Bismarck Myths

[Priest Man]

The comments on Bismarck's beam and draft are missing the point that she had to be designed to use German seaports which are notoriously shallow (like those in the southeastern USA) when compared with those on the French Atlantic coast and the UK. Thus in order for a large ship of any type to use these ports their draft had to be limited and in the case of German battleships, this was made up by increasing the beam. No other front line Navy faced this dilemma and thus German battleships are noticeable by their wide beam and shallow hulls in relation to their foreign counterparts. PC Coker

[Vic Dale]

The comments on Bismarck's beam and draft are missing the point that she had to be designed to use German seaports which are notoriously shallow (like those in the southeastern USA) when compared with those on the French Atlantic coast and the UK. Thus in order for a large ship of any type to use these ports their draft had to be limited and in the case of German battleships, this was made up by increasing the beam. No other front line Navy faced this dilemma and thus German battleships are noticeable by their wide beam and shallow hulls in relation to their foreign counterparts. PC Coker

Hello Preist Man.

It was in fact the ships who would use the Panama canal which were limited for their beam. Beamy ships are much steadier than narow ones and our ships limited to a beam of 108 feet had often to have "rolling chocks" (large baulks of timber) attacked to the outer hull below water to reduce the period of roll.

Ten feet of draught would not make a great difference to a habrour which would be dredged if it was not deep enough, whereas Bismarck making passage through the Panama would probably be a somewhat noisy affair.

Vic Dale

[madmike]

My humble opinion on Bismarck, IS she was a legend built by her brave crew and the desperate efforts of the Royal navy went to find and sink her(and the sheer amount of damage she took). We armchair experts can say whatever we like about her in tech terms, many people claim Bismarck was a average to poor grade of battleship, I would disagree, She was a well balanced ship for her time and capable of engaging ANY other battleship at that time one on one. With a fair chance of winning, And just a small point on Bismarck side, Her gunnery was excellent (optic NOT radar controlled), If you read the British reports you will notice that they say just how fast Bismarck was able to find the range (straddle), and just how accurate.(at the Denmark strait) she was,(by the last battle that gunnery was De-graded by lack of rest for her crew), And just as a side line comment of interest , i believe the German navy (Scharnhorst) holds the record for the longest ranged hit (about 26-28000 yards) by ANY ship, Not a bad effort for another SUB-GRADE German ship with sub-grade German guns. OH i was just wondering what was the greatest range hits any of the US Iowa class battleship achieved against another ship. If their radar controlled gunnery was soooo good.

I truly believe BISMARCK earn her place as a legend (myths always go hand in hand with legends).

[madmike]

In answer to healthycoffee, your statement on the USS New Jersey being able to take on Bismarck and Tirpitz at the same time, and sink both ships, sounds just a LITTLE bit like you've had just a little to much to smoke, I doubt that even the Iowa class ships would be able to achieve that feat.

[Bgile]

I think you are "preaching to the choir". Most of the posters here seem to think the Germans had the best soldiers, the best pilots, the best aircraft, the best ships, etc. etc.

In other words, the best everything and the only reason they lost the war was the allied hoards overwhelmed them with numbers.

[frontkampfer]

I think you are "preaching to the choir". Most of the posters here seem to think the Germans had the best soldiers, the best pilots, the best aircraft, the best ships, etc. etc.

In other words, the best everything and the only reason they lost the war was the allied hoards overwhelmed them with numbers.

And your point is?

[madmike]

Bgile i would agree with your comment about preaching to the choir, but change the GERMAN PART and add the AMERICANS to the list of the best of everything.
I DONT THINK SO, just a couple of points here (and only my humble opinion) the best tanks of WWII would be..........the panther and tiger, both technologically better than any allied tanks, but i like the T-34s (T-34/85), easier to make and maintain, also first tanks with sloped armour and diesel engines, The best rifles for me would be the M-1 30-06cal( not the M1 30 cal carbine), the Lee-enfield 303, The best pistol......US colt 1911A1 45 cal Automatic, the best SMGs.......German MP-40, US Thompson 45 cal, and the Australian 9mm Owen gun, then on to just about every other weapon, each side produced some good weapons and each side produced lousy weapons. And a little point to the Yanks that read this and get upset, WHAT was the name of the GERMAN rocket scientist who surrender to the Americans, with HOW MUCH paperwork on the GERMAN jet and rocket programs. And our American friends should also remember the first US rocket into space was a CAPTURED GERMAN V2.
It took alot of lives of both combatants and civilian to bring an end to that terrible time in our history. AMERICA NOR BRITAIN won the war on their own, it took a multitude of nations WORKING TOGETHER to win.

and NO i dont have a problem with yanks or poms, I had the privilege and honour to serve alongside both and would gladly do so again.

UNITED WE STAND, DIVIDED WE FALL

[Bgile]

Madmike, your opinion is I think a bit less biased than some here. For most of my life, like many who study WWII, I have admired the technical excellence of the Germans and always tried to play the German side in simulations. However, over the years I've gotten irritated by those tho think everything they did and made was the best, including their individual soldiers, sailors, and airmen. I don't want to hijack this thread with that kind of discussion, though.

[Karl Heidenreich]

Bgile:

Madmike, your opinion is I think a bit less biased than some here. For most of my life, like many who study WWII, I have admired the technical excellence of the Germans and always tried to play the German side in simulations. However, over the years I've gotten irritated by those tho think everything they did and made was the best, including their individual soldiers, sailors, and airmen. I don't want to hijack this thread with that kind of discussion, though.

Risking to be banned from ths site I would say that the thruth is exactly the opposite. It has been a group of USN fans who, relying in some outdated opinions, specially from navweaps site and a comparison made at combinedfleet site that thinks that the German designs are crap whilst South Dakota, North Carolina and Iowa are the epitomes of battleship design. However the observations and writings from Friedman, Skulsky, Garzke, Raven & Roberts, (and the report from the skipper of USS Massachussets) etc. we have a very different scenario; scenario that also has the II Guadalcanal battle as witness of how the South Dakota perforned in battle (of course it was her first battle, but in comparison also was Bismarck at DS where she blew HMS Hood skyhigh and put PoW on the run).

Also we have the numerous facts on the superiority of Yamato, which, point by point, has not been addressed only with superficial notions such as trying to make believe that the Japanese behemoth was vulnerable to USN's 16" at ranges in which no ship has an IZ against another one.

On the other hand the opinions of people that had made intensive research on radar, ballistics and IZ like Dave Saxton and Thorsten have been ignored just because the results do not abide what I called the USN gospel.

There is extensive posting in several threads here on this kind of discussion and the usual conduct is the following:

1. There is an exchange of opinions on this issues: IZ, radar and design.

2. The space arrayed armour has been proven, continiously, in the case of Bismarck as superior to All or Nothing. In the case of Yamato the data and information always favoured the Japanese in comparison to NC, SD or Iowa. And in historical perfomance there are always categorical information regarding what happened or what doesn't.

3. After bitter discussions things are cleared up and everybody is on the same page. However, weeks or months later the USN fans came, again, as if nothing happened, as if nothing was cleared up, with the same chit chat on navweaps say this, " that the Germans do not know how to build a battleship, that only the USN was capable to resolve the armour schemes properly, that the USN were the only ones that know how to do this or that, bla, bla, bla." After two or more years of this you got tired and, if you push, then the USN fans accused you of trying to do what they do all the time: monopolizing the forum or producing strawmen in order to defend their positions. Some of they have gone to these extremes in areas that do not regard battleships only:

a. That it was Bismarck, not PoW, the one risking destrucction at Denmarck Straits. There is this hallucination that if the combat took longer Bismarck would have been destroyed by PoW. Of course, this argument do not explain or regard the fact that after Bismarck destroyed Hood the PoW didn't scored a single hit on the German ships but, in less than two minutes both, PE and Bismarck, landed hit after hit on PoW. They ignored the fact that Leach, not Lindemann, ordered the withdrawal from the battlefield. It was Luthens that denied Lindemann the approval to continue the fighting. They also ignored the orders from Admiralty making sure that not a single unit fought Bismarck alone but ONLY in numerical superiority. Just read some old threads and check this out.
b. Also there are some guys that insist that the KGV class can outrun Bismarck.
c. The upper armoured deck from Bismarck (50 mm thick) has been denied as decapping or yaw inductor capability whist the 38 mm one from SOuth Dakota has been given that capablity.
d. The rudder hit on Bismarck is proof of design flaw. However, Friedman and Garzke have point out how this is a general characterstic of all warships.
e. Yamato is flawed if compared with Iowa. However the fact that the same USN came with the desing of USS Montana departing from the South Dakota and Iowa design principles is not addressed. All of the authors that regard battleship design make a point on one or another issue of the South Dak (and Iowa) design but are ignored in favour of simpathetic comments for Iowa.
f. Also, they have gone to extremes on this non battleship regarded topics such as that the Sherman tank was, toe to toe, a better tank than the Tiger I.
g. That the first 140 top air aces of WWII (all of them German) were liars and, by default, inferior to US aces that only, in the best of cases, only achieved 1/5 or 1/10th of what the Germans achieved. Only the USN borne scores are realistic: russians, finlands, british, rumanian, japanese and specially Germans have an explanation different that their pilots were simply better.
h. The Germans were not capable of designing and building a superior device, whatsoever. For example the Me 262 was as crappy design as was the Me 109, the Focke W
Wulf, the V2 or Tiger. All of these devices are inferior to the Sherman, the P47 or whatever.
i. That, despite the existing information, the allies never had the numerical superiority they historical had on: air, land or sea. This has gone to the extreme that the information on May 1945 where it shows that 1 million Germans fought 5 million western allies plus 6 millions russians in Central Germany has been challenged in the order of trying to make believe that all 6 million German troops in Europe were made prisioners on May 8th, 1945 and not during the complete western campaing from the Fall of France, Africa, Mediterranean, Normandy, Bulge, etc.
j. That the allies where the only ones with a reliable radar controlled fire direction for their ships, when it has been given proof that the Germans had their very capable one.

Of course, when you brought up these things threats came that if you continue to insist on them the forum will be left by them so you have to shut up in order not to be accussed on monopolizing. However, as many have find out, this is the other way round.

Best regards,

[paul.mercer]

"and the nearly sinking of Prince of Wales"

Gentlemen,
This question was raised in other threads. Had the 15" shell from Bismarck that lodged itself deep in the bowels of POW exploded then it is quite possible that it may have set off her magazine and caused another disaster, however, it did not and POW lived to fight another day.
What has been said before is that even in 1941 with the armour modern battleships had it would have been difficult for one battleship (Bismarck, KGv, Iowa or whatever ) to sink another in a direct one to one combat without expending a huge amount of ammunition and probably sustaining severe if not crippling damage to itself.
Without question Bismarck was one of, if not the finest ships of her time but she was not perfect, nor was she invunerable, the fact that the stern fell off Bismarck and I believe a couple of other German heavy cruisers proves that there were flaws in design of some of the German ships (possibly the welding), but nevertheless still a great ship.

[Karl Heidenreich]

This question was raised in other threads. Had the 15" shell from Bismarck that lodged itself deep in the bowels of POW exploded then it is quite possible that it may have set off her magazine and caused another disaster, however, it did not and POW lived to fight another day.
What has been said before is that even in 1941 with the armour modern battleships had it would have been difficult for one battleship (Bismarck, KGv, Iowa or whatever ) to sink another in a direct one to one combat without expending a huge amount of ammunition and probably sustaining severe if not crippling damage to itself.
Without question Bismarck was one of, if not the finest ships of her time but she was not perfect, nor was she invunerable, the fact that the stern fell off Bismarck and I believe a couple of other German heavy cruisers proves that there were flaws in design of some of the German ships (possibly the welding), but nevertheless still a great ship.

1. The context of the comment is that it was not PoW but Bismarck the one having the edge in this historical combat and need to be read jointly with the sentence that says that, after sinking Hood, it was PoW the one taking hits from Bismarck and PE. After Hood's sinking PoW stopped from hitting Bismarck and the situation revervsed. In case of doubt please read Jose Rico's book on Bismarck, Mullenheim Rechberg's book on Bismarck or Antonio Bonomi's article on DS. If the context is lost then the sentence also loses it's real meaning.

2. I have not claim, ever, that Bismarck was unvulnetable. She was not as wasn't any other battleship on WWII. The notion of unvulneravility is given to north american built ships, specially the South Dakota and Iowa Classes, despite the evidence of serious design issues (called "flaws" when it goes to German or Japanese ships) which have been raised by respected authors and by historical records.

It's important that context is respected both ways in order not to distort what is trying to be said.

Regards,

[dunmunro]

"and the nearly sinking of Prince of Wales"
Gentlemen,
This question was raised in other threads. Had the 15" shell from Bismarck that lodged itself deep in the bowels of POW exploded then it is quite possible that it may have set off her magazine and caused another disaster, however, it did not and POW lived to fight another day.
What has been said before is that even in 1941 with the armour modern battleships had it would have been difficult for one battleship (Bismarck, KGv, Iowa or whatever ) to sink another in a direct one to one combat without expending a huge amount of ammunition and probably sustaining severe if not crippling damage to itself.
.

The 15" shell that struck PoW underwater was nowhere near her magazines. If the shell's fuse functioned properly it would have detonated well before reaching PoW's hull.

[Bgile]

" ... whilst South Dakota, North Carolina and Iowa are the epitomes of battleship design ... "

"... that the Germans do not know how to build a battleship, that only the USN was capable to resolve the armour schemes properly, that the USN were the only ones that know how to do this or that, bla, bla, bla. ..."

This is the sort of thing I am talking about. As far as I know, noone here ever made the above statements. If they did, they were obviously wrong. Karl then goes on to repeat some of his opionions on this subject, thereby making my point, which is that people here believe the US ships are inferior to pretty much everyone else's in pretty much every way. Karl defends the Montana class design from time to time, but of course that is a safe topic because it didn't get much beyond the drawing board except for the power plant layout, which showed up in the Midway class carriers. The ultimate criticism of US battleships is they never got to shoot at an enemy battleship, and that is taken as proof that they were inferior, as ridiculous as that sounds.

This site has been a valuable source of information for me and I've come to understand the rationale behind Bismarck's deck protection and a number of other topics, and I appreciate that. However, it has become very one sided, and I suppose that is ultimately to be expected on a site devoted to Bismarck. Many of the posters seem to think that every aspect of Bismarck represents the ultimate in battleship construction, and I happen to be one of the few who don't agree. I think she was optimized for fighting another battleship in conditions normally present in the North Atlantic using the technology available when she was designed.

[RF]

Of course, when you brought up these things threats came that if you continue to insist on them the forum will be left by them
Best regards,

There is your answer Karl.

[RF]

The 15" shell that struck PoW underwater was nowhere near her magazines. If the shell's fuse functioned properly it would have detonated well before reaching PoW's hull.

As I understand it an 8 inch shell from Prinz Eugen penetrated into the secondary magazine for the POW's 5.25 inch guns and failed to explode. The shell apparently was later thrown overboard.