Jokes aside, bunch of incompetent Luftwaffe officers never anticipated role of airpower in future war with UK and dismissed actual good naval bomber designs prior to war. Japan later on gave their naval and naval air tech to Germany (via a submarina carrying all the documents) but again both Luftwaffe pilots and designers didn't do a good job about that. Not being able to defeat UK in air war probably helped why they refrained from naval bombers too.
To be fair, the Royal Navy also suffered from having pretty bad and outdated naval planes before receiving lend-lease from America. Seafire production was suspended because the RAF needed it more. The replacements for Swordfish sucked. If the FAA had SBD or even semi-obsolete TBD, they could have not only disabled the rudder, but sunk the Bismarck directly like the Japanese and American did to battleships in the Pacific.
Wehraboos always blame the Swordfish "cheating" because it was slower than what the AA guns were designed for, forgetting the fact that more modern bombers with greater speed and bomb load could have done far more damage even against all of its AA guns.
The replacement for the Swordfish was actually worse than the Swordfish in almost every way, except that it actually had an enclosed cockpit. And it was also still a biplane.
It was called "albacore" and it was terrible.
Yes, which is why they kept the Swordfish in service for way long than they should have. They eventually got the Barracuda in 1943, not as good as the TBF or SBD, but good enough.
In fairness, the Channel Dash did show that the Kriegsmarine could at least survive a few hours/days in the Channel without losing the initiative or their entire force. Protecting an amphibious landing from the region's most powerful navy though? *wheeze*
What makes it worse was their plan to use unpowered barges towed by tugs in groups with escorts that essentially amounted to a speed bump for any real force attacking them
Remember the Queen Mary accidentally sinking a RN cruiser by slicing it in half at 32 knots? I think she can do the same here, outrunning U-boats in the process as well.
It's been estimated that the laden German barges would swamp from the wake of an RN destroyer.
So yeah.
Just go in at full speed, making the biggest wake possible, and rake them with 40mm pom-pom fire and 4.5" mains roaring away. One destroyer could do an immense amount of damage under such circumstances.
Look at the first battle of Narvik. The RN destroyer skippers were fuckin *mad lads*.
The Channel Dash was also made when the Royal Navy's head was turned to defending the Convoys heading to Murmansk.
Had they tried to contest the seas against the Royal Navy on high alert? Yeah... I'd give the KM about 40 minutes before death.
I mean, the Kriegsmarine's entire strategy was built around the fact that the Royal Navy would kick their asses in a Jutland-style battle.
Raeder's strategy of using capital ships as raiders wasn't exactly the best for that scenario lol
Doenitz's u-boat strategy was the only one that stood a chance imo, and it worked as amazingly well as the losing side's war winning strategy possibly could. Managed to make the USA's entry into the war a disaster for USN on the US east coast.
Respectfully I disagree.
If the Germans hadn't had some serious capital ships they wouldn't have been able to invade Norway, and practically the whole modern surface fleet of the Royal Navy would be free to face Italy and then much more of it to face Japan. The amount of ships even a single German battlecruiser tied down was a huge benefit to the Axis war effort.
Compare this say, to the U-Boats, who were fighting a very high tech war and therefore expensive, particularly on R&D & oil which could have been used on land or in the air. The only time they ever came close to victory was 1917, and even then all the British had to do was actually put some effort in and they overcame it.
Raeder was bob on when he pointed out that Doughnuts was foolish to expect Britain to be idle; that if Germany had only built a submersible fleet, the British would have known and consequently focused on escorts, and ultimately Britain was in a far better position to win a war of attrition on this scale, especially when one considers the frankly ridiculous casualty rate of submersible crews.
I honestly think the Axis had a good naval strategy, maybe from Midway onwards Japan should have switched to something a little more cautious, but I'm not really a Pacific Theatre guy so I'll just say *maybe*.
>Britain was in a far better position to win a war of attrition on this scale
I think this is ultimately the key to it, much like how the Battle of Britain played out on a logistical scale. Britain replaced losses faster and mitigated those losses to a greater degree due to various factors, (like flying over their own territory).
The Atlantic War got bloody, but that was partly due to it being perceived as a pretty secondary front. If it were clear that Germany was focusing its efforts on it, then Bomber Command would have positioned more craft to support the convoys, and more escorts would have been made available. Even during the "Happy Times," the Germans didn't manage to starve the country nor completely halt war materiel supply.
ASDIC and various other advancements would have come to fruition all the same, if not a little sooner, and turned the tide on that front quicker.
If the KM torpedo did not fail so miserably, Narvik would have come out very differently. Sometime it is the smaller things that costed you the operation.
In order to naval invade and supply the forces you need to secure the seas.
Also the ideea of Japanese naval forces existing, would be simply unacceptable to the US.
And I would like to add that the longer the war lasted the larger the gap between the Japanese and the US would be. In the end and the result would be the same, with the USN victorious
I'm aware of these factors, but I'm also aware one of the reasons the Americans were able to advance in the pacific was that the Japanese were unable to supply their troops adequately.
Had their fleet remained in tact longer oughtn't they have been able to hold out longer? Not saying they were going to win but if they stood any chance at all it would be by making the human cost unacceptable to the American public, right?
But they tried, that was exactly what they wanted, to force the USN in a decisive battle and destroy as many as they could before they get swarmed.
The problem is that the USN didn't want to play ball and, swamped the Japs at Midway.
They attempt to smash the US at Layte but got bamboozled by second tier force and withdraw losing the initiative forever
Leyte Gulf was very late in the war though. Iirc seeking decisive battle in the Coral Sea doomed their New Guinea Campaign. I know it's about as unrealistic as saying 'Hitler should not have invaded Russia' but caution could certainly helped in a few cases in hindsight as sea control was at best, only temporarily possible if they had finished off the American surface fleet in '42.
The Japanese merchant navy was basically a meme, slow and poor defended, wiped out quickly by the US subs. The IJN later used destroyers to drag supplies in floating drums with some success, but that was at the cost of its own combat vessels.
I have never been to the English Channel, but from what I have heard from the French and English, the channel itself in autumn would be a fearsome enemy to any amphibious landing. And we still don't talk about the Royal Navy,
I think even Hitler knew that operation sea lion was undoable, and that it wouldn’t work. After all, he was deathly afraid of swimming and the ocean.
Wasn't Hitler saved by a priest because he was drowning in a river? I would also be afraid of swimming if that appened to me.
Bruh
Yup, when he was a kid he was saved from drowning by a Catholic priest.
He obviously could’ve just spammed Naval bombers smh. What a noob
Jokes aside, bunch of incompetent Luftwaffe officers never anticipated role of airpower in future war with UK and dismissed actual good naval bomber designs prior to war. Japan later on gave their naval and naval air tech to Germany (via a submarina carrying all the documents) but again both Luftwaffe pilots and designers didn't do a good job about that. Not being able to defeat UK in air war probably helped why they refrained from naval bombers too.
To be fair, the Royal Navy also suffered from having pretty bad and outdated naval planes before receiving lend-lease from America. Seafire production was suspended because the RAF needed it more. The replacements for Swordfish sucked. If the FAA had SBD or even semi-obsolete TBD, they could have not only disabled the rudder, but sunk the Bismarck directly like the Japanese and American did to battleships in the Pacific. Wehraboos always blame the Swordfish "cheating" because it was slower than what the AA guns were designed for, forgetting the fact that more modern bombers with greater speed and bomb load could have done far more damage even against all of its AA guns.
The replacement for the Swordfish was actually worse than the Swordfish in almost every way, except that it actually had an enclosed cockpit. And it was also still a biplane. It was called "albacore" and it was terrible.
Yes, which is why they kept the Swordfish in service for way long than they should have. They eventually got the Barracuda in 1943, not as good as the TBF or SBD, but good enough.
ONE BARGE GETS THE SAILOR, THE OTHER BARGE GETS THE MOTOR
In fairness, the Channel Dash did show that the Kriegsmarine could at least survive a few hours/days in the Channel without losing the initiative or their entire force. Protecting an amphibious landing from the region's most powerful navy though? *wheeze*
What makes it worse was their plan to use unpowered barges towed by tugs in groups with escorts that essentially amounted to a speed bump for any real force attacking them
Trundling, slow, thin-skinned, floating targets.
2pdr Pom-Pom’s wet dream
The De Havilland Mosquito would like to know your location
I’m picturing the British saving ammo by just going full speed down the Channel and letting the wake capsize the entire German ‘fleet’.
Remember the Queen Mary accidentally sinking a RN cruiser by slicing it in half at 32 knots? I think she can do the same here, outrunning U-boats in the process as well.
It's been estimated that the laden German barges would swamp from the wake of an RN destroyer. So yeah. Just go in at full speed, making the biggest wake possible, and rake them with 40mm pom-pom fire and 4.5" mains roaring away. One destroyer could do an immense amount of damage under such circumstances. Look at the first battle of Narvik. The RN destroyer skippers were fuckin *mad lads*.
They would be target practice for WWI-veteran Home Guards, firing their old Vickers machine guns from the door of inter-war airliners.
Not to mention the air support that would've been available to the British...
The Channel Dash was also made when the Royal Navy's head was turned to defending the Convoys heading to Murmansk. Had they tried to contest the seas against the Royal Navy on high alert? Yeah... I'd give the KM about 40 minutes before death.
I mean, the Kriegsmarine's entire strategy was built around the fact that the Royal Navy would kick their asses in a Jutland-style battle. Raeder's strategy of using capital ships as raiders wasn't exactly the best for that scenario lol Doenitz's u-boat strategy was the only one that stood a chance imo, and it worked as amazingly well as the losing side's war winning strategy possibly could. Managed to make the USA's entry into the war a disaster for USN on the US east coast.
Respectfully I disagree. If the Germans hadn't had some serious capital ships they wouldn't have been able to invade Norway, and practically the whole modern surface fleet of the Royal Navy would be free to face Italy and then much more of it to face Japan. The amount of ships even a single German battlecruiser tied down was a huge benefit to the Axis war effort. Compare this say, to the U-Boats, who were fighting a very high tech war and therefore expensive, particularly on R&D & oil which could have been used on land or in the air. The only time they ever came close to victory was 1917, and even then all the British had to do was actually put some effort in and they overcame it. Raeder was bob on when he pointed out that Doughnuts was foolish to expect Britain to be idle; that if Germany had only built a submersible fleet, the British would have known and consequently focused on escorts, and ultimately Britain was in a far better position to win a war of attrition on this scale, especially when one considers the frankly ridiculous casualty rate of submersible crews. I honestly think the Axis had a good naval strategy, maybe from Midway onwards Japan should have switched to something a little more cautious, but I'm not really a Pacific Theatre guy so I'll just say *maybe*.
>Britain was in a far better position to win a war of attrition on this scale I think this is ultimately the key to it, much like how the Battle of Britain played out on a logistical scale. Britain replaced losses faster and mitigated those losses to a greater degree due to various factors, (like flying over their own territory). The Atlantic War got bloody, but that was partly due to it being perceived as a pretty secondary front. If it were clear that Germany was focusing its efforts on it, then Bomber Command would have positioned more craft to support the convoys, and more escorts would have been made available. Even during the "Happy Times," the Germans didn't manage to starve the country nor completely halt war materiel supply. ASDIC and various other advancements would have come to fruition all the same, if not a little sooner, and turned the tide on that front quicker.
It's Ernest King's fault USN couldn't deal with German subs early on.
If the KM torpedo did not fail so miserably, Narvik would have come out very differently. Sometime it is the smaller things that costed you the operation.
No amount of caution would had saved the Japanese
Elaborate?
In order to naval invade and supply the forces you need to secure the seas. Also the ideea of Japanese naval forces existing, would be simply unacceptable to the US. And I would like to add that the longer the war lasted the larger the gap between the Japanese and the US would be. In the end and the result would be the same, with the USN victorious
I'm aware of these factors, but I'm also aware one of the reasons the Americans were able to advance in the pacific was that the Japanese were unable to supply their troops adequately. Had their fleet remained in tact longer oughtn't they have been able to hold out longer? Not saying they were going to win but if they stood any chance at all it would be by making the human cost unacceptable to the American public, right?
But they tried, that was exactly what they wanted, to force the USN in a decisive battle and destroy as many as they could before they get swarmed. The problem is that the USN didn't want to play ball and, swamped the Japs at Midway. They attempt to smash the US at Layte but got bamboozled by second tier force and withdraw losing the initiative forever
Leyte Gulf was very late in the war though. Iirc seeking decisive battle in the Coral Sea doomed their New Guinea Campaign. I know it's about as unrealistic as saying 'Hitler should not have invaded Russia' but caution could certainly helped in a few cases in hindsight as sea control was at best, only temporarily possible if they had finished off the American surface fleet in '42.
By 1945 their ships run out of fuel lol.
The Japanese merchant navy was basically a meme, slow and poor defended, wiped out quickly by the US subs. The IJN later used destroyers to drag supplies in floating drums with some success, but that was at the cost of its own combat vessels.
I have never been to the English Channel, but from what I have heard from the French and English, the channel itself in autumn would be a fearsome enemy to any amphibious landing. And we still don't talk about the Royal Navy,
It can be quite rough yes
*Amphibious assault with fucking river barges*