Most Influential Ship?
- Thread starter renrich
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Glider
Captain
Certainly could be but I was looking at design as its that that influences other ships..
The war record of a ship has little influence on the design of other ships and I believe we need to be careful about the influence of a design and the influence of an idea. This will become apparent later.
My choice was Hermes as British as you get, my comment about the Essex Class was in responce to a question from Syscom
These were ideas or inventions. Steam Catapult and armoured deck were both on british ships first but the steam catapult didn't change the design of the ship, no more than the development of radar. As for the armoured deck it did influence the design of carriers but little more than the beefing up of the deck to take the weight of new aircraft.so (national pride demands it) .......steam catapult, angled flight deck, armoured flight deck, mirror landing system and (I think, but stand to be corrected) arresterwire. .
As for the angled flight deck this was a british idea but was first installed on an American carrier, so who did the influencing the idea (British) or the carrier (American) it was first installed on?
A good choiceI would also like to nominate as an influential vessel Parsons TURBINIA..self explanitory..
HerrKaleut
Airman
Glider, valid and acceptable points. I would argue that , re; angled flight deck, the design of the carrier was influenced by the invention. It couldnt have been the other way round.
I will cynically suggest the Prince of Wales and Repulse.
By going down rapidly in the face of an undefended air attack early during the war, they clearly demonstrated the end of the battleship era. I'll cite as evidence the tonnage of BB's versus CV's built from 1942 to 1945.
We can argue endlessly about whether Yorktown-class vessels or Essex-class vessels were more influential on further ship designs, but the basic question of what should be built in the first place seems more important to me.
By going down rapidly in the face of an undefended air attack early during the war, they clearly demonstrated the end of the battleship era. I'll cite as evidence the tonnage of BB's versus CV's built from 1942 to 1945.
We can argue endlessly about whether Yorktown-class vessels or Essex-class vessels were more influential on further ship designs, but the basic question of what should be built in the first place seems more important to me.
I agree but.. I'd take it a step further and nominate the Ostfriedland Air Power:Billy Mitchell Sinks the Ships
(which I mentioned in post #3 of this thread but nobody seemed to agree)
Keystone Bombers, Billy Mitchell, Ostfriedland
http://www.century-of-flight.net/Aviation history/coming of age/6.jpg
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Excellent point. If people behaved rationally, Mitchell's demonstration should have been the end of the argument. Both then and now, though, it seems the idea did not take immediately. The USN clearly didn't get it until the war began.
Maybe Pearl Harbor, more than just the loss of a couple of additional isolated RN ships, finally drove home the point. It certainly yielded, from a practical point of view, a real reliance on and interest in carriers since there was little else left of the Pacific Fleet.
Maybe Pearl Harbor, more than just the loss of a couple of additional isolated RN ships, finally drove home the point. It certainly yielded, from a practical point of view, a real reliance on and interest in carriers since there was little else left of the Pacific Fleet.
vikingBerserker
Lieutenant General
On the day of Pearl Harbor, the USN had 8 Aircraft Carriers and another 8 being built. I'm pretty sure they had gotten the pic of what was to come.
trackend
Chief Master Sergeant
Most influential ship I cant say but IMO the most influential class for me was a merchantman the unsurpassed Liberty ship
US design and productivity at its best.
US design and productivity at its best.
HerrKaleut
Airman
IMO, all that Mitchell proved was that a ship could be sunk from the air....provided it was at anchor and there was no AA fire.
Surely the IOWAs were not designed for shore bombardment but as fast carrier escorts.
Surely the IOWAs were not designed for shore bombardment but as fast carrier escorts.
Glider
Captain
And the watertight doors and hatches were left open, that there wasn't any crew for damage controls and that the bombing was allowed to continue long after it was due to finish.
Remember that this was contventional bombing.
vikingBerserker
Lieutenant General
It was also extremely controlled. The aircraft were told what kind of bombs they could use, where to drop them, and had a very specific time frame to do it on. Severtimes the brass instructed the aircraft to stop during it test.
Interesting discussion.
I may be doing revisionist thinking, Viking, but another way of looking at this is: "you are what you build." From April, 1936 through December 1941, the Navy laid down 9 battleships (BB55-63) but only 5 carriers (CV7-11; the new Yorktown and Intrepid made it in a week before Pearl Harbor). And I'm not counting CVL's that were converted during 1942 from cruisers. That says to me that the brass was still not convinced of carrier supremacy.
All the numbers are somewhat distorted by the Washington naval treaty, which limited capital ship tonnage from 1921 until its expiration at the end of 1936. The fact that the Navy built carriers during the 1920's came from the fact that they had only the Langley at the beginning and were allowed to convert two battlecruisers already under construction that would have been scrapped if not modified. If you have the choice of building ships or not building ships, the answer is pretty easy: I'd vote for anything I could have.
On the other hand, you might reasonably argue that all the BB's in the fleet were getting old during the late 30's and were therefore a priority since there were already relatively new fleet carriers. I'd argue back the service was mostly still controlled by people who felt that "nothing says Navy like a battleship that weighs twice what a boat of an unproved class does" and that "we still have to be prepared to refight Jutland".
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Yes..
So? many thought it couldn't be done at all.
That was a huge feat at the time. Naval Aviation was only a few years old and the battleship had been the ultimate war machine since the days of trireme. Many people needed to be convinced that a kite made of canvas, wood and wire could sink an iron armored veteran of Jutland.
Yes it was staged
yes the water tight doors were open
yes it took several passes
...irrelevant
An $800 dollar kite sent a million dollar monolithic symbol of military power to the bottom (i'm guessing at the prices). Before that demonstration, the only thing that could sink a BB was another BB and it's supporting vessels.
Quite a benchmark in human history.
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Glider
Captain
I would be willing to bet a penny to a pound that a dozen 1918 Cuckoo's would have done the job in a fraction of the time it took the USAAF.
Had WW1 continued for another few months plans were in place to attack the High Seas Fleet with carrier based torpedo bombers. Training IIRC had started, then a much more valuble lesson would have been learnt, ie. bombs let in air and torpedo's water.
A realistic lesson would also have demolished the idea that high level bombers were effective against naval vessels, a lesson almost all nations had to relearn the hard way in WW2. In this manner the lesson of Mitchells bombing was wrong. A totally unrealistic test resulted in a belief that was totally wrong and as a benchmark in history, it was fatally flawed.
It was a demonstration.. and experiment... unrealistic yes.... It was not meant to be a tactical exercise-- it was a demonstration. It was not a "How too" but rather a "What happens if..."
You could easily argue that although the ship was sunk, the fact that it proved difficult demonstrated the need for aircraft that could deliver a payload with more energy and accuracy. This demonstration emphasized the need for dive bombers.
Lessons were gleaned from the failures perhaps more than the success.
I never said it was a brilliant example of how to sink a BB.. i acknowledged that there were flaws.
Again.. dont think with a 21st century perspective. At the time, BB's were nearly invincible.
When a wood and canvas flying machine demonstrates it is capable of sinking a BB a significant benchmark has been established. The only fatal flaw would be interpreting the significance in the wrong context.
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I'd argue this was not a benchmark, but rather a landmark proof of concept showing something small and really cheap that flies can trump size and complexity of something huge that floats.
Agreed, learning how to do it effectively with conventional weapons required a lot more work, time, and lives. That's in part why the Prince of Wales example makes some sense. Showing that unprotected capital vessels at sea under wartime conditions were completely vulnerable to air attack was also a big event, just not the very first.
HerrKaleut
Airman
I'm going to stick a fly in the ointment
Everyone goes on about big ships. I have previously mentioned TURBINIA and now I shall throw in the first world war U-9 and her sinking of the ABIKOUR, HOGUE and CRESSY thereby demonstrating just how efficient a sub could be and how that influenced the design of future warships.!
Misco; I rather think the lesson was delivered at Toranto before it was at Pearl.
Everyone goes on about big ships. I have previously mentioned TURBINIA and now I shall throw in the first world war U-9 and her sinking of the ABIKOUR, HOGUE and CRESSY thereby demonstrating just how efficient a sub could be and how that influenced the design of future warships.!Misco; I rather think the lesson was delivered at Toranto before it was at Pearl.
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Messy1
Master Sergeant
I'm going to stick a fly in the ointment
Misco; I rather think the lesson was delivered at Toranto before it was at Pearl.
That is a valid and great point HK! Submarines had a huge effect on both World Wars, and changed the rules of warfare when the nuclear boats came out.
Messy1
Master Sergeant
I have read that during the Cold War, the American nuclear sub force was a major deterrent to war with the USSR.
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