KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

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thaddeus_c
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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#61

Post by thaddeus_c » 16 Oct 2015, 06:59

Paul Lakowski wrote:Coastal defense strategy was a non starter from the beginning ...

During 'war-time' coastal defense fleet could be mass produced as could a U-boat fleet , but heavy cruiser to be of any use had to be finished [ or at least started ] before any even war began . There fore maximum effort had to go into as many surface raiders as possible.

The Pocket Battleship design was a recognition of the fact that if allied convoys were to be escorted by trade protection cruisers, then the minimum surface raider to attack such convoys had to defeat such cruisers with ease.
not sure whether you are arguing for the strategy pursued by the KM and that it was undone by number and composition of fleet? or that the strategy was flawed from the beginning?

or simply that it was (in either case) superior to a coastal defense fleet?

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#62

Post by Paul Lakowski » 16 Oct 2015, 19:52

Anything was superior to a coastal defense fleet, but the 'Fleet that Hitler built' was not the fleet that the KM wanted.


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T. A. Gardner
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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#63

Post by T. A. Gardner » 17 Oct 2015, 00:54

Well, going far afield, what the KM really needed was a paradigm shift in technology starting in about 1935. The one available was to invest in a navy that was carrier centric. Building cruisers and destroyers to support a fleet of aircraft carriers with several hundred modern aircraft would have been about the only potential way the Germans could match the RN at sea.

Britain was already locked into having most of their carrier tonnage under the WNT in older, one-off crappy carriers. The FAA was crippled by RAF policy and neglect.

Germany could have slapped down a half dozen decent sized carriers with say a 50 plane air wing using modern aircraft (say a variant of the He 112 fighter, He 70 as a torpedo bomber, and the Ju 87 dive bomber). Using Japanese knowledge on carriers as a basis would have allowed them to get the technical and operational knowledge involved quickly. Then build say 6 heavy (8") and 6 light cruisers along with a couple dozen destroyers for escorts. With a few accompanying supply ships they'd have the nucleus of a decent carrier based navy.

That renders Britain's battleship centered navy obsolescent. The French with just one old carrier and only one under construction would be in a hard spot. The only real barrier to this is, once again, fuel to operate it.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#64

Post by Paul Lakowski » 17 Oct 2015, 08:50

The basic KM concept explored in the early 1930s were....


A] Captain Donitz 300 U-Boot
B] Captain Heye dozen PBC [Panzerschiffe] to support Donitz U-Boats.
C] Grand Admiral Reader fleet of a 10 fast battleships to exploit the decoy effects of Heye's PBC
D] Admiral Carls 4 aircraft carrier battle groups each with a Graf Zeppelin type aircraft carrier plus a battle cruiser & Hipper cruiser plus several dozen Zerstroers & several Wolf Packs.... for independent sea control.

Every one knows about A & C, but few have heard of B & D since they were firmly in the Z Plan category.

All through the 1930s the KM Historically laid down 8 very large warships+ 15 large warships & 36 medium warships plus 186 small warships .

to complete such a program would need over 1.6 million tons of warship construction 1/6th of which was armored construction. Gun construction would require over 19,000 tons of 6" guns or larger, while propulsion tonnage should be somewhere in the 400,000 tons region.

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JAG13
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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#65

Post by JAG13 » 17 Oct 2015, 20:48

Paul Lakowski wrote: D] Admiral Carls 4 aircraft carrier battle groups each with a Graf Zeppelin type aircraft carrier plus a battle cruiser & Hipper cruiser plus several dozen Zerstroers & several Wolf Packs.... for independent sea control.

Every one knows about A & C, but few have heard of B & D since they were firmly in the Z Plan category.
I wouldnt go that far, both carriers A & B were supposed to be part of the 1935 budget, with C & D to follow on as part of the 1938 budget (to be laid down in May), much earlier than the 1939 Z Plan. A later decision delayed A to 1936 and B to 1938, the low priority assigned also meant that anytime resources became constrained the carriers were the ones suffering the most with the known results.

Had the Germans stuck to the original plan, carriers A & B would have been completed by early 1939 and operational in 1940... provided they get some IJN help, with C & D available in early-mid 1942.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#66

Post by Paul Lakowski » 18 Oct 2015, 07:05

actually the ABC & D did not refer to the 4 Graf Zeppelin air craft carriers but the different proposals for 1930s KM rearmament.

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JAG13
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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#67

Post by JAG13 » 18 Oct 2015, 18:48

Paul Lakowski wrote:actually the ABC & D did not refer to the 4 Graf Zeppelin air craft carriers but the different proposals for 1930s KM rearmament.
I think we have a confusion here, I was talking only about your case D and clarifying that originally the KM did intend to field 4 carriers and did so way earlier than the Z plan, that only ulterior changes to priorities had them relegated with the result that the KM completed none.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#68

Post by T. A. Gardner » 18 Oct 2015, 23:03

6 carriers is very buildable for the Germans. If they start in 1936 and roughly follow the pattern of other navies in design of these they could have all 6 completed or nearing completion by 1939. Say, 15,000 to 20,000 tons each with 40 to 60 aircraft aboard. That's 90 to 120,000 tons of ships being built. Carriers being easier to manufacture for the most part than battleships the Germans could have easily managed that tonnage of construction versus building battleships. The number of needed cruisers is relatively small (maybe a dozen or so initially) so this too is manageable. The number of destroyers really doesn't change so that can be met too.

One thing the Germans would have to change is eliminating that idiotic catapult system they were going to use on the Graf Zeppelin class. Going with something similar to Japanese or British flight deck methods would make sense. They could easily get a 40 to 60 plane air wing on a 15 to 20,000 ton carrier of good design. Even if they kept some casemated 6" on board for self-defense they could have managed that.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#69

Post by Paul Lakowski » 19 Oct 2015, 00:47

With this fleet plan as the back drop there is little likely hood of such a carrier fleet until the mid to late 1940s AKA plan Z which did plan for 2 carriers by 1940 & 1942 and then 8 by 1947.
any variation would have to work through the historical proposals with one amendment.

[plan 1932] CV + 6 PBC+ 6 CL+ 16 U-Boats & dozens of GTB by 1938. = 260kt
A] Captain Donitz 300 U-Boot = ~ 250kt
B] Captain Heye dozen PBC [Panzerschiffe] to support Donitz U-Boats. 12 x 16-25kt = 200-300kt
C] Grand Admiral Reader fleet of a 10 fast battleships to exploit the decoy effects of Heye's PBC 10 x Bismarck's = 500kt
D] Admiral Carls 4 aircraft carrier battle groups each with a Graf Zeppelin type aircraft carrier plus a battle cruiser & Hipper cruiser plus several dozen Zerstroers & several Wolf Packs.... for independent sea control. = 125kt per group.

Historically about 500kt was built prewar + 130/40 + 234/41 + 265/42 etc.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#70

Post by JAG13 » 19 Oct 2015, 02:22

Due to the AGNA the KM could do 2x19.250t carriers (22.000t cheating a bit) in 1935, with a third one for 25.000t after the Illustrious are laid down (provided that Eagle, Argus and Hermes are earmarked for retirement, otherwise they can get 2x20.000t plus the cheating margin) in 1937, after all the KM had to at least pretend to follow the AGNA until 1939.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#71

Post by Paul Lakowski » 19 Oct 2015, 02:50

Germans didn't care about treaties- high lighted by the fact that from 1928 on- defense minister Groner authorised the service branches to break what ever treaties they needed to achieve military goals. In fact at that time he authorized the expansion of the Heer from 10 to 21 army divisions , plus an order for 285 tanks. He also approved expansion of the secret air force [Lufthansa] to include hundreds of multi engine bombers plus U-Boats & CVs for the RM.....all illegal by treaty.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#72

Post by JAG13 » 19 Oct 2015, 03:29

Hitler wanted a deal with Britain and he thought he had reached it with the AGNA, even before that he came close to limiting the KM to a coastal force to save the expense and avoid provoking Britain. He held to the AGNA until he became convinced the UK would oppose him in spite of it, so then of course the treaty became irrelevant to him and the Z Plan was born, but until late 1938 IIRC, when he ditched it, the KM actually did follow it, save for the tonnage cheating of course.

As proof of that, the KM laid down 5 useless CAs that no one asked for nor knew what they actually were for.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#73

Post by Paul Lakowski » 19 Oct 2015, 05:02

Well not quite, the 5 CA came from the original plan 1932 with 1 *CV + 6 Panzerschiffe & 6 CL . When Raeder convinced Hitler to complete these warships but to an anti French fleet. The 6 Panzerschiffe DEFGHJ became the battleships Sch/Gn/ Bis/Tirp plus the battleships H &J. Meanwhile the 6 light cruisers became the 5 Hipper cruisers + CV plus the original CV.


BTW removing Hitler's meddling in KM, would seem to be A minimum gateway to any alternative KM fleet.

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#74

Post by pugsville » 19 Oct 2015, 05:29

The North Atlantic?North Sea is not going to as carrier friendly operating environment as the pacific. Just what mission are German carriers really going to perform?

Break out as merchant raiders?

Any major German naval constriction is going to have a serious British response. Germany building 6 carriers is going to have reprecussions, possible investment in RN carriers leading to revamp of FAA with decent air craft? British being more hostile and going to the mat over Sudetenland?

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Re: KM S-boat fleet ready at start of WWII?

#75

Post by Paul Lakowski » 19 Oct 2015, 05:40

The RN fleet of 1938 had already been planned by 1937 and no change could be activated until wartime. Historically the KM already had 2 CV started by 1938 , so 2 more would not mean that much to RN. What's not been explained is how KM is going to get all these carrier planes from the LW.

Not saying you wrong but what's in it for the LW?

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