Posted on 02/09/2004 11:59:24 AM PST by Johnny Gage
Floating crane maneuvered near sunken World War II era German warship off Uruguay Monday February 09, 2004 By BILL CORMIER Associated Press Writer MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) Defying tricky winds and river currents, salvage experts on Monday maneuvered a floating crane near the submerged wreckage of a German battleship scuttled off Uruguay in the opening days of World War II.
The ship the Admiral Graf Spee was a symbol of German naval might early in the war. The vessel prowled the South Atlantic, sinking as many as nine allied merchant ships before British warships crippled it in a December 1939 naval engagement.
Scuttled by its captain who feared losing the ship in a battle with the larger British force, the Graf Spee has remained for decades in waters less than 25 feet deep only miles outside the port of Montevideo.
Private investors from the United States and Europe are helping to fund a multimillion dollar recovery effort to remove the ship piece-by-piece from the River Plate within three years.
On Monday, a work barge carrying a 195-foot crane moved into position around key pieces of a 27-ton communications tower that held sophisticated range-finding equipment for the Graf Spee`s 11-inch guns.
Hector Bado, head of the recovery operation, told The Associated Press that divers and team members were working in blustery winds and choppy waters in an attempt to remove part of the tower.
``Removing this piece of equipment is going to take more time than we originally anticipated,'' he said after divers managed to affix steel cables to the wreckage following days of delays.
Winds were gusting Monday at the site where the ship lies broken in two remains, mired in tons of mud and silt.
Two tugboats helped push the barge close to the Graf Spee, bobbling atop choppy three-foot waves. At least one small part of the ship juts out from the water.
Below the surface, divers worked on tightening steel cables being used to stabilize the communications tower the first piece that salvage experts hope to recover.
Dozens of onlookers on small yachts and motor launches watched the operation from a distance under partly cloudy skies within site of the coast.
Feared by many navies at the outset of the war, the Graf Spee a ``pocket battleship'' which carried less powerful guns and was smaller than a conventional ship of that class was tracked down by British forces off the South American coast.
The ``Battle of the River Plate'' began on Dec. 13, 1939, near the mouth of the river as the German warship was pursued by a battle group consisting of two British light cruisers, HMS Exeter and HMS Ajax, and the HMS Achilles of Zealand.
Historical accounts at the time reported that Uruguayans by the thousands followed the battle from cliff tops along the coast and from high rooftops during a booming gunbattle offshore.
The Graf Spee was crippled in the fight after receiving several direct hits, and Capt. Hans Langsdorff decided to take refuge in Montevideo harbor. The ship was unable to make the necessary repairs within the 72-hour period in a neutral harbor allowed by international convention.
Langsdorff took the limping craft out of the harbor and sank it on Dec. 17, 1939. The crew was taken by ship to Buenos Aires and the captain committed suicide days later.
*oh well*
| : ) |
To say nothing of a risky scheme... (G)
I have agreed with the U-boat alternate war for a long time. There was a quote from Grand Admiral Doenitz, something that, if there were fifty more U-boats on station in 1939, Britain would've starved.
I think he said a hunndred, but if the heavy ships including the Bismarck were never built in favor of more U-boats that would have made the nut.
No problem...just wanted to add to the thread and give it a bump. FReep on!
I think that what the German Navy was trying to do was force the allies onto the horns of a dilemma: U-boat attacks force the merchant marine into convoys, but the convoys in turn are easy pickings for a heavy surface raider (like Graf Spee). There were attempts to disrupt the arctic convoys from occupied Norway in this manner. The strategy might have worked if the communications between surface and sub-surface raiders had been more effective AND the British not had sufficient battleships to accompany the convoys. Neither was the case, as it turned out.
The German High Seas Navy tried to do what they could do but they knew the correalation of forces vis a vis the British Royal Navy was way against them.
When the US came in they pretty much retired their surface ships.
Any comments on this?
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.