WI: The DPRK Sinks a Cruiser

TFSmith121

Banned
How many major warships (cruiser size and above) were

There's a museum in Pyongyang that displays a torpedo boat which sank the USS Baltimore during the Battle of Chumonchin Chan. Baltimore was never deployed to Korea, but the cruisers USS Juneau and HMS Jamaica were present at the battle. What if the torpedo boats had been successful in sinking one of the two cruisers?

How many major warships (cruiser size and above) were ever hit by a torpedo from an MTB, much less sunk?

Hell, make it destroyer size or above...hell, make it minesweeper size or above.

The IDF couldn't sink a converted Victory ship with three MTBs and multiple fast jets; seems rather doubtful the NKs could do it.

Best,
 
How many major warships (cruiser size and above) were ever hit by a torpedo from an MTB, much less sunk?

Hell, make it destroyer size or above...hell, make it minesweeper size or above.

The IDF couldn't sink a converted Victory ship with three MTBs and multiple fast jets; seems rather doubtful the NKs could do it.

Best,

Didn't the Italians sink a Austrian battlewagon with a torpedo boat during WW1?
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Yep, that's one. The MAS.15 hit Szent István 

Didn't the Italians sink a Austrian battlewagon with a torpedo boat during WW1?

Yep, that's one. The MAS.15 hit Szent István with two 18-inch torpedoes in 1918; the Austrian battleship had a top speed of 20 knots and, of course, there was no radar, air cover, or anything else.

The North Korean boats were ex-Soviet craft that had a lot in common with the Italian MAS and British CMBs of WW I; they were not a threat of any significance to modern warships in the 1950s.

Best,
 
Yep, that's one. The MAS.15 hit Szent István with two 18-inch torpedoes in 1918; the Austrian battleship had a top speed of 20 knots and, of course, there was no radar, air cover, or anything else.

The North Korean boats were ex-Soviet craft that had a lot in common with the Italian MAS and British CMBs of WW I; they were not a threat of any significance to modern warships in the 1950s.

Best,

Didn't the Italians damage a British battleship with a torpedo boat in Alexandria harbor? Or was that a manned torpedo?
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Minisub, actually; the Maile were basically

Didn't the Italians damage a British battleship with a torpedo boat in Alexandria harbor? Or was that a manned torpedo?

Minisub, actually; the Maile, or SLCs, were basically SDVs, capable of delivering two combat swimmers and an explosive charge that could be fixed to an anchored or moored ship as a limpet mine.

Best,
 
How many major warships (cruiser size and above) were ever hit by a torpedo from an MTB, much less sunk?
Italians MTBs bagged two Austrian capital ships during WW1... SMS Wien in harbour and SMS Szent István at sea.

British MBTs operated against Soviet vessels around Kronstadt during the intervention in the Russian Civil War. They managed to sink the cruiser Oleg and heavily damage the per-Dreadnought Andrei Pervozvanny. Some sources claim they also damaged the Battleship Petropavlovsk, but other sources dispute this.

HMS Manchester was scuttled after heavy damage from Italian MTBs during Operation Pedestal. Not strictly a torpedo boat attack, but HMS York was badly damaged by Italian explosive motorboats in March '41 and ultimately scuttled before the fall of Crete.

HMS Newcastle was damaged by Schnellboots in June '42. Quickly skimming wikipedia there are claims that S-Boots claimed a second cruiser damaged, but the name of the vessel goes unmentioned (and I can't be stuffed trawling through the history of every cruiser in service in the Atlantic and Med during WW2).
 
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TFSmith121

Banned
Wien was a coast defense ship from the 1880s at anchor

Italians MTBs bagged two Austrian capital ships during WW1... SMS Wien in harbour and SMS Szent István at sea.

British MBTs operated against Soviet vessels around Kronstadt during the intervention in the Russian Civil War. They managed to sink the cruiser Oleg and heavily damage the per-Dreadnought Andrei Pervozvanny. Some sources claim they also damaged the Battleship Petropavlovsk, but other sources dispute this.

HMS Manchester was scuttled after heavy damage from Italian MTBs during Operation Pedestal. Not strictly a torpedo boat attack, but HMS York was badly damaged by Italian explosive motorboats in March '41 and ultimately scuttled before the fall of Crete.

HMS Newcastle was damaged by Schnellboots in June '42. Quickly skimming wikipedia there are claims that S-Boots claimed a second cruiser damaged, but the name of the vessel goes unmentioned (and I can't be stuffed trawling through the history of every cruiser in service in the Atlantic and Med during WW2).

Wien was a coast defense ship from the 1880s at anchor; the others were all incidents involving multiple threats, and none of which could have been duplicated by the NKPN in the 1950s.

Best,
 
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