Best World war two warships?

Understand your reasoning, Glider, and I at first was going to go with Warspite, but the fact(I think) that Washington was the only BB in WW2 that sank an enema BB all by herself swayed me. I did not give Enterprise enough ink but would anyone disagree that old CV6 was the most important, influential, greatest, best, finest, indispensable and valiant warship on any side during the whole war? Jon, I enjoyed your line of thinking. One reason I think CA25, old "Swayback Maru" saw so much action(for instance-Kormondorskis) was that by the war's midpoint, she was not a new and shiny toy and might be considered expendable so she was sent wherever any dirty job had to be done.

Along the line of your thinking, jon, when the Scheers first were built, all the world's navies went into a tizzy because they could outrun almost all the warships that could outgun them and could outgun the ships that were faster(kind of like the USS Constitution and her sisters) so it was thought that the Germans had created an almost unbeatable candidate for the guerre de course(did I spell that right?) It was later found, however, that, rather than create ships to match or outclass the Scheers the antidote was a number of smaller, faster cruisers. del, I was ruminating a while back upon the dilemma that Langsdorf faced when he concentrated his main batteries on Exeter. That left only 4-5.9s (assuming the CLs stayed on one beam, which they did) to deal with 16-6 inchers. That was not good odds. Wondering if a twin 5.9 superimposed over each 11 inch turret and two twin 5.9s amidships on the centerline able to fire on either beam would not have been helpful.

Concerning the U.S.S. Washington's action against the Japanese battleship Kirishima. (The Washington was the only US battleship to defeat another capital ship in WWII.)

Third Battle of Savo

Jank, thank you for your reference. I did not endeavor to look it up but I don't believe the South Dakota got off a salvo before she was hit and all her circuit breakers popped or something. Strangely enough when the SD went back to the states for repairs ,she got all the accolades for the victory and the ship that did all the damage was unmentioned. Kind of like in the first reports of the Battle of Midway, the AAF B17s were at first credited for the sinking of the IJN carriers.

"Strangely enough when the SD went back to the states for repairs ,she got all the accolades for the victory and the ship that did all the damage was unmentioned."

Yes.

I did not know that the South Dakota didn't get get a shot off before she got walloped.

Hey Rich - you have some old Janes - is there any mention in them about a supposed Chichibu class cruiser armed with six 12" guns, up to 15,000 tons? I've read that Janes included them - of course they didn't actually exist. Anything?

SD's faulty circuit breaker. I have sometimes wondered if this was a problem specific to this ship or if the whole class had a weakness here. It would be really scary if mulitiple classes had this problem but was not talked about. Obviously this is not a problem that affected the entire US navy, we had ship pounded to oblivion but the lights didn't go out at first contact. I wonder how SD would have done not for this fault. Perhaps SD recieved a very specific unlikely hit that would have turned out the lights on other ships. I don't think this is the case because I think I have read that SD had this as an ongoing problem.

I think no matter what ship you are on you are in big trouble if all of your power goes out at first contact. What might even be the best ship of its type the world has ever seen is nothing but a floating target when that happens.

I think if Washington had not been there and SD did not have its failure that SD would have defeated Krishma but would have taken some damage from Krishma and would likely have take alot of topside damage from Krishmas friends since she was the focus of attention.

Nice going, Matt, I never paid much attention before, but my 1942 "Janes" mentions 4 ships building, one called Titibu but described as about 12000 to 15000 tons, 6 inch armor, 6- 12 inch guns, speed 30 kts. The exactitude of information is not guaranteed. Was in your vicinity last week at Port Mansfield. We flew up the beach about 30 miles upon leaving Sunday. Vfr but cloud layer though broken was low. Was hoping I did not get to meet you in an air to air. Martini time!

Jank, I read your whole reference after I posted and it did state that the SD never was in action during the part of the battle when the Kirishima was sunk. Interesting that the Kongo, Kirishima's sister, was built in Britain. They were handsome ships but of course not as well armed or armored as Washington or SD.

Battleship Washington:

I am a flag waving American and like to think we had the best stuff but I also want to always be a realist.

I see people give Washington a boost because she sank Kirishma. Well that is what you do in war, you fight the enemy but does she get too many points for this even though she did what she was supposed to do.

Kirishma was caught unaware by the Washington as she was pounding SD. I think this was partly Kirishmas fault for not responding to Washington but at the same time maybe Krishma was acting in the best way she knew in the circumstances. Perhaps she didn't realize that SD was having a circuit breaker problem and she was thinking she had to remove this threat before she could deal with another.

In any case if Washington did manage to approach the Japanese without being seen I doubt it was because Washington was stealtier than many other capital ships of the era. Well maybe harder to spot then some of the tallest masted ships but I think the tallest ships were the Japanese as well.

What if we substitute any 16 inch gun ship that was properly functioning into Washintons spot would it have made a differece. Not that I can see. If we substituted a 15 inch gun fully functioning ship of the era would it have made much difference in the outcome. I am thinking it wouldn't. I also think if we put any 14 inch gun ship of the era they would have killed of Krishma also. She had her attention on SD and was caught flat footed by Washington. She was a lesser ship but was also unprepared to face a new threat.

This is not to take anything away from Washington. I just think the way she handled Krishma does not prove or disprove what capablity Washington had.

This was not a one on one fight. Everyone was targeting SD. SD might not have been fighting back but thier turrets were trained on her. Washinton gained alot by not having turrets of various sizes trained on her.

If we substitute: Nelson, George, Venneto, Riechleu, Bismarck, I am convined the results would have been the same and Krishma is a lesser ship. I think any of the big gun battle cruisers could have taken her down just as well. You only need armor if you get hit. Washington did take any real hits. I think anything with 14 inch guns and up would have killed Krishma that day if they were in Washingtons position.

Since SD, Washington, and Krishima have are part of this topic lets try and look at it from the Krishima's prespective.

Lets say I am am looking on from the bridge of the Krishima.

Oh, It's an American Battleship. One of those newer 16 inch gun varieties with lots of 5inch secondaries. This might be bad. Open fire!!!!!!!!

Boom Boom Boom!!!! We have scored some hits, everyone join in. Perhaps our lighter ships will take out her radar, damage the directors, maybe kill the bridge crew.

Hmmmm, she is not firing back. Maybe we hit something vital. Maybe she actually was not aware we where here and was not ready. Perhaps the bridge crew is dazed. No matter, we need to finish her before she can respond with those big 16 inch guns. Everyone, concentrate your fire on that battleship. Don't let her recover. We can win this one if we do not allow her to repair what ever damage we have caused.

Hmmm, what is that??? Another battle ship. Our turrets are all on the first battleship. It will take time to turn out guns, If we do turn out guns the 1st battleship might recover and strike back.

Boom Boom Boom!!!!!

Hmmm, it seems we are going to have trouble turning our turrets if we wanted to.

Boom Boom Boom!!!!!

We might be in trouble.

Boom Boom Boom!!!!!

Ok Ok, we are in trouble.

I would like to mention that South Dakota fired 3 salvos with her MK 40 FC director. There is no mention about the results and obviously she was missing and did not achieved a hit or straddle on the target. I do not know whether or not her 5" sec. achieved any hit´s on Krishima but with the close range in mind, this cannot be excluded. However, SD wasn´t silenced early in the action. The powerloss knocked out main secondary FC and limited the power hoists in operation. There was some emergency power avaiable for the training firing of the turrets (provided by turbo dynamos) altough this energy was channelled soon to ship operations and damage controll.
There was nothing wrong with the circuit breaker itselve, prior to ~1930, it was a prone to failure under impact shock. In fact until Rickover revised the construction of USN Breakers pre WW2 it was a common occurance in USN vessels for breakers to open due to schock. However, SD had Rickover´s shock proof Breakers.
The problem therefore must be found in the integration of equipment but I am nowhere near educated enough for this question.

The reason that Kirishima concentrated her fire on SD was that she could see her. She did not see Washington. Washington "saw" Kirishima with her FC radar and her salvos were directed by radar. It is true that SD fired at a target early in the battle that was thought to be a BB but Kirishima took no hits at that time. One report says that an engineer on SD wired down the breakers so they would not pop and that caused further problems. Apparently SD was ineffective in the whole battle except as a target(which was helpful) The SD was hit several times by 14 inch bullets but most of them were shore bombardment type and did no vital damage.

The lucky thing about this battle was that the Jap destroyers who you would normally to be deadly at night and close range, didn't shine with thei their torps.

No question about the luck that the US enjoyed with their BBs in this battle re the IJN torps. In most of the other battles around Guadalcanal(as fierce and sanguinary as any in history) we suffered heavily from the Japanese torps. Of course "Ching" Lee was aware of the danger of those torps and he fought the battle accordingly. However, I stated as my criteria that a ship needed to be lucky to make my list and the Washington was lucky that night. Another ship that made my list, Pensacola, was unlucky at Tassaforonga, and had her bow blown off by a torp but she was lucky to not take the hit further aft, was repaired and fought out the rest of the war. Incidently my criteria include extra points if the ship was on the winning side in the war. We are talking about real results here.

renrich said:

No question about the luck that the US enjoyed with their BBs in this battle re the IJN torps. In most of the other battles around Guadalcanal(as fierce and sanguinary as any in history) we suffered heavily from the Japanese torps. Of course "Ching" Lee was aware of the danger of those torps and he fought the battle accordingly. However, I stated as my criteria that a ship needed to be lucky to make my list and the Washington was lucky that night. Another ship that made my list, Pensacola, was unlucky at Tassaforonga, and had her bow blown off by a torp but she was lucky to not take the hit further aft, was repaired and fought out the rest of the war. Incidently my criteria include extra points if the ship was on the winning side in the war. We are talking about real results here.

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Quite fond of the P'cola

I always say it's better to be lucky than good. That's the damn truth!

When I look at Naval history there was a turning point there the battles started to be lopsided against the Japanese in surface action.

My main point there if we would have substituted many different ships from many nations in the place of washington I think the results would have been the same. Washington was not spotted until too late. Most battleships in Washingtons position would have prevailed.

Maybe, but Washington was there, she was commanded by a smart expert in gunnery, her FC radar(new) was in place and worked, her radar operators knew how to interpret the globs and her gunners were well trained. For a first action they were pretty effective. A combination of a good weapon, well trained crew, the ship was there when doctrine dictated BBs should not operate in those tight quarters and her commander had trained all his life for that moment. Lady Luck and maybe something else was looking over our shoulder that night.

Renrich is correct.

The USS Washington was commanded by a good capt and a good admiral. And theres nothing that speaks for itself as who was left standing after a battle.

The results speak for themselves.

May I interrupt You on this? Don´t take me wrong -I very much like Washington- but she had only limited radar FC by 42. If You study the after action reports properly and compare them with FC MK 3 manuals it is absolutely clear that she needed optical input from the firing director also. The excellent display of gunnery was remarkable (esspeccially the rapid firing) but the radar was not truly able for "blind fire".
It was able to detect BB sized targets with comparably high range precission and good resolution but the deflection preciseness made it necassary to input datas via optics. In the end this process is more complicated than radar / optic only input but her crew mastered this task with remarkable performance and for good results.