Wargames wrote:And, in this case I was aware that Italian submarines did, indeed, have a meaningless contribution in terms of % of supplies landed (Although in terms of where they were landed that might have had meaning.
You've gone back and forth so many times on this and other issues that I'm not sure what your point is any longer. Suppose you argued that the sun rises in the east, we could all say you were correct, would this end the rest of this nonsense?
I thought that after my first correction you would have realized how wrong your initial figure for submarine loads was, but you didn't. So just to put the matter to rest, here are some correct figures.
Submarine - port - date - load (metric tons)
Zoea - Tobruk - 21/6/40 - 49
Bragadino - Tobruk - 28/6/40 - 30
Corridoni - Tobruk - 3/7/40 - 15
Atropo - Derna - 12/5/41 - 78
Zoea - Derna - 17/5/41 - 75
Atropo - Derna - 20/5/41 - 79
Zoea - Derna - 26/5/41 - 73
Zoea - Derna - 4/6/41 - 77
Atropo - Derna - 7/6/41 - 40
Atropo - Derna - 15/6/41 - 68
Zoea - Derna - 26/6/41 - 76
Yes, that's not much in the way of tonnage. Would it be too much asking for you to let the matter of submarines drop until you actually have information to contribute, now that you have information as to actual capabilities? Loads were mostly fuel, ammunition and documents.
Information from the Italian official history, and I solemnly swear that one day I will get around to puzzling out this Napoleonic battalion information thing so I can finally reciprocate Davide Pastore for his geneous help
Wargames wrote:I allowed for your source to be correct but, in comparing the cited links of Espero's cargo, I also noticed no other instances of other Italian DD's being sunk carrying weapons, suggesting that this attempt to use DD's as battalion transports just 18 days after the war began was in response to a known and hurried Tenth Army request and, as the DD's were intercepted, was not repeated again in that it could be readily foreseen that future DD's so overloaded could also be run down and sunk.
You have been asked, several times, why you keep insisting on this "battalion transport", or "complete combat units" transport thing. So far you have failed to answer.
I therefore fully expect you to further move the goalposts, but for your information there are numerous examples of destroyers and cruisers being used as transports after 28 June 1940, most of the time carrying personnel and/or fuel.
If you want weapons, this one may have been such a case (I don't know the exact cargo): large destroyers Vivaldi, Da Recco & Usodimare, reaching Tripoli 24 December 1941 with "une reparto di truppa (600 uomini) e materiale di armamento". Then of course we have the amphibious barges which carried a lot of armament, including tanks.
Wargames wrote:My point was that warships could not transport divisional combat units, even down to something as insignificant as a battalion, period.
Please mention examples of "divisional combat units" being transported, I simply don't understand the distinction that you're making.
Don't forget to detail what it is that liners can transport and that other ship types can't, and why. Or if liners are no longer your concern, what it is that you're actually arguing.
Right now, you sound as someone who's been proved wrong and is busy moving the goal posts and building strawmen rather than accept it. If I'm wrong and you actually have a point to argue, I'd appreciate your restating it. Clearly, too, if that's not asking too much.
Wargames wrote:Your rebutal is one convoy, one time, carrying the smallest ordnance in the italian Army, which failed (did 10 guns arrive?) and, so far as we know, was not repeated. I've stated that anyone can try anything but what matters was whether it was successful or not. Your example was a British success versus an Italian one. I expect I'm not the only person to be able to see that difference.
Actually, I don't think that I posted examples of successful British transports on warships, though some did occur. Now that you've told us they wouldn't be accepted because British warships are somehow intrinsically different from Italian ones, I won't bother.
You wrote that the 28 June convoy failed because it lost one ship out of three and it was not repeated. I show the Italians running other convoys involving destroyers at later dates. If you want to argue that they don't count as repetition because they weren't transporting a blackshirt AT unit with full equipment, no skin off my nose, I'm not going to spend too much time digging up examples each time you come up with a new idea.
Wargames wrote:
Bronsky wrote:
Combat units consist of troops and equipment. They travel separately, and join up at their destination. Reinforcements consist of troops and equipment (you wrote that they consisted of troops only, do you have a source that Italian equipment was indestructible?). They don't have to travel together. There is no practical difference from the point of view of shipping between transporting new units and transporting reinforcements.
I disagree. I see no reason why a transport carrying equipment wouldn't also carry the same troops attached to that equipment unless you have a source that says soldiers transported by destroyer are indestructible.
Right, I should have added "usually" or "most of the time" to "they travel separately". Please provide example of combat units being transported in one ship other than for amphibious assaults.
Wargames wrote:To put the soldiers on a destroyer and their equipment on a different transport doesn't change the delivery problem. It increases it.
Depends on what the alternative is. If the choice is between one cargo ship plus one destroyer or two cargo ships, then using a destroyer (or a DD squadron) to transport the troops is better from the point of view of troop safety and worse from the point of view of fuel consumption. Since you don't explain what "the delivery problem" consists of, it it makes discussing solutions difficult.
Wargames wrote:If the convoy is attacked, you now have 300 soldiers in the way of the DD's sailors and now interferring with the DD's performance in protecting the transport, if only by their weight alone. If they are aboard the transport instead. the DD can provide proper escort and, if the transport is sunk, the DD can take them off in rescue. Further, shipping the men and the equipment on the same transport ship is consistent with them arriving at the same port of destination.
This one is so funny I just couldn't delete it. The point of transporting troops on DDs is to make them cross at high speed, which makes enemy interception difficult and considerably reduces the threat from submarines. As to "arriving at the same port of destination", I assure you that ship captains could read a name on a mission order and navigate their ships to the right port.
Wargames wrote:Second, if you were right that "They travel separately, and join up at their destination" then the 52,920 Italian soldiers cited to have been transported to Tunis by DD in 1943 then joined up with what division at their destination?
They're Axis soldiers, not Italians and they're supposed to join up with their equipment, please do try to follow.
Wargames wrote: This is no mere "minor problem" to your theory. You have 52,920 soldiers who disappeared into the "Twilight Zone". 52,920 soldiers are enough to outfit FOUR ITALIAN INFANTRY DIVISIONS. According to you, I should find FOUR brand new Italian infantry divisions in Tunisia.
Only if you assume that no German personnel was included and that all the new units being shipped were divisions. Neither is true, so just please don't associate me with your leaky logic and poor math.
Wargames wrote:Because, if it were true, and the figure of 22,000 soldiers drowned enroute to North Africa is correct, and they were being transported at the time by DD's at 300 men per ship, it would require that 73 DD's were sunk with all soldiers lost enroute to North Africa in order to have 22,000 drown. Do you believe that?
22 760 is the difference between troops sent to North Africa and Tunisia between June 1940 and May 1943 and troops arrived. So you're confusing losses at sea (incidentally, they didn't all drown, some were picked up and captured) of Axis personnel transported to Libya and Tunisia in a period of two years with the example provided by Andy for a limited period of time. You then invoke a completely imaginary condition: "they were being transported by DD's at 300 men per ship".
Your logic is such a mess that my head hurts.
Wargames wrote:Since I don't think either of us is going to claim 73 DD's were sunk carrying troops, then it reasons a big chunk of those 22,000 drowned aboard something else. But the "something else" is rather limited. For example, in September, 1941 the Italian passenger liners Neptunia and her sister ship, Oceania, were torpedoed and sunk by British subs. The death toll from both ships was only 384 men, some 6,500 being rescued. So here we have two massive ship sinkings and yet only 384 drowned. We have a long ways to go to reach 22,000 at that rate in which case DD's transporting soldiers to North Africa must fill the "drowning" gap. Do they?
I provided examples of losses at sea upthread, and suggest you read them. BTW, the 22,000 break down to 5,500 to Tunisia and the rest to Libya.
Wargames wrote:You may want to blindly accept Italian DD's delivering 136 TANKS and INFANTRY to divisions that "disappeared" and you may very well be right, but I'm not taking your word on it.
Could you please stop assuming your thought process applies to me? I don't usually mind people insulting my intelligence, but you are overdoing it.
Wargames wrote:1) On January 24, 1941 the remainder of the Ariete Armored Division landed in Tripoli. How was it landed? Because, according to you, 29 DD's were used to transport its 8,600 troops. I'm betting they weren't and I'm betting you agree.
Do go to the trouble of inserting an actual
quote before writing nonsense with "according to you" attached. Particularly when calling me a liar in the next sentence. The transports involved were the Esperia, Conte Rosso, Marco Polo and Victoria, and I'm not bothering replying to the rest.