Posted on 01/23/2013 4:33:42 PM PST by virgil283
"Hitler's Germany has conquered all of Europe; all except for one resolute island nation. And, with his eye on Russia, Hitler has no interest in fighting Great Britain, he simply wants to relegate it to the inconsequential. This means stopping the supply convoys from America.... .
The terrifying armada of U-boats had already caused the American supply ships to huddle in close-knit convoys; perfect targets for the long guns of a battleship. And even if the convoy was accompanied by a cruiser, or even a battleship, that's not much of a challenge when your own battleship is so big and new that you can outgun the enemy by five miles. It was a fairly simple plan, really, and it should have worked......Bismarck had 88 large guns, the biggest with a range of over 35 miles. She also had a new state-of-the-art automated anti-aircraft system that was guaranteed to blow the fastest enemy planes out of the sky. She could do 30 knots, 5 knots faster than the fastest British ship, the pride of the British Navy, HMS Hood. Her armor plating was so thick it was deemed impenetrable by shell, bomb or torpedo......
But the state-of-the-art anti-aircraft system had been designed to repel standard war planes.
Standard war planes from World War II, not World War I.
Because of the Swordfish's ultra-slow speed, the automatic anti-aircraft tracking devices couldn't get a bead on them and not one of the fifteen Swordfish was shot down.
Bismarck also deployed the latest anti-torpedo devices, from cannon to depth charges, so an actual hit was expected to be somewhat rare. Of the one torpedo that made it through, it struck her in the one and only place that was vulnerable; the rudders.
A biplane took down the mightiest battleship ever built.
(Excerpt) Read more at maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com ...
no more than 20 could be classed (charitably) as large. And the main battery had a range of at best 20 miles (22½ if firing over land)
I think the Bismark was strongly constructed but probably not the most powerful ship ever. I know it had 15 inch guns but the American Iowa class and even the slightly older ones had 16 inch guns.
The Japanese Yamato and Musahshi had 18 inch main battery. I recall that a single torpedo almost sunk her due to a flaw in the armor. That was corrected and after that she was probably the most powerful of any battleship.
Bismarck was a good battleship, but far from the best ever built. She was definitely outclassed be the Yamatos and Iowas. She may not even have been the equal of the South Dakotas.
But the point of the article is well-taken. She received her decisive wound from a slow, obsolete biplane. Proof that the battlship, without air cover, was an obsolete wepons system in its own right.
A little pluck, a little ingenuity, and a lot faith—Traits that characterized the America I grew-up in.
And my kids wonder why I’m so disgusted the the current “leadership” of the Republican Party.
This is garbage.
The Bismarck is one of the most overrated ships in naval history. Many of its design characteristics were obsolete and left over from end-of-WWI designs.
The Bismarck had a fairly weak anti-aircraft armament that was NOT up-to-date, was poorly coordinated, had faulty equipment, and the crew was not well trained in anti-aircraft fire.
The assertion that the Swordfish were "too slow" to hit is idiotic.
Man, I missed this. This is even more stupid and reveals that the author knows nothing about naval warfare.
In World War II, the only "anti-torpedo" device were nets, deployed around stationary ships in port. Other than that, all you could do is maneuver to avoid them (despite extremely rare incidences of torpedoes being shot). You couldn't use "cannons" or "depth charges" to stop a torpedo in the water.
The ship my Father crossed the English Channel on was torpedoed. The torpedo was spotted and set off just before it struck.
I never did think to ask him how they did it. I do recall him telling me it still almost turned the ship over.
This my friends is how we can spot liberal progressive thinking, they cannot tell the truth, everything is hyped, inflated and incorrect, a lie living in fantasyland.
Anothere lesson of how to spot liberal propaganda.
I know the real facts of this story, but somebody has an agenda to rewrite history.
Just like an Obama groupie.
“Because of the Swordfish’s ultra-slow speed, the automatic anti-aircraft tracking devices couldn’t get a bead on them and not one of the fifteen Swordfish was shot down.
This is garbage.
The Bismarck is one of the most overrated ships in naval history. Many of its design characteristics were obsolete and left over from end-of-WWI designs.
The Bismarck had a fairly weak anti-aircraft armament that was NOT up-to-date, was poorly coordinated, had faulty equipment, and the crew was not well trained in anti-aircraft fire.”
agreed. secondary armament was not dual AA capable, weak stern design like ALL german BBs and CAs. she was played up so the brits could save face after HOOD, an even worse design, was sunk. after POW and REPULSE no face left to save. a SOUTH DAKOTA could take BISMARCK easily.
Now a ship with guts was the Prinz Eugen, the cruiser that originally broke out with the Bismarck and was sent on it’s own way. It surived bombs, torpedoes, several actions up to the end of WWII, and two atomic bomb tests.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_cruiser_Prinz_Eugen
Grenades were thrown by hand by sailors on deck in last desperate attempts to stop incoming torpedoes in WW2.
Lots of torpedoes fired. Lots of ships sunk. Only a few torpedoes stopped by grenades.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.