RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (Full Version)

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alanschu -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/22/2013 5:04:48 AM)

Just to be clear, I wasn't the one suggesting the 1000 pounders were ineffective. I was just asking for some extra clarification on the point.

Some chap named btbw was the one that said "MASSIVE damage from own planes mostly. Ineffective damage from 1000lb was reason to born Helldiver."



witpqs -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/22/2013 5:35:53 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: alanschu

Just to be clear, I wasn't the one suggesting the 1000 pounders were ineffective. I was just asking for some extra clarification on the point.

Some chap named btbw was the one that said "MASSIVE damage from own planes mostly. Ineffective damage from 1000lb was reason to born Helldiver."

Doh! Got it. Do have a go at Shattered Sword, you'll enjoy the read.



alanschu -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/22/2013 9:35:18 AM)

That part was still useful feedback! :D

I have heard it come up a few times beyond just this thread as well. I have a birthday coming up... HAHA



pmelheck1 -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/22/2013 2:35:03 PM)

I do think even if Kaga might have made port there's a very good chance she might have been scuttled or scrapped. If Kaga wasn't scuttled I think she would have been out of most if not all the war. If she was burned to the water line then it's not a simple case of repair but rather a need to almost rebuild her. That effort would have pulled resources from other projects not to mention using up some of Japan's limited shipyards. As far as I know they would have needed to cut her hull down to what was least damaged, repair what was left, then set out to rebuild all the upper works. In some cases damage can be so extensive that it's cheaper and quicker to build a new ship than to try to repair massive damage, even if it's an Aircraft Carrier.



wdolson -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/22/2013 10:52:01 PM)

The two DDs that were in dry dock with the Pennsylvania at Pearl Harbor were as badly damaged or worse. They were officially rebuilt, but in reality new destroyers were built with the same names and some of the bits and pieces that survived from the original ships were fitted. This was done more for the publicity value than practicality.

Under most circumstances it is easier to build a new ship than try and rebuild something that badly damaged, though the more valuable the ship, the more it's worth it to save it.

Bill



Sardaukar -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/23/2013 7:05:42 AM)

It's interesting to note that in armoured combat in WW II, tanks that were not totally blown apart or burned were often repaired. But when tank did burn, it was considered as total loss, since high temperature of fire caused changes in metal and tank was usually useless, even if it was theoretically possible to rebuild.

I think IJN would have had to scrap Kaga for that reason, even if they had gotten her to port.



Terrion -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/27/2013 10:10:24 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: witpqs

quote:

ORIGINAL: alanschu

quote:

ORIGINAL: witpqs

The myth of armed planes crowding the decks has been convincingly put to rest.


Apologies if this has been discussed in depth already, but most things I have heard indicate that the carriers (at least one anyways) were more vulnerable due to being more exposed with fuel lines.

Are you saying it's overstated (i.e. it likely helped add to the damage, but ultimately several 1000 lb bombs would still have taken her out regardless) or that it's actually incorrect? Feel free to link as I gobble this stuff up (while letting turns do their thing in the background haha).

Although you could argue the indecisively of which type of armaments to use just delayed the planes which is a gaffe big enough in and of itself.

I was responding to your comment about the 1,000 pounders being ineffective (which I think others have addressed very well in their posts) and that the damage was caused by the carriers' own planes and bombs. Basically, it was most widely believed in the west that the 4 IJN carriers were seconds away from launching full deck-loads of planes when they (3 of them) were struck, and that damage from those planes, fully armed with ordnance, is what did in the carriers. I forget the exact timeline, but IIRC certainly after the mid-1990s Japanese language sources became available to western historians, including many primary sources. Those sources debunked that long-held myth of the full decks. If you have seen the movie Midway, made in the 1970s, then you are familiar with the myth I am referring to.

Certainly planes in the hanger decks plus any openly stacked ordnance there must have contributed to the disaster. You mention "...more vulnerable due to being more exposed with fuel lines", which certainly also was a factor and I think a major one. The USN learned that lesson earlier and had changed procedures to account for it. But the real point is that the 1,000 pound bombs did the damage. All weapons do damage by destroying things themselves and by causing secondary effects. A bullet might destroy the brain and kill directly, or it might rupture an artery and bleeding causes death. The same with ships, no matter the weapon, it's just perspective on how you are counting things. Those 1,000 pound - and 500 pound and 250 pound IIRC - bombs caused some damage directly (see the photo posted above showing just what they can do without secondary effects!), and the massive fires that ensued (secondary effects) simply destroyed those ships insofar as any practical future use of them.

I am no expert on this subject and there are plenty of people on this forum who know far more about Midway than I know. Some of them have commented already and maybe more will. Beyond that, I most highly recommend that you read Shattered Sword by Parshall and Tully. Even if you presume that they might be mistaken on some point or other here or there (because who isn't?), it will really open your eyes. They take great pains to back up their analysis and the book is a whopping good read even though you already know the ending!


To elaborate on this a bit: the Japanese carriers had all either launched or recovered CAP fighters since 1000, while the dive bomber attack occurred at 1025. Spotting a deckload would have required about 45 minutes, and would not have been attempted at the same time as launching or recovering fighters (it was theoretically possible to do so, but wasn’t something the Japanese had previously attempted or trained for). This is also confirmed by the official Japanese history of the battle, which states that none of the strike aircraft were on deck. So the any aircraft on the flight decks would have been CAP fighters. There were aircraft in the hanger deck, which would have been fueled, and (except for possibly the Vals on Soryu), armed. However, the damage suffered by Kaga and Soryu would probably have been fatal even with empty hangers; the bomb hits occurred in areas that likely ignited the fuel mains and flak ammunition. Akagi, on the other hand, might have survived (at least temporarily). She was only hit once, almost directly on the midship elevator, which apparently ignited the nearest aircraft and spread from there. A near miss had destroyed her rudder and bent the aft flight deck though, so even without the catastrophic fires she would have been vulnerable follow-up strikes.

(All of this is from Shattered Sword, which I second as being great, for whatever my three post recommendation is worth).



wdolson -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/27/2013 11:29:55 AM)

I have read that av gas in fuel lines contributed to the loss of the Lexington at Coral Sea and prompted the US to start purging fuel lines when not in use. The Japanese hadn't learned that lesson by Midway and ruptured av gas lines contributed to the fires. I recall Shattered Sword also talked about the IJN carriers had collapsible barriers sort of like what hotel meeting rooms have that were supposed to be closeable as fire screens if the ship got hit, but what the designers had not anticipated was the deck buckled from the bomb hits which bent the tracks for these screens and they would not budge. So the hanger decks turned into giant blast furnaces.

Another good modern book that touches on Midway from the American side is a recent book about VT-8 called A Dawn Like Thunder. It goes into a lot of depth about the problems the Hornet had at Midway. Stanhope Ring, the air group commander was completely incompetent. He flew off in the wrong direction with VB-8 and VS-8. Most of the Wildcats with him were lost when their fuel ran out. Waldron disobeyed orders and flew right to the KB like he had over the horizon radar.

Swede Larson who was with the detachment of VT-8 with TBFs back at Pearl Harbor (only 6 of the detachment went to Midway, the rest stayed at Pearl) became the commander of VT-8 after Midway. They saw action again at Guadalcanal, getting stranded on Guadalcanal for a while. Larson was fearless in the air, he once did a torpedo run all alone against a large surface force that included BBs and CAs. He flew a Frankenstein TBF made up of several wrecks at Guadalcanal. The thing could barely fly and he took it into combat.

However Larson was a horrible commander. He got people so ticked off at him that he was almost shot by his own squadron mates twice. I haven't seen him in the game, but he should have a negative inspiration number if he is.

Air Group 8 had a lot of leadership problems.

Bill



FatR -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/27/2013 12:21:25 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: spence
high value targets sailing in the center of a compact, protective "ring" formation. Such a formation was not adopted by the IJN until 1944.

The Battle of Coral Sea proves you wrong. However, a protective ring formation did not help Shoho for a reason (besides the number of attackers), that is nearly always overlooked in local flak discussion: the number of AA guns on Japanese ships by May of 1942 was several times lower than the number of AA guns on an American TF of similar size, which contribured to comparatively low efficiency of IJN flak in 1942-43 far more than any technical disadvantages. This situation was partially due to direction of destroyer armament development taken in late 1920s, before aviation was considered a major threat, that later happened to be erroneous, but primarily due to sheer difference in production capacity. By as late as the beginning of 1941 USN ships arguably had the weakest AA armament in the world (127/25 stubs and 0.50 MG as the primary light AA gun, lol), but the upgrades through 1941 and 1942 were so massive, that by late spring of 1942 their flak suites were among the strongest (only arguably matched by Germans), and by late autumn of 1942 definitely the strongest. Japanese were unable to produce automatic AA guns in sufficient numbers until 1944, so the main deficiency of their flak armament was not having nearly enough of it until far too late.
Developers seemingly paid too little attention to this, so stats on Japanese AA guns ended up far too low, which makes historical late-war results flatly impossible. Without mods you can only get any results from Japanese flak when TFs with their best flak ratings are attacked by small groups of stragglers.




FatR -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (2/27/2013 1:11:42 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: wdolson

I have read that av gas in fuel lines contributed to the loss of the Lexington at Coral Sea and prompted the US to start purging fuel lines when not in use. The Japanese hadn't learned that lesson by Midway and ruptured av gas lines contributed to the fires.

How this could have helped considering that avgas lines were in use or just immediately finished being in use at the moment of attack is anyone's guess.


quote:

ORIGINAL: wdolsonI recall Shattered Sword also talked about the IJN carriers had collapsible barriers sort of like what hotel meeting rooms have that were supposed to be closeable as fire screens if the ship got hit, but what the designers had not anticipated was the deck buckled from the bomb hits which bent the tracks for these screens and they would not budge. So the hanger decks turned into giant blast furnaces.

For Kaga and Soryu flaws in fire screens or even their total abscense was utterly irrelevant for reasons that should be immediately obvious if you've looked at hit locations provided in Shattered Sword. On Akagi the local fireproof screens around the central elevator were hit directly and destroyed (Shattered Sword, p.254, on the same page authors note than any fire control efforts most likely were foredoomed, due to the bomb landing right on top of 18 armed and fueled torpedo aircraft and in position to severely damage firefighting systems). The only victim of Midway where survival was in question enough to even make any possible faults in the fire control system matter was Hiryu.

To compare with US carriers, Wasp, when caught in a similar stage of air operations, was fatally wrecked by gasoline fires and gasoline vapor exlosions, although hangars weren't even directly hit, and Franklin, which was probably the closet equivalent to Akagi in circumstances (although still better off, as out of 36 armed aircraft 31 were on the flight deck at the moment of attack, only 5 on hangar deck, so most of the detonations didn't hole the armored hangar deck, and damage to spaces below was limited) lost power until fires burned out, and no doubt would have been scuttled in other conditions than still unquestioned naval superiority (as happened with Hiryu, where power similarly was lost after smoke and heat made machinery spaces impossible to work in).




borner -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (3/4/2013 3:30:18 AM)

IJN carriers may have had fire barriers, but nothing you can design into a ship at that time can come close to the situation at Midway. A full deck of armed and fueled planes, and another round or ordinance stacked around the hangar deck. The USS Franklin comparison is close in terms of one hit resulting in the explosion of the planes on deck, but as pointed out, Franklin was not getting ready to launch everything she had. Had the US caught the carriers with the decks empty, I have to wonder if not only Akagi, but Kaga could have had the damage under control and made port?



wdolson -> RE: CLAAs vs CLs/CAs (3/4/2013 3:41:38 AM)

The Kaga took many hits. Even if no planes had been on deck the damage probably would have been extensive. All the senior officers were killed when the island was hit several times. That also hindered damage control efforts.

Akagi had the rudder jammed. Unless the crew could have unjammed the rudder, it's not likely the Akagi could have been saved, even if the damage hadn't been otherwise fatal. The rudder is the Achilles Heel of a modern warship.

Bill



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