Could the 1941 IJN have beaten the 1982 RN Falklands Task Force?
John Redman
browsed, lurked, and occasionally posted in s.m.n. for a while I'm
fairly sure all the smart ones have already been asked! So if you're a
defence professional and this sort of silly question profoundly pisses
you off, just skip this thread. Otherwise read on.
I have been reading the recent press coverage of the 20th anniversary
of the Falklands campaign. I note that at least one British vessel was
terminally damaged when a 1,000lb iron bomb went off while being
defused (and in fact quite severely hurt by the kinetic impact of the
bomb, even though it didn't explode). I also note that at least one
ship was lost when unburnt Exocet fuel set her on fire, even though
the warhead itself had not gone off.
So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
the same feat.
It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
Invincible-sized ship in half.
The issue would presumably be threefold.
One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
weapon they couldn't counter?
Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
support? Individually there'd have been no problem, but how many
Harriers could have been aloft at any time? Will a Sidewinder lock
onto a piston-engined aircraft's exhausts? Wouldn't the RN CAP and
missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
numbers? Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill and the British
CAP didn't get them all...so how would NAgumo have done?
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
John Redman <john_...@my-deja.com> wrote:
>So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
>through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
>to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
>
>Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
>with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
>the same feat.
If they come out then the SSNs sink them.
>It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
>difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
>ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
>Invincible-sized ship in half.
Except that WW2 Japanese ASW capability was pathetic by any standards,
even when pitched against nothing better than the submersibles of the
time. Against _Conqueror_...
Oggle.
Oggle.
Oggle.
>The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
>One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
>spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
>latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
And given that radar could see them (and paint them for attention
with Sea Dart) before they could see the carriers.
>missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
>numbers? Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
Nope. Like I said, Japanese ASW was crap - fatally crap in WW2. Against
proper submarines - not good.
There's a reason the Argentine carrier high-tailed it home and stayed
there..
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Time has stopped, says the Black Lion clock
and eternity has begun" (Dylan Thomas)
Keith Willshaw
"John Redman" <john_...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
news:d6c73c29.02040...@posting.google.com...
> OK, I know this is a very frivolous question indeed, but having
> browsed, lurked, and occasionally posted in s.m.n. for a while I'm
> fairly sure all the smart ones have already been asked! So if you're a
> defence professional and this sort of silly question profoundly pisses
> you off, just skip this thread. Otherwise read on.
>
> I have been reading the recent press coverage of the 20th anniversary
> of the Falklands campaign. I note that at least one British vessel was
> terminally damaged when a 1,000lb iron bomb went off while being
> defused (and in fact quite severely hurt by the kinetic impact of the
> bomb, even though it didn't explode). I also note that at least one
> ship was lost when unburnt Exocet fuel set her on fire, even though
> the warhead itself had not gone off.
>
> So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
> through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
> to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
>
> Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
> with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
> the same feat.
>
> It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
> difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
> ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
> Invincible-sized ship in half.
>
Trouble is long lance was launched from Destroyers and light cruisers
that wouldnt live long enough to even see the task force let alone
fire torpedoes at it.
> The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
> One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
> spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
> latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
>
No
> Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
> without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
> weapon they couldn't counter?
>
No
> Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
> strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
> support?
Sea Dart would have been picking them off before they'd even seen
the Task Force
Closer in Sea Wolf and Sea Cat would have been carrving them up
> Individually there'd have been no problem, but how many
> Harriers could have been aloft at any time? Will a Sidewinder lock
> onto a piston-engined aircraft's exhausts?
Yes
> Wouldn't the RN CAP and
> missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
> numbers?
Given the answers to One and Two this is moot
>
>Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
>
Remember the Belgrano !
> I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
> obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
> have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
> air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill and the British
> CAP didn't get them all...so how would NAgumo have done?
He'd have died gallantly.
Keith
Paul Cassidy
> through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
> to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
>
> Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
> with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
> the same feat.
>
> It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
> difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
> ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
> Invincible-sized ship in half.
>
Long Lance was fired from destroyers, and getting a destroyer close to the
RN taskforce without detection would be nigh on impossible. The Japanese did
use a smaller version of the long lance on their subs but it had a smaller
charge, and a MUCH shorter range (which was the main advantage of the Long
Lance).
On the other hand, RN SSNs would cut the Japanese formation to pieces given
half a chance.
> The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
> One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
> spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
> latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
>
Simply answer is no. The RN air search rader would spot them long before
they could see the task force. Harriers would then be vectored it.
> Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
> without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
> weapon they couldn't counter?
>
Unlikely, but not impossible.
> Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
> strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
> support? Individually there'd have been no problem, but how many
> Harriers could have been aloft at any time? Will a Sidewinder lock
> onto a piston-engined aircraft's exhausts? Wouldn't the RN CAP and
> missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
> numbers? Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
>
Sidewinder should lock on quite well. Even the old RN sams (Seacat, Seaslug)
should work well against these much slower targets. Hell, at the ranges the
Japanese would have to approach, even the 4.5" gun could be effective. Sheer
numbers might be a problem, but I would question whether even the Japanese
would press an attack when their wingmates start exploding at 20+ miles from
the target, and they continue taking losses. Combination of Harriers and
SAMs should be enough.
> I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
> obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
> have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
> air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill and the British
> CAP didn't get them all...so how would NAgumo have done?
The Argentines gained most of their hits in San Carlos water. This was a
place where they could approach unseen by the ship's radar. The ships had a
few seconds warning before the planes were dropping their bombs. This would
not be the case in a ocean fleet engagement. In open water, the Argentines
did much less well, and their best successes were scored by missiles, not
bombs.
Andrew McCruden
> browsed, lurked, and occasionally posted in s.m.n. for a while I'm
> fairly sure all the smart ones have already been asked! So if you're a
> defence professional and this sort of silly question profoundly pisses
> you off, just skip this thread. Otherwise read on.
>
> I have been reading the recent press coverage of the 20th anniversary
> of the Falklands campaign. I note that at least one British vessel was
> terminally damaged when a 1,000lb iron bomb went off while being
> defused (and in fact quite severely hurt by the kinetic impact of the
> bomb, even though it didn't explode). I also note that at least one
> ship was lost when unburnt Exocet fuel set her on fire, even though
> the warhead itself had not gone off.
But the damage done by a 1000Lb bomb going off next to a magazine would also
have gutted almost any WWII ship.
Although many ships in WWII suvived many bombs, those bombs averaged about
500lb's and many did NOT suvive many, and in most cases of ships sunk by air
attack one of the bombs did most off the damage
> So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
> through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
> to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
>
> Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
> with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
> the same feat.
>
> It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
> difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
> ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
> Invincible-sized ship in half.
>
> The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
> One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
> spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
> latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
Not likely before the Harriers found the oposing force and proably not at
all, a better radar than any the IJN ever had on an aircraft that fast (to
the IJN so fast as to be uninterceptble) make any other outcome seem
unlikely
> Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
> without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
> weapon they couldn't counter?
an SSN would present a threat that a 1942 or even 1945 escort group is
totally ill equiped to deal with, as fast as the escorts, with much better
sensors, never has to surface tactically, and with longer reach.
Conversely IJN Subs could acheive nothing attempting to attack a modern task
force like Corperate ecept force expendature of Torpedos and Depthcharges
> Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
> strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
> support?
yes, Radar was so far beyond what was availble in 1942 that interception of
the incoming strike would have been certian.
Keeping the stike together enough to stand a chance of achieving something
before it was butchered would be a massive problem, especially as the strike
would have have had to exceute a visaul search itself for the Task force
(given that the scout aircraft would be dead)
> Individually there'd have been no problem, but how many
> Harriers could have been aloft at any time?
>Will a Sidewinder lock onto a piston-engined aircraft's exhausts?
Yes
>Wouldn't the RN CAP and
> missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
> numbers?
Possibly IF the strike could maintian its cohesion after interception by
aircraft that could not be seriously split up by the efforts of Fighters
armed with 30MM cannon with fire control much more accurate than WWII
aircraft and, but this is a MAJOR issue, IMO they wouldn't have done
futher they would have to deal with the fact that Sea Dart, Sea Wolf Sea Cat
even Sea Slug would have very high PK on targets so slow, the AA gunnery
would have been much more effective than in WWII with every 4.5" in the
Briish fleet having radar fire control that WWII destroyer captains would
have done ANYTHING to get.
> Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
Given the fact that the RN would have seen them first, were at least as
tactically fast, and realisically would only have had to aviod engagment
untill the SSN's caught up with the task force (optionally sending
occasional 2 Ship Harrier strikes with bombs, which would have been far too
fast for the IJN to defend against (given that the SHARs could watch zeros
attempting to intercept better than the Zeros could track them, and could
aviod engagement through sheer speed, which would endanger futher confusion
and possibly cripple the Carriers))
> I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
> obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
> have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
> air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill
And significant quantities of Modern Aircraft, the Mirage, Dagger and
Skyhawk weren't state of the art in 1982, but they were still very effective
in the attack role.
Richard Bell
>browsed, lurked, and occasionally posted in s.m.n. for a while I'm
>fairly sure all the smart ones have already been asked! So if you're a
>defence professional and this sort of silly question profoundly pisses
>you off, just skip this thread. Otherwise read on.
>
>I have been reading the recent press coverage of the 20th anniversary
>of the Falklands campaign. I note that at least one British vessel was
>terminally damaged when a 1,000lb iron bomb went off while being
>defused (and in fact quite severely hurt by the kinetic impact of the
>bomb, even though it didn't explode). I also note that at least one
>ship was lost when unburnt Exocet fuel set her on fire, even though
>the warhead itself had not gone off.
>
>So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
>through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
>to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
To generous, assume the entire Pearl Harbour strike group comes along, for
a credible strike the SSN's require an oversaturated, target-rich environment
(more targets than weapons). If both Musashi and Yamato are magically
present, the brits may not have a single torpedoe available to task to a
CV. The BB's are a serious threat, as they are NAW capable platforms in a
surface engagement, that the harriers (for lack of heavy AP bombs) will have
some difficulty taking down [it may actually be easier for a fireteam of
monomaniacal SBS troopers to set off a satchel charge in the forward
magazine (escape optional)].
>
>Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
>with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
>the same feat.
>
>It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
>difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
>ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
>Invincible-sized ship in half.
>
>The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
>One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
>spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
>latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
>
>Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
>without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
>weapon they couldn't counter?
>
The biggest problem with the IJN task force that attacked Pearl Harbour
taking on the UK task force in the Falklands conflict is that it is way
in the South Atlantic ocean, in the late fall/early WINTER. The IJN
aircraft are limited to daylight operations in clement weather, both
of which are in short supply. The strike is either launched, or recovered
in the dark, and for a majority of the 24 hour day/night cycle, the IJN
has negligible air defence, so the single vulcan bomber can put an LGB into
whatever is left after the SSN runs out of torpedoes, with complete impunity.
It may make for an unusual alpha strike, but all of the available Wessex
helicopters, each with four sea-skua missiles, will play merry hell with
the destroyers. The harriers, with their bombs, will fare even better.
The fleet posessed by the argentines, except for the lack of BB's and CA's,
was much more capable, because it could repel aircraft at night and
threaten submarines.
Byron Audler
wrote:
>OK, I know this is a very frivolous question indeed, but having
>browsed, lurked, and occasionally posted in s.m.n. for a while I'm
>fairly sure all the smart ones have already been asked! So if you're a
>defence professional and this sort of silly question profoundly pisses
>you off, just skip this thread. Otherwise read on.
<snip>
short answer, no
I'll give you this one...put one Nimitz plus her air wing, leave ALL
the escorts home, and put it against the IJN that presented itself
against Pearl. The Hawkeye would have spotted the Zeros and Kates as
soon as they came off the deck...Sparrow and AAMRAM and Sidewinder and
20mm Vulcan would have wiped out the Japanese air wing before they
even laid eyes on the Tomcats and Hornets. The follow on strike of
Hornets, Tomcats, and maybe even the Vikings, would have enjoyed a
turkey shoot. I'll even toss in the Yamato...want to guess what would
have happened to her, if hit by about 8 JDAMs? or 2000pd LGBs? I
figure about 3 Harpoons to a carrier, and the rest of the cruisers and
destroyers about 1 or 2 apiece. Whatever was floating after the first
strike, surely wouldn't after the second....
or...
The IJN fleet, against 4 LA IIs<G>
figure 3 ADCAPs under the Yamato, and you have a new reef<G>
Add in the Poons, and you have a mess.
The answer to your question, is that WW2 ships, weapons, and aircraft
wouldn't stand a chance against modern systems. Do you understand,
that the guns on most warships today, have dual duty against cruise
missiles? Can you picture radar directed frag warheads picking off IJN
aircraft at 8 miles?
Byron Audler
David E. Powell
do was hit the landing ships. No troops = no invasion. However, the RN
performed decent ASW, IIRC.
DEP
Bill Shatzer
Assuming the Brits don't run out of torpedoes and missiles,
I can't see a WW2 era submarine getting within 200 miles of
the landing ships.
Let us not forget that the 1941 IJN had no awareness of
modern anti-submarine warfare tactics, detection devices
or weapons.
At night and 150 miles from the task force, an IJN sub
would feel quite comfortable cruising on the surface
(radar, what's that? helicopters? ditto) right up until
the time the Sea Skua came down the conning tower hatch.
Cheers and all,
Keith Willshaw
"David E. Powell" <David_Po...@msn.com> wrote in message
news:a8i8c7$sgf3e$1...@ID-135152.news.dfncis.de...
The IJN were not spectacularly succesful against
the opposition in WW2 , against 1980's ASW
forget it.
Keith
William Black
Richard Bell <rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote in message news:a8i0j7
> To generous, assume the entire Pearl Harbour strike group comes along, for
> a credible strike the SSN's require an oversaturated, target-rich
environment
> (more targets than weapons). If both Musashi and Yamato are magically
> present, the brits may not have a single torpedoe available to task to a
> CV. The BB's are a serious threat, as they are NAW capable platforms in a
> surface engagement, that the harriers (for lack of heavy AP bombs) will
have
> some difficulty taking down [it may actually be easier for a fireteam of
> monomaniacal SBS troopers to set off a satchel charge in the forward
> magazine (escape optional)].
The SSNs kill the flat-tops.
You then allow the BBs to get within surface missile range.
A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their primary
anti surface weapon.
I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform against
Japanese BBs of the period.
I'll tell you something: I'd like to see the amount of chaff and decoys
you'd have to use...
--
William Black
------------------
On time, on budget, or works;
Pick any two from three
TMOliver
....and if one accepts the traditional and broadly accepted
"rate of expansion of scientific knowledge/technological
capacity" the nearly four decades between 1943 and 1982
represented greater change than occurred in double that period
between 1863 and 1942....sort of like sending MONITOR and
VIRGINIA to challenge the IJN at Midway.
In real terms, even the modest force RN forces off the Falklands
(adding satellite and other recon/intel, plus modern
communications), would have been fairly "bulletproof",
especially when you consider that 250-300 nm carrier-based
aerial recon was considered close to the max for decent coverage
in 1943), although close encounters might well have quickly
exhausted RN SAM and AAM magazines with not much resupply
available.
TMO
kgb
William Black wrote:
>
> A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their primary
> anti surface weapon.
>
> I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform against
> Japanese BBs of the period.
They would certainly make a shambles of the topsides of a Japanese WWII
battleship. However, I'd guess that the 27" of armor on the face of one
of the YAMATO's turrets would pretty much shrug off an Exocet. The same
for other areas of the armored citadel.
One could look at it this way. An Exocet is basically a Baka with a
nonhuman guidance system. Fortunately, no Baka ever reached an American
battleship, so there's no combat experience indicating the likely
effect. But conventional kamikazes hit a number of American
battleships, killed crew and destroyed topsides equipment, but never (to
my knowledge) penetrated the citadel or otherwise endangered the
survival of the ship.
--
Kent G. Budge
Nibley's Gas Law of Learning:
Any amount of information, no matter how small, will
expand to fill any intellectual void, no matter how large.
Spamproof email: kgbudge at sandia dot gov
Matt Clonfero
>So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
>through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
>to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
3 SSNs, 1 SSK. No problems.
>Perhaps marginally more realistically, 2 old CVs in Argentine service,
>with obsolete but large air groups and highly skilled pilots, attempt
>the same feat.
The Argentines had one old CV with a fair-sized air group, and all the
land based air they could afford - which is probably more than two CVs
could manage.
>It seems to me that 1940s IJN ordnance would have absolutely no
>difficulty despatching RN ships of the 1980s. Rather ancient Argentine
>ordnance certainly could. A Long Lance would presumably cut even an
>Invincible-sized ship in half.
It's the getting there.
>The issue would presumably be threefold.
>
>One, would the IJN's air search planes have survived long enough to
>spot, fix, and report the location of the Task Force, given that the
>latter presumably had Harriers on CAP picking such searchers off?
Let's see a 1940s technology radio transmit through 1980s jamming. Now,
that air search aircraft has to get back and report verbally. Well,
although the RN didn't have AEW, they did have air search radars, and
harriers and Sea Dart to shoot down those pesky recce aircraft.
>Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
>without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
>weapon they couldn't counter?
Not a hope - they can be found from the air or from beneath the waves.
No amount of WWII ASW is going to prevent an SSN attacking a carrier
group; and Japanese ASW was worse than most.
>Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
>strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
>support? Individually there'd have been no problem, but how many
>Harriers could have been aloft at any time? Will a Sidewinder lock
>onto a piston-engined aircraft's exhausts? Wouldn't the RN CAP and
>missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
>numbers? Or would the two CVs never have got close enough to try?
Detect the high-flying aircraft on radar, early.
Leave the dive bombers to the missiles. Although Sea Dart didn't give
much of a showing against the FAA in 1982, that can be ascribed to one
fact - Argentina operated Sea Dart, knew that it would be lethal above
wavetop height, and stayed down. Slash down the torpedo bombers with
Harriers - using cannon if needs be. Ignore the Zeros - they are even
more impotent against Harriers than against P-38s, once the USAAF learnt
not to fight a turning fight in an energy fighter.
Aetherem Vincere
Matt
--
To err is human
To forgive is not
Air Force Policy
Richard Bell
Only the Former Soviet Union bothered to build anti-ship missiles for that
kind of target. Sea slugs and exocets will not do the job. It will take
heavy-weight torpedoes and history has already shown that the Yamato could
take multiple hits. Not only was she well-built, but (unlike the Shinano)
her crew was very good at damage control.
The main guns of the BB's are likely to be ineffective at long range, as
there are no BB sized targets to engage, but anything that cannot outrun them
is toast, because once changing direction after seeing the muzzle flash is
ineffective, they will rapidly be sunk.
Jon Bowden
> The Yamato is slightly larger than the USS Enterprise CVN, and it is
armored.
In what measurement was the Yamato larger than CVN-65? I think Enterprise is
substantially bigger that Yamato was.
Andrew Toppan
wrote:
>The Yamato is slightly larger than the USS Enterprise CVN, and it is armored.
How is 71,000 tons (YAMATO FL displacement) larger than 89,000 tons
(ENTERPRISE FL displacement as completed)? Fundamental disconnect in the
historical facts here....
>Only the Former Soviet Union bothered to build anti-ship missiles for that
>kind of target. Sea slugs and exocets will not do the job. It will take
>heavy-weight torpedoes and history has already shown that the Yamato could
>take multiple hits.
She took multiple hits. She sank. Apply modern, more-powerful torpedoes, and
her demise becomes more rapid.
--
Andrew Toppan --- acto...@gwi.net --- "I speak only for myself"
"Haze Gray & Underway" - Naval History, DANFS, World Navies Today,
Photo Features, Military FAQs, and more - http://www.hazegray.org/
Andrew Toppan
>Two, could the two IJN CVs get within 250 miles of the Task Force
>without being clattered by some 1980s air-sea (or of course submarine)
>weapon they couldn't counter?
The experience of GENERAL BELGRANO, an essentially unaltered late-WWII-era
warship, is instructive. She sailed, and she was sunk by an RN SSN without
ever detecting a threat.
Andrew Toppan
wrote:
>In what measurement was the Yamato larger than CVN-65?
Either Fantasy or Ignorance.
Andrew Toppan
RN in that era largely was an ASW-oriented navy, intended to oppose a
relatively modern Soviet submarine force. 1940's boats would not have been a
threat.
Byron Audler
wrote:
I suspect that even a modern cruiser, if unescorted, might have
problems with a modern SSN.
Byron Audler
John Lansford
>
>Trouble is long lance was launched from Destroyers and light cruisers
>that wouldnt live long enough to even see the task force let alone
>fire torpedoes at it.
All the IJN heavy cruisers had Long Lance torpedoes as well, and since
they had both fairly heavy armor and were large for CA's they could be
expected to survive a fairly heavy pounding.
>
>
>> Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
>> strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
>> support?
>
>Sea Dart would have been picking them off before they'd even seen
>the Task Force
>
>Closer in Sea Wolf and Sea Cat would have been carrving them up
Torpedo bombers tended to fly down near the sea level, making locking
onto them kind of hard. Dive bombers would be fairly easy targets.
>> Wouldn't the RN CAP and
>> missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
>> numbers?
>
>Given the answers to One and Two this is moot
>
Depends on the firing rate of the missile launchers, the number of
launchers (and the # of missiles the ships could control at one time),
the kill percentage of the missiles and the number of missiles in the
magazines.
>> I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
>> obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
>> have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
>> air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill and the British
>> CAP didn't get them all...so how would NAgumo have done?
>
>He'd have died gallantly.
>
If he only had two carriers, probably. If he had all four CV's, I
think that only the submarines the RN had around the Falklands would
have stopped all of them.
John Lansford
The unofficial I-26 Construction Webpage:
http://users.vnet.net/lansford/a10/
Andrew Toppan
>I suspect that even a modern cruiser, if unescorted, might have
>problems with a modern SSN.
Except "modern cruisers" essentially exist only in the US Navy, where they
have ASW suites equal to or better than anything else in the fleet.
Paul Holloway
news:a8ice3$pkb$1...@watserv3.uwaterloo.ca:
> In article <a8i9p5$hq7$1...@paris.btinternet.com>,
> William Black <black_...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>Richard Bell <rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote in message
>>news:a8i0j7
>>> To generous, assume the entire Pearl Harbour strike group comes
>>> along, for a credible strike the SSN's require an oversaturated,
>>> target-rich environment (more targets than weapons). If both Musashi
>>> and Yamato are magically present, the brits may not have a single
>>> torpedoe available to task to a CV. The BB's are a serious threat,
>>> as they are NAW capable platforms in a surface engagement, that the
>>> harriers (for lack of heavy AP bombs) will have some difficulty
>>> taking down [it may actually be easier for a fireteam of monomaniacal
>>> SBS troopers to set off a satchel charge in the forward magazine
>>> (escape optional)].
>>
>>The SSNs kill the flat-tops.
>>
>>You then allow the BBs to get within surface missile range.
>>
>>A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their
>>primary anti surface weapon.
>>
>>I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform
>>against Japanese BBs of the period.
>>
>>I'll tell you something: I'd like to see the amount of chaff and
>>decoys you'd have to use...
>>
> The Yamato is slightly larger than the USS Enterprise CVN, and it is
> armored.
Hmmm, I"m trying to think by what weird standard you could consider Yamato
larger than CVN-65. Let's compare:
Yamato:
Displacement: 71,659 tons, depending on source
CVN-65:
Displacement: 93,300 tons, ditto
Yamato:
Dismensions: 862'10" x 121'1" x 32'11"
CVN-65:
Dimensions: 1101 x 248 x 39 feet
As you can clearly see, USS Enterprise, CVN-65, is comfortably larger than
Yamato in all aspects. Where you got the notion from, I have no idea.
> Only the Former Soviet Union bothered to build anti-ship
> missiles for that kind of target. Sea slugs and exocets will not do
> the job. It will take heavy-weight torpedoes and history has already
> shown that the Yamato could take multiple hits. Not only was she
> well-built, but (unlike the Shinano) her crew was very good at damage
> control.
>
Multitudes of Exocets will quickly mission kill any IJN ships. RN
submarines will have a filed day against almost non-existent IJN ASW
capability.
> The main guns of the BB's are likely to be ineffective at long range,
> as there are no BB sized targets to engage, but anything that cannot
> outrun them is toast, because once changing direction after seeing the
> muzzle flash is ineffective, they will rapidly be sunk.
>
>
I doubt they'd ever get within gun range. In such a scenario, the only hope
is 4-6 IJN carriers getting lucky with massed air strikes.
Paul Holloway
news:a8i8c7$sgf3e$1...@ID-135152.news.dfncis.de:
LOL, they wouldn't have gotten with a 100 miles if lucky. They knew nothing
of modern ASW tactics, sensors, and weaponry (from a navy that, at the time,
was primarily focused with stopping modern USSR nuke subs).
Plus, there's a distinction between submarines and submersibles, and the IJN
ships were more properly submersibles as opposed to true submarines. Like
all WWII subs, they spent too much time on the surface.
tim gueguen
"Andrew Toppan" <acto...@gwi.net> wrote in message
news:u3kpaucjc6lfqm88h...@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 4 Apr 2002 14:09:58 -0500, "David E. Powell"
> <David_Po...@msn.com> wrote:
>
> >If the IJN subs are involved, depending on how many, maybe. All they had
to
> >do was hit the landing ships. No troops = no invasion. However, the RN
> >performed decent ASW, IIRC.
>
> RN in that era largely was an ASW-oriented navy, intended to oppose a
> relatively modern Soviet submarine force. 1940's boats would not have
been a
> threat.
>
Japanese commanders would have no clue about how far away they would be
audible.
tim gueguen 101867
Roger Fleming
[...]
> Sidewinder should lock on quite well. Even the old RN sams (Seacat, Seaslug)
> should work well against these much slower targets. Hell, at the ranges the
> Japanese would have to approach, even the 4.5" gun could be effective. Sheer
> numbers might be a problem, but I would question whether even the Japanese
> would press an attack when their wingmates start exploding at 20+ miles from
> the target, and they continue taking losses. Combination of Harriers and
Did the RN have Goalkeeper in 1982?
If so, subsonic aircraft should be easy meat once they hit around the
3km mark. With most IJN airborne torps having an extreme range of
1500m, that gives Goalkeeper about ten seconds of fairly easy
engagements.
Keith Willshaw
"Roger Fleming" <roger_f...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:fdbae11.02040...@posting.google.com...
> Paul Cassidy wrote:
> [...]
>
> Did the RN have Goalkeeper in 1982?
No
> If so, subsonic aircraft should be easy meat once they hit around the
> 3km mark. With most IJN airborne torps having an extreme range of
> 1500m, that gives Goalkeeper about ten seconds of fairly easy
> engagements.
The 4.5" fitted to most of the ships would have rather longer
range and even SeaCat could probably do something
useful :)
Keith
George Black
"Keith Willshaw" <keith@kwillshaw_NoSpam.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:1017988641.9067.0...@news.demon.co.uk...
A 4.5 dual purpose turret would do pretty good but the Seacat missile
without sea haze or fog would be my (1982) weapon of choice.
Paul Cassidy
> > > 3km mark. With most IJN airborne torps having an extreme range of
> > > 1500m, that gives Goalkeeper about ten seconds of fairly easy
> > > engagements.
> >
> > The 4.5" fitted to most of the ships would have rather longer
> > range and even SeaCat could probably do something
> > useful :)
>
> A 4.5 dual purpose turret would do pretty good but the Seacat missile
> without sea haze or fog would be my (1982) weapon of choice.
>
During the Falklands, Seacat achieved something like 10% kill ratio. That
sounds pretty low, but is much better than a WW2 ship would normally manage.
Also the '82 ships were firing in less than ideal circumstances (ie enclosed
waters with little or no raid warning). However, personally I would like to
be knocking the Japanese planes down long before they get to Seacat range
(10% makes me nervous). Now Seawolf on the other hand....... :)
Andrew McCruden
"John Lansford" <jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
news:gqkpau0sq0a2kvrk7...@4ax.com...
> "Keith Willshaw" <keith_w...@compuserve.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >Trouble is long lance was launched from Destroyers and light cruisers
> >that wouldnt live long enough to even see the task force let alone
> >fire torpedoes at it.
>
> All the IJN heavy cruisers had Long Lance torpedoes as well, and since
> they had both fairly heavy armor and were large for CA's they could be
> expected to survive a fairly heavy pounding.
They still wouldn't have got inside of Torpedo range.
> >
> >
> >> Three, could the Task Force have intercepted the resulting alpha
> >> strike from 80 to 90 torpedo- and dive-bombers with 18 Zeroes in
> >> support?
> >
> >Sea Dart would have been picking them off before they'd even seen
> >the Task Force
> >
> >Closer in Sea Wolf and Sea Cat would have been carrving them up
>
> Torpedo bombers tended to fly down near the sea level, making locking
> onto them kind of hard. Dive bombers would be fairly easy targets.
The toprdo bombers would have been Harrier meat,
given their requirted straight and level attack runs and close relase points
and the Fire control available to the 4.5" guns of most RN frigates not
equiped with Sea Wolf that were part of the Falklands TF,
Sea wolf would have had no problems whatever
also WWII toprdo boimbers typically only droped low fir their torpedo runs,
they'd have spend a large ammount of time in the Sea Dart and Sea Slug
Evelope before begining them.
> >> Wouldn't the RN CAP and
> >> missile defences simply have been overwhelmed by weight of incoming
> >> numbers?
> >
> >Given the answers to One and Two this is moot
> >
> Depends on the firing rate of the missile launchers, the number of
> launchers (and the # of missiles the ships could control at one time),
> the kill percentage of the missiles and the number of missiles in the
> magazines.
All of which still add up to such muderous early lossed the strike would
loose coheasion, and multiple WWII aircraft making single unco-ordinated
attack runs would have been dead meat.
> >> I know, I know - it's completely conjectural and if the answer's
> >> obvious, both sides would have known and one side or the other would
> >> have stayed well out of harm's way in consequence. But the Argentine
> >> air force did pretty well through sheer pilot skill and the British
> >> CAP didn't get them all...so how would NAgumo have done?
> >
> >He'd have died gallantly.
> >
> If he only had two carriers, probably. If he had all four CV's, I
> think that only the submarines the RN had around the Falklands would
> have stopped all of them.
I think even with the enitre IJN they would have been very lucky to spot the
RN task force at all.
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Andrew Toppan <acto...@gwi.net> wrote:
>On Thu, 4 Apr 2002 14:09:58 -0500, "David E. Powell"
><David_Po...@msn.com> wrote:
>
>>If the IJN subs are involved, depending on how many, maybe. All they had to
>>do was hit the landing ships. No troops = no invasion. However, the RN
>>performed decent ASW, IIRC.
>
>RN in that era largely was an ASW-oriented navy, intended to oppose a
>relatively modern Soviet submarine force. 1940's boats would not have been a
>threat.
Even leaving the helicopters and lightweight torpedoes out of the equation
(and they'd be devastating against 1940s submarines) just consider the
on-ship ASW weapons: in 1945 Squid had a 60% kill rate in attacks against
U-boats. A fairly high proportion of the ships in Corporate had Limbo,
a much more effective weapon coupled to a very good SONAR. With that
combination they could target and engage WW-2 type submarines from a
vquite a respectable distance. And then there's Ikara, delivering homing
torpedoes from miles off, and helicopters with dipping sonar, and
sonobouys, and Wasps and Lynx with torpedoes. And SSNs and O-boats
hunting on active and passive Sonar.
The RN of the early 1980s was - essentially - a force tasked to fight an
ASW battle against the biggest and quite possibly baddest submarine force
in the world. WW2 submarines would not have been a terrific threat. San
Luis refers - and she was a guppy.
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
>You then allow the BBs to get within surface missile range.
>
>A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their primary
>anti surface weapon.
>
>I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform against
>Japanese BBs of the period.
Sea Slug (with a concrete warhead) had similar (or better) anti-armour
performance to 15" AP shell (and much greater incendiary effect once
inside). It wouldn't take long to run up the cement mixer. Given that
pretty near every Sea Slug could be guided to a hit (beam-riders,
remember) I don't think it would have taken that long to convince the
battlewagons that they had places to be and things to do. This assuming
that the submarines hadn't found them beforehand.
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Time has stopped, says the Black Lion clock
and eternity has begun" (Dylan Thomas)
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
>
>
>William Black wrote:
>>
>> A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their primary
>> anti surface weapon.
>>
>> I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform against
>> Japanese BBs of the period.
>
>They would certainly make a shambles of the topsides of a Japanese WWII
>battleship. However, I'd guess that the 27" of armor on the face of one
>of the YAMATO's turrets would pretty much shrug off an Exocet. The same
>for other areas of the armored citadel.
Citadel doesn't matter. Shamble the upperworks, fire Sea Dart or Sea Slug
at the turret bases. Smash the rangefinders. Kill the DC parties so the
fires burn out of control. Sea Slug could match heavy AP shell for
penetration of armour, there wasn't much of a Yamato behind 22-24" armour
(not 27"), and that armour was pretty poor stuff - about equivalent to
14" of British or German armour or 16" or so of US plate - all it did was
weigh more so you could cover less of the ship with it.
Matt Clonfero
lum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
>To generous, assume the entire Pearl Harbour strike group comes along, for
>a credible strike the SSN's require an oversaturated, target-rich environment
>(more targets than weapons).
Let's assume that an SSN has twenty weapons, which is probably on the
low side. Three of them - 60 weapons. Let's assume 50-50 mix of Mk 24
(guided but small warhead) and Mk 8** (straight running, big bang).
That's thirty guided shots at escorts that can't detect the shot - let's
be generous and say 15 kills. Let's also assume that the Mk 8**s are
fired in salvoes of three, but each salvo mission-kills a target -
that's ten capital ships out of the equation.
There's also an O-class SS in the Task Group, which can account for,
say, a further two capital ships and three escorts.
Looks bad, even for a big WWII force.
Matt Clonfero
<David_Po...@msn.com> wrote:
>If the IJN subs are involved, depending on how many, maybe. All they had to
>do was hit the landing ships. No troops = no invasion. However, the RN
>performed decent ASW, IIRC.
Let's be serious - a 1940s submarine is actually a submersible surface
ship, with terrible submerged endurance. Even assuming that they don't
get picked off a long way away, the RN escorts would sweep them away -
real sonars, including torpedo warning; and guidance ASW ordnance
against straight runners with `that looks about right' aiming.
Matt Clonfero
>One could look at it this way. An Exocet is basically a Baka with a
>nonhuman guidance system. Fortunately, no Baka ever reached an American
>battleship, so there's no combat experience indicating the likely
>effect. But conventional kamikazes hit a number of American
>battleships, killed crew and destroyed topsides equipment, but never (to
>my knowledge) penetrated the citadel or otherwise endangered the
>survival of the ship.
And a German guided glide bomb killed the ROMA...
Sparks
"Paul Cassidy" <paul.c...@wxs.nl> wrote in message
news:a8jkdf$551$1...@reader07.wxs.nl...
> During the Falklands, Seacat achieved something like 10% kill ratio. That
> sounds pretty low, but is much better than a WW2 ship would normally manage.
> Also the '82 ships were firing in less than ideal circumstances (ie enclosed
> waters with little or no raid warning). However, personally I would like to
> be knocking the Japanese planes down long before they get to Seacat range
> (10% makes me nervous). Now Seawolf on the other hand....... :)
>
5 miles max? While Seawolf is more deadly, if it's peace of mind you're after
would the Japs fly high enough (remember they're not worried about radar)
to fly into Sea Dart territory, which goes further out to approx 25nm. I've seen
Sea Cat in action (not war) and let's just say I wasn't impressed, in my opinion
that thing was a hazard to astronauts. The RN's standard fit the 4.5" would
have
more joy.
I have to say I thought the subject title for this post was absolutely
ludicrous, but
I take it back, several interesting points being brought up.
Sparks
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
'Carriers, cruisers and battlewagons torpedoed and sunk by submarines
you can't even detect, never mind engage. Recon. a/c wiped out at 30
miles from a force they never even saw by SAMs. Night-time bombing
attacks from aircraft you never saw coming and which your sensors
can't see and your weapons can't track. Your submarines and destroyers
are getting chopped up by Sea Skua ever night, and the submarines by
Ikara by day. You're being cut to pieces by an enemy you never even
see. How long are you going to try to close in? How long before
getting the hell out starts to seem a much more appealing option?
Eugene Griessel
>'Carriers, cruisers and battlewagons torpedoed and sunk by submarines
>you can't even detect, never mind engage. Recon. a/c wiped out at 30
>miles from a force they never even saw by SAMs. Night-time bombing
>attacks from aircraft you never saw coming and which your sensors
>can't see and your weapons can't track. Your submarines and destroyers
>are getting chopped up by Sea Skua ever night, and the submarines by
>Ikara by day. You're being cut to pieces by an enemy you never even
>see. How long are you going to try to close in? How long before
>getting the hell out starts to seem a much more appealing option?
Now if the Japanese had invested in lots and lots and lots of concrete
foists they would have prevailed.
Eugene L Griessel www.dynagen.co.za/eugene
SAAF Crashboat History www.dynagen.co.za/eugene/guybook.html
"Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's game because
they almost always turn out to be - or to be indistinguishable from - self-righteous
sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time."
Neil Stephenson, Cryptonomicon
Paul Cassidy
"Sparks" <spa...@sparks.com> wrote in message
news:bher8.1247$vn2.2...@news2-win.server.ntlworld.com...
Peace of mind was my point. As I said, given half a chance I would rather
they don't get that close in the first place. However, if they do, I'd much
rather be on a Type 22 with Seawolf compared to a Type 21 with Seacat (even
if it does have a 4.5")! Of course, that assumes that Seawolf actually
works, which is something that wasn't guaranteed in '82.
John Lansford
>
>"John Lansford" <jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
>news:gqkpau0sq0a2kvrk7...@4ax.com...
>> "Keith Willshaw" <keith_w...@compuserve.com> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >Trouble is long lance was launched from Destroyers and light cruisers
>> >that wouldnt live long enough to even see the task force let alone
>> >fire torpedoes at it.
>>
>> All the IJN heavy cruisers had Long Lance torpedoes as well, and since
>> they had both fairly heavy armor and were large for CA's they could be
>> expected to survive a fairly heavy pounding.
>
>They still wouldn't have got inside of Torpedo range.
What would stop them? Harriers with rockets? Exocets? Neither would be
as effective against them as the WWII weapons they were attacked with
at, say, Samar, and the IJN CA's took a lot of damage there.
Keith Willshaw
Harriers with 1000lb MK 13 retarded bombs would be considerably
more effective
Exocet missiles may not penetrate the armour belt
but they'd do a LOT of damage topside
Torpedoes from the SSN's, glug glug
Sea Slug missiles from the County Class destoyers
which had more KE and more HE than a 15" shell
would be nasty too
Even the radar guided 4.5" Mk 8 Guns would be trashing the topsides
of the CA's at 11 miles out
Hell if the Admiral gets really pissed he could always resort
to the We-177 , a bucket of sunshine would ruin the whole
day for even the Yamato :)
Keith
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
John Lansford <jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>"Andrew McCruden" <use...@beyond-comprehension.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>They still wouldn't have got inside of Torpedo range.
>
>What would stop them? Harriers with rockets? Exocets? Neither would be
>as effective against them as the WWII weapons they were attacked with
>at, say, Samar, and the IJN CA's took a lot of damage there.
Sea Dart and Sea Slug would turn them into floating crematoria quite
effectively. Both would deposit far more KE than any weapon mounted
by a WW2 cruiser (and around as much as a shell from a battleship's
gun), would spray lavish amounts of (as yet) unburned fuel around
and would have a hit rate up in the 60-80% range (based on memory
of figures quoted from firing trials on surface targets) as opposed
to the 2-odd% that WW2 gunfire usually managed. Come to that, the
rain of rader controlled, radar-spotted 4.5" incoming would be
nasty enough in a cruiser. They might be afloat at the end of it,
but they'd not be steaming (apart, perhaps, from "very slowly, away")
and they'd certainly not be fighting (apart from the spreading fires).
The cruisers would have more weapons. The T42s and Counties, however,
had weapons that could *hit*. OTOH the cruisers could, at the cost of
dying in the attempt, empty the destroyers' area SAM magazines - so
that the destruction of air attacks from any 'carrier the submarine
hadn't found yet would be wholly a job for the Harriers (and for
4.5", Bofors, Sea Wolf and Sea Cat closer in).
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca (Richard Bell) wrote:
> and history has already shown that the Yamato could
> take multiple hits
Those hits were from airborne torpedoes with a 600lb Torpex charge.
The British Mk VIII** had a charge of 805lb of Torpex.
Ken Young
ken...@cix.co.uk
Maternity is a matter of fact
Paternity is a matter of opinion
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
bau...@bellsouth.net (Byron Audler) wrote:
> I suspect that even a modern cruiser, if unescorted,
Belgrano was escorted. If the escorts had not bee there the loss of
life would have been higher.
Stephen Shepherd
No, first Phalanx and then Goalkeeper introduced as the result of the Falklands.
CIWS's were Sea Wolf, Sea Cat, 20mm and 40mm (both of WWII vintage), GPMG - were
the twin 30mm mounts in by then? I don't think so. 4.5" mounts were also used -
in Simons War on BBC1 this week there was a shot of a Leander (maybe a Type 12?)
training her mount around as she was bombed, trying to hit the a/c!
Alan Lothian
<ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Belgrano was escorted. If the escorts had not bee there the loss of
> life would have been higher.
Hmm. The escorts rapidly scarpered, and most of the survivors spent 36
hours in liferafts before the escorts and other ships came to rescue
them
.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4078030,00.html
reports an interesting "reunion" between former enemies in which the
strange behaviour of the escorts is alluded to by a Belgrano officer.
--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk
Richard Bell
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote:
>In article <a8i9p5$hq7$1...@paris.btinternet.com>,
>William Black <black_...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>You then allow the BBs to get within surface missile range.
>>
>>A lot of RN ships of the period carried 4 of MM38 Exocet as their primary
>>anti surface weapon.
>>
>>I'm sure someone here will know exactly how well they would perform against
>>Japanese BBs of the period.
>
>Sea Slug (with a concrete warhead) had similar (or better) anti-armour
>performance to 15" AP shell (and much greater incendiary effect once
>inside). It wouldn't take long to run up the cement mixer. Given that
>pretty near every Sea Slug could be guided to a hit (beam-riders,
>remember) I don't think it would have taken that long to convince the
>battlewagons that they had places to be and things to do. This assuming
>that the submarines hadn't found them beforehand.
>
concrete filled sea-slug. The first is that one may not suffice (good
thing that they never miss) and they are few in number, and the second is
that they can only be fired after the target is the radar horizon, which is
too close to the enemy than I would like to be.
Richard Bell
<ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <a8ice3$pkb$1...@watserv3.uwaterloo.ca>,
>rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca (Richard Bell) wrote:
>
>> and history has already shown that the Yamato could
>> take multiple hits
>
> Those hits were from airborne torpedoes with a 600lb Torpex charge.
>The British Mk VIII** had a charge of 805lb of Torpex.
>
(based on historical evidence) will still be a target after receiving six
Mk VIII**'s on one side. Being a very beamy ship, the Yamato had the luxury
of defence in depth against torpedoes, that and slightly over 100 watertight
compartments never hurt.
Richard Bell
Andrew Toppan <acto...@gwi.net> wrote:
>On 4 Apr 2002 20:18:11 GMT, rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca (Richard Bell)
>wrote:
>
>>The Yamato is slightly larger than the USS Enterprise CVN, and it is armored.
>
>How is 71,000 tons (YAMATO FL displacement) larger than 89,000 tons
>(ENTERPRISE FL displacement as completed)? Fundamental disconnect in the
>historical facts here....
My error, for which I apologize. The Yamato is not as big as USN fleet
carriers, but much larger than a Midway.
>
>>Only the Former Soviet Union bothered to build anti-ship missiles for that
>>kind of target. Sea slugs and exocets will not do the job. It will take
>>heavy-weight torpedoes and history has already shown that the Yamato could
>>take multiple hits.
>
>She took multiple hits. She sank. Apply modern, more-powerful torpedoes, and
>her demise becomes more rapid.
But based on the history presented by www.warships1.com, we are talking about
a minimum of three or four hits, and I was mainly talking about how the
anti-surface missiles available to the british were not designed for targets
much larger than a Kresta CG. Even three torpedo hits may be optimistic, as
four times the explosives only does twice the damage, the Musashi took an
even worse pounding than the Yamato. After multiple hits with torpedoes and
bombs, the Musashi was still maintaining 22 knots. As I said, definitely
good damage control on those ships.
Paul J. Adam
>"Andrew McCruden" <use...@beyond-comprehension.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:
>>They still wouldn't have got inside of Torpedo range.
>
>What would stop them? Harriers with rockets? Exocets?
Harriers delivering five delay-fuzed thousand-pound bombs each?
Torpedo attack by SSNs?
--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill
Paul J. Adam ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk
kgb
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
>
> Citadel doesn't matter. Shamble the upperworks, fire Sea Dart or Sea Slug
> at the turret bases. Smash the rangefinders. Kill the DC parties so the
> fires burn out of control.
Given enough hits, you could certainly pound the YAMATO into uselessness
even if the hits were not penetrating. And with the hit probabilities
for modern missiles, you could get enough hits with many fewer missiles
than battleship shells. How many missiles did the Falklands task force
carry?
Sea Slug could match heavy AP shell for
> penetration of armour, there wasn't much of a Yamato behind 22-24" armour
> (not 27"), and that armour was pretty poor stuff - about equivalent to
> 14" of British or German armour or 16" or so of US plate - all it did was
> weigh more so you could cover less of the ship with it.
It was poorer armor, in part because the Japanese were substituting
copper (which they had fair supplies of) for scarcer alloying metals,
and it was arranged poorly. Still, it took a lot of torpedo and bomb
hits to sink YAMATO and MUSASHI.
--
Kent G. Budge
Nibley's Gas Law of Learning:
Any amount of information, no matter how small, will
expand to fill any intellectual void, no matter how large.
Spamproof email: kgbudge at sandia dot gov
kgb
Matt Clonfero wrote:
>
> And a German guided glide bomb killed the ROMA...
IIRC, the ROMA took the glide bomb right down the stack, thereby
avoiding the deck armor. That's a pretty lucky hit. Still, one
lesson of WWII was that lucky hits happened all the time. Weak spots
in capital ship protection seemed to somehow attract enemy
ordnance.
Keith Willshaw
"Richard Bell" <rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote in message
news:a8kfe7$jbp$1...@watserv3.uwaterloo.ca...
I suspect the Mark VIII isnt going to be hitting either side.
Its going to be going off under the keel which is
MUCH nastier
Keith
Paul J. Adam
>Matt Clonfero wrote:
>> And a German guided glide bomb killed the ROMA...
>
>IIRC, the ROMA took the glide bomb right down the stack, thereby
>avoiding the deck armor. That's a pretty lucky hit.
No, it hit abreast the bridge, smashed through the armour, and detonated
the forward magazine.
Her sister ship ITALIA had a similar bomb pass clean through the hull
ahead of A Turret to explode in the sea.
Keith Willshaw
"Paul J. Adam" <ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:N5BZqsex...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk...
> In article <3CADCC20...@nospam.com>, kgb <k...@nospam.com> writes
> >Matt Clonfero wrote:
> >> And a German guided glide bomb killed the ROMA...
> >
> >IIRC, the ROMA took the glide bomb right down the stack, thereby
> >avoiding the deck armor. That's a pretty lucky hit.
>
> No, it hit abreast the bridge, smashed through the armour, and detonated
> the forward magazine.
>
> Her sister ship ITALIA had a similar bomb pass clean through the hull
> ahead of A Turret to explode in the sea.
>
One which hit HMS Warspite penetrated 6 decks and blew
a hole in her bottom was I recall
Keith
David Sharpness
> So, in late 1941, a la "Final Countdown", 'Akagi' and 'Kaga' steam
> through a timewarp into the south Atlantic and find themselves tasked
> to prevent a liberation of the Falklands.
>
I liked that movie, and when they hopped out of time just before Pearl
Harbor, they didn't know where they were, and had to piece things
together.
Do the the Akagi and Kaga have foreknowledge? With that they could
plot and scheme and use the element of surprise. I mean, do the
Argentinians go back in time and get them? This whole problem is in
the Time Machine story, Pal's being the best!
And comparing weaponery can be misleading--a kamikaze pilot at the
controls of a fuel and bomb loaded plane was a menace at the end of
WW2, and apparently has been added to the arsenal of evey tin pot out
there!
Our own self sacrifices won the day at Midway.
I dont know though...:)...ask Okumiya!
David
Rainbow, CA
Eric Pinnell
<ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>Harriers delivering five delay-fuzed thousand-pound bombs each?
>
>Torpedo attack by SSNs?
The only question seems to be whether the RN would run out of ammo
before the IJN ran out of ships.
Eric Pinnell
(Author, "The Claws of The Dragon", "The Omega File")
For a preview, see: http://www.ericpinnell.com and click on "books"
Keith Willshaw
> In article <a8jm4a$8g3i$1...@central.aber.ac.uk>,
> >
> Has this actually been tested?
Oh yes
HMS Glamorgan used Sea Slug to bombard the airfield at
Port Stanley during the closing days of the Falklands war
and managed to hit and destroy the radar that had survived
the vulcan and harrier attacks to date.
> There are still two problems with the
> concrete filled sea-slug. The first is that one may not suffice (good
> thing that they never miss) and they are few in number, and the second is
> that they can only be fired after the target is the radar horizon, which
is
> too close to the enemy than I would like to be.
>
The effective range is going to be a lot better than the optically
aimed guns of the IJN and Sea Slug was a seriously big missile
It was 20 ft long had a wingspan of round 5 ft, weighed in at over
2 tons and arrives at well above Mach 2. They left the contact
fuse off the Mk 2 as they realised that with that much KE the
warhead would be irrelevant.
There's a nice Seaslug page at
http://homepages.enterprise.net/sjenkins/seaslug.htm
Keith
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
ISTR (could check in Brown, but I can't be bothered- it's been a busy
week) effectiveness of underwater explosions scales as rather more than
the cube of bursting charge - so > (8.5/6)**3 - call it 2.5 times
as effective, hit for hit. Two Mk.VIII* are worth five air-launched
torpedoes - but the effectiveness in starting leaks through adjacent
bulkheads would be much greater, of course.
tim gueguen
"David Sharpness" <dshar...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:50090fb0.02040...@posting.google.com...
>>
> And comparing weaponery can be misleading--a kamikaze pilot at the
> controls of a fuel and bomb loaded plane was a menace at the end of
> WW2, and apparently has been added to the arsenal of evey tin pot out
> there!
>
before being SAMed, assuming he doesn't get intercepted and shot down by a
Harrier.
tim gueguen 101867
Paul J. Adam
<rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> writes
>In article <07kpau47v7ivi8tpg...@4ax.com>,
>Andrew Toppan <acto...@gwi.net> wrote:
>>She took multiple hits. She sank. Apply modern, more-powerful torpedoes, and
>>her demise becomes more rapid.
>
>But based on the history presented by www.warships1.com, we are talking about
>a minimum of three or four hits,
To *sink* her. At what point does she become incapable of pursuing
further offensive combat operations?
>and I was mainly talking about how the
>anti-surface missiles available to the british were not designed for targets
>much larger than a Kresta CG.
Thus, hitting a much larger target with no countermeasures or useful
defences would be even easier... the phrase "broad side of a barn" comes
to mind.
>Even three torpedo hits may be optimistic, as
>four times the explosives only does twice the damage, the Musashi took an
>even worse pounding than the Yamato. After multiple hits with torpedoes and
>bombs, the Musashi was still maintaining 22 knots.
For how long? "Not very".
The USS NORTH CAROLINA took _one_ torpedo hit in September 1942; and
needed two months of repairs before being fit to fight again.
>As I said, definitely
>good damage control on those ships.
Not good enough to stop them sinking... or to let them get close enough
to the enemy to do any damage.
Paul J. Adam
<rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> writes
>In article <a8jm4a$8g3i$1...@central.aber.ac.uk>,
>ANDREW ROBERT BREEN <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote:
>>Sea Slug (with a concrete warhead) had similar (or better) anti-armour
>>performance to 15" AP shell (and much greater incendiary effect once
>>inside). It wouldn't take long to run up the cement mixer. Given that
>>pretty near every Sea Slug could be guided to a hit (beam-riders,
>>remember) I don't think it would have taken that long to convince the
>>battlewagons that they had places to be and things to do. This assuming
>>that the submarines hadn't found them beforehand.
>>
>Has this actually been tested?
The US was testing the even older Talos SAM as a surface-to-surface
missile back in the 1960s, using the decommissioned escort carrier
MAKASSAR STRAIT as a target. Multiple hits were scored with very severe
damage. Long-range SAMs come in fast, hit hard, and bring large amounts
of combustibles to the party.
>There are still two problems with the
>concrete filled sea-slug. The first is that one may not suffice (good
>thing that they never miss)
That's okay, there's a few dozen in the magazine...
>and they are few in number, and the second is
>that they can only be fired after the target is the radar horizon, which is
>too close to the enemy than I would like to be.
Still gives you ten miles or so of grace between "can hit him with
missiles" and "he has a significant chance of hitting you with gunfire".
If the US Navy's newest battleships couldn't hit a dodging Japanese
destroyer in an hour of shooting, why is the IJN assumed to be superior
(while firing in the murk of the South Atlantic's weather?)
Paul Holloway
news:a8kfe7$jbp$1...@watserv3.uwaterloo.ca:
This is what gets me about Yamato and Musashi........
Everybody talks about the number of hits they took before they sank. That
begs the question, did it actually take THAT MANY hits to sink them, or were
they simply taking further hits because we didn't give them time to sink?
I think the second option is the answer.....the reason they took so many
hits is because the USN resorted to overkill and kept hitting them why they
were still afloat. I seriously doubt it would have taken that many hits to
sink either of them.
Paul Holloway
> In article <07kpau47v7ivi8tpg...@4ax.com>,
> Andrew Toppan <acto...@gwi.net> wrote:
>>On 4 Apr 2002 20:18:11 GMT, rlb...@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca (Richard
>>Bell) wrote:
>>
>>>The Yamato is slightly larger than the USS Enterprise CVN, and it is
>>>armored.
>>
>>How is 71,000 tons (YAMATO FL displacement) larger than 89,000 tons
>>(ENTERPRISE FL displacement as completed)? Fundamental disconnect in
>>the historical facts here....
>
> My error, for which I apologize. The Yamato is not as big as USN fleet
> carriers, but much larger than a Midway.
As built (before reconstruction into modern units with modern air wings),
the Midways were only about 5000 tons les FL displacement, and were
comparable or larger in other dimensions.
I fail to see your point anway.
>>
>>>Only the Former Soviet Union bothered to build anti-ship missiles for
>>>that kind of target. Sea slugs and exocets will not do the job. It
>>>will take heavy-weight torpedoes and history has already shown that
>>>the Yamato could take multiple hits.
>>
>>She took multiple hits. She sank. Apply modern, more-powerful
>>torpedoes, and her demise becomes more rapid.
>
> But based on the history presented by www.warships1.com, we are talking
> about a minimum of three or four hits, and I was mainly talking about
> how the anti-surface missiles available to the british were not
> designed for targets much larger than a Kresta CG. Even three torpedo
> hits may be optimistic, as four times the explosives only does twice
> the damage, the Musashi took an even worse pounding than the Yamato.
> After multiple hits with torpedoes and bombs, the Musashi was still
> maintaining 22 knots. As I said, definitely good damage control on
> those ships.
>
>
Yes, she was maintaining 22 knots while down by the bows, taking on more and
more water by the minute. All those hits weren't necessary to sink her, we
just kept simply hitting her until she wasn't there any more.
Oh, and the IJN was noted for mediocre DC at best, and I wouldn't use the
Yamato or Musashi as examples of their DC prowess.........they both sank!
Not that any amount of DC would have saved them..........
David E. Powell
news:1018030423.2606.0...@news.demon.co.uk...
Nice missile. According to Mr. Toppan's site, they appear to be out of
service, even among client nations. It looks impressive, though. Was there
ever a planned "Mk 3" upgrade?
DEP
Keith Willshaw
"David E. Powell" <David_Po...@msn.com> wrote in message
news:a8l8n8$taujh$1...@ID-135152.news.dfncis.de...
>
> Nice missile. According to Mr. Toppan's site, they appear to be out of
> service, even among client nations. It looks impressive, though. Was there
> ever a planned "Mk 3" upgrade?
>
> DEP
>
>
Not to my knowledge, Sea Dart came along to fill that role.
Keith
John Lansford
As did the one that hit USS Savannah.
John Lansford
The unofficial I-26 Construction Webpage:
http://users.vnet.net/lansford/a10/
Alan Minyard
Bell) wrote:
The Yamato class had a weakness in their anti-torpedo defense, caused
by the joint of the armor belt, as well as a poorly placed horizontal
beam system. The only reason that they "survived" so many hits is
that the USN kept on pounding them after they were already in a
sinking condition (as would any prudent force).
Al Minyard
Tom Schoene
"Paul Cassidy" <paul.c...@wxs.nl> wrote in message
news:a8jkdf$551$1...@reader07.wxs.nl...
> > > The 4.5" fitted to most of the ships would have rather longer
> > > range and even SeaCat could probably do something
> > > useful :)
> >
> > A 4.5 dual purpose turret would do pretty good but the Seacat missile
> > without sea haze or fog would be my (1982) weapon of choice.
> >
>
> During the Falklands, Seacat achieved something like 10% kill ratio.
It would do far better against WW2-era prop planes. Halving the target
speed does wonders for acuracy. If it did worse than 30%, I'd be surprised.
Back to guns, remember that the 4.5inch woudl have had proximity fuzing.
With crude verisons of this technology, WW2 5-inch guns became the premire
shipbaord AAW weapon. The Mk 6 and Mk 8 mounts would have been lethal.
--
Tom Schoene (replace "invalid" with "net" to email)
We must welcome the future, remembering that soon it will be the
past; and we must respect the past, knowing that once it was all that
was humanly possible. - George Santayana
>
Tom Schoene
"kgb" <k...@nospam.com> wrote in message news:3CADCB5D...@nospam.com...
>
>
> ANDREW ROBERT BREEN wrote:
> >
> > Citadel doesn't matter. Shamble the upperworks, fire Sea Dart or Sea
Slug
> > at the turret bases. Smash the rangefinders. Kill the DC parties so the
> > fires burn out of control.
>
> Given enough hits, you could certainly pound the YAMATO into uselessness
> even if the hits were not penetrating. And with the hit probabilities
> for modern missiles, you could get enough hits with many fewer missiles
> than battleship shells. How many missiles did the Falklands task force
> carry?
Depends a lont on when the action ahppens. Let's assume 1 May, when there
was a real (if slim) chance of a naval action in real life.
At this point you have 2 County DLGs, 2 Type 22 FFs and 2 Type 21 FFs, each
with 4 Exocet (total 24 missiles). But at least one of these had been
detached for South Georgia. By the end of May, another nine Exocet-armed
ships had joined the Task Force, though some of the originals were damaged
or destroyed. In general, I'd say there were roughly 20 usable Exocets in
the Task force at any one time.
There were many more SAMs, at least 100 long-rnage Sea Slug and Sea Dart,
plus scads of Sea Cat and Sea Wolf and assorted Blowpipe MANPADS. The
long-range SAMs all had a credible secondary antiship mode, though many
would have been expended on the air threat.
Paul Holloway
news:iqsrau0lhhdlq3hfa...@4ax.com:
Ah, thank you, that's what I've always postulated. They simply took so many
hits because they were still afloat........they were already sinking, we
just kept hitting them.
Richard Bell
Paul Holloway <pau...@exis.net> wrote:
>
>This is what gets me about Yamato and Musashi........
>
>Everybody talks about the number of hits they took before they sank. That
>begs the question, did it actually take THAT MANY hits to sink them, or were
>they simply taking further hits because we didn't give them time to sink?
>
>I think the second option is the answer.....the reason they took so many
>hits is because the USN resorted to overkill and kept hitting them why they
>were still afloat. I seriously doubt it would have taken that many hits to
>sink either of them.
>
They were attacked by several waves of aircraft, over a period of a few
hours. If the first wave was enough to sink them, why were they still afloat
for an hour, before the next wave arrived?
David E. Powell
Titanic stayed up a while.
DEP
David E. Powell
Much thanks. It was interesting to see on that page, how many people would
come out to watch one of these monster missiles being test fired. It looked
like the kind of missile that would greatly appeal to my old High School
Physics class. (Or at least, the big time pyromaniacs we had in it.) The
continuous rod effect warhead on the second version was interesting, too.
Especially how they removed the contact fuze, as a direct hit would do so
much damage just from kinetic force and fuel,etc.
> Keith
DEP
Michael P Reed
> Let's assume that an SSN has twenty weapons, which is probably on the
> low side. Three of them - 60 weapons. Let's assume 50-50 mix of Mk 24
Were Mk-24's capable of ASuW? Thought I read somewhere were they were not (at
the time), but very well may be wrong.
--
Regards,
Michael P. Reed
Tom Schoene
"Michael P Reed" <mpr...@chartermi.net> wrote in message
news:uasqlnc...@corp.supernews.com...
Mk24 Mod 0 frankly sucked out loud in this timeframe. It had a notional
ASuW capability, but wasn't reliable enough to be regarded as useful for
either ASW or ASuW.
Here's what some bloke named Paul Jonathan Adam :-) had to say about it
back in 1995
"Even as recently as 1982, when we were in the Falklands we rejected
Mark 24 (the weapon that became Tigerfish) because it was unreliable:
Conqueror used World War 2 vintage Mark 8 straight-runners on the
General Belgrano. They tried to sink the Sir Galahad's hulk with torpedoes:
five fired, two hits (both failed to detonate) at point-blank range on
the easiest target imaginable."
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=801258429snz%40jrwlynch.demon.co.uk&out
put=gplain
Andrew McCruden
wrote in sci.military.naval
Fatally wounded ships often take some considerable time to sink.
--
Andrew McCruden
"Sometimes we break the system, Sometimes the system breaks us"
mdhome
I dont think any RN warships in 82 had either goalkeeper or phalanx.
They were added after the falklands.
Regards MD
On 4 Apr 2002 22:27:56 -0800, roger_f...@hotmail.com (Roger
Fleming) wrote:
>Did the RN have Goalkeeper in 1982?
Paul Holloway
Shall we list all the instances where ships were afloat for an hour or
better but they were undoubtedly sinking??
Alan Minyard
Bell) wrote:
Because it takes time for a ship to sink. Having uncontrollable
fire/flooding does not mean that you will not stay afloat for a few
hours until the inevitable happens.
Al minyard
John Halliwell
Willshaw <keith_w...@compuserve.com> writes
>Harriers with 1000lb MK 13 retarded bombs would be considerably
>more effective
Can we chuck Nimrod into the equation along with its motley collection
of anti-ship weaponry?
--
John
Preston, Lancs, UK.
Bill Shatzer
On 6 Apr 2002, Richard Bell wrote:
-snips-
> >I think the second option is the answer.....the reason they took so many
> >hits is because the USN resorted to overkill and kept hitting them why they
> >were still afloat. I seriously doubt it would have taken that many hits to
> >sink either of them.
> They were attacked by several waves of aircraft, over a period of a few
> hours. If the first wave was enough to sink them, why were they still afloat
> for an hour, before the next wave arrived?
It takes a while for a big ship to sink, even when fatally wounded.
And Yamato was a REALLY big ship.
Shinano went down rather quickly but her damage control sucked, her
crew was untrained and she was not at general quarters with her
water tight doors secured and her damage and fire control personnel
at the ready. 'Sides, Shinano took a full spaced spread of six
torpedoes which undoubtably were evenly spaced along her hull and
essentially blew her bottom out. None of these considerations
would have applied with Yamato. It takes a while for 60,000 tons
of water to make it's way in - even through rather large holes
in the hull. Counterflooding, pumping, and securing the water tight
compartments can extend the time even longer if your damage
control folks are functioning at all.
What was the US carrier (Hornet? Wasp?) which was abandoned during
one of the Solomons battles and was found burned out but still
afloat the next morning by the Japanese?
Joel Shepherd
>
> What was the US carrier (Hornet? Wasp?) which was abandoned during
> one of the Solomons battles and was found burned out but still
> afloat the next morning by the Japanese?
Hornet (CV-8) at Santa Cruz (26 Oct. 1942). Actually she was found
before midnight on the 26th. The Japanese attempted to take her in
tow, and then finished her off with four Long Lances.
Compartmentalization in action.
-- Joel.
Michael P Reed
>
> "Michael P Reed" <mpr...@chartermi.net> wrote in message
> news:uasqlnc...@corp.supernews.com...
> > In message <70KrJHAY...@ntlworld.com>, Matt Clonfero wrote:
> >
> > > Let's assume that an SSN has twenty weapons, which is probably on the
> > > low side. Three of them - 60 weapons. Let's assume 50-50 mix of Mk 24
> >
> > Were Mk-24's capable of ASuW? Thought I read somewhere were they were not
> (at
> > the time), but very well may be wrong.
>
> Mk24 Mod 0 frankly sucked out loud in this timeframe. It had a notional
> ASuW capability, but wasn't reliable enough to be regarded as useful for
> either ASW or ASuW.
>
> Here's what some bloke named Paul Jonathan Adam :-) had to say about it
> back in 1995
Thanks Tom. 1995? Even after nearly five years, I still feel like a newbie
hereabouts.
> "Even as recently as 1982, when we were in the Falklands we rejected
> Mark 24 (the weapon that became Tigerfish) because it was unreliable:
> Conqueror used World War 2 vintage Mark 8 straight-runners on the
> General Belgrano. They tried to sink the Sir Galahad's hulk with torpedoes:
> five fired, two hits (both failed to detonate) at point-blank range on
> the easiest target imaginable."
I presume that Paul was referring to Mk 24's re. SIR GALAHAD.
Michael P Reed
Willshaw" wrote:
>
> "John Lansford" <jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
> news:k70raukvskpjv3iui...@4ax.com...
> > "Andrew McCruden" <use...@beyond-comprehension.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >"John Lansford" <jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
> > >news:gqkpau0sq0a2kvrk7...@4ax.com...
> > >> "Keith Willshaw" <keith_w...@compuserve.com> wrote:
> > >>
> > >> >
> > >> >Trouble is long lance was launched from Destroyers and light cruisers
> > >> >that wouldnt live long enough to even see the task force let alone
> > >> >fire torpedoes at it.
> > >>
> > >> All the IJN heavy cruisers had Long Lance torpedoes as well, and since
> > >> they had both fairly heavy armor and were large for CA's they could be
> > >> expected to survive a fairly heavy pounding.
> > >
> > >They still wouldn't have got inside of Torpedo range.
> >
> > What would stop them? Harriers with rockets? Exocets? Neither would be
> > as effective against them as the WWII weapons they were attacked with
> > at, say, Samar, and the IJN CA's took a lot of damage there.
> >
> > John Lansford
> >
>
> Harriers with 1000lb MK 13 retarded bombs would be considerably
> more effective
>
> but they'd do a LOT of damage topside
I would think that the Exocets would impact well above the armor belt.
> Sea Slug missiles from the County Class destoyers
> which had more KE and more HE than a 15" shell
> would be nasty too
The Sea Slug site you posted elsewhere mentioned that the missile could be used
something like a sea skimmer, but could it not also be used on a more ballistic
trajectory (would be simpler I think) that impacted from above and only had to
worry about the all too thin armor deck?
Tank Fixer
<a8ker6$jbo$1...@watserv3.uwaterloo.ca>,
> even worse pounding than the Yamato. After multiple hits with torpedoes and
> bombs, the Musashi was still maintaining 22 knots. As I said, definitely
> good damage control on those ships.
>
How good will that damage control be with 70+ year old crewman ?
I mean geeze those IJN vets are gonna be old by 1982.
--
Remember, Friendly fire, Isn't :
Keith Willshaw
Standard tactic was a flat trajectory to above the target
then snap down into a dive, nasty as you say.
Keith
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Slug was a beam rider - hence the honking great radar antenna aft on the
Counties. That pretty well tied it to straight line flight. Meant that it
was very hard to jam or confuse, though.
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Time has stopped, says the Black Lion clock
and eternity has begun" (Dylan Thomas)
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
:)
Another point that I've not seen raised is that IJN ships of WW2 were only
marginally habitable at the best of times - keep them at action stations
for any length of time and efficiency will decline (Skelton's law
refers). In the south Atlantic this will go in spades (for a start you
could ignore the Japanese destroyers as those that hadn't already capsized
whould be hove-to and praying for a quick end). When in blue water bet on
the comfy ships.
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
"Who dies with the most toys wins" (Gary Barnes)
Keith Willshaw
"ANDREW ROBERT BREEN" <a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:a8p765$c6ld$1...@central.aber.ac.uk...
> In article <uavb788...@corp.supernews.com>,
> Michael P Reed <mpr...@chartermi.net> wrote:
> >In message <1018004914.16685....@news.demon.co.uk>, "Keith
> >Willshaw" wrote:
> >
> >> Sea Slug missiles from the County Class destoyers
> >> which had more KE and more HE than a 15" shell
> >> would be nasty too
> >
> >The Sea Slug site you posted elsewhere mentioned that the missile could
be used
> >something like a sea skimmer, but could it not also be used on a more
ballistic
> >trajectory (would be simpler I think) that impacted from above and only
had to
> >worry about the all too thin armor deck?
>
> Slug was a beam rider - hence the honking great radar antenna aft on the
> Counties. That pretty well tied it to straight line flight. Meant that it
> was very hard to jam or confuse, though.
>
There was a programmed mode called CASWTD,
Constant Angle of Sight With Terminal Dive that allowed
it to ride the beam to a point close to the target then
dive on it a 45deg angle
Keith
Eugene Griessel
>Another point that I've not seen raised is that IJN ships of WW2 were only
>marginally habitable at the best of times - keep them at action stations
>for any length of time and efficiency will decline (Skelton's law
>refers). In the south Atlantic this will go in spades (for a start you
>could ignore the Japanese destroyers as those that hadn't already capsized
>whould be hove-to and praying for a quick end). When in blue water bet on
>the comfy ships.
I've been very uncomfy aboard a County in the South Atlantic, I can
tell you that!
Eugene L Griessel www.dynagen.co.za/eugene
SAAF Crashboat History www.dynagen.co.za/eugene/guybook.html
"Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's game because
they almost always turn out to be - or to be indistinguishable from - self-righteous
sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time."
Neil Stephenson, Cryptonomicon
Peter H. Granzeau
<ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>Even three torpedo hits may be optimistic, as
>>four times the explosives only does twice the damage, the Musashi took an
>>even worse pounding than the Yamato. After multiple hits with torpedoes and
>>bombs, the Musashi was still maintaining 22 knots.
>
>For how long? "Not very".
>
>The USS NORTH CAROLINA took _one_ torpedo hit in September 1942; and
>needed two months of repairs before being fit to fight again.
The USN learned a few things about welded ship construction, too (a
little too late to help the North Carolina). If the same hit had been
a Long Lance, she might have been damaged much worse. As it was,
North Caroline had cracks as high as the main radar pedestal, and
several of the 12" armor places were cracked, as well.
John Lansford
Except the torpedo protection performed as expected, although it was
strained by the larger warhead than the design was intended for.
If the USN's torpedo protection wasn't so good, then perhaps someone
could point out a nation's design that was better?
John Lansford
The unofficial I-26 Construction Webpage:
http://users.vnet.net/lansford/a10/
Matt Clonfero
<mpr...@chartermi.net> wrote:
>In message <70KrJHAY...@ntlworld.com>, Matt Clonfero wrote:
>
>> Let's assume that an SSN has twenty weapons, which is probably on the
>> low side. Three of them - 60 weapons. Let's assume 50-50 mix of Mk 24
>
>Were Mk-24's capable of ASuW?
Officially, yes. Actually, the reliability on the Mk.24 was poor; and
the warhead was dinky - hence the use of the Mk.8** to sink ARA General
Belgrano.
Of course, if this scenario gives the RN any notice (i.e. they know that
the defenders have a big old WWII fleet, rather than the Final Countdown
scenario), expect to see the SSNs carrying far more Mk.8 and fewer
Mk.24.
Aetherem Vincere
Matt
--
To err is human
To forgive is not
Air Force Policy
Andy Spark
<a...@aber.ac.uk> wrote:
> Another point that I've not seen raised is that IJN ships of WW2 were only
> marginally habitable at the best of times - keep them at action stations
> for any length of time and efficiency will decline (Skelton's law
> refers). In the south Atlantic this will go in spades (for a start you
> could ignore the Japanese destroyers as those that hadn't already capsized
> whould be hove-to and praying for a quick end). When in blue water bet on
> the comfy ships.
Have SSNs been disallowed from this scenario?
Or did I miss that bit?
Peter Skelton
<jlns...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>Except the torpedo protection performed as expected, although it was
>strained by the larger warhead than the design was intended for.
>
>If the USN's torpedo protection wasn't so good, then perhaps someone
>could point out a nation's design that was better?
Switzerland.
____
Peter Skelton
ANDREW ROBERT BREEN
Eugene Griessel <eugene.@dynagen..co..za> wrote:
>a...@aber.ac.uk (ANDREW ROBERT BREEN) wrote:
>
>>Another point that I've not seen raised is that IJN ships of WW2 were only
>>marginally habitable at the best of times - keep them at action stations
>>for any length of time and efficiency will decline (Skelton's law
>>refers). In the south Atlantic this will go in spades (for a start you
>>could ignore the Japanese destroyers as those that hadn't already capsized
>>whould be hove-to and praying for a quick end). When in blue water bet on
>>the comfy ships.
>
>I've been very uncomfy aboard a County in the South Atlantic, I can
>tell you that!
But consider what one of those horribly over-gunned and under-hulled (and
over-crowded) Japanese 1940s destroyers or cruisers would be doing in the
same sort of weather (heading straight downwards in most cases, I'd
suspect, either as a result of capsize or the interesting structual
failure modes the IJN liked to explore).
--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
John Redman
> The only question seems to be whether the RN would run out of ammo
> before the IJN ran out of ships.
Actually this is exactly what I was getting at with the original
question.
The 1941 IJN could have hit from 250 or maybe at a pinch 300 miles
out, i.e. they could launch from *outside* the TEZ. Think of the
reaction to the _Belgrano_, then multiply the casualties and the
uproar by 10 if _Conqueror_ hits a pair of CVs rather than a CL. For
political reasons, the RN might have to wait for the punch to be
thrown rather than do the obvious and have an SSN hit one or both of
them first (humour me here).
What interests me, therefore, is what would have happened if no such
interception had happened, and either or both sides had actually got a
strike off.
I haven't read through every reply (97 so far!! Wow!) in this thread
yet, so apologies to all if I'm restating something improbable that's
been dealt with elsewhere.
The RN had 23 Harriers, IIRC. I don't how many of those they could
have got into the air, or for how long. I'm guessing it wouldn't be
all of them. I'm also guessing that at least a couple that were
airborne would be hanging elsewhere around protecting the landing
ships, etc. That may be wrong, i.e. they'd defend the carriers rather
than the troopships if it came down to one or the other.
That said, the question seems to be whether whatever Harriers could be
got airborne, plus the ships' missile defences, could jointly take
down the *entire* incoming strike. As Eric says, does the RN run out
of ammo before the IJN runs out of targets?
I say the *entire* strike because the IJN, and indeed plenty of WW2
era navies, did historically accept shockingly high losses in pushing
their attacks. For instance, Bettys took 100% losses trying to
intercept 2 US CVs which raided Rabaul in 3/1942. And, of course,
there were the 3 TBD squadrons who lost 40 of 44 aircraft at Midway.
So I'd say the defenders have to hit *all* 120-odd attackers,
including the fairly harmless Zeroes, unless their radars can sort
them by size, identify what ordnance they're carrying, and provide
assurance that nobody in a Zero's going to try a kamikaze attack (and
let's not rule that out in extremis, because a Vindicator pilot did
just that at Midway IIRC).
So, 15 or so Harriers plus missile and gun defences versus 120
targets. Killing 110 isn't good enough. The defenders have to get them
all, probably. How many Sidewinders did a Harrier carry? How many
bursts of 30mm cannon fire? If they're doing 550 knots and their
targets are doing 200, aren't they going to overshoot their targets,
VIFFing notwithstanding, and wind up in the same airspace, full of
exploding SAMs all over the place? (Very possibly not, but I wouldn't
know - post 1945 isn't my area...does it show?) Aren't they at least
going to have to spend a lot of time turning around, following the
strike, and re-engaging?
And what happens if 10 dive bombers survive? And, as at Trincomalee,
score 6 or 8 hits on an Invincible? Would she survive?
As for an RN counterstrike, I can see how various SSMs would be
effective against even armoured warships - especially ones with pretty
average damage control. What I don't quite get is how potent the
threat to a CA would be from a 4.5" gun. Wouldn't a 4.5" round just,
well, bounce off? Or have shells, as well as the aiming of them, come
on a bit?
Stimulating responses so far....
John