A question about the battle of Saltash

Jonathan_S wrote:However the real difference in swapping in the USN is that the only modern battleship the US had at the time of the Bismarck fight was the USS North Carolina (commissioned just a month earlier). She was about as fast as HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Hood (in '41 condition), but none of the other US Battleships were. So she'd either have to try to keep up with Bismarck solo or else stay in formation with one of the 21 knot Standards and watch Bismark steam away.

Be careful about assuming US BBs were slower than their European contemporaries. The US from before 1900 published design speed with full load, not maximum speed (almost all US warships can exceed their published speed if ordered to do so). Most European Navies at the time of the Battleship arms race published a top speed that was from sea trial with light load. As an example I have seen published top speeds for the Iowa Class of both 27 Knots and 33 Knots.

Even the Nevada may have been able to keep up with Bismark, mostly because Nevada would likely have had half full fuel tanks.

I believe that the most likely scenario if a pair of Nevada class BBs tangled with Bismark in 1940 would be first a long range slugfest much like what happened, followed by a race toward France where Bismark tries to break contact, but the Nevadas pulling 22+ Knots are able to hold contact long enough to vector other ships in to engage Bismark at least enough to force her to maneuver and thus stay well below top speed. This would end in a protracted periodic running gun duel as other ships forced Bismark to dodge torpedoes or maneuver around other RMN Battleships.

Fox2! wrote:

saber964 wrote:More like Togo at Tsushima vs W A Lee at Samar.

Do you mean Wilis Augustus (Ching) Lee, VADM, USN, commander of BATDIV 6 at the Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal? He had USS Washington (BB 56) and USS South Dakota (BB 57) under his command, flying his flag aboard Washington. Washington engaged in a successful one-on-one duel with IJS Kirishima.

He was considered an expert in the then new technology of radar, which he used to great success against Kirishima. In Sep 1944, he was Commander, Battleships, Pacific Fleet and was with Halsey chasing after the carriers of the Japanese Northern Force. He would have been the commander of TF 34, if Halsey had deployed his fast BB to guard the San Bernadino Strait.

Lee's presence at Samar is most noticeable by his absence.

"Turkey trots to water. Where, repeat where, is TF 34? The world wonders."
msg from CINCPAC to COM3FLT

Yes, Lee would have commanded IIRC USS Iowa USS New Jersey USS Alabama USS Massachusetts USS Washington and USS South Dakota He would of handed Kurita his head. Center force had at best only one ship (Yamato) with fire control radar the rest had first generation radar but no FCR. While the US battle line all had the latest FCR.

SharkHunter wrote:In the Honorverse at Saltash, a single Sag-C carrying a full pod loadout and all 16-G's would have taken out the four Solarian battlecruisers just about as quickly as Zavala's DD's. Make it eight or sixteen- same difference. The force imbalance doesn't change until you stack up enough targets that the RMN cruiser has to shoot itself dry of offensive missiles, and you still have enough undamaged ships to englobe and close on the RMN ship which for some plot reason will not maneuver to escape. (say like defending a planet a la HotQ) Otherwise, the -C's commander saves enough missiles to blow an opening in the globe and escapes rather easily, re-arms and comes back for round two.

I see no reason not to shoot dry and leave even if there is something they should be defending. Once the magazine is empty trying to attack is simply suicide for no benefit--they don't have the armor to survive to energy range and thus have no more ability to inflict damage.

At the start of WW II, the IJN had the LongLance torpedoes. Better and longer range than the US fish.
Take the SLN SDs, now picture them with 4x worsetimes range differential of US fish vs Long Lance agrivated by the RMN (or RHN) MDS plus ECM and penetration aids and RMN control capabilities plus much higher destructive power of the MDM warheads. RMN or RHN stand off and shoot "fish in a barrel". SLN can't close to use their most effective weapons- the engergy broadsides- and die in signicant numbers.
The SLN CL-BC classes may do better as far as attempting to engage but not much. Their only way to take out RMN or RHN is to swarm them with numbers. Either RMN or RHN can out manuver then. Ok, if SLN catches RMN or RHN ships in a place they HAVE to defend, they are going to begin to be successful by swarming. But the cost is going to be catastrophic. They will be unable to get improved systems into combat any time soon and they will continue to loose experienced crews faster than they can replace ships.

I will wait for the book:)

Energy range combat is also not that cut-and-dry.

Modern RMN designs include bow and stern-walls, which means they can maneuver in ways that the Sollies just can't in close combat. One method would be for the ships to dive right into Solly fire, taking hits on the bow, until the RMN ships get to an angle that exposes the Solly throats and kilts.

It might cost the RMN to take those hits, but then again, this is the final attack bit. And wouldn't it surprise a Solly to learn that their attacks aren't going up the unprotected throats of the RMN ships, instead having their hits get deflected by bow-walls that are even stronger than sidewalls?

Brigade XO wrote:At the start of WW II, the IJN had the LongLance torpedoes. Better and longer range than the US fish.
Take the SLN SDs, now picture them with 4x worsetimes range differential of US fish vs Long Lance agrivated by the RMN (or RHN) MDS plus ECM and penetration aids and RMN control capabilities plus much higher destructive power of the MDM warheads. RMN or RHN stand off and shoot "fish in a barrel". SLN can't close to use their most effective weapons- the engergy broadsides- and die in signicant numbers.
The SLN CL-BC classes may do better as far as attempting to engage but not much. Their only way to take out RMN or RHN is to swarm them with numbers. Either RMN or RHN can out manuver then. Ok, if SLN catches RMN or RHN ships in a place they HAVE to defend, they are going to begin to be successful by swarming. But the cost is going to be catastrophic. They will be unable to get improved systems into combat any time soon and they will continue to loose experienced crews faster than they can replace ships.

I will wait for the book:)

Actually the Type 93 was even worse than your analogy. The IJN Type 93 mod 1 Long Lance had a range of 22 nm vs the USN Mk 15 4.5 nm. The Long Lance also had a bigger warhead than the U.S. torpedo.

--snipping--

saber964 wrote:

Brigade XO wrote:At the start of WW II, the IJN had the LongLance torpedoes. Better and longer range than the US fish.

Actually the Type 93 was even worse than your analogy. The IJN Type 93 mod 1 Long Lance had a range of 22 nm vs the USN Mk 15 4.5 nm. The Long Lance also had a bigger warhead than the U.S. torpedo.

Precisely -- but what the Long Lance did not have was the ability to be controlled to it's target at full range -- which is where -- in the Honorverse, the RMN has gained it's supreme tactical advantage. First with MDM or DDM missiles, and second with the downrange control to get those salvos on target first time nearly every time. Making it always a bad day to be on the op force.

noblehunter wrote:For the record, the discussion is not if DDs can destroy SDs but whether or not they can do it before they run out of missiles.

Does that strike anybody else as a little bit nuts?

Another thought on this: Pit a WWII BB (since they didn't have SDs) vs a modern DD. The exact same scenario--the only question is if it has enough birds in it's magazine.

Loren Pechtel wrote:

noblehunter wrote:For the record, the discussion is not if DDs can destroy SDs but whether or not they can do it before they run out of missiles.

Does that strike anybody else as a little bit nuts?

Another thought on this: Pit a WWII BB (since they didn't have SDs) vs a modern DD. The exact same scenario--the only question is if it has enough birds in it's magazine.

Actually modern DDs are pretty singularly unsuited for disabling or sinking an old BB. None of their weapons are good for more than taking out vulnerable unarmored items like antennas or radar dishes.

That's because their primary weapons in missiles and nobody really builds anti-ship missiles designed to deal with thick homogeneous armor belts; (much less ones small enough to mount on a DD). (Some of the old ex-Soviet air-launched anti-ship missiles designed to kill carriers might do it; but not the normal kind of anti-ship missile anybody deploys)

Of course nobody builds missiles capable of that because there aren't actually targets for them. It'd be easier to build a missile than a BB; so anybody actually building modern heavily armored warships would likely face in-service missiles capable of dealing with them before the ships were even commissioned.


But as it is a modern DD has a few types of weapons:
1) Land attack cruise missiles - basically useless in an anti-ship role.
2) Anti-ship missiles (like Harpoon) - not designed to penetrate heavy homogeneous armor. Likely to simply break up on that waterline main armored belt.
3) AA missiles (some of which have a secondary anti-surface role) - again not armor piercing and even smaller warheads that the dedicated anti-ship missiles. (But possibly better able to be re-targeted away from the waterline)
4) 5" gun - Backed by capable radars and fire control computers it should be more accurate than anything the BB carries. And at least the 5'/54 carried by modern USN destroyers outranges than 5'/38 dual purpose guns used as their BB's secondary armament. But it has barely 60% the range of the BB's main guns.
5) Torpedoes - lightweight anti-submarine models with less range than their guns and relatively small warheads designed to punch a hole in a sub's pressure hull; not break the back of a heavily built ship. I'm not even sure if those torpedoes have a back-up surface attack mode.
6) CIWS - Phalanx close in weapons systems, 20mm Gatling gun firing depleted uranium slugs. Probably capable of penetrating the BB's superstructure; but at ranges of less than 2 miles; far far shorter than the effective range of the BB's many secondary guns.

Given those the modern DD has a good chance of wrecking the BB's exposed upper works, antennas, radars, light AA, etc. But it's got little chance of taking out the BB's heavy guns much less disabling or sinking the it. And if it did get tagged by even a secondary weapons it'd probably be a in world of hurt.

Loren Pechtel wrote:Another thought on this: Pit a WWII BB (since they didn't have SDs) vs a modern DD. The exact same scenario--the only question is if it has enough birds in it's magazine.

The thing is that WW2/Modern doesn't line up with SLN/RMN. The Roland has an equivalent class in the SLN (a light cruiser by tonnage, not a destroyer, but still). There is no read-across WW2 equivalent to a modern missile destroyer. Nor is the closest equivalent likely to be a DD based on size, weapons, or role(?).

The difference between WW2 and today is much greater than the difference between pre-MDM and Apollo. The new tech is not going to mean the end of SDs as a role or class whereas today no one's building BB at all and it's all about the new class, carriers. Apollo is the logical extension of the trend started by the laser head: throw the most, smartest, and heaviest missiles you can at the other side. It's not a paradigm shift, it's just a (probable) endpoint of an evolution in salvo density and range increases.