the franco-prussian war - Strategy & Tactics

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the chances of obtaining a negotiated peacewould have been greatly enhanced, as isevidenced by the Solomon Island Campaignwhich took better than 1 % years to advance amere 400 miles toward Tokyo. [Note: thehighly successful "leap frog" techniques usedlater on was only possible due to complete airand naval superiority, superiority which wewould not have been able to mount nearly soreadily had it not been for Midway, et al.).5. Pg. 16. Java Sea was a battle of severalphases which took place over a seven hourperiod, not three as is stated, from 1615 whenthe first broadsides were exchanged to 2350when DE RUYTER and JAVA were torpedoedby NACHI and HAGURO. The Japanese didnot use their training or torpedos to their full,often firing long lances at impossible rangesand improbable angles. It was only the chancelucky hit on EXETER which threw the alliedbattle line into the path of Tanaka's torpedoes.The two heavies did not redeem the fleet thatnight with their attack on the allied cruisersthough.6. Pg 76 (again): What carrier attack on theMarianas??? The extent of the early war raidswere Kwajelien (ENTERPRISE 1 Feb 42).Rabaul (LEXINGTON 20 Feb 421, and. Lae-Salamua (YORKTOWN 10 Mar 42). Anyraid into the Marianas would have been met byMihoro Air Group (36 G3M 8iG4M) and 2ndAir Group (48 A6M2) plus some assortedsearch units of Yokohama Air Group.7. Pg. 16 once more. People have a tendencyto attribute human qualities to inanimateobjects. The US CVs were not fearful of airattacks, Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher was verymuch so. The strain of constant combat fornine months was showing very much, andhaving had two carriers sunk from underneathhim in as many months certainly did not helpthings along. No, if you must put the blame forthat little piece of lunacy, which cost 1024lives, put it on F.J.F.8. Pg. 18. The discussion of Cape Esperanceshows a singular lack of understanding of that: action. Scott strictly forbade the use SC radari by those ships that had it, Intelligence reportshad indicated that the Japanese had a radardetection capability (a device similar to theGerman Naxos) which could sense metricwave length radar. He had planned to useaircraft (4) but those that finally got airbornewere forgotten about in the heat of the battle.Only HELENA had SG radar which picked upGoto at 28,000 yards. . .the only problem wasthat this was not reported to Scott until therange was down to 12,000 yards, at whichpoint in time the US column was in the processof making a 180° turn. It was only pure luckthat LAFFEY continued through the turnrather than following DUNCAN after Goto, forhad she and the remainder of the force doneso, it would have been almost a mirror imageof the 13 Nov action with both lines rammingeach other head on. As it was, Scott was soconfused that he thought he was firing atfriendly ships (as did Goto) and ordered ceasefire repeatedly after HELENA opened up. It1 was luck more than anything else that carriedScott through that action. As far as Japanesetorpedos not being very effective, both AOBAand FURUTAKA were knocked out very early,FUBUKI was smashed as she was turning tounmask her tubes (sinking in three minutes).KINUGASA and HATSUYUKI had turned toport which gave them a trailing shot throughwater occupied by their own flagship, although Other Warships. Morrison credits a torpedo hittorpedoes from KINUGASA passed ahead of on FURUTAKA by either DUNCAN orBOISE at midnight. On top of that the force FARENHOLT during Cape Esperance, whichcommander was killed and there was no helps to save face for our DDs in thatdirection or control for coordinated torpedo campaign, albeit only slightly.attacks. At any rate, the main point is thatradar played little part in Cape EsperanceTabulation. South Dakota carried a 12-inchexcept to help HELENA to be more aware of main belt' 18' This was a mythwhat was going on than anyone else, including perpertrated wartime propaganda whichwas not dispelled until 1970 when BreyersScott' Also' map Of Cape Esperance Schlachtschiff und Schlachtkreuzer publishedshows the lead making the the accurate figures. Note also that Janes forKINUGASA, the trailing CA actually made thatthe year that NEW JERSEY operated off Vietturn' leading turned Nam rated her at her proper belt thickness, i.e.,starboard.310mm (12%"1.The same data can be found8. DESCRIPTIVE MODULESin the revised edition of the Lenton seriespocketbook.1. Ships of Guadalcanal.BBs. If as claimed, the Japanese fastbattleships were unsuccessful in their nightbombardment role, then 14 Oct 42 must havebeen the work of some very strange force.Actually KONGO and HARUNA conducted a1 '/i hour long shoot, placing 918 projectiles intothe Henderson field area with what can only beconsidered devastating effect. Some differenceof opinion exists as to whether the ammoused was type 0 high capacity or type 3incendiary, but the fact remains thatHenderson lost nearly 60% of its aircraft thatnight and six transports unloaded threebattalions off Tassafaronga. The myth of ourPT's driving off the bombardment group isanother bunch of hogwash that is oftenperpetuated (although not by your article). Forboth bombardment missions (14 Oct and 13Nov) the Kongos carried 60 rounds per gun forthat purpose making a total of 960 shells.Simple mathematics indicated that by the endof the second pass by Henderson there wereonly four broadsides of these rounds left so theshoot was ended.CLs. All Japanese destroyer squadrons had alight cruiser attached as flotilla flagship. This isthe reason for the size of Japanese lightcruisers, ships large enough to pack aconsiderable punch when backing up adestroyer flotilla and yet not so large as tobecome an expensive liability that commanderswould not be willina to exDose to danaer.Probably one of the besfexamples of this Gpewas the Dutch TROMP class which wereOnly two of the Takao class CAs were rebuiltalong lines shown (ATAGO and TAKAO).MAYA was rearmed in 1942 with twin 5/40cal AA replacing the single 4.7's but still carriedonly 8 tubes. Chokai was never rebuilt andcarried 4~4.7" and 8x24" TT to the day shewas sunk. This can be referenced in Watts &Gordon's The Imperial Japanese Navy.Tenryu class were never armed with 24" tubes,carried 6x21" (Type 81 torpedo) with noreloads. YUBARI also did not carry anyreloads.2. Naval OrdnanceSomewhere someone has his wires crossed.AP shells pass through unarmored shipswithout exploding. . .(Coggins is wrong). . .HC shells have contact fuses (as do incendiaryshells) which explode instantaneously todamage thin skinned vessels. AARON WARDsurvived only because she was hit by AP whichpassed right through her without exploding,much the same as FANSHAW BAY at Leyte fwhen she took a 16" AP hit from NAGATO '..which passed right through the engine roomwithout detonating. During the 13 Nov battle,Adm Abe had eight minutes from first sightingof the US van to the time he opened fire, duringwhich time he was able to change over frombombardment to AP, although 'they did usesome during the action.No Japanese CLs carried a 6" gun. OnlyOYODO carried 6.1" artillery, and those wererelatively cheap and expendable, as cruisers the9th and 10th turrets removed from the firstgo, and yet which was nimble enough asset to two Mogamis. The Aganos carried a hand .;any destroyer flotilla which she served. loaded 5.9" weapon.ORDNANCE:Some corrections to the gunnery figures:-iapolis and earlier 1
TORPEDOES:Mark/Model Dia - - wt - -- Wrnd - -Performance Utilization-< -MklO steam 21" 2100' 415 3500136 -Subs ----'Mk13 steam 22" 1921 600 3000136 AIC, PTMk14 ste, 2: 500 4500146 Subs9000132Mkl5steam 21" 2215 660 4400148 Surface shlps880013215000126.5I403. TorpedoesA relatively good discussion of the difficultieswe faced with our torpedoes, the only problemis that both the Mk 10 and Mk 14 types listedwere submarine torpedoes. The standarddestroyer torpedo was the Mk 15 which was aBliss-Leavitt model using the same MI C pistolof the Mk 14, making it equally as unreliable asthe Mk 14. Also, the standard rack mountedtorpedo for the Higgins type PT boats was the22" Mk 13 aircraft torpedo, although the Elcoboats carried the Mk 15 in tubes. The Mk 15was a fairly good weapon once the bugs of1942 were ironed out. At any rate it wasreplaced in 1944 by the Mk 18, an electrictorpedo copied from the German G7e-FATelectric. The accompanying table may help toplace them in perspective.While looking at torpedoes, the main Japanesesurface ship torpedo was the Type 93, butmany of the older DDs and CLs as well as allsubmarines carried the Type 81, a 21" steamjob (YUNAGI and TENRYU did at Savo).Japanese aircraft and MTBs carried a 1760 Ib.18" type with a 440 Ib. warhead which mayexplain why it took five to sinkCHICAGO although fewer would have probablybeen sufficient had they been in rapidsuccession rather than two followed by threemore some 20 hours later. This carries over tothe Hit and Hit Hard area and may explainsome of the differences in warship resistanceto torpedo as well as other damage.4. Hit and Hit HardWhat ship is the BENTON? Please pass thisinformation on as apparently you havediscovered a destroyer even the USN did notknow existed.Morrison credits WASHINGTON with onlynine 16" hits out of 75 rounds fired atKIRISHIMA. They were all that were necessaryto save SOUTH DAKOTA'S bacon for, in spiteof the fact that her engineering spaces werestill intact, she had lost one 16" turret and wasa blazing pyre that was attracting 14" shellslike moths. It would not have been too muchlonger before her luck would have run out andshe, too, would have suffered a critical injury.5. Who Won.Again, in the discussion of Cape Esperance itshould be noted that the Japanese achievedtheir objective, Sumiyoshi landed with hisartillery and tanks safely.C. "CA" GAME RULESA fair number of errors are in section 12.0, ShipCharacteristics.1. So DakotaIN Carolina 38,000 tons2. Iowa 48,500 tons- 7DD/sS - -- ""--"'"3. Maryland only 3 units (4th, WASHINGTON,sunk 1924)4. Baltimore 13.600 tons5. Omaha 5 units CL-1, 5 type CL-26. Atlanta 4 units 16x5" 8x21"TT4 units 12x5" 8x21"TT3 units 12x5" 0 TT7. Sims DD 12 units 4x5" 8x21"TT (extramounts removed 1941)8. Craven 22 units9. Benson DD-5 should be Bristol Class10. Benson 2 1620 tons1. Agano 6~5.9"2. Akatsuki should be DD-23. Asashio should be DD-44. Hatsuharu should be DD-3a (6x24"TT)5. CHOKAI should be CA-2a (4x4.7"AA.8x24"TT)6. MAYA should be CA-2b (8x5"AA, 8x24"TT)7. Tenryu 6x21"TT8. Mutsuki 2x4.7"DP, 6x24"TT9. Kamikaze DD-la 3~4.7". 4x21"TT (YAYOI)This seems to be about all I wish to cover atthis time. Please do not interpret what hasbeen written here as anything other than someconstructive criticism. I noticed that there wasno listing of source materials, but it appears asif you rested heavily on Jack Coggins' TheCampaign for Guadalcanal which is a fair workbut tends to perpetuate many of the mythsthat more thorough researchers have disproven.It would be to you advantage to havesomeone with a reasonable knowledge of thesubject check the accuracy of future endeavorsin this area. At the risk of soundingpresumptious, may I suggest that someone likemyself be utilized in the area of naval and navalair fields. I have a relatively extensive technicaland descriptive library on the subject and havewritten an article on Guadalcanal in Conflict,plus collaborated with Dave Dickson on his IanAllen series book on the Philippine Sea battle. Iwould like to offer my services on the abovescore if you feel that they may help to providea more accurate publication.The following is a response to Mr. Hafting'scomments by David lsby, author of "CA."A. MAIN ARTICLEKEYED TO HARTING'S COMMENTS1. Pg. 12. Agreed that the Japanese did notrun over the Pacific firing off expensiveordnance, but their torpedo training techniqueswere still more realistic than theAmericans, as I'm sure you would agree2. While the U.S. also disposed of someobsolete warships by sinking them, these weremainly by air (OSTERFRIEDLAND, VIRGINIA,and others) or by other means, includinggunfire (WASHINGTON). My comment was,however, in relation to torpedo use. It shouldbe noted that the Americans stopped thispractice once the immediate surplus of shipsresulting from the Naval Treaties had beenexhausted.3. All ships tend to be designed "underweight"and gradually flesh out, through building andreconstruction, to a much larger displacement.That the AOBA's were designed to stay withinthe Treaty limits is obvious, and quite possiblythe others too, but I feel you could not get thekind of armament and protection of ships suchas the ATAGO on 10,000 tons. Your commentsabout the U.S. Treaty crusiers is interesting.4. As should have been clear from the article,the Japanese had their battleship Admirals,who remained unconvinced, in some cases,until YAMATO went down. However, therewere enough of the "Carrier Admirals" in theright position at the right time to have shapedJapanese opening strategy. The Japanesewere definitely disappointed in not havingpicked up the carriers at Pearl, but I feel theideas expressed in the article find amplegrounds in the Japanese use and deploymentof their battlewagons (squadrons of battleshipsbeing Senkan Sentai) in the first sixmonths of the Pacific War. Also, from thewritings and interviews with Japanese Navalofficers in the U.S. Naval Institute's TheImperial Japanese Navy in World War /I and inthe Strategic Bombing Survey's Naval volumes,especially those with Admirals Toyodoand Fukudome and Capt. Fuchida.5. The fighting at Java Sea lasted some threehours, the rest of the time being used for theABDAFLOT and Japanese to sort themselvesout. These "wild" torpedo shots wereprobably deliberate and kept the ABDAFLOTforces from moving in closer, where their 6"and 5.9" guns would be more effective.6. "Marianas" should read "Marshalls" -refering to the "Big E's" strike on Kwajelein.The abortive relief of Wake Island - whichwas unsuccessful partially because of themiscalculations of Jack Fletcher, could also beconsidered in this category.7. If the American carriers could haveemotions, I'm sure that they would have beenfearful too. The "mistake" was Fletcher's, but Icould hardly term it "lunacy." Fletcher wasquite capable of making big mistakes, but I fearat Savo only hindsight makes him wrong.What would you have done if you were JackFletcher on that night? If I were in his shoes,I'm afraid I might very well have donethe same thing.8. Your account of Cape Esperance differs inone point from Morrison's official history, fromwhich may account is largely drawn. I believeHELENA informed Scott of its sighting byusing TBS (Talk-Between-Ships Radio Telephone)soon after.2325, while you have thisaction taking place some five minutes later.When one deals with such fine tolerances insomething such as a night naval battle,something is sure to get lost in the translation.The logs of the ships involved would often notmesh by as least as much time. Scott hadintended to countermarch when he did,
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