I don't buy that no shells were found. There must have been shore stocks somewhere. Plus, Tirpitz was sunk in shallow water and was eventually cut up for scrap. If someone had really wanted a shell I'm sure they could have salvaged one from Tirpitz.
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Is the M-1 Abrams outclassed now?
- Thread starter Randy Daytona
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Max the Mad Russian
Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Pretty sure all APs were unloaded from Tirpitz after Tungsten operation - can't remember whether I have read about it or heard at some naval history conf. For sure, 280-mm shells for Scheer class pocket BBs were expended to zero in 1945 on Baltic, no shell remained in the shore storages.
It was a war prize and one of the few intact major German surface combatants still afloat at the end of the war so I am sure there was a laundry list of things they wanted to check out from armor to guns to optics and a lot of other stuff.
As for preventing the Russians from getting it, I assume it had more to do with just getting it for ourselves versus someone else whoever else it was. Remember at the time tensions really hadn't arisen yet when we seized her, that took the next year for real tensions to start to surface.
Hard to believe an 8" shell would wreak that much havoc but as with a lot things we won't ever know for sure. There are some pretty detailed accounts of the battle, salvo by salvo, and while I haven't read one in a while I think the consensus is the Bismark sunk the the HMS Hood.
The wikipedia article contradicts itself; one source says USN didn't want the ship but they wanted to keep it from the Russian while another states that the US literally drew PE from a hat.
PE sailed under British escort into allied hand following VE; she wasn't seized. Following her surrender she was awarded to US as discussed above.
Tensions were indeed already high, hence Operation Paperclip to acquire as much German tech and brain as possible before the Russians. "Our Germans are better than their Germans."
Concur. Hood was still a BC and, by doctrine and design, should have been able to withstand cruiser fire. It was fire from BBs that she was vulnerable to.
If the shells were offloaded then they went somewhere
And there weren't other ships using them either since only Bismarck, Tirpitz, and some shore batteries used those guns.
Max the Mad Russian
Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Or something similar to USS Iowa case of 1989, whatever the reason was (i.e. turret crew's mistake or poor powder as such). We had the same in 1978 on light cruiser Admiral Senyavin, in the bow 6" turret (#1). 37 died.
If I remember the NIS case correctly, it was the CO trying to set a range record, causing an overloading of the gun which killed crew members and it was followed by an attempted coverup after the explosion...
Never heard of that one but I am not too familiar with the final outcome of the investigation, other than the fiasco that were the initial conclusions that was part of the reason it is now NCIS and not NIS anymore.
Turret explosions were not the unheard of before the USS Iowa, I remember there were a few articles (found one from the LA Times!) that pointed out there were several on big gun ships before when the accident happened. In addition to the USS Mississippi having the misfortune of suffering two explosions in the same turret in 1924 and 1943, there were turret explosions on the heavy cruiser USS Newport News in 1972 and the heavy cruiser HMS Devonshire in 1929.
The CO, a gunnery officer, and a FC master chief ...
A Glimpse of Hell (https://www.amazon.com/Glimpse-Hell-Explosion-Iowa-Cover-Up/dp/0393047148) is a harrowing take on the subject, and worth a read.
Max the Mad Russian
Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Our Japanese collegues suffered such a cases twice, in 1905 on BB Mikasa and in 1943 on BB Mutsu. First case was not about the firing but was connected with the sailors' striving for alcohol which they tried to get from the signal flares by boiling and occasionally fired the powder of 6" guns. On big gun ships it's always the risk of an explosion of the powder magazines existed. While USN has thankfully escaped the missiles' disasters, the Soviet Navy had lost the DD Otvagny ("Courageuos") in 1974 due to the anti-air missiles explosion, namely booster of one missile (NATO SA-N-1 Goa) had been started while in magazine.
The First Tank Was Used 100 Years Ago Today. This is What it Looked Like
As British and French soldiers fought the Germans at Flers-Courcelette, an attack during the famous Battle of the Somme on Sept. 15, 1916, the British forces unleashed a new weapon that could cover terrain previous military vehicles could not. To mark the anniversary, a replica of the original Mark IV tank has been placed in Trafalgar Square in London, the BBC reports.
http://time.com/4494957/tank-100-year-anniversary/
As British and French soldiers fought the Germans at Flers-Courcelette, an attack during the famous Battle of the Somme on Sept. 15, 1916, the British forces unleashed a new weapon that could cover terrain previous military vehicles could not. To mark the anniversary, a replica of the original Mark IV tank has been placed in Trafalgar Square in London, the BBC reports.
http://time.com/4494957/tank-100-year-anniversary/
BBC put out a miniseries a while back called "Our World War" and one of the shows was based around a WWI tank crew.The First Tank Was Used 100 Years Ago Today. This is What it Looked Like
As British and French soldiers fought the Germans at Flers-Courcelette, an attack during the famous Battle of the Somme on Sept. 15, 1916, the British forces unleashed a new weapon that could cover terrain previous military vehicles could not. To mark the anniversary, a replica of the original Mark IV tank has been placed in Trafalgar Square in London, the BBC reports.
http://time.com/4494957/tank-100-year-anniversary/
I thought of that miniseries when I saw the article, too. The acting was a little overwrought but overall I enjoyed it. Particularly Part 1, with the "guns of August" first British vs German engagements across the Belgian frontier in 1914, and how it emphasized the Brit attitude of "we're the professional army here and we'll wipe out these conscript Huns in a jiff." I haven't studied WWI that closely, but that attitude does seem accurate. The British Army in 1914 was small but full of long-service professionals, whereas the German army were largely young conscripts and older reservists. Both were pretty much wiped out at First Ypres and rebuilt as mass-production draftee armies.
If you are looking for a first rate podcast on WWI, try Dan Carlin's Hardcore History. I have listed it before but thought some might have missed it. Extremely well researched.
http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-50-blueprint-for-armageddon-i/
http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-50-blueprint-for-armageddon-i/