If the RAF had been defeated in the Battle of Britain

Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules


Heh, not to defend the nazis but, for the Germans the ship of legality had sailed in WW1, after the British broke international law and began to intercept and divert merchants and seize neutral cargoes there was really no point in unilaterally abiding by the rules. Why would they expect different in WW2?
 
For the Germans the ship of using neutrality sailed when they invaded Belgium in both wars. Germany wanted to enjoy a game of rugby while insisting all others must play cricket.
 

Indeed, like the He 113, many pilots claimed to have seen it. It was a propaganda ploy by the Germans and it worked. Although to what end is something of a mystery.

Wiki page on the He 113: Heinkel He 113 - Wikipedia

I'll get back to pushing the Fw 187 later
Click to expand...

Oh, please don't.
 


In WWI neither side were seizing the ships or the cargoes of neutrals friendly to ones own side. In WWII, Finnish ships refused to transport thir ore to Germany in their own ships, for fear the germans would steal both the ship and the cargo, and most probably the crew too. The Germans were forced to transport such cargoes in their own ships , and did not receive any cargo unless they paid for the goods in advance. Nobody trusted them after the disgraceful displays they put on in August-December 1939, and from there, for the remainder of the war.


Your mixing up the issue of unrestricted warfare on enemy shipping to the kind of state sanctioned looting and thievery which the germans used routinely from the outbreak of the war. There is nothing comparable to that in WWI, and nothing in both world wars on the allied side that comes remotely close to that behavior.


It gets worse. In 1939, Sweden and Germany came quite close to open warfare over Germany's maritime practices. Both sides were not averse to laying mines in the territorial waters of the neutrals (a major reason for the formation of the pan-American neutrality zone). However the generally accepted practice was to provide warnings in advance that a minefiled was being laid, so that neutral shipping could avoid such minefields. Plans of this nature were laid by the RN in the Baltic in 1939, but came to nothing. The RN was intending to at least inform the neutrals of their action. Not so the germans. They went ahead and planted minefields in Swedish, Norwegian and Danish territorial waters without informing them of these minefields. These were not at that time declared areas 9in the Baltic) and led to heavy losses of neutral shipping and the loss of many crew from countries that at that time were working mostly for the Germans rather than the allies.


There is no rhyme or reason for the germans to act in this way. And there was no precedent from WWI either. The germans were behaving with extreme arrogance and disregard to the neutrals, and then wonder why their exports to these and other countries fell right away after the outbreak of war, and why in areas where they excelled, such as their aircraft industries, they still had a hard time selling their stuff
 
No contest, the nazis acted like, well, nazis...

On the other hand...

"In WWI neither side were seizing the ships or the cargoes of neutrals friendly to ones own side."

The British did, they turned procedure around and detained ships expecting the owners to justify their cargo instead of them proving it was contraband, even though they didnt even had the right to stop shipping in the high seas to begin with... no to speak of confiscating cargo just because they believed it would be sold to the Germans, which, if they did, would have been completely legal and their business...

...and all this in order to starve people in breach of international law.

So, again, not defending the nazis, but after WW1 I wouldnt expect the Germans to play nice.
 

Sorry, but intercepting and diverting merchant ships was within international law; this was customary international law as argued by the US 50 years earlier, and the British 50 years before that.
 
swampyankee said:
Sorry, but intercepting and diverting merchant ships was within international law; this was customary international law as argued by the US 50 years earlier, and the British 50 years before that.
Click to expand...

Only as part of a legal and effective blockade on the enemy coast, which was not the case in WW1.

There was no such thing as a distant blockade, not in international law.
 
And again, you are badly mistaken.

What you are referring to was a system of customs control, which was something that had been going on since the times of the Napoleonic wars. It was refined and internationally accepted under the Hague conventions which had generally be in force since the beginning of the 20th century.

The British operated wholly within the rules, except and only after the german decided to break them. They were within their rights to stop and search any ship, on the high seas or within coastal waters, that came within the declared areas (ie the declared war zones) and detain or even sink said ships unable to produce an adequate cargo manifest. It was legitimate and lawful to enforce a blockade on neutral shipping and sink enemy shipping within that area. It was lawful for the british to pursue enemy shipping (which they rather generously interpreted as including neutral shipping in certain circumstances (notably Norwegian waters) under the guise of the "Hot Pursuit" rules which allowed the warships to enter into the waters of a neutral if it was known that an enemy ship or presence was being harboured in that neutral territory, Given that the Norwegians were caught allowing Uboats, warships and fully laden cargo ships bound for Germany via the Norwegian leads this was entirely legal and entirely reasonable for the British to hunt down said ships.

Blockade was recognized as a legitimate form of warfare in 1907. The claim that it was somehow illegal for the RN to enforce the blockade is farcical, and often trotted out by the German sympathisers trying to get some quick miles over the issue. It was always open to the germans to surrender, but they chose not to. The consequence of that obstinance is that in WWI they starved, whilst in WWII their economy suffered.

Plus we are comparing apples to oranges here. There is nothing illegal or immoral with prosecuting shipping, up to an including its sinking if said shipping is found (or even suspected) of working in the emply of the enemy. The Germans were not doing that in 1940. Shipping working in local waters, with manifests showing they were working for the germans were being seized, their cargoes stolen as well as the ships themselves even though the germans were fully aware of who these ships were and what they were doing. It didn't matter to them. For a while at least any ship not flying a swastika was an enemy ship, even when it wasn't. there was no precedent on the allied side in either war, and no justification can be found for it in the hague conventions
 
JAG88 said:
Only as part of a legal and effective blockade on the enemy coast, which was not the case in WW1.

There was no such thing as a distant blockade, not in international law.
Click to expand...

Since the Confederacy was not a recognized state, international law wouldn't have applied to US actions taken against ships registered to the Confederacy, but the US stopped and seized shipping likely to be trying to break the blockade, including British ships. The only time that came close to causing serious trouble was the Trent Affair; the other cases were within customary practice at the time: ships, even neutral ships, which seemed to be potential carriers of contraband could be and were stopped on the high seas for decades before, e.g., by the British during the Napoleonic Wars (I've not heard anyone arguing that it was illegal when the target was the French).
 
Juha2 said:
Hello Koopernic!
In fact only above 5 500m, well above the FTHs. So IMHO you are too optimistic in your power calculation.
Click to expand...

Hi, most of the gains seem to come from the increase in FTH,

If the over Dornier Do 215 Managed 465km/h on the DB601Aa producing 1100hp at a FTH of 3700m/12200ft.

The effect of the DB601N producing 1175 at a FTH of 4900m/16200ft is as follows:

1 Increase in power 1175/1100 =1.068%
2 Decrease in drag due to thinner air is 12% equal to an increase in power of 12%.
3 The two factors compound 1.068 x 1.12 = 1.196.
4 Taking the cube root ³√1.196 = 1.061.
465kmh x 1.061 = 493.6kmh/306mph.

If we either assume the over reved DB601N managed 1275hp at the same altitude or 1175 at 5500m then the thinner air or power gets us another few percent. 316mph is in reach for the Do 215, whatever the source of the data (probably a Dornier Sales Brochure). I doubt they wasted time in an elaborate series of tests to satisfy armchair historians. They'd do some calculations, change the engines and do one test flight.

I'm capable of a prandle glauert compressibility correction, a rough propellor efficiency loss (which reduces the gain) and a jet thrust increase (very substantial) but this is well under Mach 0.5 over a 6% marginal increase.

I interpolated this for my density data:

I used the density reduction between 10000-15000 and interpolated 80% of that to represent the 4000ft decrease in air density drag from 12200-16200ft.

The primary concern of the over reving limitation to above 5500m was probably to keep manifold pressure below 1.3 atmospheres.

The impact on Me 109E4/N with DB601N over Me 109E4 with DB601A1 must have been dramatic.
 
Last edited:
JAG88 said:
Only as part of a legal and effective blockade on the enemy coast, which was not the case in WW1.

There was no such thing as a distant blockade, not in international law.
Click to expand...
The following is from:

The Law of Armed Conflict and the Use of Force: Max Planck

It summarises the development of the international laws of the sea from the time of napoleon to the present day. With regard to the hague convention and the London naval treaties it summarized the situation fairly neatly in the following terms:




Nowhere in Plancks summary does its suggest that stop and search (and the enforcement of blockade) is in any way illegal. It does restrain the searching party from the excessive use of force, but stop and search and apprehension is not in any sense excessive force. sink on sight is excessive, against the shipping of a party lawfully engaged in the transport of good for that neutral 9or any other neutral).

So, I am at a loss as to where you get this wild notion that "there was no such thing as a distant blockade". its written in plain English in the international conventions accepted by both Britain and Germany at the time. I'm at a loss to understand where you might be drawing your information from.

And remember, this is action against neutrals working for Germany, with said stop search and confiscation being done by the germans against the shipping working for them. That they would rob the people working for them is just unconscionable behaviour
 
Didn't anyone read that encounter report about the fight between the DO-17 and Hurricane ?

He makes plain the DO-17 was ABOVE and used that height advantage to gain speed and gain on him when he tried to get away just using normal power.

When they were flying round and round, he says the D)-17 was firing at him sometimes with his front gun, sometimes with his rear. What does that tell you ?
The front and rear guns on a DO-17 were aimed by gunners, the DO-17 could be flying a greatly larger circle but the gunners could still aim the guns at the Hurricane flying in a smaller circle. With him saying they sometimes shot with the front gun, and sometimes rear gun indicates to me he was turning inside them, which would put him above them in a banked turn. He wasn't being out manuvered .

And once he went through the wire to full emergency power ( or whatever it was called ) he wasn't being outran by the DO-17 either.
 

I don't think of it as a big deal and my statements were tongue in cheek, yanking the chain. However a Dornier Do 17 with its constant speed prop might have a slight speed advantage over a Huricane with a 2 pitch or fixed pitch prop restricted to its old 87 octane boost restriction of 6.25 psig. The BMW radial on the Do 17 was a bit weak and had a lot of drag but the supercharger had been set up for low altitude. Maybe it was a Do 215B2 which had the more powerfull and streamlined DB601Ba

At 1220m/4000ft at Do 17Z2 managed 410kph/255mph
At the same altitude Hurrricane managed 440kph/273mph
(this is without 100 octane WEP or rotol prop).

A Do 215B2 with the DB601Ba engine seemed about 13.5% faster than Do 17Z-2 radial version. It had 1100hp at SL even a short term WEP of 1175 there.

It's food for thought if you imagine DB having its Geisingham engine plant pumping out DB601Aa and DB601N rapidly equiping Do 17 as Do 215 class aircraft, Ju 89 instead of Fw 200 and Fw 187 in production with a proper engine. About the same time 601N engines could reequip the Me 109, 110 annulling some of the advantage the RAF had gained with 100 octane.

A good pilot might use a speed advantage to gain altitude over an opponent. The altitude and speed could then be converted into a tight turn. This would not be a sustained turn advantage just a half turn or so.
 
Last edited:

The Bimarck's FLAK not being able to track 'biplanes' is a provable myth. It does obliquely link into the proctalgia fugax in this thread over the Dornier Do 215B2 that the Reich supplied the USSR in return for its cooperation and most particularly its Wheat and Oil.

The FLAK systems for the Bismarck's 10.5cm and 15cm duel purpose guns was designed and capable of attacking fast small boats such as patrol boats either with a burst above the target or via direct fire. Obviously they'd be able to track a biplane. The guns could all depress several degrees below the horizon. This nonsense was fabricated by someone who was pretty ignorant, like we all are on certain topics, but propagated as if he knew for sure.

You can get all of these Original documents from KBismarck.org

There were supposed to be 4 triaxially stabilized directors: a pair to port and starboard of the bridge, they look like cyclops, and another pair in tandem aft of the superstructure.

Because of the Reichs agreements with the USSR the two tandem aft directors were removed from Bismarck (and another two from Prinz Eugen) and shipped to the USSR. There was no question of the Reich not meeting its agreements on time. Less capable biaxially units were installed and may have hurt Bismarck's Defense.

They were very advanced: the target would track bearing, elevation and range ( taken in by a 3.5m range finder). Any other range finder could provide the data including any of the 3 FuMO 23 Seetakt radars or the 10m main optical range finders. These were converted to Cartesian coordinates and the 6 variables (x,y,z) for position and another 3 for velocity in the 3 directions calculated. The position of the target could thus be predicted at anytime 't'in the future. Another computer would converge on a firing solution, firing time and fuse setting time. The solution was transmitted via remote power control direct to the electro hydraulic elevation mechanism of the 10.5cm guns (hydraulic swashplate) but the traverse was by power operated but manual match the dial. Probably for safety reasons as this was an open mount and the men walked around the guns. All the other turrets were completely RPC.

The attack on the Bismarck was carried out in limited visibility and the Swordfish used clouds to hide from the Bismarck's FLAK. The Swordfish had radar. The Japanese also used clouds to hide when they sank Prince of Wales and Repulse but that was on an otherwise clear day.

The Bismarck had 3 FuMO 23 Seetakt radar. The beam width was about 4 degrees and they could probably localize the Swordfish to within 1 degree and their range to better than 70m but they did not know their elevation.

No one in those days had a PPI Plan Position Indicator display in service. That means the radar operators would have been tracking targets and calling out their position for a plastic model to be placed on a plotting table of some kind. This plotting room was inadequate to the task as noted by the Kriegsmarinen Artillery Branch. 3 radars plotting 12 aircraft, overloading.

The 10.5cm and 15cm FLAK was very good for the day.

The 2.0cm and 3.7cm was week and this was what may have let the Swordfish through.

The 2.0cm C38 FLAK in a quad mount was a very effective weapon but there were only two of these. The rest were more basic single and twin gun mounts. The C38 2.0cm had 5300 yards range at 45 degree elevation, which was slightly more than the RN 40mm Pom Pom. When fired from a quad mount 2 guns could maintain continuous fire while the other two were reloaded and cooled. Dozens were fitted to Tirpitz but Bismarck had inadequate numbers.

The naval 3.7 cm guns had excellent ballistics. Fired at 45 degrees they had a 9000 yard range. By comparison the 40 Pom Pom was 5000 yards, 20 mm Oerlikon and 2.0cm C38 5300 yards, German Luftwaffe/Army FLAK 3.7cm 7100 yards. They were almost as good as the Boffors 40mm and its 11000 yard range.

They were fired from a gyrostabilized mount aimed by a reflector site.

Their main weakness was that they were manually loaded semi automatic weapons so rate of was 30-60 rounds per minute.

This is not totally silly since higher firing rates would have blinded the gunners with flash and smoke and lead to guns over heating.

What was needed was FLAK predictors to remotely aim the guns to get the gunners away from the blast and smoke.

One survivor from the Bismarck says he was unable to aim his gun because of the flash and smoke of the nearby heavy guns.

So there you have it: 12 swordfish, 700m visibility, Clouds to hide in, enough of a swell such that the German gunners reported seeing the Swordfish dip below the waves, congestion at the plotting table which was overwhelmed by 12 Swordfish attacking simultaneously, gun blast from nearby weapons disturbing the critical 3.7cm weapons.

No ship would have performed well at the time in these circumstances at this time. Tirptiz with here upgraded FLAK was able to evade all Torpedoes and shoot down two Albacore's latter.

The Germans introduced a PPI radar on the ground in the form of dreh Freya and Jagdschloss in 1943 and in the form of the 50cm Hohetenweil radar in 1944 on ships as well as a microwave unit called Berlin.

The Royal Navy was perhaps a little more prepared in that it was trying to use remote predictor aiming (using match the dial initially) for its 40mm Pom Pom this moving the gun aimers away from the blast but it had such mediocre ballistics. They also had a basic range only radar type 285 on these sighting stations that could autonomously locate a target and thus reducing the overload. 3 of 4 were broken down on PoW for want of parts on the day of her sinking.

Tirpitz received an upgraded Seetakt that could get bearing to 0.25 degree and was blind fire capable. It's somewhat of a mystery that GEMA produced 58 height finding radars for ships. I'm told that some of the latter Seetaks had height finding capability through the phase steering type system used on their other product the Wasserman Early Warning and height finding radars. (That's a naval mystery).
 
Last edited:
THe WWI British blockade was not generally considered legal by the international comunity

The Blockade and Attempted Starvation of Germany

This was what Lord Devlin frankly calls "the starvation policy" directed against the civilians of the Central Powers (particularly Germany),2 the plan that aimed, as Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty in 1914 and one of the framers of the scheme, admitted, to "starve the whole population — men, women, and children, old and young, wounded and sound — into submission."3

The British policy was in contravention of international law on two major points.4 First, in regard to the character of the blockade, it violated the Declaration of Paris of 1856, which Britain itself had signed, and which, among other things, permitted "close" but not "distant" blockades. A belligerent was allowed to station ships near the three-mile limit to stop traffic with an enemy's ports; it was not allowed simply to declare areas of the high seas comprising the approaches to the enemy's coast to be off-limits.

This is what Britain did on November 3,1914, when it announced, allegedly in response to the discovery of a German ship unloading mines off the English coast, that henceforth the whole of the North Sea was a military area, which would be mined and into which neutral ships proceeded "at their own peril." Similar measures in regard to the English Channel insured that neutral ships would be forced to put into British ports for sailing instructions or to take on British pilots. During this time they could easily be searched, obviating the requirement of searching them on the high seas.

This introduces the second and even more complex question: that of contraband. Briefly, following the lead of the Hague Conference of 1907, the Declaration of London of 1909 considered food to be "conditional contraband," that is, subject to interception and capture only when intended for the use of the enemy's military forces. This was part of the painstaking effort, extending over generations, to strip war of its most savage aspects by establishing a sharp distinction between combatants and noncombatants. Among the corollaries of this was that food not intended for military use could legitimately be transported to a neutral port, even if it ultimately found its way to the enemy's territory. The House of Lords had refused its consent to the Declaration of London, which did not, consequently, come into full force. Still, as the US government pointed out to the British at the start of the war, the declaration's provisions were in keeping "with the generally recognized principles of international law." As an indication of this, the British admiralty had incorporated the Declaration into its manuals.
 
The Swordfish used to attack the Bismarck had no radar. If you read the encounter reports it clearly states several had to return to the nearest British ship to get the bearing to the vicinity of the Bismarck.
The first experimental use of radar equipped Swordfish was months after the Bismarck was sunk.
 
The starvation policy continued after the Armistice and continued until 1919. The Germans were on the ropes run out of steal and food.

About 600,000 with estimates 1,000,000 million are said to have perished. Malnutrition kills through disease and infant mortality.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)

Similar threads

FW-190 and The Battle of Britain
2 3
Replies
40
Views
2K
Admiral Beez
A
S
Battle of Britain:
Replies
15
Views
1K
fubar57
M
USAAF aircraft lost through transport sinkings during Battle of the Atlantic?
Replies
2
Views
349
fubar57
M
Why Didn't The RAF use Beaufighters Instead of Typhoons In The ETO
2
Replies
29
Views
3K
MIflyer
M
Aircraft in Battle of Păuliș? Hungary vs Romania 1944
Replies
0
Views
619
CHen10
Menu
Log in
Register