Royal Navy in WWII

[Soulmage]

Why does the RN get subjected to so much pwnage in WWII. Seriously, for all the vaunted power of the Royal Navy, it seems like they play 2nd fiddle to pretty much all the other major powers.

Were they much bigger and badder in WWI, and is that and the age of sail where their rep comes from? I'm certainly not seeing it in their WWII showing!

 

[DM]

Better do some more reading then

(a slightly flippant answer but then it is nearly midnight here, I've just watched 3 episodes of B5 and a documentary on the only sinking of a submerged submarine by another submerged submarine - (HMS Venturer sinking U-864 off Norway) and I'm dog-tired)

Answering the last bit though, yes the RN was pretty much the dominant military force in the world from the late 1700s until the end of WW1.

 

[Lord David the Denied]

The dominant naval force, you mean. For all the pomp and ceremony of the Navy, it's the Army that made the Empire and held it together as long as it lasted.

*cackles at DM*

 

[katadder]

lol without the navy the army couldnt have gone anywhere to hold anything together. the army was nothing without the navy, just stuck in the UK, same as these days, nothing without the other 2

 

[Wulf Corbett]

lol without the navy the army couldnt have gone anywhere to hold anything together. the army was nothing without the navy, just stuck in the UK, same as these days, nothing without the other 2

They could have caught a ferry.

Wulf

 

[katadder]

lol back then, french navy would have sunk it. plus would take the army years to march to the far reaches of the empire by time they got there they would be old men uncapable of defending the empire.

 

[DM]

The dominant naval force, you mean. For all the pomp and ceremony of the Navy, it's the Army that made the Empire and held it together as long as it lasted.

No, I mean the dominant military force. Getting a visit from the Royal Navy in the 1800s was like having the USAF playing in your backyard today. As such it was the UK's primary instrument for "defence diplomacy". For example the erroneously named "Crimean War" was actually won in the Baltic in 1855, rather than on the battlefields of the Crimea. For many years thereafter just the mere mention that the RN "Special Service Squadron" was assembling at Chatham for manoeuvres in the Baltic was sufficient to put the mockers on Russian political activity.

 

[Wulf Corbett]

lol back then, french navy would have sunk it.

Well, catch a French ferry. The navy wouldn't sink that, they're probably in the same union... 8)

Wulf

 

[DomSkelton]

"Seriously, for all the vaunted power of the Royal Navy, it seems like they play 2nd fiddle to pretty much all the other major powers."

Ahem. Rubbish....

The Royal Navy was in the uniquely unpleasant position of having to defend an island nation, and its empire, for the entirety of WW2. That pretty much made it inevitable that it was going to take a lot of losses, as it was in a 6 year war of attrition.

If you actually look at most engagements, the RN gave every bit as it got, and frequently better. The trouble is that it spent huge amounts of time on lousy duties without air cover; perfect circumstances for *any* navy to take a beating.... The RN only lost two major combatants in surface engagements (Hood and Glorious) and the cruiser losses tell a similar story to the big boys; air attack and submarines; Exeter was the only cruiser lost to enemy fleet action. (2 others were lost to E Boats, and the rest air and submarine attacks.)

Pretty much *any* navy would take a pasting in a similar strategic situation; heck, take a look at the Japanese; a roaring surprise success, followed by massive sustained losses, mainly to air and submarine attack. Sound familiar?

Looking at total major units lost, the RN looks like it did terribly, but taking a look at the full equation it doesn't tally. Yes, U-Boats in particular gave the RN quite a beating at times, but (1) the RN had to defend Britain's trade routes, putting it out where U-Boats could get at it, and (2) by the end of the war Germany had lost nearly a thousand U-Boats....

Don't get me wrong, the RN had some shocking off days (Hood, Prince Of Wales and Repulse spring to mind) but it also gave much truly great service, and kept Britain in the war. Bearing in mind that it did that when everybody else had been steam-rollered, that wasn't such bad going.

Dom.

 

[chaos0xomega]

Soulmage, are you familiar with the history of the Kriegsmarine in WW2? If you are, you would know that the Kriegsmarine was pretty much a naval joke. They never completed(or used) a single aircraft carrier, their surface fleet was rather tiny and although boasting some powerful ships, tactics were poor to say the least. For instance the Bismark, had absolutely no escort to speak of, maybe if it had some supporting craft to back it up it wouldn't have been sunk. This was common throughout the war. Like the Admiral Graf Spee, fought all on it's lonesome in the River Plate.

And then of course there was the constant fighting and bickering within and between the different commands of the German military(for instance Raeder and Goering).

Now, if you consider the German Subsurface fleet, then they are worthy of respect, although later in the war some of the policies were laughable. Also, it seems that due to early failures of the Surface fleet, Hitler declined to give any serious additional funding to it, and instead chose to focus on other aspects of the military and the U-boat fleet. I seem to remember watching a program on the history channel that mentioned that at one point in the war they were churning out x number of U-boats a day or something(I think x=7)

 

[Baldrick]

The German Navy was not a joke, it was exactly what it was designed to be - a threat to enemy shipping and a support for land operations.

Also, to see how effective the German navy could be, look at the operation of the German Navy in the Baltic Sea - a theater where Germans invested their surface assets with considerable results. By the end of 1941, the Soviets lost 217 ships - including 3/4 of their destroyers and a battleship. The Germans were able to dominate the Baltic Sea for most of the war, and even in the Spring of 1945, they were able to evacuate over 2,000,000 people from the Baltic region, despite considerable Soviet efforts to stop the evacuations. This was the single, largest sea evacuation in history.

 

[justmatt]

Why does the RN get subjected to so much pwnage in WWII. Seriously, for all the vaunted power of the Royal Navy, it seems like they play 2nd fiddle to pretty much all the other major powers.

Pretty weak statement.

The Royal Navy and their allies whupped the holy hell out of the Regia Marina in just about every encounter -- in Matapan, Cunningham and company sank three heavy cruisers and damaged a Littorio class BB in exchange for a single Swordfish. Its carrier launched strike on the Italian fleet while in port was the chief inspiration for the Japanese approach to Pearl Harbor.

The Regia Marina had some fascinatin' ships, and maybe some able commanders. But they only "won" one straight cruiser engagement, during Operation Harpoon. Look at what HMAS Sydney did at Cape Spada. Look at how the British took advantage of RADAR at Cape Bon -- sinking two light cruisers at night without loss. What was the other, Tarigo Convoy?

You're maybe comparing their actions to the U.S. in the Pacific. But from that it's not fair to say they accomplished little compared to all the other powers. And look at Narvik for one example of how they fought in other theaters.

If you want to look at ineffectual fleets, then Hell's Bells, what did the Italians accomplish? Granted, they were handicapped by some significant logistical problems. But there, to me, was the biggest navy to just drop the ball entirely.

 

[chaos0xomega]

The German Navy was not a joke, it was exactly what it was designed to be - a threat to enemy shipping and a support for land operations.

Also, to see how effective the German navy could be, look at the operation of the German Navy in the Baltic Sea - a theater where Germans invested their surface assets with considerable results. By the end of 1941, the Soviets lost 217 ships - including 3/4 of their destroyers and a battleship. The Germans were able to dominate the Baltic Sea for most of the war, and even in the Spring of 1945, they were able to evacuate over 2,000,000 people from the Baltic region, despite considerable Soviet efforts to stop the evacuations. This was the single, largest sea evacuation in history.

Yes, they proved to be a decent force in the Baltic which literally borders Germany and which contained many friendly ports for them to retreat back to for repairs. Wonderful, they were able to dominate a region that was almost entirely surrounded by friendly or neutral areas.

In the less friendly combat zones however, the Kriegsmarine did not fair quite as well, did it. They were never really able to enter the Meditteranean(thanks to the Rock of Gibraltar). Their actions in the North Atlantic wasn't really that impressive to say the least. Only 2 of the 10 Captial Ships(Battleships and Carriers in this case) sunk by the Kriegsmarin during the war were sunk by the Surface fleet. This of course was the Hood and the Glorious(which required the Scharnhorst and Gniesenau to get the job done). Only a single American capital ship was sunk by the Kriegsmarine(Carrier: Block Island).

Really after 1943 the Surface Fleet pretty much ceased to exist as a serious threat to anyone, and served only as a threat(read bark was way worse than bite) to allied navies and shipping.(Plus it's use for artillery support and evacuations in teh Baltic).

 

[Baldrick]

I never said that the German navy was able to operate on an equal footing with the US or the Royal Navy, which had a considerable advantage in naval strength, I said that the German navy was anything but a joke. It did exactly what it was designed to do. With limited resources and a greater demand for land and air assets, Germany never developed a surface fleet capable of challenging the Royal Navy on the high seas. From the inception of the state of German, it was never German naval policy to become a dominant naval power. The navy was designed to challenge for control of the Baltic, defend Germany from seaborne invasions from the North Sea and disrupt enemy shipping. In many respects, the construction of capital ships probably harmed Germany far more then it helped them. Imagine how the course of the war could have been changed had the Germans been able to field more submarines during the early war years, instead of building the Bismarck or the Tirpitz. (Even scarier, imagine if the Germans had developed anechoic sooner!)

The Baltic is strategically important to Germany, far more important then the Mediterranean. A considerable portion of the iron ore that Germany used during WWII came from trade with Sweden. While Germany could have developed their own iron ore resources, doing so would have taken away from other vital war time production. Furthermore, other neutral nations traded with Germany, through Sweden. For example, chromite from Turkey and tungsten from Spain entered Germany from Sweden. Without these three resources, you are not going to produce steel. Keeping a strong presence in the Baltic was a key component to German wartime strategy. Furthermore, the German blockade of the North Sea, effectively eliminated 70% of the trade between Sweden and the Allies.

Certainly, by 1943, the German navy had passed its zenith - even the u-boats were ineffective. Of the 1154 submarines built, over 600 of them were sunk after 1942. Considering that from 1939 to 1941 68 u-boats were sunk, you get an idea of how effective Allied ASW had become.

Your argument about the ports and the geographic proximity of the Baltic and Germany is specious.

edit: changed English Navy to Royal Navy

 

[chaos0xomega]

I would disagree on that last part.

And although the information you posted is pretty much entirely correct, I still don't think that it proves that the German Navy was 'anything but a joke'. In any case it just reinforces my point from my perspective of it. If it's goal was commerce raiding and land support, then there are far better ship types out there for both of these than the Bismark and Tirpitz and most of the larger ships of the Kriegsmarine. Especially considering that allied shipping tended to operate in rather well protected convoys, ships like the Bismark would have quickly met their demise. As for support of land operations, there was very little to support, considering the range on the guns and the width of the European Continent. I believe that that role came about later in the war much by accident(just as evacuations did).

If Germany really wanted to use its fleet for land support and commerce raiding, then they should have used the money and manpower that went toward Tirpitz and Bismark and some of the other ships and put that towards Graf Spee and other Carriers. At least then Germany could have had a chance of succeeding in the London Blitz and the aborted Operation Sea Lion.

 

[Baldrick]

I think we are mostly in agreement and if we were having this discussion over a pint it would be a blast. Yes, there were far better ways that Germany could have used the resources that went into the Bismarck and the Tirpitz - those were both ships that hindered the German war effort. Maybe if Germany was able to fully implement Plan Z, the Bismarck and Tirpitz could have played a more prominent role, but as it was, those ships were a tremendous waste of resources.

While I still don't think that the German navy was a joke, I do feel that they were increasingly ineffective after 1943 and I can see why you say that they were a joke (and even over-rated perhaps).

Support for land operations was a major part of the Baltic fleet's job, from the opening days of Barbarossa, and not something that it stumbled into. Keep in mind that support is not just the rounds on the ground, but it is also the delivering of supplies as well. While not a glamorous job, keeping supply lanes open did support operations in Russia. Certainly, given the size of Europe, you could not expect the German Navy to support combat operations inland, but still, combat operations near the coast could be supported.

Prost!

 

[Hugbiel]

Well if the RN don't appear to be brilliant it's IMHO mainly because they not fight for domination, they have it, but for supply. That's a far less glamourous task. And the RN zone is just the world witch mean lot of ship, few who can be the best but lot who can be where needed. ( For exemple Graff Spee wasn't engaged by the force seeking him, but the ships who are near enought to go after her )

The kriegsmarine was never a threat to the RN. They was hampered by politic ( Hitler's love for big gun, Goering will of not sharing his flying toy ). They had started building ship for a big fleet but was catch in war before they build enought ship to build a surface fleet and don't see the coming of the air domination ( but IMHO no politician have seen that, the fleet for the war in 1945 would have a core of 8 more heavy BB than the bismark )
But the German fleet was never able to go for the RN on deep sea, they have to hide and try to pass unseen. And it wasn't long that they stop trying to be a match for the RN, and give the command to Doenitz.

The Regia Marina don't help. Same as everywhere the army don't want to give them plane. Democracy help sometime. Their carrier is called Italy and don't move far ( 3cm north a year ). Worst, a footmen is in command and want the ships to be able to repel an ennemy force, so to have the most of their power safe ( sweet dream ) at home.
AfAIR in the meantime a guy called Cunningam stated something like "A ship is build in 3 year, a tradition in 3 century" ...

Without a wortly opponnent it's hard to shine.

But it's better than being shot by former ally because the footmen surender to an opponent you had beat when he dare come to you.

 

[Wulf Corbett]

I never said that the German navy was able to operate on an equal footing with the US or the English Navy

Since there hasn't been a English navy for over 300 years, that wouldn't be difficult...

Wulf

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Bismarck and Tirpitz would have been the ultimate commerce raiders if they'd made it into the Atlantic without being stopped. Battleships as powerful as them would have crushed the frigates and corvettes that escorted convoys and could have vanished before serious response could have arrived. Their massive armaments would have laid waste to any convoy they encountered.

There's a very good reason the Royal Navy went to such lengths to stop those ships making it into the Atlantic, and it wasn't all to do with scoring points off Hitler by sinking his battleships.

 

[DM]

Actually I suspect they'd have been just as successful as the other German surface ships sent on raiding missions - not very. Remember that convoys also sailed with battleship escorts (S&G encountered one with an R Class escorting it and made off). Later in the war convoys also enjoyed carrier escort protection. These were obviously aimed primarily at providing ASW cover, but if there had been a serious surface threat they would have been bolstered for ASuW as well. There were also "covering groups" of battleships and carriers on general patrol covering one or more convoys (although this was more of an "Arctic Convoy" thing - the ships that sank the Scharnhorst were drawn from convoy escorts and convoy covering forces). If anything the smaller, cheaper ships such as Hipper were more cost-effective, although they also performed badly against minimal escort on occasion (convoy JW51B springs to mind - Lutzow and Hipper against a convoy with minimal escort, bagged none of the merchants). Creaming the ecort and them all the merchies works fine if the targets are obliging and hang around to get shot. If they scatter then the raider will bag a few but thats it. U boats made MUCH more effective weapons against convoys.