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Posted on 07/02/2005 9:00:46 AM PDT by snippy_about_it
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 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
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 The Z-Plan was Germanys fleet building program started shortly before World War 2. In the mid 1930s a major discussion about a new fleet program started in Germany. There were two major opinions, what kind of program should have been chosen. One plan was focused on a large submarine fleet and a relatively small surface fleet for coast protection, this plan was preferred by the U-Boat fraction in the Kriegsmarine command. The other alternative was a mixed fleet of various surface ships and a much smaller U-Boat fleet, quite similar to the Imperial Navy in World War I or the British Royal Navy. In the end, this plan was chosen as the new fleet building program, after several modifications it was called the "Z-Plan". According to this plan, the German Kriegsmarine should have grown to about 800 units, consisting of 13 battleships and battlecruisers, 4 aircraft carriers, 15 Panzerschiffe, 23 cruisers and 22 so called "Spähkreuzer" which were basically large destroyers. In addition to this many smaller vessels should have been build. Those ships should have been build between 1939 and 1946, in this time, the personal of the Kriegsmarine should have been enlarged to 201.000 men and over 33 billion Reichsmark should have spend for building the new units. This project never got reality. Its very questionable that the German industry would have had the resources for such a construction program and that the other European Nations would stood still and not react to this program. The realization of the Z-Plan started on January 29th, 1939. Two H-Class battleships were laid down, three months later Germany quit the the fleet treaty with England and the dream "No more war against Britain" was gone. But only four months later Germany attacked Poland and work on all Z-Plan projects was stopped. During the next months, all incomplete ships of the Z-plan were scrapped and the material was used to build additional submarines. Kriegsmarine Ships When talking about the German Kriegsmarine in World War II, the German U-Boats are often the first thing that comes into mind. At the outbreak of the war of the war, Germany had 57 U-Boats, most of them not capable of operations in the Atlantic. It was planned to build about 250 in the Naval construction program called Z-Plan, but since this plan was never realized, Germany entered the war with a much less number of submarines than the allied nations. In following 6 years, over 1100 boats were built, and was often seen as the biggest threat to Great Britain in the whole war. Those submarines operated in all oceans of the world - from the North Sea, to the Atlantic, the American Coast (Operation Donnerschlag), the Arctic and even the Indian Ocean and the Pacific - until mid 1943 they were superior to their allied hunters. But with the introduction of radar, Huff Duff, and a continuous air cover for allied convoys, the former hunter got the hunted, even the introduction of new, revolutionary Submarines like the Type XXI could not change this. Besides their success in the early years of the war, the U-Boats paid a terrible price for it. About 80% of all U-Boats were destroyed, 28.000 of the 40.000 U-boat personal were killed during the war, 8.000 were captured. Thanks to PzLdr for the idea for today's topic. sym·po·sium : a social gathering at which there is free interchange of ideas So now let's get on with the discussion. Pull up a chair or grab a spot on the floor around the virtual Foxhole Cabin and let's chat.      |
Hi miss Feather
Morning PE!
Got plans for the weekend??
Nothing going on here yet. Lovely day, weather has cooled down a lot, very pleasant.
((HUGS))Good morning, snippy and everyone at the Freeper foxhole.
Between Naps Bump for the Saturday Symposium Edition of the Freeper Foxhole.
As mentioned in the article the German Kriegesmarine had only 57 submarines at the start of hostilities on September 1, 1939. Of those IIRC only about 20 were fir for sea duty, the rest being either training or coastal defense boats. You can figure in inservice rate of roughly 50% on the ocean going U-boats. Bear in mind that with this meager number of U-boats the NAZIs almost took England down.
PAR35 I have to agree with your comnment that the Germans would not have been able to wait another 5 to 6 years to start the war. Not only would the Volk have gotten restless but by that time the British and French would have been re-armed making any fight that much harder.
However had the NAZIs waited just 1 more year and gotten things going in the spring of 1940 versus fall of 1939 I think the results would have been terribly differnt.
Had the NAZIs just another 20 or so U-boats they would have been able to put a signifigant blockade on the British Isles as well as being able to conduct operations away from England in support of the blockade.
My .02 for what it is worth.
Regards
alfa6 ;>}
Good afternoon. I had to work today.
With 300 U-boats in 1939-1940 England would have been isolated and starved out. 300 boats would have had approx 100 on station, 100 in transit and 100 in port for resupply and refitting at any one time. he results would have been devestaing to England. Just the small number of boats available came close to suceeding.
As for the Z-Plan, even if Germany was able to delay the start of the war and build the planned ships, the Allies, especially Britain would not have been sitting idly by, they'd also have had new ships on-line. If completed, IMHO, even the Z-Plan ships wouldn't have been able to defeat the British Navy, they would have caused a lot more problems but the Kriegsmarine would have pretty much pursue the same strategy it did for most of the war, "keeping a fleet in being" as a threat.
The best bet for Germany was the U-Boats, luckily Hitler and the high Command didn't see it. Hitler didn't really understand the concept of "Naval Power" and it's relationship to land battles.
IMHO, Russia and Germany would have been at war before 1944-45, even if England and france were somehow kept at bay.
Oops! Re Post 13, Someone left the machine signed on. ;-)
Will take a front seat for today's symposium and listen to the scholars discuss . . . it's a little out of my league.
On This Day In History
Birthdates which occurred on July 02:
0419 Valentinian III Roman emperor (425-55)
1489 Thomas Cranmer England, archbishop/reformer/martyr
1810 Robert Augustus Toombs, Secy State (Confederacy), died in 1885
1830 John Bordenave Villepigue, Brig General (Confederate Army)
1865 Lili Braun Prussia, feminist/socialist writer (Im Schatten Titanen)
1877 Hermann Hesse Switzerland, novelist/poet (Steppenwolf, Nobel 1946)
1884 Dr Otto Bohm Prussia, scientist (helped create Radar)
1894 Walter Brennan Swampscott Mass, actor (Real McCoys)
1905 Jean-Rene Lacoste France, tennis champ/alligator shirt designer
1908 Thurgood Marshall Md, 1st black Supreme Court justice (1967-91)
1916 Barry Gray, [Bernard Yaroslaw], interviewer (the father of talk radio)
1916 Ken Curtis Lamar Colo, actor (Ripcord, Festus-Gunsmoke)
1922 Dan Rowan Beggs Okla, comedian (Rowan & Martin's Laugh-in)
1925 Marvin Rainwater Wichita Ks, country singer (Ozark Jubilee)
1925 Patrice Lumumba Zaire, revolutionary/1st premier of Congo
1937 Richard Petty auto race driver (Daytona 500-1979,81)
1939 John Sununu US Secretary of State (1989-91)
1940 Georgi Ivan Ivanov 1st Bulgarian space traveler (Soyuz 33)
1946 Ron Silver NYC, actor (Gary-Rhoda, "Bruno Gianelli"-The West Wing, Himself-Fahrenhype 9/11 )
1947 Luci Baines Johnson Nugent Turpin daughter of Pres LBJ
1952 Linda M Godwin Cape Girardeau Missouri, PhD/astronaut (STS 37)
1956 Jerry Hall Mesquite Tx, model/Mrs Mick Jagger
1959 Wendy B Lawrence Jacksonville Fla, USN Lt Commander/astronaut
1964 Jos‚ Canseco Havana Cuba, Oakland As (1986 Rookie Year, 1988 AL MVP)
Thanks again for the golf balls. Off the sweet spot of the club you don't even know you've made contact. Soft as sponge. But oh do they take off . . . like a howitzer! And with the breezes today the dimple design really cuts the air, but with a higher trajectory than I like.
I can't get over how soft they are. After about 6 holes I had to switch to a new one as I could tell they were loosing their shape and not rolling accurately on the putting surface.
Still, for the price (and I got mine free) it's a good deal. I'm a traditionalist, however, and will probably always play Titleist.
According to this plan, the German Kriegsmarine should have grown to about 800 units, consisting of 13 battleships and battlecruisers, 4 aircraft carriers, 15 Panzerschiffe, 23 cruisers and 22 so called "Spähkreuzer" which were basically large destroyers. In addition to this many smaller vessels should have been build.
The problem with this is geography. No easy access to the open sea. The and Germany had no tradition of navel service. The Kriegsmarine was definitely the second service.
If they of built up the U-boat fleet... they very well might of won.
Just one mans opinion (freely given and worth almost that much)
Not only would the Volk have gotten restless
Something I'd never really thought about before. Expand please.
If you look at the history of the NAZIs prior to the start of WW-II it was laways one gigantic bluff after another untill the Poland invasion. The march into the Rhineland in 1936 could have been put down and the NAZI regime ended by the use of a division or two at best by the French and English as the NAZIs had no real miltary "yet" in 1936. Like wise the takeover of the Czecks was predicated mostly on bluff as well.
As a side note I did read somewhere recently that the main reason that Chamberlin agreed to the Munich accord was to give Britian more time to re-arm.
The average Germasn was not all that keen on going to war as the memory of WW-I was still rather fresh in the memory.
However if the NAZIs keep pulling off these magnificent bluffs and getting away with it pretty soon the Volk start thinking, hmm maybe we are invincible.
Even after the British and French called the bluff with the Polish invasion there was nothing that the Allies could do right away owing to time and space considerations.
As far as the average German went the Polish campaign was a great success. yes there were some causalities but they weren't to many and after all the glorious armies of the Third Reich had conquered most of Poland in what, three weeks or so.
One final thought, one of the unintended conswquences of the Allied Strategic Bombing campaign was that it gave the average German somebody to hate and to unify against other than the NAZIs. Yea the NAZIs may have gotten the Germans into this war but the NAZIs were able to play the bombings into something that the citizens could rail against. Think of the British citizens during the blitz, eh.
Have to go, I am not sure I have explained things very well but have to gwet back to work./
Regards
alfa6 ;>}
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