Without the IJN having radar, any high flying strike force has a very good chance to arrive over the IJN carriers undetected. The first time it happened was on 9 April 1942 when 9 Blenheims bombed the IJN's carrier flagship, undetected, until the bombs hit the water.
Churchill agrees to RAF reinforcements to Malaya. What to send?
- Thread starter Admiral Beez
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Without the IJN having radar, any high flying strike force has a very good chance to arrive over the IJN carriers undetected. The first time it happened was on 9 April 1942 when 9 Blenheims bombed the IJN's carrier flagship, undetected, until the bombs hit the water.
27 Vals split up and hit both ships weakening AA fire, damage radar etc, Kates split up say 18 go after Bismarck and 9 after Prinz Eugene. I'd say no more than 3 hits would dispose of Prinz Eugene, not sure how many for Bismarck
For that matter, all 27 Vals hit Bismarck, split up torpedo planes between them. With radar and many secondary guns out of action it would be simple to let escorting Japanese destroyers finish off Bismarck with Long Lance torpedoes in a night action, again the Japanese destroyer captains being the best trained at torpedo attacks and having the best surface ship torpedoes in the world at the time
Right 3 hits from 9 aircraft..., and I suppose 6 from eighteen...
Anyways using those hit rates Victorious would have sunk Bismarck, if she would have embarked a full complement of aircraft.Ok, we fly 2 whole missions from our single Japanese carrier. All 27 Vals and 27 Kates attack Bismarck on first attack. Everyone that returns rearms and all of the 2nd wave, let's say 20 Vals and 20 Kates, attacks Prinz Eugene. Does that work for you?Right 3 hits from 9 aircraft..., and I suppose 6 from eighteen...
The FAA used ASV radar to find Bismarck during both strikes.
RN torpedoes were highly efficient and the RN was just as well trained in night fighting as the IJN and the RN had radar to boot.
Again, you're posting stuff that should be in a fantasy forum.
Says the guy that wants to face off against the Japanese navy with Swordfish and Skuas. The US had radar as well at Guadalcanal, those Long Lance torpedos were an amazing equalizer.
They still have to find Bismarck and that's gonna be tough with no ASV radar. 2ndly Victorious could do the same. One Albacore can carry 3 times the bomb load of a Val, BTW and is just as efficient a dive bomber.
RN torpedoes may have been highly efficient, but what are you going to deliver them with in late 1941-42 during a daylight raid against a 6 carrier Japanese fleet? They sure didn't do well during the Channel Dash. How many Swordfish did Ark Royal deploy during Bismarck chase? Why didn't she sink Bismarck? She had Skuas as well, why weren't they used as five bombers?
For what it's worth, I don't believe a large US carrier would have done very well against Bismarck. Our torpedoes didn't work and all they could do is pummel the upper decks of Bismarck with dive bombers. I'm not sure if we carried anything heavier than a 500 pounder at that time.
The Swordfish would have been long gone by Dec 1941 if the RN wasn't fighting a war in the ETO. A Skua with a 500lb bomb could knock out any IJN carrier with a single hit and was basically equivalent to a Val.
The USN couldn't fight at night, without radar, They had no ability to fight at night using optical firecontrol because they didn't have flashless powder nor did they have even warning gongs so that FC personal could close their eyes when the guns were going to fire. The USN had evolved no night fighting doctrine between the wars. The RN taught the IJN how to fight at night. Without FC radar, courtesy of the UK and RN, the USN would have been slaughtered at Guadalcanal.
The IJN would have scored the same successes at Guadalcanal using RN torpedoes.
Ark Royal had Swordfish and Fulmars in May 1941. The seas were so rough that only the Swordfish could fly and only with reduced deck ranges. No other navy could have operated aircraft under those conditions, and even if they did they still couldn't find their target, because only the RN had ASV radar.
Freebird
Master Sergeant
None of which did any serious damage.
Ah yes, the Channel Dash.
Otherwise known as the death ride of the Kriegsmarine.
The heavy cover of Me109s protected them through the channel
Then the Scharnhorst hit a British mine - minor damage
Gneisnau hit another mine - this time serious damage
Sharnhorst then hit YET ANOTHER mine - severe damage.
Sharnhorst spent all of 1942 & most of 1943 repairing damage and working up again - only to be sunk at North Cape
Her sister never sailed again....
While the damage to Gneisnau wasn't as serious, a follow up raid by the RAF in April blew off about 90' of her bow, she was never repaired.
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
I believe Dick Best hit the Akagi with a thousand pound bomb.
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
Which was nowhere's near Malaya.
- Thread starter
- #255
Admiral Beez
Major
Brother, you're killing me with Eugene, lol. Who the heck is Eugene? Anyway, this has nothing to do with Malaya.
- Thread starter
- #256
Admiral Beez
Major
The Swordfish dmonstrates how the RN was optimized for rough North Atlantic ops, operating in rough seas against small groups of opponents lacking in air cover.
Had the RN more time to prepare a Far East carrier force, knowing that they'll be facing an entirely different scenario than above (concentrated groups of fast fleet carriers with large CAGs of long range fighters and monoplane strike aircraft), I wonder what aircraft the RN would send. My guess is a lot of bomb-capable Fulmars, every Skua and Martlet they could find, plus Sea Hurricanes, and some Albacores but no Swordfish. Ideally you want Barracudas and Seafires (with drop tanks) but this isn't 1943.
Eugene instead of Eugen was an autocorrect phone issue. We got off on the Bismarck tangent because I said the Bismarck chase was a major battle for the Royal Navy and the Japanese could have sunk the Bismarck in a single raid with 27 Vals and 27 Kates from a single carrier.
It's not what the final outcome was, it's how it happened. A ship randomly running into a minefield might have the same effect as a torpedo in putting the ship out of action but I don't believe the Japanese would have needed such luck. I personally think they would have sent out Vals and Kates escorted by Zeroes and sunk them outright. They sunk Prince of Wales and Repulse on the high seas in a very impressive series of attacks. They were, in my opinion, the best in the world at that time.
I stand corrected twice. My mistake. In my defense, what do you call a ship that large with guns that small? Battle cruiser? Pocket battleship? Battleship? Under gunned? Not well endowed? Like Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner putting a label on it can get confusing.....
swampyankee
Chief Master Sergeant
- 4,030
- Jun 25, 2013
There were numerous problems with USN's actions during those battles, including in the USN's tactical use of radar, undervaluing torpedoes as naval weapons, overvaluing the 8" guns as ship-killers against maneuvering targets at long range, and underestimating Japanese night fighting skills.
Now, how the FAA performs against the IJN with Skuas and Swordfish depends a lot on when the operation occurs. At night, in dirty weather, the ASV-equipped Swordfish would have a very real chance of successfully attacking the IJN, which had poor, if any, radar equipment early in the war, making it very difficult to defend against an air attack.
I sometimes wonder how the USN would have performed in WW2 if the main fleet base in the Pacific was Puget Sound and San Francisco, not Los Angeles and San DIego, with the latter pair's excess of sunny days and clear skies.
