 75mm AA gun (which would have been used for the 75mm HV gun), so change the bore to use 17pdr ammo. Why create a new design of projectile when you can recycle the 17pdr version?

NB the difference in case size between the US 75mm and UK 77mm; versus the similarity for 6pdr and US 75mm.
 
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The case for the 77mm is from the 75mm AA gun (which would have been used for the 75mm HV gun)
Actually not. The 75 mm HV and the 77 mm both used the case from the 3” 20 cwt AA gun, which was still in production. The 75 mm AA gun, in the context of this discussion was a relatively short run export model from the 30’s.
 
15 February 1942. Singapore.
15 February 1942. Singapore.

Lieutenant-General Percival’s Chief of Staff, Brigadier Kenneth Torrance, noted that Percival seemed slightly off colour. The GOC Malaya Command explained that he hadn’t slept well the previous night, he’d had a nightmare about walking up a road in a group who were carrying both the union flag and a white flag, surrendering his command to a Japanese general. He’s woken up covered in sweat and the dream had been so real he couldn’t get back to sleep.

Torrance made sure that his CO had a cup of tea, and then handed him a signal that had just come in from London. The Prime Minister congratulated Percival for his defence of northern Malaya, the success of the counterattack and noted that the congratulations should be passed on to everyone under his command.

The sting in the tail was that, after consultations with General Auchinleck, it was decided that a new Army would be formed in Malaya from the forces currently under Percival’s Command. The creation of the 12th Army, consisting of Indian III Corps, Australian I Corps, (with another Corps to be added) would be under the command of Lieutenant General Alan Cunningham.

General Auchinleck arrived later that morning to explain to Percival a bit more about why London had decided to make the change.

Cunningham had conquered the Italians in East Africa, and General Alan Brooke (Chief of the Imperial General Staff CIGS) was strongly of the opinion that he was the best man for the job. Lieutenant-General Heath (GOC III Indian Corps) would no doubt be delighted as they had worked well together in East Africa. Percival guessed that Bill Slim in Burma would be happy for the same reason. In some ways Percival was a little relieved. Commanding his forces was a strain, especially in the early days when so many things could have gone wrong.

Percival didn’t know Cunningham personally, though his reputation in bringing together Empire Forces from South Africa, East and West Africa, British and Sudanese was well appreciated. After the destruction of the Italians, Cunningham had been recalled to England, where he’d spent time in the War Office trying to help senior officers think through Corps and Army level command. Percival knew that he could have done with that kind of training before being appointed to Malaya. The other advantage, and this was perhaps why General Alan Brooke was keen to have Cunningham in command, was that the campaign in East Africa had been over some pretty horrible terrain. Pushing the Japanese out of Malaya, Borneo, and perhaps French Indo-China, would likely be every bit as difficult.

As well as Cunningham, 12th Army was being sent reinforcements that would be British V Corps, under the command of Lieutenant-General Edmund Schreiber. The 1st, 4th and 51st Divisions were all designated to sail to Singapore on the next couple of Winston Special Convoys. This Corps would also have an Army Tank Brigade assigned to it, with enough reinforcements to beef up the current Tank Brigades for the III Indian and I Australian Corps. Corps and Army level units of Artillery, Engineers, Signals, Medical etc would also be arriving in due course.

The Australian Corps would eventually be joined by the Australian 1 Armoured Division, bringing it up to three Australian Divisions. The III Indian Corps had been receiving drafts of troops to bring 9th and 11th Divisions back up to full strength, and in due course, 19th Indian Division, nearing the completion of its training, would join them, allowing British 18th Division to become an Army reserve.

Auchinleck told Percival that he wanted him on his ABDA staff, but there were other options, if he chose to return home. CIGS had said that Percival would have his pick of a number of roles in the War Office after his showing in Malaya. There was some obvious flattery at play here to take the sting out of Percival losing Malaya Command. Auchinleck gave him some time to think about it, after all Cunningham wouldn’t take up command of 12th Army until the beginning of March. By then, if the Australian Corps carried on the way it was going, it might have knocked the Japanese back towards the Thai border.
 
I think Percival should go home . His talents as a staff officer would be a definite asset to the War Office. Particularly when it comes to planning out the eventually return of the British armed forces to Western Europe.
 
I think Percival should go home . His talents as a staff officer would be a definite asset to the War Office. Particularly when it comes to planning out the eventually return of the British armed forces to Western Europe.
That and he needs a long rest. He was in over his head and he knew it. That kind of pressure takes a toll.
 
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