The Navy Thread

Benson/Gleaves-class Destroyers

It is 1936, and the naval world is reeling over the open withdrawal of Japan from the Washington Naval Treaty and Germany from the Treaty of Versallies. The US in particular has been slowly modernizing its WW 1-era destroyer force of several hundred 4-stacker Clemson/Wilkes-class ships in bits and pieces; 8 ships in 1932, 24 ships in 1934, 19 ships in 1935, 10 ships in 1936. The 1937 budget authorizes 12 more ships, but is inked before Japan and Germany announce their naval expansions; at the time it was expected to authorize only eight ships a year for 1938, 1939, and 1940; all of them from Bath Iron Works in Maine, all of them to the same design.

The changing international military and political situation put a stop to that. First, the initial contract for eight hulls with Bath Iron Works (the Gleaves class) was expanded to include a contract for another eight hulls from Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation (the Benson class) in 1938. Then, in 1939, when France fell, Congress passed the Two-Ocean Navy Act, which authorized the USN a 70% expansion in combat tonnage. Because of the urgency of the situation, as the Navy still had nearly a hundred obsolete flush-deck 4-stacks on the rolls, it was decided to order another 72 ships to the Benson/Gleaves basic design. These became the Bristol-class and Livermore-class ships, although realistically the only differences between these and their forebears was completion to the design which existing ships were already modified to. In turn, the only noticeable difference between the Benson and Gleaves classes was in the shape of the stacks. In the end, a few more ships are also authorized for the the 1942 year as well alongside the majority of the Fletchers.

As completed originally the design had five 5"/38 guns, a quad 1.1"/75 AA machinegun, and 10 torpedo tubes in two quintuple mounts, plus a pair of depth charge racks on the stern. Four of the 5" guns are in proper base-ring turret mounts; one is an open mount on the after deckhouse. This mount is eliminated from operational ships by the end of 1941; it cannot keep pace with the other mounts due to its different ammunition-handling arrangements and many destroyer commanders question its effectiveness in comparison to the enclosed mounts. The space freed up is usually used for another 1.1" quad, or by late 1942 a pair of single 40mm Bofors mounts to replace both their 1.1" guns. Similarly by mid-1942 the ships of the class have begun to land their after torpedo mounts to reduce topside weight and make space for a pair for 20mm/70 Oerlikons and a director for their 40mm guns. Final wartime fit and what most of the later ships are completed to is four 5"/38 dual-purpose guns in base-ring enclosed turrets, 1 quintuple 21" torpedo tube mount, 2 40mm/60 Bofors, and 4 20mm/70 Oerlikons plus 2 depth charge racks and four K-gun depth charge throwers.

It would take a lot more time than I could hold your interest for to give a proper overview of the exploits of all 96 ships. They fought in every theater of war the USN was involved in and served in every major carrier or amphib operation of the war in both Europe and the Pacific. 11 Gleaves-class and 3 Benson-class ships were lost during the course of the World War 2; 5 by surface ship, 6 by conventional air attack, 1 by kamikaze, 1 by submarine, and 1 in a collision with a friendly merchant vessel. One additional ship was lost in collision postwar in the 1950s, and several were sunk as targets in the 1970s. A fair number of the class were transferred to Allied nations in the late 1940s, primarily Turkey. The remainder were sold for scrap.

The star ship of both classes is probably USS Laffey DD-459, whose brief combat career nonetheless included several significant achievements. At Cape Esperance Laffey is credited specifically with the damage that knocked out the after turret of Japanese heavy cruiser Aoba, though Aoba was the target of several ships; this damage was so severe that it was initially judged irreparable and the after turret simply welded over, with proper repairs not coming until late 1943. At the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, the battle of Friday the Thirteenth, Laffey was in the van destroyers and hit the Japanese line somewhere very close to battleship Hiei; Laffey launched torpedoes only to see them run under as Hiei turned into her, and the two ships avoided collision by only 20 feet. At such close range Hiei 's main and secondary batteries could not depress sufficiently to hit Laffey, while her 5"/38s and AA guns were elevated to 45 degrees and played across the battleship's bridge. Hiei 's detailed action report specifically blames this for the wounding of Vice Admiral Hiroaki Abe and the decimation of his staff and the ship's senior officers. It is equally likely that the fires started by this encounter were the reason Hiei drew the attention of practically every US ship in the battle.

Laffey lived only a few minutes more after her encounter with the battleship, as while she was engaged to port Japanese destroyers Samidare, Asagumo, and Murasame approached her undetected from her starboard side and shattered her with gunfire. As Laffey turned to try and escape these new tormentors she took a torpedo hit "up" the fantail that destroys her rudder and both screws. Abandon ship was ordered but had not been completed before Laffey's magazines detonated, destroying the ship and killing the majority of the crew.

edited 3rd Feb '15 2:59:51 PM by Night

Yeah, a ship death like that is a Hell of a way to go.

Two of the Balikpapan-class will be donated by Australia to the Philippine Navy. The remaining three will be paid for. Expected delivery for the donations is this year, the three will follow immediately.

The fact that this Tactical RPG long range unit disadvantage has real examples amuses me to no end. I recall something similar to Laffy's situation happening during the Battle off Samar.

^ Wasn't the Taffy 3 one a DE?

It happened to some of the "tin cans" in Leyte Gulf. Because they were so close to the Japanese (and they're not as tall) they don't get hit by the ones near to them. They were able to hit the cruisers and most shots of those cruisers were still too high, but it was the battleships (Kongo, Yamato), that were able to score hits.

Yeah, destroyer escort USS Samuel B. Roberts took on the Japanese heavy cruiser Chikuma while the latter was going in for the kill on the escort carrier USS Gambier Bay. By all rights this should have the mismatch from hell as far as the Sammy B. was concerned, but like Laffey and Hiei up there in Night's post, the tin can was so close that Chikuma's guns couldn't depress low enough to actually hit it.

Like Laffey, she was able to do a good deal of damage to her bigger opponent. Also like Laffey, she sank a little bit later. >_>

Moral of the Story: Smaller has its advantages, but you will still get pwnd in the end.

edited 3rd Feb '15 11:06:52 PM by Parable

Also, they were too thin-skinned to set off the Japanese AP shells, which went right through them like bullets through a shoebox. This might also be related to the infamously unreliable Japanese AP fuses, though. Japanese AP shells were so designed that if they struck short of their target they'd continue on for a short distance underwater and hit the target beneath the waterline, in theory; in practice, the very long delay on the fuses led to a high percentage of duds, and the compromise shell shape degraded their aerodynamics.

Half the battle was the Americans being saved because the Japanese thought they were bigger than they actually were.

'kay, so, it appears until further notices Wednesday will be a wash...which is a shame, 'cuz Seydlitz. Today's list of significant events is kinda nice because Inflexible and Deustchland (the WW 2 version) both of which make for interesting history. I'm not going to discuss either; we'll return to them another time.

Hilfskreigschiff Passim

You could well be forgiven for not having heard of this ship before; it rarely operated under its own flag and it was very likely the smallest participant in the Battle of the Atlantic. The title of "Auxiliary War Ship" is misleading considering Passim never carried a weapon more dangerous than a small radio and would have been at the mercy of any Allied vessel or aircraft that realized what she was. Despite this, she sailed further during the war than almost any other ship of the Kriegsmarine.

Passim was a 16-meter, 30-ton sailing yawl with an auxiliary motor, found by the Germans in Brest during the war. Her mission was the long-range insertion of German agents into enemy or neutral countries, under the command of Leutnant zur See der Reserve Heinrich Garbers. Garbers was noted before the war for several feats of traditional seamanship including a number of solo voyages across the Atlantic. It had six other crew, hand-picked by Garbers from among his sailing buddies. The ship spent 545 days at sea during her operational life, traveling no less than 68289 kilometers in three operational voyages. While she had several encounters with Allied units, none of them ever realized what she was.

Passim used a variety of ruses to complete her mission, including repainting at sea at least once a voyage, often twice, and flying the flags of Portugal and Argentina. The closest she came to being caught was when she accidentally blundered into a UK-to-Gibraltar convoy during the outbound leg of one voyage and was closely inspected by a destroyer; the closest the ship came to destruction on the other hand was a hurricane on the inbound leg of a different voyage that partially dismasted her, so that she only barely made the Bay of Biscay and had to be towed into port, out of gas.

Passim successfully completed three voyages. Though the ship itself did well, the agents she delivered did not. On her first trip, to Africa, her attempt to land a pair of agents in Gambia was marred by the overturning of the rubber dinghy in the surf, deep-sixing the agent's radios. The two agents nonetheless made it to shore...and were never heard from again by either Germany or the British. Perhaps they died in the local desert or perhaps they melted into the population so thoroughly that the British interest in finding them after the war couldn't. A second drop, 1300 kilometers south in South Africa for a single agent, saw the agent arrested within a day of his arrival.

On Passim's second trip to Brazil, she landed two agents at Cabo Frio after great difficulties in actually getting them ashore; several attempts to land were turned back by heavy surf and it took nearly a week. When the agents reached their contact point with the local spy ring, however, the Brazilian police immediately arrested them: the Americans had solved the coded radio messages regarding their arrival and passed the information on to the Brazilians. These two faced the spy's traditional punishment: execution.

Passim's final voyage was to transport a radioman, a microphotographer, and their equipment to Argentina: the local spy ring had serious need of their technical skills. Also along for the ride was a large supply of cash, as well as pharmaceuticals which could be sold to provide continuing income. It was an unqualified success on the surface; German agents in Argentina met the two newcomers on the beach, all cargo was offloaded, and Passim picked up three other men (two spies from Peru who were on the run after the Peruvians smashed the German spy ring in that country, and one interned German merchant mariner who had escaped internment) for the trip back. But the success was temporary; German spying in Argentina had only six more months to live as an effective organization before the Argentines cracked down in late 1944.

On the return trip from this last voyage, Operation Overlord abruptly denied most of the French ports as places that Passim could reach safely. Leutnant Garbers wanted to attempt to reach Kiel, but the crew refused a route that would have put them in the North Atlantic and North Sea during the winter. Passim instead chose to make port in Vigo, Spain. All military gear and documentation was dumped over the side, and the crew pretended they were German nationals who had been trapped in Argentina when the war began, and then pooled their money and bought the ship from the Mar Del Plata Sailing Club for an attempt to return to Germany. The ruse worked, and the crew was returned to Germany by diplomatic channels. This, however, ended the service of Passim to the Kriegsmarine.

The fate of the brave little yacht after she left German service, like her origins before she entered it, is not recorded by history.

edited 5th Feb '15 2:29:19 PM by Night

I had never heard of that ship. Bravo!

Alright gents, if you were to design a new ship, what would you design it with?

I would design the modern day battleship/battlecruiser. Whatever you may think of modern naval warfare....throw it in the trash because this ship is gonna be armed to the teeth.

First thing's first, it's built on a fast cruiser hull armored in laminated composites (think Chobham) and powered by nuclear power. Hull armor is expected to survive or otherwise be resistant to small scale missile attack (think SM-2 types or from aircraft), lightweight torpedoes and some forms of ground/ship based artillery and ASHM's.

Sensors wise it has a full AEGIS-capable radar suite with real-time tracking and networking with other friendly vessels and aircraft. No sonar/ASW sensors, ASW will be left to the destroyers and hunter killer subs.

Now for the best part: ARMAMENT. The modern battleship will be a hybrid gun/missile platform. Its main armament will consist of no less than TWO 8 inch railgun twin-gun turrets. One fore, one aft. Superfiring above each of these is a twin-gun turret containing 155mm Advanced Gun System platforms. All main and auxiliary turrets are fully automated. Augmenting this amidships are no less than two single or twin gun turrets for Mk 110 57mm autocannon for auxiliary, anti-aircraft and CIWS defense. (Possibly superfiring above the fore and aft batteries or replacing the AGS turrets.) On each of the "corners" of the superstructure will contain 1 Phalanx CIWS turret with SeaRAM missiles. Additionally, the ship contains NO LESS than 96 cells for Mk 41 VLS containing a mixture of SM-2 and SM-3 anti-aircraft/anti-ballistic missiles, Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles and Harpoon Anti-Ship Missiles. Ammunition proportions for the VLS tubes is mission-contextual.

A lot of automated systems will be in play to minimize crew. Additionally the aft-most section of the ship is capable of handling MH-60 Sea Hawk and MV-22 Osprey helicopters (among others) for recon, search and rescue and evacuation purposes.

I know the estimated cost to build these ships would probably be around that to build a Gerald R Ford class.

Excellent post, Night! Semi-related: there's a guy down in Kent who owns one of Hitler's old motor launches from the Aviso Grille.

I have a rough idea of something, but I'll flesh it out tomorrow.

edited 6th Feb '15 5:41:17 PM by Achaemenid

Heard of it? I don't think I can even pronounce it. Still, talk about the little boat that could. Great job bringing this little guy into the spotlight, Night!

I think I can....really badly.

SMS Sankt Georg

So those of you who know the abreviations are going "It's German!" It's not German. Sankt Georg was built for the Kaiserliche und Königliche Kriegsmarine, the Austro-Hungarian navy.

The story of the Austro-Hungarian navy prior to World War I is in a sense the story of the German navy, only more extreme. Germany actually had overseas colonies, and so on some level the navy was necessary; Austria and Hungary did not, and the government was mostly army-minded. Despite a proud service tradition and a victorious history, the Navy was neglected. At the same time the Battle of Lissa in 1866 and the outnumbered and outgunned KuK's victory against the Italians meant the Austro-Hungarian navy had more than the usual bragging rights of a European power other than the Britain.

After a decade and more of neglect, though, in 1890 two things happened that contributed to the relative revitalization of the Austrian navy. First, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, a firm believer in naval things, came to power. And Italy started modernizing their navy, demanding an Austro-Hungarian response. Part of that response was three new armored cruisers: SMS Kaiserin und Königing Maria Theresia, then SMS Kaiser Karl VI, and finally on February 8th, 1903 SMS Sankt Georg. She would be the last and the best armored cruiser built for Austria-Hungary.

Details on Sankt Georg are vague in English. She was clearly a compromise design between building something to match the major navies of the period and the lack of sufficient budget to do so. In terms of armament (1 twin 9.4"/40, 5 single 7.5"/42, 4 single 5.9"/40, 8 12pdr and 6 3pdr, plus two torpedo tubes) they were essentially half of HMS Minotaur, the British "ultimate" armored cruiser, and suffered likewise in comparison to the German "ultimate" in SMS Scharnhorst. Compared to her predecessors in the Austrian Navy, particularly Kaiser Karl VI, Sankt Georg was a thousand tons heavier, slightly larger, and had better engines for a couple knots more speed. Her armor was better; comparable to Scharnhorst, slightly better than Minotaur. She also used an improved 9.4" gun design; roughly the same dimensions, but more space in the chamber for a larger propellent charge.

Before World War I Sankt Georg was part of a goodwill cruise to the US with SMS Kaiserin und Königing Maria Theresia where she visited Boston, New York, and Roanoke. Sankt Georg's wartime career is as active as any ship of the KuK, opening with the escort of Goeben and Breslau to Turkey, participating in numerous bombardments, and sortieing for the Battle of the Otranto Straits though she did not engage. She ended her wartime career when her crew mutinied at Cattaro in February 1918 over poor working conditions and the long periods of inactivity, but the mutiny rapidly politicized into a communist-based call for peace...and thus it failed, unable to spread and causing a counter-revolt in many of those who initially gave their support. Sankt Georg was the only major combatant unit to refuse to abandon the mutiny, and in the end only a few destroyers and torpedo boats and the armored cruiser were still in revolt when III Division's battleships arrived the next day and threatened to sink any mutinous ship that did not strike its colors and surrender. Sankt Georg struck her colors, and was deactivated along with many of the older ships to reduce the numbers of navy ships just sitting around. She was never reactivated and never participated in another action.

After the war, Sankt Georg was ceded to the British, who promptly sold her to an Italian scrapyard in 1920 after having run comparative trials and being largely unimpressed.

edited 8th Feb '15 6:23:43 PM by Night

The BRP Sierra Madre, afaik the ONLY ship of a country's navy whose "crew" are all Marines...lol

I have to admit, my knowledge of WWI naval combat needs brushing up. I recognize the Austrian Navy as one of those also-rans that mostly stayed out of the way...although if their newest armored cruiser only sported a pair of 9.2s, it's little wonder.

Anyway, there's something that's always bugged me a bit. Ship in question is the IJN Nagato, and by extension her much less illustrious sister, Mutsu. Apparently her secondaries were single-purpose 14cm guns in casemate mountings, which were rapidly being recognized as a bad idea by the 1930s and 40s, and yet...for whatever reason they were never faired over and replaced with more useful DP guns like what the Americans did to the roughly-equivalent Standard class.

Granted, Japanese AA was never the best, but additional 5-inchers would have surely been helpful against the swarms of Avengers and Dauntlesses, so...why? Were they simply out of dockyard capacity? Or did they really envision a calm-seas scenario where the extra throw weight of the 14cm guns would have been useful?

Perhaps the IJN were of the mind that changing the guns would be too much of an expensive and time consuming bureaucratic hassle to mind; the byzantine Japanese logistics and technological procurement system was quite literally a labyrinth to navigate, what with countless weapons constantly featuring specifically designed calibers incompatible with others. Otherwise, there might have been a degree of confidence in the new carrier aviation arms to provide air security for the battleships.

I think it was mostly cost and lack of availability/time to do it. The IJN never really could do a re-fit or modernization of any ship after 1941. Plus given the countless PT boat attacks in the Solomons, Guadalcanal, New Guinea and the Philippines, maybe they thought such a big ship could use the shit? It was the same logic why Kriegsmarine vessels never went to a DP-gun model.

Of course, even the DP guns could handle PT boats and light vessels. So that lends credence to the didn't have time/money/steel/etc. route.

I thought of that, too, but on the other hand they did carry out some extensive refits of existing ships. The Yamato-class comes to mind: in the middle of the war, the Japanese replaced a bunch of their six-inch secondaries with five-inch DP batteries. Ise and her sisters got changed over to half-carriers, et cetera, et cetera.

I suppose the real answer would be if the Japanese ever intended to do so, regardless of whether or not they had the time or resources. Haruna and Kongo both kept substantial portions of their secondaries, for instance, even after they'd be refitted midwar.

The Japanese were big believers in the torpedo, even during the Russo-Japanese War. This meant they were also big believers in heavy antidestroyer secondary armament, because they recognized the threat of torpedo-armed craft.

Add to that the casemate mounts were on their own very light relatively (casemate guns tend to be extremely simplistic in mounting and don't require much elevation, which is the part of a gun mount that induces weight like no other), and removing them would not free up much in the way of tonnage; nor would it free up deck space for more 5"/40 twins, because the casemates were casemates.

Add to that the fact Japan NEVER had the ability to conduct the kind of rebuild performed on the older US ships that were heavily damaged at Pearl; they were never going to be able to give the Kongos or Nagatos the kind of complete facelift and overhaul Pennsylvania or New Mexico got.

The IJN had the guns, but not the gunners, for quickly sinking destroyers and destroyer escorts...

Even the relatively minor midlife refits the Kongos got before the war consumed huge amounts of time and money; industrially the ability just wasn't there to rebuild and rearrange a ship like that.

Probably could have done it if they'd scrapped the white-elephant Shinano and oh who am I kidding.

Without powered elevation in even a light sea, I can't imagine the casemate guns being anywhere close to effective. With the turret guns I can at least imagine them holding the guns at a given elevation and firing only on the rise, but it sounds like the casemates had to fire virtually Napoleonic-style from a rocking platform.