Better luck for the RN carrier force 1939-1941

[Admiral Beez]

Sept. 1939 - HMS Courageous is hit by three torpedoes per OTL, but ITTL only two detonate, causing significant, near-fatal damage. Her escorts chase off U-29 and then take the carrier under tow. Mind you, Courageous has a long tow from her location, so we may need to reduce the level of damage so that she can get underway again.

MaritimeQuest - HMS Courageous Wreck Map

June 1940 - HMS Glorious is spotted by S&G without TSR or CAP aloft, per OTL. But ITTL, Glorious manages to launch her five torpedo-armed Swordfish. The two escorting destroyers combined with the five Swordfish disrupt S&G from accurately engaging Glorious. The carrier increases to max power, meanwhile launches her nine Gladiators to further disrupt S&G. Meanwhile over open frequency S&G location is relayed to Ark Royal's CBG. Scharnhorst is hit by a single airdropped torpedo, while Gneisenau is hit by a torpedo from HMS Acosta. Glorious is still badly hit by 11" fire, not losing power, but causing fires among the Hurricanes and wrecking the upper aft hangar and flight deck. S&G withdraw, while all five Swordfish and four of the Gladiators are shot down. Glorious burns through the day until fires are under control. She arrives at Scapa where courts martial will decide what the hell happened.

Nov 1941 - U-81 scores the torpedo hit per OTL. however ITTL, Ark Royal is successfully towed to Gibraltar.

Dec 1941 - HMS Audacity is sunk per OTL.

So there we have it, the Royal Navy has three badly damaged aircraft carriers between September 1939 and November 1941. And they've just seen their first carrier, albeit a CVE sunk by U-boat that December.

So the Royal Navy has had a little bit of luck. How, where and when do we go about repairing these three carriers? How do we see this impacting the FAA and RN in general? When these three carriers re-enter service, will there not be a shortage of personnel and aircraft because the Illustrious class are entring service at the same time?

If she's surplus relative to the availability of aircraft and trained pilots perhaps HMS Courageous gets sent stateside for repairs and then becomes a fleet air arm training unit, perhaps based in Canada? Though the training school should be located somewhere beyond the usual U-boat hunting ranges.

Does the lack of Ark Royal's sinking impact the designed redundancies and damage control systems of the Illustrious and Implacable classes?

 

[swampyankee]

Does the lack of Ark Royal's sinking impact the designed redundancies and damage control systems of the and Implacable classes?

I think the answer is "Yes."

The HMS Glorious was lost due to operational errors; the RN would make similar changes to its operational procedures whether the ship was lost or was towed into port, listing, flooded, and smoldering. The Ark Royal was lost due to problems with damage tolerance and damage control; a severely damaged Ark Royal that's towed into harbor would provide more information about the nature of the damage than would one that's under a few scores of meters of disputed sea. I think an Ark Royal that's a constructive total loss would actually provide better information about how to design ships and damage control procedures than what actually occurred.

 

[Admiral Beez]

I think the answer is "Yes."

The HMS Glorious was lost due to operational errors; the RN would make similar changes to its operational procedures whether the ship was lost or was towed into port, listing, flooded, and smoldering.

I like the idea of Glorious or her sister being repaired in time for a larger Taranto raid of Nov 1940. Judging by the damage though, it's likely Courageous that joins the RN strike that day.

 

[Shortround6]

The HMS Glorious was lost due to operational errors; the RN would make similar changes to its operational procedures whether the ship was lost or was towed into port, listing, flooded, and smoldering.

The Courageous was also lost due to operational errors.

An alternate history doesn't need faulty weapons or bad aim on the German's side, it just needs smarter decisions on the British side. Sending a Fleet carrier out to go sub hunting with only 4 destroyers could only be done by somebody who ignored the lesson of the Cressy, Aboukir and Hogue.
Granted it doesn't give you any lessons in damage control or construction for new carriers,

You want "luck" for the Glorious? Put up even two aircraft (of any kind) at a time sweeping the intended course just 50 miles ahead of the carrier. two is for redundancy, so you have one in the air or in position no matter what.

Lack of stupidity nets 2 operational carriers instead of 2 sunk ones, let alone damaged.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Sending a Fleet carrier out to go sub hunting with only 4 destroyers could only be done by somebody who ignored the lesson of the Cressy, Aboukir and Hogue.

There's nothing wrong with using carriers to attack subs, and with more than two dozen depth charge armed Swordfish four destroyers is probably sufficient. So the tools and the mission are not to blame. But the carrier should have been running at 30 knots in erratic manoeuvres and operating at least fifty miles away from wherever u-boats were predicted to be.

 

[Shortround6]

The tools, mission and training, tactics are very much to blame.

Later in the war cheap, easy to build (replace) escort carriers were used to hunt subs, usually with a much higher number of surface escorts, which had a much larger anti sub weapons/sensor suite than 1939 destroyers.
Using an expensive, very hard to replace fleet carrier as a sub hunter in the fall of 1939 with a token escort of surface ships (1/2 of which were detached to investigate a contact) is just not paying attention to history.
Ship was torpedoed during a period when ALL aircraft had been landed to refuel, no rotating 'guard' of planes to protect carrier, so very poor tactics.

Sub hunting was a constantly evolving scene of operations and using the results of even 1941-42 to judge 1939 is not comparing apples to apples.

 

[Admiral Beez]

The tools, mission and training, tactics are very much to blame.

To be fair, there were no proven ASW tactics yet, the RN didn't have disposable escort carriers (though Argus is close to a CVE), and the Germans knew their business. The war was only a few days old, there was no contemporary experience to draw from, and Courageous was operating well into the Atlantic where threat was likely perceived to be lower.

Courageous was the first carrier lost to submarines, but there were many more, including HMS Ark Royal, Eagle, Audacity (the first CVE) and Avenger, USS Yorktown, USS Wasp and Block Island, IJNS Taiho, Shōkaku, Unryū and Shinano. If you're sending carriers into combat, you're going to lose some to enemy submarines even with the best ASW and damage control procedures.

But luck plays a big role in submarine warfare. That's what got me thinking about this thread, since a slight change in the day results in Courageous and Ark Royal surviving. Now, Glorious' loss, that was inexcusable.

 

[TheMadPenguin]

"S&G without TSR or CAP aloft, per OTL. But ITTL"
Can you translate your acronyms to what they mean?
I guess S&G means Scharnhorst & Gneisnau, since they liked the taste of carriers.
CAP is Combat Air Patrol
The other three?

 

[MikeMeech]

The Courageous was also lost due to operational errors.

An alternate history doesn't need faulty weapons or bad aim on the German's side, it just needs smarter decisions on the British side. Sending a Fleet carrier out to go sub hunting with only 4 destroyers could only be done by somebody who ignored the lesson of the Cressy, Aboukir and Hogue.
Granted it doesn't give you any lessons in damage control or construction for new carriers,

You want "luck" for the Glorious? Put up even two aircraft (of any kind) at a time sweeping the intended course just 50 miles ahead of the carrier. two is for redundancy, so you have one in the air or in position no matter what.

Lack of stupidity nets 2 operational carriers instead of 2 sunk ones, let alone damaged.

Hi

Courageous was not 'just hunting submarines' in the South West Approaches, she was out there to give protection to the merchant ships approaching the area due to them being at sea when war was declared, they were not in convoy or under any other protection. The carrier and its escort were in the area where these ships were deemed to be at risk and the hunting of the German submarines was deemed as a method of reducing the risk to the merchant marine. There was a very limited choice available of what to do, but leaving the merchant fleet totally unprotected in the area was probably not a decision the admiralty would choose. The question to answer is what were the realistic alternatives to sending a carrier?

Mike

 

[TheMadPenguin]

Were any plane-carrying cruisers in the area to scout out subs for the destroyers to attack?

 

[MikeMeech]

Were any plane-carrying cruisers in the area to scout out subs for the destroyers to attack?

Hi

Rather limited air power, two Walrus or two Seafox, plus the cruiser has to 'stop' to pick them up in an area they are searching for submarines! Maybe lessons of Cressy, Aboukir and Hogue are relevant here?

Mike

 

[TheMadPenguin]

Operational Tempo: How long to stop the cruiser and lift aboard the plane?
Curious why the plane and cruiser both doing the same speed can't connect & lift the plane.

In any regard, Germany can replace my sub and my crew (including me) much faster than the Brits can replace a cruiser or carrier. Load & engage!

 

[Admiral Beez]

"S&G without TSR or CAP aloft, per OTL. But ITTL"
Can you translate your acronyms to what they mean?

TSR is Fleet Air Arm speak for Torpedo-Strike-Reconasance, the designation for the Swordfish, Albacore and Barracuda. What If posts sometimes use Our Timeline (OTL) and In This Timelime (ITTL) to differentiate between what occurred in real life and what is being suggested as occurring. But I should have put that in the first post, as I hate the exclusionary nature of acronyms.

 

[TheMadPenguin]

"But I should have put that in the first post, as I hate the exclusionary nature of acronyms. "
Write them in a file, put a link to them in your sig, "acronymicon"

 

[Shortround6]

The question to answer is what were the realistic alternatives to sending a carrier?

Send the destroyers without the carrier or add a light cruiser ot two (two actually helped rescue the survivors so they were not only at sea but in the general area,) This was a case of the RN having needed to be "seen doing something" rather than a well thought out plan to really protect the merchant ships.
Or it was a case to total overconfidence in the ability of the Swordfish and the sonar on the destroyers.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Or it was a case to total overconfidence in the ability of the Swordfish and the sonar on the destroyers.

There's a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking here. This was 14 days after the war began, everyone was learning.

There was overconfidence on all fronts. The Germans thought Churchill wouldn't declare war over Poland, assumed America would stay out of things, and believed their U-Boats could defeat Britain. Yes, the Germans managed to sink four British CVs and two CVEs, but the latter built six more CVs, four CVLs and procured >40 CVEs between Courageous' loss and VE Day. And look at the Italians; went for the perceived easy win against France, then gets smoked in North Africa, sunk at Taranto and wiped out in Russia - did any nation demonstrate as much overconfidence or undeserved bravado as the Italians?

 

[TheMadPenguin]

These Italians got whooped by the Greeks, yes? They needed a bail-out from the Wehrmacht. Yeah, they overplayed their hand. So did Germany, because of Hitler. So did Japan because of <insert 30 names here>.
So, good luck (or better luck) for the Brits is simply "Winning and Losing count for little. The courage to persevere is what matters." Wrong words, correct thought from Winnie.

 

[Shortround6]

There's a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking here. This was 14 days after the war began, everyone was learning.

Some people were relearning what they had known in WW I.
Some people were going to war with totally untested weapons or weapons that been unchanged since 1918.

The Swordfish of 1939 did not have radar. It is subject to question whether they had actual depth charges or 100/250lb anti-submarine bombs.

The whole concept of organizing hunting groups in 1939 should have been laid to rest by any halfway competent friday night quarterback/coach.

If swanning about all over the ocean with aircraft was a waste of effort, the sending out around 100 anti-sub ships in groups with 1 mile range asdic into a 3000 mile wide ocean can only be seen as pure folly. Not to mention that by sending out the hunter groups there weren't enough ships left to escort the convoys properly.
Double fail.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Some people were relearning what they had known in WW I.
Some people were going to war with totally untested weapons or weapons that been unchanged since 1918.

The Swordfish of 1939 did not have radar. It is subject to question whether they had actual depth charges or 100/250lb anti-submarine bombs.

The whole concept of organizing hunting groups in 1939 should have been laid to rest by any halfway competent friday night quarterback/coach.

If swanning about all over the ocean with aircraft was a waste of effort, the sending out around 100 anti-sub ships in groups with 1 mile range asdic into a 3000 mile wide ocean can only be seen as pure folly. Not to mention that by sending out the hunter groups there weren't enough ships left to escort the convoys properly.
Double fail.

I agree with everything you wrote here. Very succinctly put.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Now, had Glorious, Courageous and Ark Royal survived to serve into 1942, do we see them resulting in better RN results in the upcoming campaigns? I'd don't think the first two would suit the Russian convoys (though Furious is weathering well enough below), but Ark might be hardy for the Murmansk runs. Glorious and Courageous might make good aircraft ferries to the subcontinent or Australia.