Why were Scharnhorst's guns so small?

sharlin

Banned
If the germans were not hamstrung by their ROE they could have turned and fought and the pair would have probably overwhelmed the Renown, the sea was so rough the destroyers would be useless and launching torpedoes would have been near useless and a matter of luck to get one going in the right direction. But the Renown would have probably caused significant damage to the Germans before going down.

And a crippled BC would become a prime time target for anything the RN had in the region which at the time (considering this was in the Norway invasion) was quite a significant force including most of the Home Fleet.

The Germans would then face two options, abandoning the damaged ship to her fate, or the two ships sticking together and trying to return home at the speed of the slowest vessel at which point you risk both of them and both German ships were irriplacable.
 
Eighteen 280mm guns vs. six 15". If the Germans are serious about a fight and the weather negates the DD's and the Germans know its just Renown (they though there was another capital ship or at least a heavy cruiser) then I don't give Renown much chance at all. At the range in question Renown can't defeat the Twins citadel protection. You need a weird deflection (like north cape) to get a shell into the engineering spaces. As such the Twins should be able to avoid flooding of the engineering spaces and have full power; assuming the engines don't break down which one did break down here. Flooding of bow & stern spaces is very possible but to say it would be enough to slow the ships / doom them is a very large assumption.

Keep in mind N square. Renown because she is facing more firepower is going to loose her own combat power quicker and quicker as the combat advantage shifts more and more towards the Germans.


Michael
 
Eighteen 280mm guns vs. six 15". If the Germans are serious about a fight and the weather negates the DD's and the Germans know its just Renown (they though there was another capital ship or at least a heavy cruiser) then I don't give Renown much chance at all. At the range in question Renown can't defeat the Twins citadel protection. You need a weird deflection (like north cape) to get a shell into the engineering spaces. As such the Twins should be able to avoid flooding of the engineering spaces and have full power; assuming the engines don't break down which one did break down here. Flooding of bow & stern spaces is very possible but to say it would be enough to slow the ships / doom them is a very large assumption.

Keep in mind N square. Renown because she is facing more firepower is going to loose her own combat power quicker and quicker as the combat advantage shifts more and more towards the Germans.


Michael


On a one against two base, the Germans are in an advantage, as they can force the single British ship to split her already modest number of heavy guns on two targets, while the two German battleships can both bring on their whole armament normally. The British also had a disatvatage in speed, as the HSM Renown after her refit was just good for a maximum of 29 knots in fair wheather and certainly less in the heavy seas encountered, when in the OTL engaging Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. The two German battleship both could make 32 knots in fair wheather and had generally better lines and higher freeboard compared to the basically unaltered hulllines of HMS Renowns, which included a very low stern which tended to dig in at high speed.

The advantage in speed of around some 5 knots in the sort of wheather encountered was possibly a serious advantage for the germans, combined with their generally tougher protective systems and more numereous heavy guns, dispite them being smaller. The Germans could choose to engage and disengage at will against one target, if they knew HMS Renown was just alone out there (discounting the Destroyers). The Germans however expected correctly that both HMS Repulse and HMS Warspite were in the same general erea as well, as earlier scoutreports had confirmed the presence of these two ships as wel, although not precisely where. (HMS Repulse was patrolling of the Narvik erea, with her Destroyerscreen, while HMS Warspite was still in the region as well, acting as flagship of the Homefleet at the time. Further the 1st cruisers squadron of four heavy cruisers was known to have set sail for Norwegian waters earlier that week and was not reported yet about.

So the Germans had a lot of guessing to do, as they at the time lacked a reliable radar yet and other intelligence was also far from accurate.
 
So the Germans had a lot of guessing to do, as they at the time lacked a reliable radar yet and other intelligence was also far from accurate.

They had a radar and it spotted the British. As you pointed out though the Germans didn't know what else was in the area or how quick it might appear. While I generally discount the ability of Renown to cripple the twins at long range that doesn't mean its impossible either. Picking off a lone capital ship is all well and good but the real world really cooperates especially with fog of war.

I do wonder if the weather truly negated the DD's or not.

Michael
 
They had a radar and it spotted the British. As you pointed out though the Germans didn't know what else was in the area or how quick it might appear. While I generally discount the ability of Renown to cripple the twins at long range that doesn't mean its impossible either. Picking off a lone capital ship is all well and good but the real world really cooperates especially with fog of war.

I do wonder if the weather truly negated the DD's or not.

Michael


German protocole was to have their own capital ships (both battleships and cruisers) run away from opposing heavy units and enemy cruisers as well, since damage was something the Germans could not affort at all, as it would weaken their already under strength fleet. So Marschall did what he was supposed to do, namely disengage at the earliest opportunity, as he simply could not know HMS Renown was the only heavy British unit within reach. His radar was operational, but rather primitive still and lacked the needed range to spot potential dangers very far away. So Marschall used the one true advantage of the Scharnhorst class battleship, namely their superior speed, to get out of harms way. (after Gneisenau had been damaged by a single 15 inch and two 4.5 inch shells. One of the later hitting the foretop, damaging the firecontroll and radar.)

By the way, the British Destroyers were trained to operate in heavy seas, but had to cope with lower speeds possible, due to the shipping of much water. German destroyers were of a less wheaterly design and dispite being much bigger, suffered worse in heavy sea conditions. The Germans did not know that in 1940, untill experience showed this (sinking of HMS Glorious, Acasta and Ardent in 1940, battle in the Barentzsea, Battle of the North Cape were all examples of British destroyers performing well in poor wheater, while German destroyers in the two later battles performed below average.)
 
Top