Why Wasn't Admiral King Removed in 1942?
genrl_m...@my-deja.com
Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
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Before you buy.
Bill Shatzer
On Thu, 6 Apr 2000 genrl_m...@my-deja.com wrote:
> One thing that has puzzled me recently is the success of Operation
> Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
> that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
> merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
> Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
> considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
> refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
Convoys are not cost free. I've seen estimates that instituting convoys
is the equivalent to losing as much as one-half of one's shipping. In
other words, between the time lost waiting for convoys to assemble, the
need to reduce the convoy speed to the speed of the slowest ship, and the
port congestion and unloading delays when the convoy arrives en masse, a
given tonnage of merchant ships can transport only one-half the amount of
cargo as the same tonnage of ships could transport if sailing
independently.
I'm not defending King's decisions but the judgment is much clearer in
hindsight. It is not at all clear that his decisions were clearly
erroneous at the time.
Cheers and all,
John Lansford
>One thing that has puzzled me recently is the success of Operation
>Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
>that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
>merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
>Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
>considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
>refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
It wasn't that he refused to adopt convoys, the system just wasn't in
place to allow convoy operations along the East Coast due to reasons
not totally within King's control.
Clay Blair, Jr., in his "U-boat War; the Hunters" points out why King
did not implement convoying immediately along the East Coast. Lack of
adequate escorts or air cover, no defensive minefields, a lack of
available large ports and resistance to the convoying system by
merchant shipping were all given as reasons why it wasn't put into
effect quicker.
John Lansford
The unofficial I-26 Construction Webpage:
http://users.vnet.net/lansford/a10/
TSBench
genrl_m...@my-deja.com writes:
>One thing that has puzzled me recently is the success of Operation
>Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
>that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
>merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
>Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
>considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
>refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?>>>>
King was charged with transporting US troops (and associated equipment and
supplies) to the Pacific as his first priority (more US troops went to the
Pacific in 1942 than to Europe.) He used his limited escort resources to
accomplish this without loss.
Merchant seaman were considered more replaceable than trained troops. It's a
hard calculus.
Regards,
TSB
Bill Walker...Producer and Cohost of The Shooting Bench radio
program....General Manager, WDIS-Radio, Norfolk, Massachusetts.
Lawrence Dillard
a
serious charge, now known to be false. Please consult vol. 1 of Blair's
"Hitler's U-Boat War" for the appropriate antidote.
King was not fired simply because he was too competent and too often right
in his appreciations and decisions, such that firing him would have served
no useful purpose and might have done serious harm to the war effort.
Contrary to apparently accepted opinion, King announced, when asked, that
"convoying is the only solution" to dealing with the U-boat threat to
Allied
shipping, and bent every reasonable effort toward implementing the concept
as swiftly as possible. However, the USN at the outset of war already
faced
a shortage of destroyers, then the only suitable USN convoy escort vessels.
There simply were too few destroyers and too many tasks for them to perform
at one and the same time.
Later, King set up a "paper" fleet, commanded by himself, called the US
10th
Fleet, which had responsibility for all USN anti-sub and convoying
activities in the Atlantic. 10th Fleet in short order proved very
successful against the depredations of the U-boats. Although it took time,
King instituted convoys progressively farther south and east along the US
Atlantic seaboard, then into the Caribbean. As convoying under his plans
covered more and more area, losses due to U-boat activities declined
progressively.
Nonetheless, King's reputation took many a hit, from historians, sailors,
soldiers and political figures on both sides of the Atlantic, who failed to
fully study King's activities and methods, and who, for example, rushing
to
hold someone to blame for the considerable initial losses due to Operation
DRUMBEAT, found in King a convenient to scapegoat. OTOH, Chief of Staff
Marshall and FDR held King in high esteem.
Steve Ewing
<genrl_m...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
news:oc9oes8umt5229lef...@4ax.com...
> One thing that has puzzled me recently is the success of Operation
> Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
> that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
> merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
> Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
> considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
> refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
Briefly:
Not enough suitable escorts. King didn't get what he asked for before US
entry because his Commander in Chief had been running the navy during the
last war and had some stupid ideas about how to run it in the next one.
You'll find the numbers of escorts inflated. YP-389 is a great example of
this, as it got outrun and then outgunned by U-515. Neither of those
things
happen to actual warships. Remember those stupid ideas FDR had? Useless
warships was one of them.
The number of legitimate escorts was thinned by the enormous demand in
1942.
The US was projecting power everywhere, and that meant carriers,
troopships,
and BBs going all over the place, which were too high value to risk. When
you start off with 89 destroyers, counting the twenty-year old ones, have
to
cover part of the North Atlantic run, have approximately 14 in drydock at
any given time, have to allow for normal maintenance, too, and then have to
use six to cover a carrier going to Malta, four to get a BB to Scapa, eight
to get troopships to Liverpool, etc., you start to run out of escorts for
the thousands of vessels between Maine and Curacao.
The escorts were further strained by the destroyers-for-bases deal. One of
the results (probably the most important result) of that deal is that
before
Pearl Harbor, the RN could concentrate forces in the important areas
because
the US was handling the Caribbean, while when the war came to the US, the
Caribbean became more than the US could handle.
Unescorted convoys are utterly useless for coastal shipping. When they're
all going by Cape Hatteras anyway, the choke point means that a convoy
doesn't make the ships any harder to find. Your average IX-B is quite
capable of sinking them three and four at a time, and then chasing
survivors
down for a gunnery duel or another torpedo salvo in those conditions. All
unescorted convoys would have accomplished is a 30% decrease in shipping
capacity.
One of the things that delayed the British convoys in WW1 was the
impossibility of covering all the coastal stuff. It wasn't until they
abandoned the very type of shipping that King is criticized for in order to
concentrate on the big stuff that they could institute effective convoying.
King is also the scapegoat for the loss of Enigma at about that time. The
loss was actually in late '41, but the weather prevented an immediate
effect. He was blamed to divert attention from the fact that sinkings
climbed because we stopped reading the Germans' mail.
King did take steps to set up a convoy system, but he had a _lot_ of work
to
do first. He needed the ships, the crews, and some protected anchorages.
It took him about six months, which ain't bad from a standing start, while
fighting the largest naval war the world has ever seen on the other side of
the planet.
Incidentally, I'd suggest ignoring Gannon and Hickam altogether. They're
good for anecdotes, but both have enormous flaws in their conclusions, and
are out to sell books through sensationalism, rather than tell the truth.
Blair makes a much more convincing argument in defense of King. Padfield
isn't exactly at his best, here, either.
And I'm nearly dancing in the streets to see somebody criticize King
without
invoking that ridiculous blackout lunacy.
Steve
Thor Eysteinsson
genrl_m...@my-deja.com wrote in message ...
>One thing that has puzzled me recently is the success of Operation
>Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
>that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
>merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
>Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
>considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
>refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
Well, Churchill and FDR had a bit of a chit-chat about this matter at
Casablanca in January 1943. Presumably (and I believe there is
evidence to it) Winston raised his concerns about the ASW in the
North Atlantic there. Of course FDR was fully aware of the problems, but
he generally trusted his military commanders until shown that they
were lacking, as in this case. It was decided at Casablanca that the
Allied commanders involved would meet in Washington DC, and
there was a naval conference held there in March. At the end of it
FDR basically ordered Admiral King to cooperate with the Royal
Navy, and pay attention to what it had to offer in matters of ASW.
Admiral King duly obeyed. Things immediately improved as a
consequence. His problem was that he had refused to listen to
anything from the British on naval issues, until then.
Admiral Sir Max Horton was the C-in-C in the Royal Navy of escorts
on the Western Approaches, and these very fine naval commanders
were basically forced, willy-nilly,to collaborate. Both were characters
in their own right, and had strong opinions on how to proceed, but
both were given a certain degree of freedom while ordered to work
together. I believe they never actually met face to face.
Admiral King was quite capable as a naval commander, but he has
been accused of being an anglophobe, and that thus he refused to
pay any attention to anything from Britain. This been offered as an
explanation for his stubborn adherence to his failed tactics and
the Drumbeat disaster. I am not sure that it has been shown that
he would actually go to such lengths;be willing to sacrifice American
lives out of some silly spite towards the British, who had far greater
knowledge and experience of ASW than he did. Another possibility
is that he, and the US Navy in general, simply did not have sufficient
experience with ASW, and was sort of stuck in ideas and tactics that
the British had already found out were insufficient and even dangerous.
But this does not explain the surprisingly stubborn refusal to listen to
reason,
whilst hundreds of thousands of tonnes of shipping were being sunk
by U-boats. After all, the Americans are supposed to be pragmatic
people, quick to learn from experience etc., but perhaps there was
a remnant from the "I am not listening" attitude of isolationism.
In any case, I don't think the historians have really offered a
convincing explanation for this extraordinary behaviour on the part
of Admiral King, but it was not due to lack of competence. He proved
to be an extremely competent Commander in Chief, once FDR had
basically ordered him to behave rationally towards the British.
Thor Eysteinsson
Steven James Forsberg
: Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
: that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
: merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
: Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
: considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
: refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
As others have pointed out, there were factors beyond Kings
control. Among other things, there were sensitive political problems
involved with "raising the alarm" over German U-Boat dangers. There was
much resistance to convoying (by shippers and their backers), in order
to overcome it the Navy would have had to publicize just exactly how badly
the Germans were damaging US merchant shipping. This was not something the
administration wanted done at the time (though it was known we were taking
losses, knowledge of the extent was somewhat delayed). In addition, King
did not think we had sufficient assets to protect convoys, and may have
feared that if we adopted convoys and "they didn't work" people would loose
faith in the Navy entirely.
This is not to let King (or the navy) entirely off, however, in
retrospect there are probably many things King would have done differently
Perhaps most importantly, take seriously the role of 'civilain militia' ASW
patrols (especially with light aircraft) and the Coast Guard. The navy looked
down its nose at help from "amateurs" at just the time it needed all the help
it could get from any quarter.
In the end, Roosevelt decided Kings assets outweighed any mistakes
he may have had early in the fray.
regards,
-------------------------------------------------------------
sjfo...@bayou.uh.edu wizard 87-01
Steve Ewing
> Drumbeat and the lack of appropriate reaction by Admiral King. Given
> that the British had shown convoys to be effective as a means to defend
> merchant shipping in both WWI and the first 2 1/2 years of WWII,
> Admiral King's refusal to adopt the convoy system quickly has to be
> considered gross negligence. When losses skyrocketed and he still
> refused to adopt convoys, why wasn't he replaced?
>
>
Briefly:
down for a gunnery duel or another torpedo salvo in those conditions. The
math is that with 22 torpedoes, a salvo strength of six, and a 30 day stay
in US waters, it only needs one convoy going past any given point on the
coast every ten days, allowing four torpedoes for the trip out and back,
ignoring the stern tubes altogether. All unescorted convoys would have
accomplished is a 30% decrease in shipping
capacity.
One of the things that delayed the British convoys in WW1 was the
impossibility of covering all the coastal stuff. It wasn't until they
abandoned the very type of shipping that King is criticized for in order to
concentrate on the big stuff that they could institute effective convoying.
In short, the British WW1 experience actually encouraged the opposite of
what is usually claimed WRT coastal shipping.
King is also the scapegoat for the loss of Enigma at about that time. The
loss was actually in late '41, but the weather prevented an immediate
effect. He was blamed to divert attention from the fact that sinkings
climbed because we stopped reading the Germans' mail.
King did take steps to set up a convoy system, but he had a _lot_ of work to
do first. He needed the ships, the crews, and some protected anchorages.
It took him about six months, which ain't bad from a standing start, while
fighting the largest naval war the world has ever seen on the other side of
the planet.
King also gets criticized for applying American solutions to American
problems, rather than British solutions to British problems. His merchant
losses are underscored by his critics, while his capitol ship record is
ignored. The British chose to take higher relative risks with their heavy
units and troopships vis-a-vis the merchant vessels, which was, IMO, the
correct approach for their strategic position. King was running the navy of
a country not nearly so dependent on shipping, but whose capitol ships were
desperately needed at the time, and whose veteran peacetime personnel were
badly needed as the skeleton of the exploding American military. The cadre
of such men was important, exactly like the troopships, and the moral effect
of losing a few thousand of them in some catastrophe was unthinkable while
the US was losing territory left and right in the Pacific. King chose to
safeguard them in their thousands, and let the (often British) merchant
seamen drown by the score. For the USN's position, IMO, this was also the
correct response to the American problem. He had different problems than
the RN, and cannot be fairly blamed for finding different solutions.
Incidentally, I'd suggest ignoring Gannon and Hickam altogether. They're
good for anecdotes, but both have enormous flaws in their conclusions, and
are out to sell books through sensationalism, rather than tell the truth.
Blair makes a much more convincing argument in defense of King. Padfield
isn't exactly at his best, here, either, with frequent derision making it
clear that he wasn't quite impartial.
And I'm nearly dancing in the streets to see somebody criticize King without
invoking that ridiculous blackout lunacy. Louis managed it, but it's not at
all common.
Steve
Angus M McLellan
<ldil...@enteract.com> wrote:
>The assessment of Adm King as having resisted the adoption of convoying is
>a
>serious charge, now known to be false. Please consult vol. 1 of Blair's
>"Hitler's U-Boat War" for the appropriate antidote.
<Deleted>
IOW, I need to shell out money on a book which I doubt that I would
want to buy based on the limited knowledge I have about it's content
and conclusions. Would it be too much to ask that you (or Mr Ewing)
summarise Blair's defence of King on this matter.
While I agree that much of the criticism of King is either unfounded,
viz. the blackout myth, or misdirected, i.e. it should be aimed at
Roosevelt, at Arnold, at Stark, or at Andrews, it seems that there is
quite enough left to make King appear to be at best slow to act or, at
worst, deliberately ignoring experience gained by others on the basis
of his (strong) prejudices.
As regards the general point of who to blame, I would submit that if
any one person was responsible, it was FDR, and not just because the
buck stopped with him. FDR appears - based on assumptions on who was
supplying Woodrow Wilson's naval "thinking" - to have missed the point
of ASW in WWI and to have learned nothing between the wars. FDR is
also responsible, especially since he took a great interest in naval
matters, for the failure to order small ships. OTOH, the USN itself
had, and continued to have, an institutional disregard for small ships
and for ASW and/or mine warfare in particular. In this failure,
Roosevelt fairly accurately reflected the views of the USN itself, so
that even had Roosevelt thought differently, it seems unlikely that
the Navy would have acted otherwise. Roosevelt is also responsible for
the absence of a blackout, although this is - or should have been -
pretty much a non-issue. Likewise, as CinC, Roosevelt is responsible
for the initial failures of Army/Navy cooperation. Lastly, as CinC
Roosevelt was also responsible for the fact that King and Andrews (and
anyone else who one cares to blame) held the posts they did, and had
FDR believed they were unsuited, he could have removed them forthwith.
As King had *no* responsibility for most of these issues, since he had
run the Navy for only a few weeks when Paukenschlag began, he can
hardly be held responsible for failures of procurement, of doctrine,
of training or for the USN's institutional disregard for ASW.
The only things that King can be fairly criticised for are those
things which happened on his watch. These are limited to (a) a failure
to institute convoy at the earliest possible date, (b) a failure to
institute a coherent command structure in the Atlantic, (c) a failure
to order subordinates to act in the appropriate fashion and to relieve
them if they failed and (d) an incorrect division of resources between
the Atlantic and Pacific commands or within the Atlantic commands.
To return to Mr Blair, if I can read between the lines of what those
who quote him approvingly write, I assume that the defence rests
primarily on the alleged inability of the USN, under whatever
leadership, to implement (a) above any earlier than was the case. I
will further assume that the defence will make great use of the
allegedly limited numbers of destroyers and the multiple tasks which
they were allegedly required for. If, and I confess that I am only
guessing that it's so, this *is* the defence, I shall be saving my
money, as all Mr Blair will have done is demonstrated that the myopia
of early 1942 lives on.
Angus
Tony Whitaker
affairs,
including affairs with the wives of some other Navy officers. Is this true?
If so, does anyone his moral character should have eliminated him from
command?
Rob Davis
W/Cdr Guy Gibson of Dam Buster fame was a serial womanizer whose
tactics included inviting the wife of one of his flight commanders to
bed with the promise that such would improve her husband's promotion
chances. This was one of the reasons which is likely to have hindered
Gibson's progression beyond Wing Commander, when he clearly merited
Air rank after the Dams Raid and his American tour. Arguably, such
would have made it more difficult for him to have returned to
operations and his ultimate death in action.
Yet, he was a from-the-front hands-on leader whose qualities in a
wartime situation are exactly what is required. Nobody is perfect.
=====================
Rob Davis MSc MIAP
Telford Shropshire UK
Steve Ewing
news:390a43d0...@mail.nsw.dialix.com.au...
>Would it be too much to ask that you (or Mr Ewing)
> summarise Blair's defence of King on this matter.
As the burden is usually on the prosecution, why don't we take that on a
point by point basis as you've led into later? I fear the alternative has
me chasing phantoms.
<snip the long list of people who weren't all that they could be, if I can
steal the Army's slogan>
Especially in light of the time elapsed and reading material that has
crossed my desk, any errors are, of course, mine, rather than Blair's.
> The only things that King can be fairly criticised for are those
> things which happened on his watch. These are limited to (a) a failure
> to institute convoy at the earliest possible date,
To begin with, unescorted coastal convoys are useless. If it's going to
pass, e.g., Cape Hatteras, it doesn't matter much if it's one ship or five.
A IX-B has ~22 torpedoes, ~30 days on station and a salvo strength of six,
which means that one defenseless convoy every ten days or so gives it all
the targets it can handle, neglecting the stern tubes or any targets of
opportunity encountered on the way out or back. Blair only counts
destroyers largely because everything else was useless, with the exception
of a handful of USCG cutters, all on the North Atlantic runs. YP-389 (IIRC)
and U-515 (again, IIRC) prove this quite handily, as it has to be the only
time in the history of naval warfare that a submarine ran down and destroyed
a surface warship due to superior performance and firepower. King's
critics, at least his published ones, seem to like to pretend that these
vessels count, when, as we've both noted, there is some blame deserved by
FDR for their simple existence. Having done the math, it's unescorted
convoys or lone sailings, at least for a while.
To follow that point, albeit by departing from Blair in favor of Keegan,
British convoy experience in WW1 is usually cited as evidence of King's
inability to grasp the importance of convoys. In fact, the British WW1
convoys were only instituted after the Minister for Shipping, Norman Leslie,
and Commander R.G.A. Henderson noticed that the important _ocean-going_
shipping numbers were 120-140 a week, while the RN had been concentrating on
the 2,500 total weekly sailings, which included much small coastal traffic.
In short, King copied _exactly_ what the RN got right in the First World
War, and has been lambasted for ignoring RN experience. This, frankly, does
not make much sense to me.
To further follow that point, by going back to Blair, the ships King
identified as important were the USN capitol ships and the USA troopships.
He put all his eggs in one basket and watched that basket. King convoyed
_everything_ he felt was of a high enough value to justify the resources,
right from the begining. The only difference is whether he had the
resources. The USA learned in WW1 that it's rather hard to build an entire
army at home and then ship the whole thing overseas at once. They decided
to spread the effort out a little, and King couldn't be responsible for a
few thousand dead soldiers at that point in time, or for the loss of a
battleship while the Japanese were running amok. There is the little matter
of the two most powerful navies in the world fighting the largest naval war
the world has ever seen on the other side of the planet, regardless of the
desires of the RN or Kriegsmarine.
And, just to make it clear that King grasped the concept of convoys at least
as well as anybody, the first US convoy sailed in 1941, which is the fastest
elapsed time from a declaration of war to a convoy that I'm aware of,
beating even the British record. Of course, he'd been paying attention to
their lessons, while they'd been learning them, so that's to be expected.
If only FDR had let him run the navy, this silly little hobgoblin would
never have been born.
(b) a failure to
> institute a coherent command structure in the Atlantic,
It wasn't particularly clear, granted. If it wasn't much of a help, it
wasn't much of a hindrance. Also, I'm unaware of many troops to be
confused.
>(c) a failure
> to order subordinates to act in the appropriate fashion and to relieve
> them if they failed and
Can I get some specifics? I'm departing Blair here, I think, but I could be
wrong. Anyway, granted that Dolly Andrews was on the verge of a nervous
breakdown, but he'd been hard-used. A certain amount of replacement seems
to be the norm when the shooting starts, and it's quite reasonable to send
the most promising commanders to the Pacific, especially with the
replacement of Kimmel et. al. King decided to let it ride with the guys who
had won the job in peacetime rather than send in what he knew was the
_third_ team.
>(d) an incorrect division of resources between
> the Atlantic and Pacific commands
He was just slightly preoccupied with the IJN. IMO, this is forgivable, as
a career naval officer can be expected to salivate after the biggest
opponent. OTOH, that was the _right_ call, as the Coral Sea and Midway both
happened in the span King is usually criticized for stealing destroyers from
the Atlantic. Of course, that makes as much sense as the WW1 convoy thing,
as King actually _raised_ destroyer strength in the Atlantic-slightly.
Very, very slightly.
>or within the Atlantic commands.
>
Again, if you've got a problem with King's dispositions, I'd take it up with
FDR. The USN was busy with the North Atlantic run, which was certainly
important to the war effort, but when the President agrees to send the USN
out of its backyard, it's poor taste to blame the USN for not being in that
backyard. As far as those special convoys escorting troops, carriers,
battleships, etc., King got it right, and it's just that simple. You don't
sacrifice a few thousand trained soldiers or a few thousand trained sailors
manning a carrier in order to save a few dozen (likely foreign) merchant
sailors.
> To return to Mr Blair, if I can read between the lines of what those
> who quote him approvingly write, I assume that the defence rests
> primarily on the alleged inability of the USN, under whatever
> leadership, to implement (a) above any earlier than was the case. I
> will further assume that the defence will make great use of the
> allegedly limited numbers of destroyers and the multiple tasks which
> they were allegedly required for. If, and I confess that I am only
> guessing that it's so, this *is* the defence, I shall be saving my
> money, as all Mr Blair will have done is demonstrated that the myopia
> of early 1942 lives on.
It's part of the defense. It's not all of it, but it's certainly part. I
will offer the observation that King had a profoundly grating personality,
and was thus not well-liked by many contemporary experts, particularly the
British ones. This transmitted quite well to later generations, too;
you'll recall Padfield letting loose with such sarcastic descriptions of
King as "The Great Man." I will further volunteer the opinion that Blair
feels (a) that _he_ is the best writer about submarine warfare on the planet
and (b) that the USN conducted the only _real_ submarine campaign in
history. Those views of his are nearly as annoying as King's personality is
rumored to have been.
Bluntly put, if you're serious, you'll read Blair. He's worth that much.
He's not the savant who was fortunate enough to take part in The One True
Sub Campaign that he affects to be, but he's worth reading.
Steve
Louis Capdeboscq
One small point:
> YP-389 (IIRC)
> and U-515 (again, IIRC) prove this quite handily, as it has to be the only
> time in the history of naval warfare that a submarine ran down and destroyed
> a surface warship due to superior performance and firepower.
I'm not sure it proves anything.
Surely, in a one-on-one duel, the average U-boat could be expected to
prevail against a large part of the RN / RCN escorts, as the latter were
mostly made up of sloops with whatever equipment could be scrapped for them
and not-exactly-in-top-training-shape crews, at least in the first part of
the war.
On the other hand, what of a U-boat against 2-3 of those?
Angus' point, which I share (along with his ignorance of Blair's relevant
work, even though I did read "silent victory"), is that the "King was right"
advocates completely dismiss these admitedly inadequate craft, while the
British experience does indicate, IMO, that even crappy escorts are better
than none, and substantially better at that.
> Bluntly put, if you're serious, you'll read Blair. He's worth that much.
> He's not the savant who was fortunate enough to take part in The One True
> Sub Campaign that he affects to be, but he's worth reading.
And is there such a savant available, assuming I find the time to read Blair?
Steve Ewing
news:8d4bk3$rn3$6...@wanadoo.fr...
> Angus' point, which I share (along with his ignorance of Blair's relevant
> work, even though I did read "silent victory"), is that the "King was right"
> advocates completely dismiss these admitedly inadequate craft, while the
> British experience does indicate, IMO, that even crappy escorts are better
> than none, and substantially better at that.
The British poor escorts were successful largely because the Germans weren't
sure whether they were really the crappy ones, and didn't know if it might
not be either a real escort or backed by a real escort.
They had no such doubts about the American ones.
To go back to the YP-389 encounter: U-515 was lying on the bottom while the
crew rested for another night's carnage. There was an annoying droning
sound keeping them awake. Turned out to be the YP-389 patrolling the edge
of a minefield. After a while, the captain decided he couldn't take the
sound of propellors overhead and decided to do some pest control out of
sheer annoyance.
These poor escorts were hunted down as _vermin_ simply because they woke up
sleeping U-boat crewmen. I believe that speaks volumes about how effective
they were at frightening U-boats.
Again, if you want to criticize the effectiveness of such vessels, I'd point
fingers at Roosevelt for building them in the first place, when the navy had
desperate requirements for the men and material on real escorts, which were
in hopelessly short supply.
--
soc.culture.japan.moderated Moderator on duty
scj...@eyrie.org
John Lansford
>Surely, in a one-on-one duel, the average U-boat could be expected to
>prevail against a large part of the RN / RCN escorts, as the latter were
>mostly made up of sloops with whatever equipment could be scrapped for them
>and not-exactly-in-top-training-shape crews, at least in the first part of
>the war.
>
>On the other hand, what of a U-boat against 2-3 of those?
If the USN had had such vessels in those kind of numbers, then they
surely would have been used in early 1942. However, there were none
available; Andrews had just a few destroyers and only a handful of
smaller vessels to patrol and escort an area from New York to Miami.
Many of the smaller craft were not seaworthy enough to venture far
from harbor (some were converted luxury yachts with no weaponry), and
others were so mechanically unreliable they broke down when used.
>Angus' point, which I share (along with his ignorance of Blair's relevant
>work, even though I did read "silent victory"), is that the "King was right"
>advocates completely dismiss these admitedly inadequate craft, while the
>British experience does indicate, IMO, that even crappy escorts are better
>than none, and substantially better at that.
Too bad that King and Andrews didn't have these "crappy escorts",
then. They used what they had; there just weren't enough of them to
make any difference given the immense amount of area needed to cover.
Louis Capdeboscq
> To go back to the YP-389 encounter: (snip details)
> These poor escorts were hunted down as _vermin_ simply because they wokeup
> sleeping U-boat crewmen. I believe that speaks volumes about how effective
> they were at frightening U-boats.
I'm not sure it does.
>From a purely tactical situation, the U-boat captain may have decided to
attack the escort while it was still alone and, more importantly, while his
own sub was still undetected.
This isn't at all the point that I made: yes, the individual escort was no
match for a U-boat. So what ? Send 2-3 of them, and the U-boat has to
beware. That provides some amount of protection, so these lighter craft
_should_ be counted.
Brad Meyer
<tony...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>I read somewhere that Admiral King was a big womanizer who had many affairs,
>including affairs with the wives of some other Navy officers. Is this true?
Probably. Buell, one of his biographers, alludes to such.
>If so, does anyone his moral character should have eliminated him from
>command?
No. The militarty exists for one real purpose, success in battle.
After Pearl Harbor, FDR wanted the toughtest, smartest, most organized
admiral available, which was King. He was generally credited with
having about the best brain in the navy, with RK Turner perhaps his
equal and Raymond Spruance perhaps his superior (at lest Spru was the
only office King ever acknowledged was smater then he). As one Admirla
said, "We are looking for tigers, and can't use sheep, even if they
have the finest Merino wool". Generally, the military is willing to
put up with a certian amount of "moral terpitude" in order to have the
tigers they seek.
Brad Meyer
"It is history that teaches us to hope"
-- R E Lee
Angus M McLellan
<stephe...@email.msn.com> wrote:
>Louis Capdeboscq <Louis.Ca...@wanadoo.fr> wrote in message
>news:8d4bk3$rn3$6...@wanadoo.fr...
>The British poor escorts were successful largely because the Germans weren't
>sure whether they were really the crappy ones, and didn't know if it might
>not be either a real escort or backed by a real escort.
>They had no such doubts about the American ones.
>To go back to the YP-389 encounter: U-515 was lying on the bottom while the
>crew rested for another night's carnage. There was an annoying droning
>sound keeping them awake. Turned out to be the YP-389 patrolling the edge
>of a minefield. After a while, the captain decided he couldn't take the
>sound of propellors overhead and decided to do some pest control out of
>sheer annoyance.
>These poor escorts were hunted down as _vermin_ simply because they woke up
>sleeping U-boat crewmen. I believe that speaks volumes about how effective
>they were at frightening U-boats.
>Again, if you want to criticize the effectiveness of such vessels, I'd point
>fingers at Roosevelt for building them in the first place, when the navy had
>desperate requirements for the men and material on real escorts, which were
>in hopelessly short supply.
I was perfectly well aware of this event, just as British makeshift
escorts were also sunk by U-boats and just as I was aware of real
escorts coming to the same end. I agree that a single trawler, drifter
or other small vessel fitted with an ancient gun without adequate fire
control, capable of a speed significantly less than a surfaced U-boat
and often with an inexperienced crew, was no match, one on one, for a
well handled U-boat. Which is to say no match for any U-boat likely to
be met off the eastern seaboard of the USA in 1942.
However, there are some important points to be made about the loss of
the poor little YP389. (1) It was not, by any stretch of the
imagination, a convoy escort. (2) As a lone picket, it was obviously
vulnerable, and would have been so even had it been a much larger and
more powerful warship. (3) Even by the standards of the multitudinous
adhoc escorts used by the RN and Kriegsmarine, the YP389, with it's
alleged top speed of about 7 knots and it's lack of ASDIC or
hydrophones was a pretty weak reed. What the loss of the YP-389 has
to tell us about the efficacy of trawlers, whalers and yachts as
convoy escorts is not immediately obvious.
Had the YP-389 been a part of a convoy escort, and it would have been
almost equally useless in such circumstances being so slow and without
hydrophones or ASDIC, it would not have been the sole target had Degen
chanced upon it. It would presumably have been supported by one or
more larger warships, such as a CG cutter, destroyer or minesweeper,
and by other small ones. Degen would have been very unlikely to have
risked a surface *gun* attack, even on such a feeble ship, with other
armed vessels in the vicinity.
However, had the "Bucket Brigade" system, and I would be loathe to
describe it as convoying, been in use earlier, small vessels like the
YP389 could have been better employed on short runs and in those areas
where shoals, sandbanks or whatever made submerged U-boat operations
more hazardous, reserving more capable escorts, whether they were
warships, former auxiliaries or larger, faster trawlers, yachts or
whalers, for the more exposed and more dangerous routes, such as the
area off Cape Hatteras.
While I have a good deal of information on British and German
warships, I will freely confess that I don't have the same information
on US ones. However, I had a quick look at Andrew Toppan's USS Salem
website, which contains voluminous extracts from the DANFS, and it did
appear to me as if there were in fact a *considerable* number of
escorts. However, based on this thoroughly unscientific sampling, the
descriptions seem to indicate, with the frequent use of the words
"patrol" and "patrolling", that these were being used to "hunt"
U-boats and not to escort merchantmen. It also appeared that the
available minesweepers were being used in role, which is surprising
given the alleged lack of seaworthy escorts. Given that convoying
reduces losses to mines (see the introduction to the Navy Records
Society reprint of _The Defeat of the Enemy Attack on Shipping,
1939-1945_), it would surely, or so ISTM, have been better to have
employed these vessels as escorts and the likes of the YP389 as
minesweepers. However, as I said, this wasn't a very scientific
analysis.
But since Mr Blair's opus is apparently soon to (re?) appear in
paperback form, I shall await it's arrival with interest.
Angus
Andrew Clark
Louis Capdeboscq <Louis.Ca...@wanadoo.fr> wrote
> Angus' point, which I share is that the "King was right"
> advocates completely dismiss these admitedly inadequate craft, while the
> British experience does indicate, IMO, that even crappy escorts are better
> than none, and substantially better at that.
I agree. One other point which I'd be interested in learning is whether
King
or anyone thought to requisition any of the tens of thousands of US deep
sea
trawlers and small coastal craft to be used as temporary escorts. In
1939/40, Britain converted lots of the British east coast and Scottish
fishing fleets into crude coastal ASW craft simply by fitting rudimentary
depth charge racks and some WW1-vintage machine guns. Half a dozen of these
could scare away a U-boat quite effectively, and a flock of them - IIRC -
once fought off a surface attack by circling and suppressing the U-boat gun
crew with rifle fire! And the draught, generally, was too shallow for an
effective torpedo attack. All in all, as you say, much better than nothing.
Chris Manteuffel
<acl...@starcott.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>I agree. One other point which I'd be interested in learning is whether
>King
>or anyone thought to requisition any of the tens of thousands of US deep
>sea
>trawlers and small coastal craft to be used as temporary escorts. In
While some yachts were converted, I wonder at the taking of so many
ships out of economic use- considering how much bloody hell the US
mayors raised at loss of tourist revenue's over blackouts, I wonder
whether the US fish industry would let King take their ships and use
them. Yachts were fairly easy to requisition, because they're the
playthings of the rich, so you won't hear much of the howls of protest
that taking away the livelihood of hundreds of people would do. King
would have to wait till he got the blackouts to get these ships,
probably. Which would be when? Would they still be of much use?
Chris Manteuffel
History, n. An account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant,
which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers mostly
fools. - Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary
Steve Ewing
> > I believe that speaks volumes about how effective
> > they were at frightening U-boats.
>
> I'm not sure it does.
>
How about the U-boat that unknowingly surfaced underneath a patrol vessel,
sank it, and sailed off completely oblivious to the wreckage and men in the
water behind it? Was _that_ U-boat scared enough? Does it at least paint
a
picture of exactly how poor the available pool was?
> >From a purely tactical situation, the U-boat captain may have decided to
> attack the escort while it was still alone and, more importantly, while
his
> own sub was still undetected.
>
Considering that I've already indicated that the U-701 sank YP-389 on 19
June, 1942, solely because Horst Degen was hot, tired, and irritable, I'm
unable to come up with a truly charitable response to the above flight of
fancy. Might I suggest actually reading something on the encounter?
Chapter 23 of Hickam's _Torpedo Junction_ is a trifle melodramatic, but the
entire chapter is about the encounter. Of course, the "escort" was capable
of seven knots, effectively blind, and armed with a .30 MG. The U-boat
initially ignored the worthless piece of crap because it posed no threat,
and sinking it might draw attention. It was ignored for days, and
oblivious
to the U-boat in its area the entire time. Eventually, the pest annoyed
Degen enough that he decided to sink it. He opened up with the 20mm
because
he didn't want to "waste much ammunition on the little ship." When the
YP-389 swung into shallow water, "the U-boat kept following. It was almost
as if the commander of the U-boat had a vendetta against them."
In short, it was alone for days before it was attacked; if both vessels
were
still out there, the YP-389 wouldn't have detected the sub yet; a couple of
20mm cannon and an 88 mm deck gun combined with an eleven knot speed
advantage against vessels armed with .30 MGs mean that the U-boat could
probably have taken three or four of the pointless little craft whenever it
felt like it, assuming it didn't simply ignore them; and any complaints
about the facts not fitting your preconceived misconceptions should be
directed to Homer Hickam, c/o Dell. You could also direct them to Clay
Blair, et al.
> This isn't at all the point that I made: yes, the individual escort was no
> match for a U-boat. So what ? Send 2-3 of them, and the U-boat has to
> beware. That provides some amount of protection, so these lighter craft
> _should_ be counted.
>
If your point isn't that _modest_ escorts kept _shadowing_ U-boats down
while a convoy ran away from it and the _converging wolfpack_ in the _open
ocean_, then what is it? In any event, it's not all that applicable to
coastal shipping. Drumbeat was about ambushes at essentially fixed points
(e.g. Cape Hatteras) by single, stationary U-boats against genuinely awful
escorts. A bunch of blind fishing trawlers wandering aimlessly about
before
a sinking aren't going to matter any more than the same vessels flailing
about blindly after the sinking. Or, here's an idea, if the USN got a
bunch
of equivalents to the YP-389, the IX-Bs could ignore them, sink the convoy
with torpedoes, then surface and outgun the escorts while running rings
around them.
The escorts available to the USN were worse than his critics show any grasp
of. The tactics necessary for the change in coastline are completely
ignored by those who would rail at King. The only remaining criticisms
I've
seen of King during Drumbeat are essentially a mantra, rather than
meaningful. A couple of quibbles, but nothing substantial exists.
This is actually getting kind of strange, as there _are_ some genuine
criticisms of King which are actually well-thought-out. The Alaskas, for
instance, were championed by King, and he actually deserves some criticism
there, unlike this silly little Drumbeat hobgoblin.
And regardless of whether Blair is the best on the larger topic or not,
he's
still the best I've seen on Drumbeat.
Steve