What role would the Imperial Japanese Navy have had if the Allies invaded the Japansese home islands, besides kamikaze attacks from the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service?
Why didn’t the British dominions such as Australia and Canada establish equivalents to the British Royal Marines? I’ve always found this a bit odd considering how much they imitated the rest of the Royal Navy
On the underappreciated role of what it takes to operate a propulsion plant on a warship - I have an old Navy friend down in Texas, who served on the recomissioning crews for both the Iowa and Wisconsin in the 1980's, and was on the Wisconsin when it was deployed during the First Gulf War, a Machinist Mate, who's job it was to operate the propulsion plant - whereas I was the nuclear equivalent on board submarines. One time while visiting him, I commented that the one thing I really hated about being in Engineering, was having to get up at 2 AM to start up the reactor and propulsion plant, whilst most of the rest of the crew didn't have to bother being on board until 7:55 AM for an 8 AM underway. That's the one time he ever got anything approaching angry with me, he let me have it with both barrels - "I don't want to f*****g hear that! Try having to be on board FOUR DAYS ahead of time, to get four separate boiler rooms and four separate steam plants up and operating and balanced out, on a 40 year old steam plant!"
So what you're saying is that the 2012 Battleship movie isn't the most accurate representation of what it takes to get a mothballed Iowa class up and running on the face of the planet.
And then the poor shipfitter chimes in - "Months to find slaves? HAH! Think of what I have to go thru. I have to wait 20 years for those damn oak trees to grow big enough before I can cut them down and whittle out the oars!"
Your friend is honestly the person I would want to be if I had to serve on an Iowa. I'm not only a bit of a glutton for hard work and punishment, but love engineering
If you ever want to troll your friend, fire up the Battleship 2012 movie (I know, I know, just hear me out) and go to the part where they are getting the USS Missouri underway and capable of combat... somehow... and go about showing them starting the boilers and the guy just inserts a flame wick and, boom, there ya go, it's up and running.
@@cp1cupcake I think they would sail up to Tromsø at night, with only their fellow Polish Navy ships escorting them to utterly murder every German in sight or die trying to do so. Who knows we might see an R-class BB go up to 23 knots in order to ram and destroy Tirpitz as a last ditch effort. Or who fucking knows, they might board Tirpitz for the great insult of flying their flag on the mast of Germany's largest battleship.
@@MS-gr2nv Poland was invaded by Germany in the west and Russia in the east out numbered by worse than 40 to 1 and went down fighting they did do that "hero stuff" in 39 but some battles can't be won.
@@MS-gr2nv they did. Learn your history. There's nothing more heroic than fighting an unwinnable battle, against impossible odds for nothing more than the honour of your nation.
@@MS-gr2nv Like the others have said the poles fought really well given how outnumbered they were and how lacking their equipment was, and poles went on to acts of heroics all through other theaters, only to have their homeland languish under the boot of a very evil empire for two generations, doesn't get much more heroic than that to me tbh
Suggestion: do an episode on the conversion of the fleet from coal to oil. That had to be a massive operation covering the ships, ports, and logistics.
This would be a very interesting topic, at least to me. The switch was easy for the US since we had what seemed like an unending oil supply after the various oil strikes in places like Oklahoma, Texas, and California by 1900. The RN, having very little in the way of domestic oil, stuck with coal firing, albeit with some ships using oil spraying systems, until mostly after WWI. The RN saw a graphic demonstration of the advantages of oil when 34 destroyers, being sent to join the Grand Fleet in 1917, were refueled at sea on the trip from the US using just four oilers. I don't know much about how the switchover went for other navies but I'd like to find out.
Agree. I know the empire had control of middle East oil. But via a tenuous supply route (as it turned out). I wonder when the north sea oil/gas was discovered. I assume after ww2 so not relevant. Probably a bugger of a choice for the admirals. Stay ahead of technology. But abandon the use of a prime national resource to do so...
@@AdamMGTF Actually, oil and gas in the North Sea was discovered in the 1850's. At the time, extraction was just too costly and difficult, and most of the oil was located offshore beyond the then three mile limit of national sovereignty. The Dutch discovered oil within the three mile limit in 1938 but there was obviously no time top develop the field before the war. It was the combination of the UK Continental Shelf Act in 1964 and discovery of the very large Forties and Brent fields in 1965-70 that changed everything, as Britain at last had a dependable source of oil and natural gas close to home. Ironically, these discoveries were controlled by National Coal Board, and they fought tooth and nail not to have these discoveries exploited in any large manner since it meant thousands of coal miners would be unemployed, and all the industries and services around coal would be put out of business. It took another ten years before the oil fields were allowed to compete with coal on level playing field basis. It's possible that more RN ships would have been oil fired if the fields were able to be exploited 20 years earlier, but it''s not likely the UK could have gotten its act together in time anyway.
I can just imagine the reactions of the Bismarck’s crew at seeing a R-class battleship heading straight for Bismarck while constantly signaling “I am a Pole!”
"It would've been interesting trying to watch the British keep some kind of leash on the thing.." Priceless! I now have a mental picture of some Naval equivalent of the scene in the classic "Battle of Britain" film, with an increasingly infuriated Sir Andrew Cunningham enunciating "steer 2-3-zero" as Capt. Pilsudski replies "Repeat please" and the former HMS Ramillies disappears up the Strait of Messina.
@@richardtaylor1652 That's true, but in the end it didn't turn out to be a successful design. Even with that saving grace it was still a terrible ship, especially when compared to other RN turret ships (slow rate of fire comes to my mind as a first), but Drach did explain the point far better than I could do here in his video on the ship.
Regarding the Polish hypothetical BB, This was actually contemplated with ex-French battleship Paris when she sailed to UK. There were ideas to bring her back to operational status under Polish banner. It got nowhere as she was deemed too to be worth it and the manning requirements were considered prohibitive. She ended up serving as a barracks ship for Polish Navy personnel until the end of the war.
Drach, the Chief Engineer taps the Pressure gauges..... that raises steam quickly..... I have seen it it in films... it almost worked for the Tripitz......
Don't remember if it was mentioned in this Q&A or an earlier one, but as far as Ship prefixes that are apropriate to use: I would really like to see "KNM" ("Kongelig Norsk Marine" which translates to "Royal Norwegian Navy") used more than it is insdead of "HNoMS" for Norwegian ships. I'm not as much bugged by it now as I used to be given than nearly everyone outside of Norway use HNoMS when adressing Norwegian ships, but given that "SMS" ("Seiner Majestät Schiff") is used for imperial German ships I don't see the harm in using "KNM". I have no clue why it's not used internationally instead of HNoMS (which is also an aproved way of adressing the ships), but I just prefer the Norwegian version.
I can see a Polish R class Battleship charging out of the fog of the North sea into the entrance of the Kiel canal, it's loudspeakers blaring ride of the Valkiri and demonic Polish laughter as it shoots at everything in sight. With a skeleton crew and stripped of all non-essential stores and crammed with explosive, it's going to Cambeltown the Kiel canal under the cover of midwinter fog and darkness.
Thanks Drach, as always an enjoyable and learning experience. I agree the fire control systems are vastly simplified for movie goers. I've read that a naval officer once describe BB's shooting at each other as "Trying to hit a rabbit racing over broken ground from the back of a moving car with a rifle. It's a miracle we hit anything" An evil polish laugh? Isn't it "Muhahahahaha" IN POLISH! Yeah, giving the Polish navy a BB, yeesh! good luck holding them back, I'm not crazy enough to get in their way. I can imagine them sending rude messages to Bismarck daring it to come over here and fight.
The modification of the standard USN periscope to use a miniaturized ST radar completely enclosed in the periscope was a real advance in terms of torpedo aiming. The ST periscope could detect a BB size target up to 5 miles away while it could "see" a DD size vessel up to 3 miles. This was enough to give much more accurate bearing, distance, and speed data to the torpedo data computer (TDC). Before the radar periscope, most of those numbers were estimates from the captain or XO, depending on which officer was the better estimator. The ST radar could almost instantaneously feed original estimates into the TDC, and the ST could update any changes before firing as the target vessel took evasive action. The combination of the ST periscope and TDC meant that, by late 1944, almost every torpedo fired would hit the target. This accuracy, along with torpedos that actually worked, allowed US subs longer patrol times by not having to fire as many salvos. The ST was one of the primary sensors that led to the USN sinking nearly all the larger Japanese merchantmen and most IJN warships still able to leave port by June, 1945. Even more formidable to the Japanese were seven US subs fitted out as gunboats, armed with two 5"/25 guns and two 40 mm guns. The big advance was the addition of the Mark 6 fire control system and plotting room, along with SJ surface/air search radar, all feeding data to the guns, meant the Japanese small, sampan type freighters were no longer able to escape sinking due to their draft being so shallow that torpedoes went under them rather than hitting them. The estimate was that these gunboats, which were going to be converted from about 30 additional Balao class subs, would have swept the seas clear of any remaining Japanese merchant shipping by January, 1946, just in time for the main invasion to begin.
@@AdamMGTF You're welcome. I'm an extra class amateur radio operator, and anything electronic has fascinated me since I built my first radio kit in about 1957. WWII electronics represented a watershed period between the Mark I Eyeball and analog calculation days of 1938 to the transition nearly 100% electronic control of things like fire control systems and detection of enemy ships by 1950. All of this was accelerated by probably 20 years due to the needs of war. Almost all the systems we use today, although now solid state and able to handle prodigious volumes of data compared to the primitive days of 1940, still have as their cornerstone all those late WWII radars, communications, and fire control systems. We owe a lot to all the unsung heroes able to keep those tube (valve) powered monsters working.
@@sarjim4381 I had a similar experience growing up when I read about Alan Turing and his work on early computing. I began really learning about ww2 as the files on Bletchly park, the twenty committee and many other secret documents were becoming public access here in England/Britain. It was exciting. It fueled an interest I already had into computers. I was into early windows computing, building computers and such. The very early internet as well. The effort I put into makeing dial up not slow 🙄 But then I discovered race cars 😂. Now I really appreciate the effort that restoration societies put into keeping old tanks driving and even more so, old aircraft flying (older ships being sea worthy seems less applicable. But keeping them in good condition is appreciated). I know what it takes to keep a 25 year old race car working. God knows what it takes to keep a 70+ year old tank/fighter/bomber or other piece of equipment working!
Hey Drach, one remark to the Jutland-Fleets-vs-Yamato and Musahi - answer of yours: I think you migth have underestimated the impact of the non-capital ships present in the combined fleets. Given that there were well more than 150 of those ships available, and I would guess that at least one hundred of those would have been able to match or outmatch the Yamatos in speed. So Musashi and Yamato would have been forced to concentrate their fire on those ships, which could have attacked from all directions (given that ships like the Tripperary made 32 knots). Yes, the secondary batteries of Musashi and Yamato are not trivial, but some destroyers or cruisers would be able to close the distance and launch torpedos and at least reduce the speed of the two battleships by a few knots, if not sink them. The combined battlefleets come into reach and fire a few thousand rounds (if needed). Game over. Best regards, Nel.
WWI-era torpedoes were much less of a threat than WWII-era torpedoes. They would definitely be a factor but I wouldn't be so certain they would tip the balance.
@@bkjeong4302 WW1-era torpedos had somewhat smaller warheads, that is right - and Yamato had good torpedo protection. But still, a "lucky shot" near the rudder or the screws would still cost Yamato speed, even without damaging the torpedo belt. And with potentially hundreds of torpedos in the water, something will eventually do damage. Also, even while the armament of a destroyer in WW1 looks trivial, I would not bet that rangefinders, radar, basically anything outside the heavily armoured areas of the Yamato will be left in good condition after some hundred 10.2 and 8.8 cm guns fired at them for a while.
@@ViceadmiralNelson I wasn't thinking in terms of tanking shots (though it is true that WWI era fish were a lot less destructive), but more in terms of speed and range. Hitting is going to be a lot harder. Though I guess with 200+ torpedoes in the water one or two would probably hit, but that's still nowhere near as bad as 200+ WWII torpedoes in the water.
I can only imagine if the Poles had a battleship taking on the Bismarck. "Admiral Tovey, an urgent message from the Zemsta." "Yes, Ensign?" "They are requesting that we cease fire on the Bismarck." "What possible reason could they have for that?" "They wish to attempt a boarding action, Sir."
What is the history behind Royal Navy ships badges and mottoes? Where are they derived from, which party manages them and is there any resource available that lists them and their stories?
Royal Navy had offered the Polish Navy a capital ship... A french one, one of Couberts I believe. The PMW had declined it because it would mean (aside from taking an obsolete ship) striping crew from pretty much anything else. So no, the PMW would probably decline an R-class as well as crewing it would limit their involvement and impact on the war.
@56:46 for some introduction to Fire Control try Periscope Films film # 27794 on Y/T. The film is called US Navy Basic Mechanical Fire Control computing.
Hope you feel better sir....thank you for the fantastic video. Your maniacal laughter was a wholly unexpected surprise but a welcome one nonetheless. I just have the image of Nelson bombarding Bismarck into a wreck, then all of a sudden an R class comes steaming out of the fog, black smoke pouring from its funnels and a massive Polish flag readily visible. And on deck are dozens of Polish sailors preparing pistols, cutlasses and axes for a boarding action. All the while her forward guns are firing non stop and her signal lamp is flashing "We are Pole....Eat pierogi and die!!!" Three Brooklyn's vs Graf Spee ?? For the Graf Spee that would be as the Chieftain says, a significant amount of emotional events. How many 6inch shells could the Graf Spee absorb before everything is on fire, broken and dead ?? The Brooklyn's would love to find out. The Brooklyn's were the living embodiment of MORE DAKKA !!!! I'm curious what 3 New Orleans class cruisers could do vs the Graf Spee 🤔🤔 Those are my favorites of the heavy cruisers.
As soon as I heard that question I thought you'd want to fit a ramming prow before handing it over to the poles if you want the ship back at some point. Ram and board seems right up their street!
The New Orleans class ships would have still had the same issues as the Brooklyns in terms of range differential. It would have depended on either luck or one of the San Francisco's sacrificing itself so her two sisters would have been able to pound the Graf Spee into submission.
@@sarjim4381 considering the NOs class ability to withstand damage, it's a possibility that all 3 ships could have survived. I mean in the real history all 3 British ships were absolutely swiss cheesed but stayed afloat.
Now I imagine your comment, but instead of the ship Nelson bombarding Bismarck it's the admiral on a ship of the line pummeling a beast made of steel as the --winged hussars-- R class arrived.
Livestream with Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnoughts was my original idea. It'd be interesting to see how you build a dreadnought in comparison to us other players, IE. Matt likes all the biggest guns.
This game seems to be perking a lot of interest. Last night, PointyHairedJedi produced a vid on it, in which he built 3 Super-Fuso's to take on the same mission. And today, iChase built a 15 gun Yamato/Tillman IV-2 to do the same in his vid.
I have read once that before Polish Navy received their first light cruiser the HMS Dragon there was an idea of taking over the French battleship Paris instead, however just like you said the practicality of that, manpower required and costs would be too big obstacles for that to happen. So it was far easier to train people to run cruiser as it is similar to the destroyer - only bigger, than to run a battleship.
Realisticly I'd imagine it'd be worse then the Soviets being given a British Battleship. They wouldn't know how to run the damn thing plus they would struggle for meet the manpower requirements.
19:05 "We're building tons of ships and we can put tons of Americans on them..." Seems strange to think about people in terms of tonnage, but I suppose ship, aircraft and even car and train designers do it all the time! Not to mention high rise architects, bridge builders, sports stadium builders...
When considering the scale of ships it would, jokes aside, make sense. Take HMS Belfast. She had a crew of roughly seven hundred and fifty souls. Assuming sixty kilogrammes a person that makes for forty-five tonnes. For all Americans, that's the weight of a 5"/38 on an Essex class.
@Klobi 60kg per person - we're talking adult caucasian males - strikes me as rather low. Even considering that folks back then weren't as... well fed, shall we say... as today, I'd calculate with 75-80 kg.
@@Bird_Dog00 Certainly, I tend to calculate with males at 80kg. However, there's no harm in being conservative with my numbers here. I simply don't know how much the average RN sailor weighed.
@@Bird_Dog00 Maybe uncle Drach can shed some light on this. I say this because I cannot trust any British stereotypes, eating related or otherwise, after my last London trip had splendid weather every day I was there.
@00:26:53 Polish Free Navy was offered a Battleship. One of the French Courbet-class battleships. Poles did not want it as it would take up all the manpower reserves it had at the time. The ship in question actually had a Polish commander for a time and acted as an AA platform.
There was an ammunition handling scene for HMS Exeter on the bbc drama World on Fire. Not sure if it was accurate. They were lifting rounds onto a carousel beneath the turret which was blown off
What would have happened if the Poles were given an R Class?...... they would have killed many Germans, then conquered the Universe, have no doubt....... like in the scene in the Battle of Britain with the Polish training flight engaging a German formation they discovered.
The 2018 movie 'Mission of Honor" is about Polish airmen fighting with the RAF. If the free Polish Navy fought like that as I'm sure they did, they must have been force to be reckoned with
00:26:53 Now I want a Quentin Tarantino alt-history movie a la Inglorious Basterds where they let an angry Polish crew loose on the high seas with an experimental prototype battleship carrying dieselpunk missiles and death rays and shit.
Drach, when you get to the states you have to make sure you get some trigger time in. If you don't know someone personally with firearms go to a place that rents them. Trust me you will enjoy yourself immensely. GET SOME!!! ;)
I think I disagree about Yamato and Musashi vs the combined Grand and High Seas Fleets during Jutland weather conditions. Weather conditions were bad enough that ranges were 18000 yards at best, and usually worse. At this range given the number of opponents, and the sheer number of shells being fired at the Japanese combatants, they would be rendered combat ineffective or they would flee the battlefield. Plus there's around two hundred destroyers and light cruisers, any one of which is capable of ruining either one of those ships' day. With the sheer amount of firepower arrayed against the two combatants, command and control, or propulsion, or something else vital but vulnerable will be lost. Also, I would rate Jellicoe, Sheer, and Hipper as better admirals than anyone who commanded the Japanese mega battleships in battle.
I'd agree in absolute terms, but at Jutland itself most of the time only portions of both fleets were engaged. With Yamato having at least basic radar, the IJN would be able to position itself in a way such that the majority of the combined fleets couldn't bring their guns to bear at once, thus avoiding a death by sheer weight of fire.
@@bkjeong4302 There aren't many situations in which a captain is going to steam straight in to a torpedo attack, regardless of the (perceived) quality of the torpedoes.
It would most likely be named after a king. Probably either one of the Piast dynasty or one of the king-commanders. More specifically I can almost guarantee it would be a close contest between Bolesław I the Brave or Jan III Sobieski.
My vote is on Jan III Sobieski, find a couple of destroyers/frigates named after famous Hussars to screen the ship, and let awesome Polish craziness happen.
When I head the laugh and then in Polish that made me think of the movie Battle of Britain when the Polish pilots are first seen and go after the Luftwaffe bombers and the squadron leader replies to the constant back and forth "Silence ... in Polish!" I could just see a battle line getting the Tirpitz in view and then the Polish R class breaks off to pull a Nelson and get close enough they can hit them with swords. "Please get back in formation" to which they would reply, "Repeat please"
"What would have happened if someone had given the Free Polish Navy a battleship? Such as one of the old R-Classes" As a polish dude, i was laughing for about half of this part and had to pause the video after to just laugh it away. And write this: u said 'i would watch that movie?' Well, me to, thats why I am going to write a script. Or at least i would like to :)
Polish Navy was offered a battelship. If I remember right it was one of the old French BB captured on 1940. Polish Navy declined because it would requiered top mamy men and was old. Edit: It was Paris en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_battleship_Paris Edit 2: An article on the subject, unfortunatly on polish: zbiam.pl/artyku%C5%82y/okrety-ktore-nie-podniosly-bialo-czerwonej-bandery-cz-10/
Nah. Not on your life. If she was named after a king, it'd be either Bolesław I the Brave or Jan III Sobieski. Poniatowski was not a military commander and was not really kept in high esteem.
Hurricats: the first Selbstopfereinsätze. And we said that other nations doing it was stupid. Double standards? If you don't mind me weighing in . . . 3 Modernized Kirovs, 3 Nimitz class, 3 Ticonderoga class, supported by a small host of modern DE (Perry class?), an Arleigh Burke (for command and control), 3 LCS (the modern, easy to chew, iteration of the Battle Cruiser) for decoys, and a couple Sea Wolf or Las Angeles class to do the real work. Unfortunately, the need for a fleet replenishment train is going to be a serious liability/vulnerability.
Rats!. I knew that a notification would show up at 0430 CDT, just as I was finally going to be about to get to sleep. Oh, well, time for a cup of very strong coffee.
Heres a thought in mental hilarity. Have the Royal Navy steal a Yamato class battleship and give it to the Free Polish navy and say (here you go chaps, have lots of fun with the German navy!!)
1 yamato against the two Bismarck class, the Sharnhorsts, plus all the cruisers and destroyers not to mention the u boats. It'd be one sided all right. And not to the polish advantage 😂 I doubt the engagement would last more than 20 mins. Heck a single lucky u boat would more or less end it. A 4 torpedo spread from u boat sized torpedo's would probably put it down.
*u boat comment based on what happened to musashi when the us worked out they had to focus on one side of the ship with torpedoes. Arial dropped being much smaller than ship launched etc
@@AdamMGTF Problem with U-Boats; they are way too slow to be of use as dedicated anti-capital ship weapons (see Japan's garbage submarine doctrine as proof that this idea doesn't work). U-Boats attacking capital ships was something that happened in port or if a U-Boat happened to come across a capital ship. It's not something that you can pull off intentionally at sea. Especially against 27 knot targets. German destroyers were complete crap (as in they literally destroyed parts of themselves at flank speed), their cruisers weren't much better, and among the four capital ships only two really have the firepower needed for this fight (and those two are still individually outmatched).
@@bkjeong4302 hence why I said a lucky u boat. It doesn't matter if the destroyers are crap. They carry torpedoes and a battleship can't get them all. Not when they have a large group of cruisers, 2 pocket battle ships and 2 Bismarck class. You can't point a 18.1 inch gun at 50 targets. Most of which carry torpedoes. It's game over for yamato. It will take several ships down with it. But it's loosing and it's loosing very quickly.
Thogh nobody know that Yamato had 18.1 inch guns....so any responce had a good chance of actually using 16 inch guns since that was what ever major navy was going for exept for the Italians.
Oh NOOoo's, sickly Drach. I sympathize, haven't been feeling to great myself last weeks too. Personally got mixed feelings on UA:D as it is implemented in Alpha. Current missions really do not offer too much flexibility in the build template to succeed, and 'fleet' combat seems a bit tedious, but if left unmanaged by speeding up, it ends up in BB vs BB battle's alone. For Alpha it looks very promising, but I still have yet see the potential fulfilled (I'm not familiar with other Ultimate Admiral games, so maybe my worries are completely unfounded). _edit_ And thanks for the answer!
The USS S-25, an S class submarine was transferred to Polish Navy as ORP Jastrząb (Falcon). Sadly she was lost due to friendly fire incident while trying to join one of Russia bound convoy by the said convoy escorts.
Thanks for answering my question. I had actually thought of saying two Brooklyn’s vs Graf Spee, but that might be a close thing given that one salvo hit from the 11” would be disastrous. You should have plenty of chances to visit a gun range and rent any number of firearms here in the U. S. if you want. The staff would be very friendly and helpful to show you safely how to cut up some paper.
Honestly it's not that difficult to shoot a gun in the UK as long as shooting clays with a shotgun counts. For anything more than that you'd have to join a gun club but there's plenty of places that will let people have a go with a shotgun.
It would really depend on if the cruisers got able in range or the Graf Spee being able to stay out of range. The number of guns doesn't mean much if you can't get close enough to hit the enemy. At maximum elevation of 40 degrees, the Graf Spee would have a range of about 40,000 yards while the US ships maximum range was about 26,000 yards. That's a huge disparity, and one unlikely to be overcome before they were all disabled or sunk.
@@billbrockman779 Probably so, but the range differential remained about the same no matter what, so the Brooklyns would still have needed a lot of luck to be able close range and be able to sink or disable Graf Spee before the same fate awaited them.
Sar Jim Are you specifically thinking of the three Brooklyn’s on my initial question or the two Brooklyn class of my comment here? I think two vs Graf Spee would be a close run thing, but that three could smother her with 6” “machine gun fire” to steal a phrase. After all, the three much less heavily armed cruisers mission killed her without being destroyed.
In this episode of the drydock, the krigsmarine get a polish battleship sent at them. And they get to modernize the Nassaus! Yes. It really is a bad time to be a German
I think you over simply the two versus many at Jutland. When you have a 20+ - 1 advantage you split your fleet and surround your two opponents. Even if the two Yamatos use their speed advantage to maneuver out of the encirclement theur accuracy is going to be severely degraded. If they get encircled they are dead. They may take a large number of their opponents with them but dead is still dead. As Leon Trotsky said "Quantity has a quality all its own.
All I can say about the Polish getting a battleship oh, look at the twin sisters as they were called to the deadliest polish submarines in World War II and then just upscale it by 200%.
Could you do a single video on how artillery ammunition work, i.e. how they developed from solid iron balls into shells and then exploding shells. How do they explode? What triggers the explosion? What are the mechanical differences between AP, HE, Incendiary, et al? This would be interesting to know. What happens in a near-miss? And, this goes to the bombs that "almost" hit the Turpitz but still caused so much damage. What triggers the explosion when the bombs only hit the water nearby? How do these things work? I guess this question would even extend to how torpedoes explode. Something triggers explosives to explode upon impact. But what is that mechanical process? How was it developed from solid projectiles?
A modernized Nassau could depend on how much they was willing to put in to the modernization. If it was. Literally a Nassau except with turbines don't think it would be very helpful. If you changed the magazine and turret configuration from 6 twin 11s hexagonal to say 4 twin 13.8 or 15 on centerline it would become a more formidable unit
@Nguyen Johnathan if they couldn't afford to reconfigure it to Less larger guns, they could have stayed with 12 11's but went with the upgraded Scharnhorst 11's that was heavier and higher velocity than WWI 11s
@Nguyen Johnathan another elephant in the room is that IF the allies let Germany keep the Nassaus they would have had the helogolands too(those two classes wasn't seized until after the scuttling of the classes the allies wanted at scapa flow) The 12 inch helogolands would have slightly better firepower and didn't have quite as bad of a reputation for stability issues. Also if they had 12 inch ships still in service the Scharnhorsts may have gotten an improved 12 instead of an improved 11.
Further to your last answer about firing rates in peacetime and battle: what slows down the rate of fire most? Pitch and roll of a maneuvering ship making shell handling and loading difficult? Target acquisition? It seems to me that in the relative isolation of the magazine and turret you would be insulated to the outside effects of battle and just focus on loading and ramming shells but i can see the time needed to acquire targets and calculate the shell arc making the theoretical rof moot
You also forget to factor in crew fatigue. Down in the lower handling rooms, they move a lot of those shells by hand to the lift. After the first 4 or 5 salvos, those guys are going to get tired and slow down.
There is one other rather silly possibility with Germany keeping the Nassaus: they scrap all of them and end up with 48, count them, 48 11 inch 45 caliber guns in inventory. Now imagine they ditch the Scharnhorsts, take the Bismarck, build three of them, toss in some quadruple turrets, and... Also, based on that last question I have a feeling you're not the biggest fan of the 2012 Battleship movie...
Don't taie this the wrong way but . . . I like the Drydocks because they are kind of like ASMR when at a low volume level Keeps my mind interested in something interesting while I drift off. I would just end up worrying about the same subject matter all night and never get to sleep without the expert guidance.
Hi Drac. In the middle (period) of the battle of the Atlantic the U Boats struggled to be as effective when escorts, radar, depth charges etc became more common. I appreciate the U Boats were attempting to stop the supply of raw materials etc going across the Atlantic but why did the U Boats particularly in packs not take on convoy escorts? Were they really that badly matched against Destroyers, corvettes etc? Would they have been able to just remove the numbers of escorts down to levels that made the convoys unprotectable a bit like the Luftwaffe nearly did to the RAF?
Seems like I did not use enough incence in regards to the latest giveaway... Or I forgot to bring enough blessed lubricant. I definitely remembered the correct chants though.... The emperor protects.
7:10 -- and I notice you haven't. So Yeah -- knowing where the ship is before launching is important, because the torp needs to know to turn to port or starboard, when it "finds" (Crosses) the wake.
Why was the entrance of Trondheim so overarmed with coastal artillerybguns. One turret from Gneisenau ended up there as well as 5 main guns from Bismarks successor. But Bergen is closer to the Atlantic and Tromsö is closer to the arvtic conwoys.
I asked this in an earlier video but dont know if it made it onto the list. Did naval engineers have any kind of rule of thumb for beyond armor effects? Say, increasing the bursting charge by a factor of four increases beyond armor damage by the square root of 4, i.e, doubling.
Loved the evil contemplative laughter in regards to giving the Poles a battleship. In my opinion, I think that the time and effort given to sinking the Tirpitz by all would not have been needed. The first statement by the British Admiralty would have been, "What do mean you've misplaced the Polish Fleet??!!". Followed a few days later by, "Do you mean to tell me that the Poles RAMMED the Tirpitz and all other shipping in the fiord??!!". Just sayin'.
Speaking of Frogmen, do you have any particular details about Lionel Crabb, his actions and disappearance? I remember reading a really old 60s era comic that mentioned him but not much else
If you make it to Detroit area I will take I will take you shooting and riding quads. Only naval things we have here in Michigan are LST 393 in Muskegon and USS Silversides, USS Edson in Bay City, Sometimes you can catch USCG Bramble (nuked at bikini). Soo Saint Marie has decent Locks to watch 1000ft freighters go thru as well. There are some good car and automotive museums here, you can ride model-T at Henry Ford and tons of steam engines at Henry Ford village. And in Windsor, Ontario they have a neat park with Spit and Hurricane (plus you get to take a tunel built in 30s under Detroit river to get there).
OK, Drach. I've gone through all of your currently posted videos line by line and picked apart every Drydock in a binge-watching session to find everything that you've done on the evolution of naval armor. I was SURE that you'd done a special on it, but could not find one. Did you do one, or did I just dream that up? And... Why do I expect the answer to be "42"?
Drach, the word you were looking for, for a firearm that uses gunpowder as propellant, was 'firearm'. If it involves fire it's a firearm, that's basically the whole distinction, despite our governments insistence that anything vaguely gun shaped is a weapon of mass destruction. You mentioned blanks in real firearms, have you done some reenacting?
@Drachinifel if you want to shoot a firearm in the United States you have to fill out an ESTA waiver. I work at a shooting range in Florida and we have to turn away a lot of British citizens due to not having an ESTA
It’s a waiver to allow you to rent a firearm in the United States. As far as when to get it most have it before they come to the range but we have had someone get it online the day of coming to the range. Some ranges might not care but the one I work at we do everything by the book. 18 U.S.C. 922(y)(2) is the ATF regulation regarding non immigrant visitors from possessing a firearm. It is rare to be caught for violating this regulation but it is a felony if you are and we would lose our FFL so we don’t chance it.
Pinned post for Q&A :)
How were submerged torpedo tubes on capital ships used? Was there some way of aiming them besides moving the whole ship? How effective were they
Repeating my question on why and how the light cruiser ROCN Chongqing defected to the Chinese Communists on 2/25/1949.
What role would the Imperial Japanese Navy have had if the Allies invaded the Japansese home islands, besides kamikaze attacks from the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service?
Why didn’t the British dominions such as Australia and Canada establish equivalents to the British Royal Marines? I’ve always found this a bit odd considering how much they imitated the rest of the Royal Navy
What are the advantages/disadvantages of having Air Force controlled naval aviation compared to Navy controlled naval aviation?
On the underappreciated role of what it takes to operate a propulsion plant on a warship - I have an old Navy friend down in Texas, who served on the recomissioning crews for both the Iowa and Wisconsin in the 1980's, and was on the Wisconsin when it was deployed during the First Gulf War, a Machinist Mate, who's job it was to operate the propulsion plant - whereas I was the nuclear equivalent on board submarines.
One time while visiting him, I commented that the one thing I really hated about being in Engineering, was having to get up at 2 AM to start up the reactor and propulsion plant, whilst most of the rest of the crew didn't have to bother being on board until 7:55 AM for an 8 AM underway.
That's the one time he ever got anything approaching angry with me, he let me have it with both barrels - "I don't want to f*****g hear that! Try having to be on board FOUR DAYS ahead of time, to get four separate boiler rooms and four separate steam plants up and operating and balanced out, on a 40 year old steam plant!"
So what you're saying is that the 2012 Battleship movie isn't the most accurate representation of what it takes to get a mothballed Iowa class up and running on the face of the planet.
And then the poor shipfitter chimes in - "Months to find slaves? HAH! Think of what I have to go thru. I have to wait 20 years for those damn oak trees to grow big enough before I can cut them down and whittle out the oars!"
Boring guns? I say interesting.
Your friend is honestly the person I would want to be if I had to serve on an Iowa. I'm not only a bit of a glutton for hard work and punishment, but love engineering
If you ever want to troll your friend, fire up the Battleship 2012 movie (I know, I know, just hear me out) and go to the part where they are getting the USS Missouri underway and capable of combat... somehow... and go about showing them starting the boilers and the guy just inserts a flame wick and, boom, there ya go, it's up and running.
Drach's evil laugh at a Polish-crewed BB...Offering a surprisingly chilling challenge to Joaquin Phoenix's Joker.
I thought the answer was going to be something along the lines of sailing to Japan and attacking the Yamato by itself.
@@cp1cupcake Japan never attacked Poland though. But the Poles would suicidally attack the Germans at least.
@@mattblom3990 poles charging at the tirpitz
@@theguyeverybodylikes9667 Don't tempt them. The Poles will go back in time to duel it.
@@cp1cupcake I think they would sail up to Tromsø at night, with only their fellow Polish Navy ships escorting them to utterly murder every German in sight or die trying to do so.
Who knows we might see an R-class BB go up to 23 knots in order to ram and destroy Tirpitz as a last ditch effort.
Or who fucking knows, they might board Tirpitz for the great insult of flying their flag on the mast of Germany's largest battleship.
The free Polish Navy Battleship chasing the Bismarck would have gotten an extra 2 knots from the crew rowing.
Row row row
Would of been better if they just did all that "hero" stuff in 39...no?
@@MS-gr2nv
Poland was invaded by Germany in the west and Russia in the east out numbered by worse than 40 to 1 and went down fighting they did do that "hero stuff" in 39 but some battles can't be won.
@@MS-gr2nv they did. Learn your history. There's nothing more heroic than fighting an unwinnable battle, against impossible odds for nothing more than the honour of your nation.
@@MS-gr2nv Like the others have said the poles fought really well given how outnumbered they were and how lacking their equipment was, and poles went on to acts of heroics all through other theaters, only to have their homeland languish under the boot of a very evil empire for two generations, doesn't get much more heroic than that to me tbh
Suggestion: do an episode on the conversion of the fleet from coal to oil.
That had to be a massive operation covering the ships, ports, and logistics.
This would be a very interesting topic, at least to me. The switch was easy for the US since we had what seemed like an unending oil supply after the various oil strikes in places like Oklahoma, Texas, and California by 1900. The RN, having very little in the way of domestic oil, stuck with coal firing, albeit with some ships using oil spraying systems, until mostly after WWI. The RN saw a graphic demonstration of the advantages of oil when 34 destroyers, being sent to join the Grand Fleet in 1917, were refueled at sea on the trip from the US using just four oilers. I don't know much about how the switchover went for other navies but I'd like to find out.
Agree. I know the empire had control of middle East oil. But via a tenuous supply route (as it turned out). I wonder when the north sea oil/gas was discovered. I assume after ww2 so not relevant. Probably a bugger of a choice for the admirals. Stay ahead of technology. But abandon the use of a prime national resource to do so...
@@AdamMGTF Actually, oil and gas in the North Sea was discovered in the 1850's. At the time, extraction was just too costly and difficult, and most of the oil was located offshore beyond the then three mile limit of national sovereignty. The Dutch discovered oil within the three mile limit in 1938 but there was obviously no time top develop the field before the war. It was the combination of the UK Continental Shelf Act in 1964 and discovery of the very large Forties and Brent fields in 1965-70 that changed everything, as Britain at last had a dependable source of oil and natural gas close to home. Ironically, these discoveries were controlled by National Coal Board, and they fought tooth and nail not to have these discoveries exploited in any large manner since it meant thousands of coal miners would be unemployed, and all the industries and services around coal would be put out of business. It took another ten years before the oil fields were allowed to compete with coal on level playing field basis. It's possible that more RN ships would have been oil fired if the fields were able to be exploited 20 years earlier, but it''s not likely the UK could have gotten its act together in time anyway.
HQ: Free Polish BB... escorting PQ17... the Tirpitz is coming.
Polish: I am a Pol. I am a Pol.
Why do you think Polish are crazy and unreasonable?
@@KrzysztofDanielCiba Why do you think we aren't?
The quote "I am a Pol" is from Bismark vs the little Pol that could. Now if that doesn't qualify as crazy...
They'd call it the "Wing Hussar" and ram it into the Tirpitz.
@@KrzysztofDanielCiba I think what he's saying is that the Free Polish Navy was 'Cray Cray in a GOOD way' as per the explanation below!
I can just imagine the reactions of the Bismarck’s crew at seeing a R-class battleship heading straight for Bismarck while constantly signaling “I am a Pole!”
They might just sink themselves in terror, much to Rodney's confusion.
"Where did our target go? Why is there an R-class here?"
@@tomhsia4354 how is an R class making 30+ knots ......
"GDANSK CALLING, NIEMIECKI! KUUUUUURVAAAAA!"
Bismarck: Gott hilf mir.....
"It would've been interesting trying to watch the British keep some kind of leash on the thing.." Priceless! I now have a mental picture of some Naval equivalent of the scene in the classic "Battle of Britain" film, with an increasingly infuriated Sir Andrew Cunningham enunciating "steer 2-3-zero" as Capt. Pilsudski replies "Repeat please" and the former HMS Ramillies disappears up the Strait of Messina.
'..And things like stability calculations, which are often vastly, vastly neglected..', not looking at you HMS Captain.
In their defence the ship was designed to showcase the concept of revolving ship gun turrets, not ship stability.
@@richardtaylor1652 That's true, but in the end it didn't turn out to be a successful design. Even with that saving grace it was still a terrible ship, especially when compared to other RN turret ships (slow rate of fire comes to my mind as a first), but Drach did explain the point far better than I could do here in his video on the ship.
Regarding the Polish hypothetical BB, This was actually contemplated with ex-French battleship Paris when she sailed to UK. There were ideas to bring her back to operational status under Polish banner. It got nowhere as she was deemed too to be worth it and the manning requirements were considered prohibitive. She ended up serving as a barracks ship for Polish Navy personnel until the end of the war.
Didnt expect that evil laugh there. Reminds me of the spanish inquisition. Hope you get well soon uncle drach!
Drach, the Chief Engineer taps the Pressure gauges..... that raises steam quickly..... I have seen it it in films... it almost worked for the Tripitz......
Don't remember if it was mentioned in this Q&A or an earlier one, but as far as Ship prefixes that are apropriate to use:
I would really like to see "KNM" ("Kongelig Norsk Marine" which translates to "Royal Norwegian Navy") used more than it is insdead of "HNoMS" for Norwegian ships. I'm not as much bugged by it now as I used to be given than nearly everyone outside of Norway use HNoMS when adressing Norwegian ships, but given that "SMS" ("Seiner Majestät Schiff") is used for imperial German ships I don't see the harm in using "KNM". I have no clue why it's not used internationally instead of HNoMS (which is also an aproved way of adressing the ships), but I just prefer the Norwegian version.
I can see a Polish R class Battleship charging out of the fog of the North sea into the entrance of the Kiel canal, it's loudspeakers blaring ride of the Valkiri and demonic Polish laughter as it shoots at everything in sight. With a skeleton crew and stripped of all non-essential stores and crammed with explosive, it's going to Cambeltown the Kiel canal under the cover of midwinter fog and darkness.
You mean a few guys couldn't carry a 16 inch high capacity round from the aft turret of the Missouri to the forward turret? Hollywood lied????
Hi Drach; a tip from a Portuguese speaker: Minas Gerais is spoken with a J sound (as in JET; Minas JERAIS) not a g as in gecko
Drach: I might play UA:D on stream
Rule the Waves 2: Am I a joke to you?
They should send me the key I paid for :D
@@Drachinifel That's annoying, I hope you manage to get it, I'd love to see you play it!
@Drachinifel. Activation process id a ... but you should send them 2 codes seen on start window, and then you willa get e-mail Wit activation codes.
Thanks for another enjoyable Sunday morning! Hope you feel better, Drach,
If I could give the Free Polish Navy any Ship from WoWs, I'd give them a Magnu-S. They would most definitely get at least 9 ramming kills per match.
Drach, if you get to Southern California please get in touch, I'll let you shoot all kinds of fun stuff.
Thanks Drach, as always an enjoyable and learning experience.
I agree the fire control systems are vastly simplified for movie goers. I've read that a naval officer once describe BB's shooting at each other as "Trying to hit a rabbit racing over broken ground from the back of a moving car with a rifle. It's a miracle we hit anything"
An evil polish laugh? Isn't it "Muhahahahaha" IN POLISH!
Yeah, giving the Polish navy a BB, yeesh! good luck holding them back, I'm not crazy enough to get in their way. I can imagine them sending rude messages to Bismarck daring it to come over here and fight.
The modification of the standard USN periscope to use a miniaturized ST radar completely enclosed in the periscope was a real advance in terms of torpedo aiming. The ST periscope could detect a BB size target up to 5 miles away while it could "see" a DD size vessel up to 3 miles. This was enough to give much more accurate bearing, distance, and speed data to the torpedo data computer (TDC). Before the radar periscope, most of those numbers were estimates from the captain or XO, depending on which officer was the better estimator. The ST radar could almost instantaneously feed original estimates into the TDC, and the ST could update any changes before firing as the target vessel took evasive action. The combination of the ST periscope and TDC meant that, by late 1944, almost every torpedo fired would hit the target. This accuracy, along with torpedos that actually worked, allowed US subs longer patrol times by not having to fire as many salvos. The ST was one of the primary sensors that led to the USN sinking nearly all the larger Japanese merchantmen and most IJN warships still able to leave port by June, 1945.
Even more formidable to the Japanese were seven US subs fitted out as gunboats, armed with two 5"/25 guns and two 40 mm guns. The big advance was the addition of the Mark 6 fire control system and plotting room, along with SJ surface/air search radar, all feeding data to the guns, meant the Japanese small, sampan type freighters were no longer able to escape sinking due to their draft being so shallow that torpedoes went under them rather than hitting them. The estimate was that these gunboats, which were going to be converted from about 30 additional Balao class subs, would have swept the seas clear of any remaining Japanese merchant shipping by January, 1946, just in time for the main invasion to begin.
Another nugget of Sar Jim info. Thanks.
The one thing I've learnt about ww2 in 20 years studying it. Is that there's always more to learn.
@@AdamMGTF You're welcome. I'm an extra class amateur radio operator, and anything electronic has fascinated me since I built my first radio kit in about 1957. WWII electronics represented a watershed period between the Mark I Eyeball and analog calculation days of 1938 to the transition nearly 100% electronic control of things like fire control systems and detection of enemy ships by 1950. All of this was accelerated by probably 20 years due to the needs of war. Almost all the systems we use today, although now solid state and able to handle prodigious volumes of data compared to the primitive days of 1940, still have as their cornerstone all those late WWII radars, communications, and fire control systems. We owe a lot to all the unsung heroes able to keep those tube (valve) powered monsters working.
@@sarjim4381 I had a similar experience growing up when I read about Alan Turing and his work on early computing. I began really learning about ww2 as the files on Bletchly park, the twenty committee and many other secret documents were becoming public access here in England/Britain. It was exciting. It fueled an interest I already had into computers. I was into early windows computing, building computers and such. The very early internet as well. The effort I put into makeing dial up not slow 🙄
But then I discovered race cars 😂.
Now I really appreciate the effort that restoration societies put into keeping old tanks driving and even more so, old aircraft flying (older ships being sea worthy seems less applicable. But keeping them in good condition is appreciated). I know what it takes to keep a 25 year old race car working. God knows what it takes to keep a 70+ year old tank/fighter/bomber or other piece of equipment working!
This advance became even more effective when they got torpedoes that actually worked.
@@chandlerwhite8302 Yes. That's exactly what I said, but be my guest if you want to repeat it.
The Engineer TF2 reference, very nice drach!
A 12 inch deck gun... Those boats must have handled like crap while submerged.
Subs of that era rarely submerged, it wasn't really an issue
Hey Drach, one remark to the Jutland-Fleets-vs-Yamato and Musahi - answer of yours: I think you migth have underestimated the impact of the non-capital ships present in the combined fleets. Given that there were well more than 150 of those ships available, and I would guess that at least one hundred of those would have been able to match or outmatch the Yamatos in speed. So Musashi and Yamato would have been forced to concentrate their fire on those ships, which could have attacked from all directions (given that ships like the Tripperary made 32 knots). Yes, the secondary batteries of Musashi and Yamato are not trivial, but some destroyers or cruisers would be able to close the distance and launch torpedos and at least reduce the speed of the two battleships by a few knots, if not sink them. The combined battlefleets come into reach and fire a few thousand rounds (if needed). Game over. Best regards, Nel.
Yeah, seems like he was only thinking about the BBs and BCs.
WWI-era torpedoes were much less of a threat than WWII-era torpedoes. They would definitely be a factor but I wouldn't be so certain they would tip the balance.
Apparently we're also assuming that the Yamatos have fully armoured upperworks so we may as well make them immune to torpedoes. ;)
@@bkjeong4302 WW1-era torpedos had somewhat smaller warheads, that is right - and Yamato had good torpedo protection. But still, a "lucky shot" near the rudder or the screws would still cost Yamato speed, even without damaging the torpedo belt. And with potentially hundreds of torpedos in the water, something will eventually do damage. Also, even while the armament of a destroyer in WW1 looks trivial, I would not bet that rangefinders, radar, basically anything outside the heavily armoured areas of the Yamato will be left in good condition after some hundred 10.2 and 8.8 cm guns fired at them for a while.
@@ViceadmiralNelson I wasn't thinking in terms of tanking shots (though it is true that WWI era fish were a lot less destructive), but more in terms of speed and range. Hitting is going to be a lot harder.
Though I guess with 200+ torpedoes in the water one or two would probably hit, but that's still nowhere near as bad as 200+ WWII torpedoes in the water.
Dude.
Take it easy.
If you don’t want the sickness to stick, take the day off!
We can wait.
I can only imagine if the Poles had a battleship taking on the Bismarck.
"Admiral Tovey, an urgent message from the Zemsta."
"Yes, Ensign?"
"They are requesting that we cease fire on the Bismarck."
"What possible reason could they have for that?"
"They wish to attempt a boarding action, Sir."
What is the history behind Royal Navy ships badges and mottoes? Where are they derived from, which party manages them and is there any resource available that lists them and their stories?
Royal Navy had offered the Polish Navy a capital ship... A french one, one of Couberts I believe. The PMW had declined it because it would mean (aside from taking an obsolete ship) striping crew from pretty much anything else. So no, the PMW would probably decline an R-class as well as crewing it would limit their involvement and impact on the war.
@56:46 for some introduction to Fire Control try Periscope Films film # 27794 on Y/T. The film is called US Navy Basic Mechanical Fire Control computing.
Dammit drach. No one warned me colds could be passed via youtube. Still loving the show. Always checking in.
Gonna listen to this while I drive home from my shift at the hospital, then demolish a steak dinner. Then hit the hay. Good end to a rough day.
Hope you feel better sir....thank you for the fantastic video.
Your maniacal laughter was a wholly unexpected surprise but a welcome one nonetheless.
I just have the image of Nelson bombarding Bismarck into a wreck, then all of a sudden an R class comes steaming out of the fog, black smoke pouring from its funnels and a massive Polish flag readily visible. And on deck are dozens of Polish sailors preparing pistols, cutlasses and axes for a boarding action. All the while her forward guns are firing non stop and her signal lamp is flashing "We are Pole....Eat pierogi and die!!!"
Three Brooklyn's vs Graf Spee ??
For the Graf Spee that would be as the Chieftain says, a significant amount of emotional events.
How many 6inch shells could the Graf Spee absorb before everything is on fire, broken and dead ?? The Brooklyn's would love to find out. The Brooklyn's were the living embodiment of MORE DAKKA !!!!
I'm curious what 3 New Orleans class cruisers could do vs the Graf Spee 🤔🤔
Those are my favorites of the heavy cruisers.
As soon as I heard that question I thought you'd want to fit a ramming prow before handing it over to the poles if you want the ship back at some point. Ram and board seems right up their street!
The New Orleans class ships would have still had the same issues as the Brooklyns in terms of range differential. It would have depended on either luck or one of the San Francisco's sacrificing itself so her two sisters would have been able to pound the Graf Spee into submission.
@@sarjim4381 considering the NOs class ability to withstand damage, it's a possibility that all 3 ships could have survived.
I mean in the real history all 3 British ships were absolutely swiss cheesed but stayed afloat.
Now I imagine your comment, but instead of the ship Nelson bombarding Bismarck it's the admiral on a ship of the line pummeling a beast made of steel as the --winged hussars-- R class arrived.
Lol. Lots of lol
23:36 "Is this somehow true?" xD This is such a standard, yet characteristically Drach-esque historical question to ask....
Livestream with Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnoughts was my original idea. It'd be interesting to see how you build a dreadnought in comparison to us other players, IE. Matt likes all the biggest guns.
I thought French pre-dreadnoughts were rock bottom, until I saw the designs some people came up with...
This game seems to be perking a lot of interest. Last night, PointyHairedJedi produced a vid on it, in which he built 3 Super-Fuso's to take on the same mission. And today, iChase built a 15 gun Yamato/Tillman IV-2 to do the same in his vid.
@@eric24567 LoL I can only imagine.
@@mattblom3990 not trying to be mean but they're the perfect example of "series of logical decisions that led to a disaster"
@@eric24567 You're not mean at all!
I have read once that before Polish Navy received their first light cruiser the HMS Dragon there was an idea of taking over the French battleship Paris instead, however just like you said the practicality of that, manpower required and costs would be too big obstacles for that to happen. So it was far easier to train people to run cruiser as it is similar to the destroyer - only bigger, than to run a battleship.
I imagine a polish battleship being like an America battleship. Everyone gets a gun.
Every Marine a rifleman.
It would be the first ship to successfully ram and sink a coastline.
The traditional saying went "Every pole is a sabre", so...
In Poland, ALL DANCING is pole-dancing
Realisticly I'd imagine it'd be worse then the Soviets being given a British Battleship. They wouldn't know how to run the damn thing plus they would struggle for meet the manpower requirements.
Re:Polish crew maning capital ship: not likely given manpower shortages for Polish Navy.
19:05 "We're building tons of ships and we can put tons of Americans on them..."
Seems strange to think about people in terms of tonnage, but I suppose ship, aircraft and even car and train designers do it all the time! Not to mention high rise architects, bridge builders, sports stadium builders...
When considering the scale of ships it would, jokes aside, make sense. Take HMS Belfast. She had a crew of roughly seven hundred and fifty souls. Assuming sixty kilogrammes a person that makes for forty-five tonnes. For all Americans, that's the weight of a 5"/38 on an Essex class.
@Klobi
60kg per person - we're talking adult caucasian males - strikes me as rather low. Even considering that folks back then weren't as... well fed, shall we say... as today, I'd calculate with 75-80 kg.
@@Bird_Dog00
Certainly, I tend to calculate with males at 80kg. However, there's no harm in being conservative with my numbers here. I simply don't know how much the average RN sailor weighed.
With all that fish 'n chips? At least 80... :D
@@Bird_Dog00
Maybe uncle Drach can shed some light on this. I say this because I cannot trust any British stereotypes, eating related or otherwise, after my last London trip had splendid weather every day I was there.
I can’t believe 2019 Drach had the audacity to call this a ‘plague episode’
Drachinifel: Can Deal with armchair admirals of yesteryear, Avoids with Armchair Admirals of the modern day! :P
@00:26:53
Polish Free Navy was offered a Battleship. One of the French Courbet-class battleships. Poles did not want it as it would take up all the manpower reserves it had at the time. The ship in question actually had a Polish commander for a time and acted as an AA platform.
Murrican Firemission - put Drach on the most impressive large caliber firearm possible whilst stateside.
And we have a winner! Woohoo!
There was an ammunition handling scene for HMS Exeter on the bbc drama World on Fire. Not sure if it was accurate. They were lifting rounds onto a carousel beneath the turret which was blown off
What would have happened if the Poles were given an R Class?...... they would have killed many Germans, then conquered the Universe, have no doubt....... like in the scene in the Battle of Britain with the Polish training flight engaging a German formation they discovered.
Repeat please.
now i wanna see a movie that focuses on some Polish sailors during WWII
The 2018 movie 'Mission of Honor" is about Polish airmen fighting with the RAF. If the free Polish Navy fought like that as I'm sure they did, they must have been force to be reckoned with
00:26:53 Now I want a Quentin Tarantino alt-history movie a la Inglorious Basterds where they let an angry Polish crew loose on the high seas with an experimental prototype battleship carrying dieselpunk missiles and death rays and shit.
I suspect a couple of hundred destroyers worth of Torpedos would somewhat reduce Yamato and Musashis life expectancy at Jutland ...
Agreed. The light craft alone would sinknthem both
Can you do a video on acoustic torpedoes their development and used in World War II and their effectiveness?
Drach, when you get to the states you have to make sure you get some trigger time in. If you don't know someone personally with firearms go to a place that rents them. Trust me you will enjoy yourself immensely. GET SOME!!! ;)
@drachinifel, Come to Alaska, we have enough firearms to go around and can shot on public land!
Almost every decent sized town here has an indoor gun range where you can rent fully automatic AK-47’s, Uzi’s or M-4’s. for $35 an hour. No joke.
HMCS is always a tricky one when it comes to commonwealth ships, as everyone thinks it is a Canadian. :p damn prefix can be so tricky.
Drach your being unfair to the m3 of the m-class. It was a decent when it was turned into a minelayer.
Well, it wasn't a disaster, but the M-class generally can't be called a success if it takes four different roles before you find one that works :)
I think I disagree about Yamato and Musashi vs the combined Grand and High Seas Fleets during Jutland weather conditions. Weather conditions were bad enough that ranges were 18000 yards at best, and usually worse. At this range given the number of opponents, and the sheer number of shells being fired at the Japanese combatants, they would be rendered combat ineffective or they would flee the battlefield.
Plus there's around two hundred destroyers and light cruisers, any one of which is capable of ruining either one of those ships' day. With the sheer amount of firepower arrayed against the two combatants, command and control, or propulsion, or something else vital but vulnerable will be lost.
Also, I would rate Jellicoe, Sheer, and Hipper as better admirals than anyone who commanded the Japanese mega battleships in battle.
I'd agree in absolute terms, but at Jutland itself most of the time only portions of both fleets were engaged. With Yamato having at least basic radar, the IJN would be able to position itself in a way such that the majority of the combined fleets couldn't bring their guns to bear at once, thus avoiding a death by sheer weight of fire.
I'd like to see the Japanese ships fending off an attack by a couple of hundred destroyers and light cruisers. ^^
140 destroyers and 37 light cruisers not quite a couple of hundred. Also wouldn't WW1 era torpedoes be rather limited?
@@kayjohnston1132 WWI era torpedoes were much, MUCH less capable than WWII era torpedoes.
@@bkjeong4302 There aren't many situations in which a captain is going to steam straight in to a torpedo attack, regardless of the (perceived) quality of the torpedoes.
For the name of a Revenge class BB for the Polish navy, maybe Zemsta? It’s Polish for Revenge (I just google translated it)
It would most likely be named after a king. Probably either one of the Piast dynasty or one of the king-commanders. More specifically I can almost guarantee it would be a close contest between Bolesław I the Brave or Jan III Sobieski.
My vote is on Jan III Sobieski, find a couple of destroyers/frigates named after famous Hussars to screen the ship, and let awesome Polish craziness happen.
@@dzejrid Poland hasn't named ships after historical figures until 1990s.
"What if Yamato and Musashi* was in Jutland" is literally all the ShipGirls animes (includes Arpeggio tho not ShipGirls in this case) Backstory
gerfand keep your weebo shit out of here
Wtf
@@JohnSmith-kg2rt yall can't read
@@gerfand I can just that seems strange even for anime
When I head the laugh and then in Polish that made me think of the movie Battle of Britain when the Polish pilots are first seen and go after the Luftwaffe bombers and the squadron leader replies to the constant back and forth "Silence ... in Polish!" I could just see a battle line getting the Tirpitz in view and then the Polish R class breaks off to pull a Nelson and get close enough they can hit them with swords. "Please get back in formation" to which they would reply, "Repeat please"
"What would have happened if someone had given the Free Polish Navy a battleship? Such as one of the old R-Classes"
As a polish dude, i was laughing for about half of this part and had to pause the video after to just laugh it away. And write this:
u said 'i would watch that movie?' Well, me to, thats why I am going to write a script. Or at least i would like to :)
Is the script ready yet?
@@EmyrDerfel hell, completely forgot i wrote that. That'll teach me not to write from my ass :D to be honest, i was probably a bit drunk
kinda funny with the idea of an Revenge class ship with the Free Polish Navy as I made an shipbucket profile of it about an month ago
Polish Navy was offered a battelship. If I remember right it was one of the old French BB captured on 1940. Polish Navy declined because it would requiered top mamy men and was old.
Edit: It was Paris
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_battleship_Paris
Edit 2: An article on the subject, unfortunatly on polish: zbiam.pl/artyku%C5%82y/okrety-ktore-nie-podniosly-bialo-czerwonej-bandery-cz-10/
My nomination for the name of the Polish BB: Poniatowski
Nah. Not on your life. If she was named after a king, it'd be either Bolesław I the Brave or Jan III Sobieski. Poniatowski was not a military commander and was not really kept in high esteem.
Kazimierz Wielki - Obviously or Bolesław Chrobry.
You may not have fired a live round but you are good at dodging the bullet. Liked your answer to your fantasy modern fleet question.
Hurricats: the first Selbstopfereinsätze.
And we said that other nations doing it was stupid. Double standards?
If you don't mind me weighing in . . .
3 Modernized Kirovs, 3 Nimitz class, 3 Ticonderoga class, supported by a small host of modern DE (Perry class?), an Arleigh Burke (for command and control), 3 LCS (the modern, easy to chew, iteration of the Battle Cruiser) for decoys, and a couple Sea Wolf or Las Angeles class to do the real work. Unfortunately, the need for a fleet replenishment train is going to be a serious liability/vulnerability.
50:15
Or a very slightly smaller version of the Hipper-class _Seydlitz._
Rats!. I knew that a notification would show up at 0430 CDT, just as I was finally going to be about to get to sleep. Oh, well, time for a cup of very strong coffee.
Coffee? Is that something like black tea?
@@klobiforpresident2254 don't open that can of worms. He drinks like a colonial.
*Shuffles feet and moves my tea with teabag still in to one side*
14:40 When you insist on doing your homework but no one cares and you've just wasted time
Heres a thought in mental hilarity. Have the Royal Navy steal a Yamato class battleship and give it to the Free Polish navy and say (here you go chaps, have lots of fun with the German navy!!)
RIP the Kriegsmarine surface fleet (unless the Luftwaffe intervenes).
1 yamato against the two Bismarck class, the Sharnhorsts, plus all the cruisers and destroyers not to mention the u boats.
It'd be one sided all right. And not to the polish advantage 😂
I doubt the engagement would last more than 20 mins. Heck a single lucky u boat would more or less end it. A 4 torpedo spread from u boat sized torpedo's would probably put it down.
*u boat comment based on what happened to musashi when the us worked out they had to focus on one side of the ship with torpedoes. Arial dropped being much smaller than ship launched etc
@@AdamMGTF Problem with U-Boats; they are way too slow to be of use as dedicated anti-capital ship weapons (see Japan's garbage submarine doctrine as proof that this idea doesn't work). U-Boats attacking capital ships was something that happened in port or if a U-Boat happened to come across a capital ship. It's not something that you can pull off intentionally at sea. Especially against 27 knot targets.
German destroyers were complete crap (as in they literally destroyed parts of themselves at flank speed), their cruisers weren't much better, and among the four capital ships only two really have the firepower needed for this fight (and those two are still individually outmatched).
@@bkjeong4302 hence why I said a lucky u boat.
It doesn't matter if the destroyers are crap. They carry torpedoes and a battleship can't get them all. Not when they have a large group of cruisers, 2 pocket battle ships and 2 Bismarck class.
You can't point a 18.1 inch gun at 50 targets. Most of which carry torpedoes.
It's game over for yamato. It will take several ships down with it. But it's loosing and it's loosing very quickly.
If you want to shoot and get to Charleston, SC. We can go make some noise in a variety of places.
Thogh nobody know that Yamato had 18.1 inch guns....so any responce had a good chance of actually using 16 inch guns since that was what ever major navy was going for exept for the Italians.
As for submarines firing while submerged, clearly the best example is HMS Venturer. Only time one submerged sub sank another submerged sub.
Oh NOOoo's, sickly Drach. I sympathize, haven't been feeling to great myself last weeks too.
Personally got mixed feelings on UA:D as it is implemented in Alpha. Current missions really do not offer too much flexibility in the build template to succeed, and 'fleet' combat seems a bit tedious, but if left unmanaged by speeding up, it ends up in BB vs BB battle's alone. For Alpha it looks very promising, but I still have yet see the potential fulfilled (I'm not familiar with other Ultimate Admiral games, so maybe my worries are completely unfounded).
_edit_ And thanks for the answer!
The USS S-25, an S class submarine was transferred to Polish Navy as ORP Jastrząb (Falcon). Sadly she was lost due to friendly fire incident while trying to join one of Russia bound convoy by the said convoy escorts.
Thanks for answering my question. I had actually thought of saying two Brooklyn’s vs Graf Spee, but that might be a close thing given that one salvo hit from the 11” would be disastrous.
You should have plenty of chances to visit a gun range and rent any number of firearms here in the U. S. if you want. The staff would be very friendly and helpful to show you safely how to cut up some paper.
Honestly it's not that difficult to shoot a gun in the UK as long as shooting clays with a shotgun counts. For anything more than that you'd have to join a gun club but there's plenty of places that will let people have a go with a shotgun.
It would really depend on if the cruisers got able in range or the Graf Spee being able to stay out of range. The number of guns doesn't mean much if you can't get close enough to hit the enemy. At maximum elevation of 40 degrees, the Graf Spee would have a range of about 40,000 yards while the US ships maximum range was about 26,000 yards. That's a huge disparity, and one unlikely to be overcome before they were all disabled or sunk.
Sar Jim I think the Graf Spee could probably empty her magazines at 40,000 without much to show for it.
@@billbrockman779 Probably so, but the range differential remained about the same no matter what, so the Brooklyns would still have needed a lot of luck to be able close range and be able to sink or disable Graf Spee before the same fate awaited them.
Sar Jim Are you specifically thinking of the three Brooklyn’s on my initial question or the two Brooklyn class of my comment here? I think two vs Graf Spee would be a close run thing, but that three could smother her with 6” “machine gun fire” to steal a phrase. After all, the three much less heavily armed cruisers mission killed her without being destroyed.
In this episode of the drydock, the krigsmarine get a polish battleship sent at them. And they get to modernize the Nassaus!
Yes. It really is a bad time to be a German
I think you over simply the two versus many at Jutland. When you have a 20+ - 1 advantage you split your fleet and surround your two opponents. Even if the two Yamatos use their speed advantage to maneuver out of the encirclement theur accuracy is going to be severely degraded. If they get encircled they are dead. They may take a large number of their opponents with them but dead is still dead.
As Leon Trotsky said "Quantity has a quality all its own.
All I can say about the Polish getting a battleship oh, look at the twin sisters as they were called to the deadliest polish submarines in World War II and then just upscale it by 200%.
Could you do a single video on how artillery ammunition work, i.e. how they developed from solid iron balls into shells and then exploding shells. How do they explode? What triggers the explosion? What are the mechanical differences between AP, HE, Incendiary, et al? This would be interesting to know. What happens in a near-miss? And, this goes to the bombs that "almost" hit the Turpitz but still caused so much damage. What triggers the explosion when the bombs only hit the water nearby? How do these things work? I guess this question would even extend to how torpedoes explode. Something triggers explosives to explode upon impact. But what is that mechanical process? How was it developed from solid projectiles?
Could you do a commentary on the Design 1047 battlecruiser of the Royal Netherlands Navy?
A modernized Nassau could depend on how much they was willing to put in to the modernization.
If it was. Literally a Nassau except with turbines don't think it would be very helpful.
If you changed the magazine and turret configuration from 6 twin 11s hexagonal to say 4 twin 13.8 or 15 on centerline it would become a more formidable unit
@Nguyen Johnathan if they couldn't afford to reconfigure it to Less larger guns, they could have stayed with 12 11's but went with the upgraded Scharnhorst 11's that was heavier and higher velocity than WWI 11s
@Nguyen Johnathan another elephant in the room is that IF the allies let Germany keep the Nassaus they would have had the helogolands too(those two classes wasn't seized until after the scuttling of the classes the allies wanted at scapa flow)
The 12 inch helogolands would have slightly better firepower and didn't have quite as bad of a reputation for stability issues. Also if they had 12 inch ships still in service the Scharnhorsts may have gotten an improved 12 instead of an improved 11.
Further to your last answer about firing rates in peacetime and battle: what slows down the rate of fire most? Pitch and roll of a maneuvering ship making shell handling and loading difficult? Target acquisition? It seems to me that in the relative isolation of the magazine and turret you would be insulated to the outside effects of battle and just focus on loading and ramming shells but i can see the time needed to acquire targets and calculate the shell arc making the theoretical rof moot
You also forget to factor in crew fatigue. Down in the lower handling rooms, they move a lot of those shells by hand to the lift. After the first 4 or 5 salvos, those guys are going to get tired and slow down.
@@TheWarthogInstitute fair enough. Tough to get that cardio in on one little ship!
There is one other rather silly possibility with Germany keeping the Nassaus: they scrap all of them and end up with 48, count them, 48 11 inch 45 caliber guns in inventory. Now imagine they ditch the Scharnhorsts, take the Bismarck, build three of them, toss in some quadruple turrets, and...
Also, based on that last question I have a feeling you're not the biggest fan of the 2012 Battleship movie...
Don't taie this the wrong way but . . . I like the Drydocks because they are kind of like ASMR when at a low volume level Keeps my mind interested in something interesting while I drift off. I would just end up worrying about the same subject matter all night and never get to sleep without the expert guidance.
What are all the tubes for shown angling down the sides of these deadnoughts?...THank You
Hi Drac. In the middle (period) of the battle of the Atlantic the U Boats struggled to be as effective when escorts, radar, depth charges etc became more common. I appreciate the U Boats were attempting to stop the supply of raw materials etc going across the Atlantic but why did the U Boats particularly in packs not take on convoy escorts? Were they really that badly matched against Destroyers, corvettes etc? Would they have been able to just remove the numbers of escorts down to levels that made the convoys unprotectable a bit like the Luftwaffe nearly did to the RAF?
Seems like I did not use enough incence in regards to the latest giveaway... Or I forgot to bring enough blessed lubricant. I definitely remembered the correct chants though.... The emperor protects.
8:45 - AKA "Decks Awash"
6:15 -- Don't forget Wakehoming, as a guidance option.
7:10 -- and I notice you haven't. So Yeah -- knowing where the ship is before launching is important, because the torp needs to know to turn to port or starboard, when it "finds" (Crosses) the wake.
have you heard of the game ultimate Admiral dreadnoughts and would you consider doing a video on it?
Why was the entrance of Trondheim so overarmed with coastal artillerybguns. One turret from Gneisenau ended up there as well as 5 main guns from Bismarks successor. But Bergen is closer to the Atlantic and Tromsö is closer to the arvtic conwoys.
I asked this in an earlier video but dont know if it made it onto the list. Did naval engineers have any kind of rule of thumb for beyond armor effects? Say, increasing the bursting charge by a factor of four increases beyond armor damage by the square root of 4, i.e, doubling.
You need to post the question in the pinned post for questions. He mentions it at the end of just about every episode.
May help you out :)
Sweden (and Switzerland) were neutral but not so stupid to not to know who was a threat and who not.
Loved the evil contemplative laughter in regards to giving the Poles a battleship. In my opinion, I think that the time and effort given to sinking the Tirpitz by all would not have been needed. The first statement by the British Admiralty would have been, "What do mean you've misplaced the Polish Fleet??!!". Followed a few days later by, "Do you mean to tell me that the Poles RAMMED the Tirpitz and all other shipping in the fiord??!!". Just sayin'.
Why not board the thing, then return with it to shoot up everything in the fjord?
If the Polish got a battleship.
The plot of Space Battleship Yamato, except they’re speaking polish.
Speaking of Frogmen, do you have any particular details about Lionel Crabb, his actions and disappearance? I remember reading a really old 60s era comic that mentioned him but not much else
ruclips.net/video/NwPHalFGKkg/видео.html
If you make it to Detroit area I will take I will take you shooting and riding quads. Only naval things we have here in Michigan are LST 393 in Muskegon and USS Silversides, USS Edson in Bay City, Sometimes you can catch USCG Bramble (nuked at bikini). Soo Saint Marie has decent Locks to watch 1000ft freighters go thru as well. There are some good car and automotive museums here, you can ride model-T at Henry Ford and tons of steam engines at Henry Ford village. And in Windsor, Ontario they have a neat park with Spit and Hurricane (plus you get to take a tunel built in 30s under Detroit river to get there).
27:13 that's a evil laugh
OK, Drach. I've gone through all of your currently posted videos line by line and picked apart every Drydock in a binge-watching session to find everything that you've done on the evolution of naval armor. I was SURE that you'd done a special on it, but could not find one. Did you do one, or did I just dream that up?
And...
Why do I expect the answer to be "42"?
For much of the war... read after 39 40 41
Drach, the word you were looking for, for a firearm that uses gunpowder as propellant, was 'firearm'. If it involves fire it's a firearm, that's basically the whole distinction, despite our governments insistence that anything vaguely gun shaped is a weapon of mass destruction. You mentioned blanks in real firearms, have you done some reenacting?
@Drachinifel if you want to shoot a firearm in the United States you have to fill out an ESTA waiver. I work at a shooting range in Florida and we have to turn away a lot of British citizens due to not having an ESTA
What's an ESTA waiver? Do I need to do it before I leave?
It’s a waiver to allow you to rent a firearm in the United States. As far as when to get it most have it before they come to the range but we have had someone get it online the day of coming to the range. Some ranges might not care but the one I work at we do everything by the book. 18 U.S.C. 922(y)(2) is the ATF regulation regarding non immigrant visitors from possessing a firearm. It is rare to be caught for violating this regulation but it is a felony if you are and we would lose our FFL so we don’t chance it.