I think this is your best RUclips video. It's also the one where you speak a great deal. The information you verbally give us is better than anything we get out of the documentaries. Your analysis of the battlecruiser problem is elegant and correct. I hope you give us more of that. I want to know what you think, not documentary videos.
Chase did you know that there was another british capital ship here during the battle of the falklands the pre dreadnought hms canopus and she saved the battlecruisers from being shot up at there moorings. Was beached in whale bone cove and fired the 1st shots Of the battle and the aft guns scored a hit! The hit was what made von spee turn out to sea.
Thanks for putting this video together and sharing on youtube. I found it very informative and insightful, learning more about the history and role of the ship. I recently traced a family relative who served as a signalman on the invincible. The huge loss of lives (on both sides) and the manner in which people died at sea was truly tragic and such a waste of lives.
Yet another great video. Can't wait for a video on the County class cruisers, my favorites. The black and white top and side shot is of the Indefatigable class, their bigger, faster, and more poorly armored successors. The armor plate bolted over the amidships turret barbettes is the easiest way to tell them apart from the Invinceables 😊
The problem was powder handling shortcuts taken for rate of fire. Specifically bringing powder up from the magazines before it was to be used and leaving hatches open for ease of handling. Wrote that before I got to 17:00.
+Philip Edwards The over storing of cordite was endemic amongst all British warships of the time, for centuries the RN had put great emphasis in rate of fire so were misusing the barbet system. Beatty had two options; he could have stayed a certain distance away from the German fleet as his ships' guns had- on paper at least- a greater range, or he could get in close, making his battlecruisers less vulnerable to plunging fire. Sadly, he did neither.
Staying at range would probably not have been practical anyway. The range advantage of the British guns were not that significant and the effective range is more governed by the optical rangefinders than the guns themselves and at that point the Germans were superior.
Argumentative Piece of shit Not saying you're wrong, but the Battlecruiser was never intended to be used in the main battle line, they were intended to be an Uber-cruiser, so superior to other cruisers as to render them obselete. Had they never been used at Jutland, they would have been seen as a success.
Argumentative Piece of shit Again, I'm not saying you're wrong, the British Battlecruisers were just too lightly armoured for use in any kind of fleet action, while the German Battlecruisers were an effective part of the High Seas Fleet, as seen at Jutland. The Seydlitz, the most heavily damaged survivor of Jutland is a testament to that designs worth.
Excellent video. Robert Massie's "Castles of Steel" and "The Great War at Sea" by Richard Hough have good information on the battlecruisers, and their misuse. They also discuss how the Germans learned proper ammunition handling and flash safeguards at the Battle of Dogger Bank in 1915. SMS Seydlitz was nearly destroyed in the same way that Invincible and the others would be at Jutland.
Really been enjoying your series. Im using a 3 yr old laptop that strains in World of Tanks so applying for Warships Beta isn't valid for me. Hope the game comes out soon. Find your vids, clear language, no swearing and multiple sources of information is well combined with gameplay and game mechanics.
The problem was not just that day, but from the beginning. If you are going to give ships battleship grade guns, then it needs battleship grade protection. It would also be a good idea to not negate flash protection.
The issue with them as rapid response squadrons was rather or not they could make enough of them. If you only have 1 squadron for the whole of the pacific it's not going to work very well. A larger number of lighter ships are more flexible. Chasing down surface ships they could do well but they couldn't do much else, especially after the danger to merchant ships became submarines they weren't of use anymore. Instead destroyers and even lighter corvettes became more prominent.
um...that fits Armed Merchant Cruisers...like the Olympic and Britanic, more than a properly deployed BC. When used as intended, as a long range commerce raider, they could have a profound impact. As the German Pacific force did prior to Japan's intervention..
Panzerdeal BC´s were not intended as long range commerce raiders. They were (the British at least) intended to hunt long range commerce raiders. And while they are excellent cruiser killers, they are also way overpriced for the job. Keep in mind that most British BCs were as expensive as battleships or more!
And airplanes were not intended as weapons of war...but it happened. Aircraft carriers were not intended as landing craft...yet I refer you to the landing assault carriers used by the marines...notably memorable is the Iwo Jima class...
Tragically, it was that same mind set that doomed HMS HOOD during WWII, when she was sent out to stop the BISMARCK. She was the biggest and last of the "battlecruiser" type built by the British, possessing the same philosophy flaw that her predecessors had. Fast, powerful, but fragile. Hood was supposed to get a major refit, but was pressed into service by the outbreak of the war. When confronted with the Bismarck, she was destroyed because battlecruisers were never designed to go mano-a-mano with BATTLESHIPS, since they had no hope of hanging in against heavy shells that could easily pierce their 'cruiser' armor.
Margaret Fortune. A late reply I know but if you are talking about the poles that line the flanks of the hull they are supports for anti torpedo nets usually deployed while the ship was at anchor.
I wonder whether theyre going to put these along with Hood in their own line since theyre not quite cruisers and not quite BBs. Either way, I imagine they'll have a stunning rate of fire (for BBs) but will get citadel'd like crazy
Probably not as there´s already precedent for putting battlecruisers in the Japanese battleship-line: The Kongo class for instance. (No matter how much the Japanese insist that the Kongo´s were upgraded to battleships, they weren't. They had no where near enough armour to be properly classed as a battleship.)
I think the battlecruisers were flawed in that they were as expensive as battleships. That makes it far too risky to use them separately as they could get trapped and destroyed without support. In addition to the risks their expenses made it so that there were so few in number they couldn't deal with multiple raiders without spreading themselves too thinly.
Don't think of it that way. Think of it like this, they were used for a purpose they were not supposed to be used in, it's not that the ships themselves are bad for all reasons, they were actually good at what they were supposed to do.
What were they supposed to be used for? As scouts it was risky because they were so costly so naval admirals were reluctant to push them into unfamiliar waters. The one thing they did do well is chase down raiders but they couldn't do much outside of that. They were meant also as escorts but escorts is all about numbers and the cost made them too few for escort duty.
There are several reasons why 3 British battlecruisers were lost on that day, lack of armour and ammunition handling goes without saying, but what isn't realized is that British cordite (the shell propellant) was unstable and apt to flash rather than burn and it deteriorated with age, German cordite was much more stable. Also the deployment of the ships contributed to their destruction, battlecruisers were designed to fight smaller enemy ships with speed to catch them and speed to escape if something the same size should come into view, but what naval commander could resist putting as many big guns as possible into the line of battle? All the battlecruisers advantages were therefore lost.
Its quite amusing but sad that Britain always seemed to invent everything, but was always out-competed in their designs later on. Things like the Ironclad, Drednought and Tank were revolutionary and changed warfare forever but little old england could never keep up. Things not invented by British designers like the Aeroplane, Machine gun and Tea were developed brilliantly by the British to the point of domination. Anyone else see a trend here?
Jamraptor. Hi Cant think of to many naval battles the Royal Navy has lost in the past fine hundred years. The Challenger 2 is still understood to be among the very best in the world. I don't think you could name better frigates or subs in any modern navy. Even on D Day the only allied tank capable of taking the Germans on was the Firefly a British modified tank. I think you have made a fool out of yourself. Better luck next time.
Is that really true though? The enemies the UK was facing knew up to a decade in advance they were going to be facing/instigating a huge war and spent huge portions of their GDP on their militaries to buff them up and get the best designs possible. The Kaiser was half bankrupting Germany to build up a massive fleet whilst the nazi's and Japan spent half their budget on the military and had years and years to prepare. Meanwhile the UK like the US and France were simply occasionally updating their ships, tanks, etc, to keep up to times, often sacrificing capability for decreased cost.
Wanderer628 I think what you've identified is the difference between the military policies of fascist dictatorships compared to liberal democracies. Britain often invented things as a way of making things more efficient, comfortable and effective, as a pose to a focus on aggressive warmongering/arms races.
look at what the british invented for carriers in the jet age. angled flight deck, steam catapult and the light system (forget the name) used by planes to land safely.
I'm a big fan of the German battlecruisers. They didn't have the insane speed of the Royal Navy battlecruisers, but they were still fast. Their armament wasn't that much behind their British counterparts, and they could take a pounding and continue to fight.
SpaceGhost1984 Yeah and I think it was a good principle. I'd say similar things about American and British carriers in WWII. The Royal Navy knew that the Fleet Air Arm had sub-par aircraft (early part of WWII British carrier aviation was really behind the curve), but it would take too long to design/built/put into service better ones, so the first thing they did was build really tough carriers. The US Navy put a strong emphasis on fire fighting, damage control, and stuff like isolating fuel and ammo stowage. Our carriers took a beating before they went down. Japan, who admittedly hardly had any purpose built carriers, didn't armor theirs like Britain, or emphasize damage control/fire fighting or safety like the US Navy. Their ships took a few hits and became unsalvageable bonfires that had to be abandoned, or just sank outright.
Captain_Dorja it seems like the only durable carriers the ijn had were the shokaku and the zuikaku. but there were only two of them. shokaku survived major battle damage from 1000lb bombs at coral sea and Santa Cruz and only the torpedo strikes from USS cavalla during the battle of the Philippine sea proved fatal. the shokaku's damage control was among the best in the kido butai. during the battle of Santa Cruz possibly as many as 6 1000lb bombs may have hit her, those bombs being powerful enough to damage a battleship. she survived somehow and went on to fight at the Philippine sea battle. they are still in my opinion the best class of carrier the Japanese ever put to sea. damage control is a very important factor in a ships survival at sea and a good captain will train his crew on damage control and have regular drills done to ensure they know how to contain any damage they suffer.
Back in the day, the British High Command thought that the faster you fired your guns the more power you delivered! Unfortunatly there came a down side to that in that the safety devices in the shell and powder delivery systems as using them slowed the firing of the guns. So the safety devices were bypassed and to get the speed that the High command wanted. This put the shells and powder bags in the companion ways to get the speed wanted!! That worked well in practice but in actually doing this in combat was real dumb as any hit would set off the powder and end the fight quickly. "Something seems to be wrong with our ships today"
Considering the RN was born at a time were this shoot reload as quick as you can logic was effective. It wasn't suprising they continued to do so. But let's not forget the German navy was a new development and it had only ever known a world of large rifles and thick armour, not to mention Germanys army was already the best at gunnery in mainland Europe.
Hey chase, maby you could do a episode about the sms seydlitz or the deffinger class. these cruisers dit survive a hell of a load damage, and the sms seydlitz was eaven quit active during the war. its turrets got burnd out a few times and survived the war, to be scuttled with the hole fleet. Roeno1997
The biggest flaw the British battlecruisers had were that they were not that much less expensive than proper battleship. The Lion class (if I remember correctly) was more expensive than contemporary battleships.
I don't think the cost could be a flaw, if they had only been used to hunt down and catch enemy cruisers then the class would have been perfect (the Hood initially hunted for the Graf Spee in WW2, if she had caught her the fight would have been very one sided!). But pressing them into the main line in a battleship encounter seems reckless, and not building fast battleships and then having to rely on a battlecruiser to catch the Bismark was more a result of lack of ship building in the Royal navy pre-WW2.I think the best description of a battlecruiser was a battleship with less armour fitted and instead more engines added, in that case they never were going to be (much) cheaper, but its an expensive ace card to play against any cruisers trying to raid your shipping.
I respectfully disagree tough you do have a point. The Battle of the Falkland Islands during WWI was a perfect example of battlecruisers used the right way. The German cruisers had no chance at all against the British battlecruisers. However, and here is what I mean by their cost being their biggest flaw, the job could have been done just as well by a large cruiser task force at a much lower cost. If the battlecruisers had not been built, the British would either have more battleships or vastly larger number of cruisers in stead. Now, definitions/classifications of ships have never been a particularly exact science. The German battlecruisers for instance had lower calibre guns than battleships, but vastly more armour than the British battlecruisers. At the battle of Jutland the Germans only lost one battlecruiser, the SMS Lützow, and that only after it took 24 heavy calibre hits and sunk one British battlecruiser and an armoured cruiser (HMS Invincible and HMS Defence). And even then most of her crew survived. The Hood is a very interesting example of classification-confusion. By the definitions of WWII she was a fast battleship! The British called her a battlecruiser because she had battleship guns and cruiser speed. (The British definition at the time said nothing about armour). She reached her impressive speed not by sacrificing armour (as the Lion class battlecruiser for instance) but simply by having enormously powerful engines. I think we agree on the two most important points tough. 1: British-type battlecruisers (battleship size and guns, cruiser speed and armour) should never have been used on the main battle line. They are utterly unsuited to face battleships (or even German-type battlecruisers apparently). 2: British-type battlecruisers are fantastic cruiser killers! Used for their intended purpose, they are absolute beasts. The one point we disagree on is if they are actually worth their immense cost. I think they aren't. The fact is that the British battlecruisers were more expensive than their proper battleship sisters. You could get a cruiser AND a battleship for the price of one battlecruiser. Had those resources been evenly split between cruisers and battleships, you would have gotten a far stronger main line as well as a far larger number of cruisers to counter the enemy cruisers with, and I think that would have been a much more efficient use of funds.
the brits didn't build them thinking they would be in any cheaper, it was all to do with tactics and how they wanted to use their fleet of battlecrusiers that ended up terribly flawed, they didn't really care that much about the cost in those days
True, the brits were well aware of the cost of these machines and did think they were worth it when they made them. And their downfall were mostly due to how they were (mis)used at Jutland. As I said, they worked excellently at the Falklands. However, I still maintain that those resources would have been better spent on battleships and cruisers as the battlecruisers really weren't worth the investment even when used properly. That´s what it always boils down to: Bang for the buck. (They DID provide a lot of bang at Jutland, but not in a good way :P )
I'll bet that's not the way they were taught to load those shells? That's what they said and you and at the end then to. 1800 yards is only a little over a mile vs Big Mo's 16" guns at over 20 miles.
Mr. Midshipman It was a philosophy to fire as quickly as possible (some have suggested it was to compensate for rather poor fire control) so it resulted in many shortcuts being taken
Andry Randrianantoandro no, there were 2 sets of ships with those names, the ones in ww1 that the Invincible and Indefatigable fought were armoured cruisers.
Heavy cruisers were far smaller wih smaller caliber guns - 8 inch usually. Battlecruisers were the size of battleships with battleship arnament with high speed but thre armor was as bad as cruisers
Hi Vince =^^= I'm a fourth generation US Navy vet and I love military weapons history so here's a basic breakdown of naval terminology and ship type classification. Here's a list of ship types with explanations following =^^= Fleet Types: Escorts, Cruisers, Capital, & Super Capital. Ship Types: Escorts: The lightest ship types of a battle fleet including corvettes, frigates, & destroyers. Cruisers: Medium weight warships including light cruiser, escort cruisers (anti aircraft artillery) & heavy cruisers (aka armored cruisers). Capital: These are the heavies including light battlecruisers (aka pocket battleships), battlecruisers, dreadnoughts, super dreadnoughts, fast battleships, battleships, light carriers, & fleet carriers. Super Capital: There are very few warships that occupy this special class of warship. They evolved during WWII. The only nation with functioning super capital warships currently is the US Navy's super battle carriers. During WWII these only included the IJN (Japanese) super battleships Yamato, Mushashi, & super carrier Shinano. KMS (German) super battleships Bismarck & Tirpitz. The Japanese I400 class submersible carriers could be argued as being a super ship type. Some history: A heavy cruiser (CH) or armored cruiser (CA) is a lighter ship type compared to the capital ship type of a battlecruiser (BC). Battle fleets, like any other military entity, function based on offense and defense countering one another. IE you build a ship to carry out a specific function and I in turn build a new warship or modify my current warships counter to it. So how does that apply to your CH vs BC question? Well when light and heavy cruisers made their debut in the navies of the world, naval architects began thinking of a counter to these new warships. The Royal Navy's First Sea Lord, Admiral Jackie Fisher, proposed a new capital ship type based off of the battleship. He did this for numerous reasons but two that stand out are that he did not want his primary capital warships, his battleships, tied up chasing faster cruisers. Something they were ill equipped to do. Furthermore he needed his battleships to engage enemy battleships. That said, he needed a faster, bigger, heavily armed warship to decisively kill enemy cruisers then to assist the main battle line in putting steel onto enemy capital warships. So he looked at current battleships and devised a variant that reduced their armor to levels below that of a battleship but above that of armored cruisers, while retaining their heavier capital armament. This reduction in armor weight allowed this new ship type, dubbed battlecruisers, to quickly engage and destroy attacking cruisers. Differences: Heavy cruisers typically displaced (weighed) between 8,000 to 12,000 tons. They were armed with 8" primary gun mounts (we don't refer to them as turrets) with torpedoes, and the following dual purpose (anti air/anti surface) 5" secondary mounts, 40mm, 20mm, and .50cal mounts. CH/CA were designed to participate in large fleet & task forces operations or act alone in independent operations if need be. They could counter light cruisers leading destroyer squadrons and were also adept as commerce raisers. Battlecruisers displaced anywhere between 10,000 to 46,000+ tons (though they could in theory be heavier) and mounted primary guns ranging in caliber from 11" to 15". Secondary dual purpose 5" guns, and various triple A dual purpose auto cannon and small arms. Where CH/CA were design to hammer lighter cruisers and escort vessels the BC were designed as a bigger hammer to smash cruisers. Hope this helps explain the differences =^^= if you have any questions please ask. I tend to get wordy lol Take care =^^=
As anyone who's played world of tanks knows, mobility without armor is fine so long as you play to your advantages. The British Admiralty was a bit stuffed up its own arse it seems in learning how to use such things.
Time and time again, new strategies have "failed" because of backward uses by outmoded commanders. When the concept of commandos was first put forward, lots of them were wasted in futile frontal attacks, and battles of attrition. The same issue here with battlecruisers. The problem was, the temptation to use them to help search out the enemy, in the days before radar. And the temptation to subsequently add their considerable firepower to the attack, putting them in harms way. They replay the same problem, in WW2 with the Hood.
There's a lot of misconception about the so called failed design of the BCs. Current data research is revealing exactly why the BC designs failed at Jutland and it had nothing to do with their designs which were appropriate for the fleet actions they were to participate in. The reason they exploded as they did was that Royal Navy gunners and ammunition handlers were instructed by gun captains to have stocks of ammunition and powder laid out unprotected so as to facilitate a higher initial ROF (Rate Of Fire). They also compromised the safety of the ship by leaving the ammunition elevators open. When their armor was defeated and these gun mounts (we gunners do not call them turrets) armor defense was compromised, the resulting propellant fire would result in a catastrophic casualty failure of the compartmentalization safety protocols. The fire would kill everyone and vaporize everything inside as well as spread to the main mags. Once the warheads onboard the heavy projectiles detonated the overpressure wave and thermo energy wave would seal the fate of the warship. It's a horrific cascade failure. The WWI BC designs were sound but somewhere at sometime the weapons division culture became complacent and that will more than likely get you and your shipmates killed. Regarding the HMS Hood. Modern studies have found that her keel was over burdened by all of the modernization and life extension refits the RN had performed on her. When she was in a heavy sea state it was not uncommon for her weather deck to completely submerge. When the Bismarck was detected she was such a great treat to the supply lifeline to keep Britain in the fight at a time when she was the only European nation left standing against the leftist Nazis, that every warship was dispatched. There was not a convey escort that could stand against a super battleship being deployed as a surface commerce raider. What's more is that left alone she could have wiped out entire convoys by herself. When Hood was deployed against Bismarck it was done so out of necessity knowing she was outclassed. This only points to the courage of both crews. The Bismarck did my way to engage Hood and the Hood crew was cautious about going after a super BB. Veterans on both sides sad they were surprised when both capital warships ran into one another and both were concerned. Hood did not die due to incompetence, she was destroyed out of a necessity to save the countless lives of merchantmen and the life of the UK. I love these kinds of historical discussions. Especially the naval forces since I'm a fourth gen navy vet =^^=
Super BB? She had 8 15" guns making Bismarcks Fire power = to hoods. The only difference was Bismarck was far more heavily armoured, and her new reloading system ment she could fire rounds faster, speed was about the same. Plus I would argue it wasn't a hopeless attack as prinz Eugen could easily go down if struck by a 14"/15" shell. Furthermore as you are awear Prince of Wales at ten 14" guns more powerful than the old MK I 15" was present, with hood. Prince of Wales further more could manage 28knots and had a fancy new reloading system as well, also it's armour was = if not greater than bismarcks. If any thing the british would have tatical advantage it was extreme luck Bismarck 15" shell hit hoods less armoured back half. It was also lucky that prince of Wales aft quadruple turret malfunctioned.
Lionwolf0777 The ammunition handling practices present throughout the Royal Navy during WWI were a crucial factor in the loss of the 3 BCs at Jutland. However, it was the lack of armor on the ships themselves that allowed German fire to reach the improperly handled powder. Consider that the four Queen Elizabeth-class ships were also under heavy fire for an extended period in the same battle. They undoubtedly handled their ammunition in the same dangerous way, but their armor was strong enough to prevent enemy shells from reaching it. The real problem with the battlecruiser concept, as implemented by the British, was that they never considered the prospect of those ships having to face comparable enemy vessels. They were designed to fight their way through cruiser screens made up of existing armored cruiser designs, which they could easily do. But as typically happens in warfare, once one side comes up with a good idea, the other side will start copying it. This meant that the British BCs instead had to fight screens of enemy BCs with similar armaments, which they were not designed to handle. That's the reason that the concept of a "balanced ship" became so prevalent; if a ship carries armor strong enough to resist the fire of its own weapons, then it should in theory be able to stand up to a similar ship on the other side. The British BCs were not balanced, whereas the German BCs were. While the German BCs were undergunned and slow by British standards, they fared better in a battle between comparable ships because their balanced design was able to handle it.
+bohba13 Battlecruisers were "dreadnoughts". Two main characteristics of a "dreadnought" were turbine power plant and all-big-guns armament rather than class.
Origami Chiken I'm using the dreadnaught term to refer to the slower more heavily armored and armed BBs the royal navy had. A battle cruiser has a totally different role than a dreadnaught, a CC is a cruiser with BB guns made to respond quickly to threats and chase down wounded or slow cruisers, a dreadnaught is a BB with large guns, and lots of armor, making it slow and powerful, whereas the CC, designed for speed, had less armor, one of the key components of a dreadnaught is armor, something most CCs lacked.
bohba13 From what i've read, the whole concept of a dreadnought was - speed is the best armour. "Dreadnough" was not a class of ship like cruiser or battleship. It was a design concept. Comparing "dreadnought vs battlecruiser" makes little sense as battlecruisers WERE dreadnoughts. Just the same as turbine powered all-big-guns battleships were dreadnoughts. The fact that Germans outdid British in this whole "dreadnought" matter is entirely different can of worms.
Alright, I'm just saying this as many of the US BBs, especially the NY class and Wyoming class are Dreadnaughts and are quite slow when compared to the kongo class battle cruiser / fast BB and the Myogi, both lack armor like that of the NY and Wyoming, but exchange that for speed
There is a certain irony that despite being the largest and most experienced Navy in the world at the time, the Royal Navy didn't perform well during WW1. They won the naval war more by virtue of sheer numbers than anything else. By contrast, the Germans were superb despite their own Navy being quite new.
Always makes me wonder if all the honour and tradition (a poweful force in of itself) stopped the Naval architects from being as innovative as ze germans.
I think the Royal navy were incredibly innovative in their designs, the Dreadnought was the best result of that. But we also had some whacky ideas, the battlecruiser was a good idea in the way it was deployed in the Falklands but not in a battleship scouting role. For innovative have a look at the proposed HMS incomparable, a light battleship with 20 inch guns and a 35 knot speed - really cannot see the logic in going so far with the concept! Fortunately the war ended before they could be built (and they were converted into aircraft carriers), the idea was to use them in shallower waters I believe.But in a way concentrating on speed was ahead of its time, fast forward to the WW2 and battleships that could not achieve 25-30 knots were found to be just to slow for anything other than defensive duties. I don't think the gunnery was poor in the Royal navy either, the Falklands for example was a case of rough seas and fighting downwind of the smoke (Spee deliberately did his best to gain every advantage - surprised though we did not close in, but maybe Sturdee was playing it safe and using his range advantage). Really all gunnery ranges had increased rapidly far beyond the targeting, in WW2 the targeting caught up somewhat.In speed vs armour the Germans certainly got a better ratio (our Elizabeth class battleships though were excellent), but there is/was a certain tradition in the Royal Navy of single minded concentration on the destruction of your foe, and carrying larger guns than armour was just another aspect of it.
Well In the battlecruiser department anyway.. just been reading about HMS Argus- she was essentially the worlds first carrier, an insane innovation for the time.
Well In the battlecruiser department anyway.. just been reading about HMS Argus- she was essentially the worlds first carrier, an insane innovation for the time.
'Royal Navy didn't perform well during WW1' Really? How is that? Because a few more ships were sunk at Jutland? Did the Soviets really lose WW2 because the Germans killed millions more of the Red army than they did? The RN won the majority of the sea combat and could afford the losses it too easily, whilst every loss the Germans suffered was virtually irreplaceable. Much the same narrative in WW2.
At the end of this, they tell the problems that caused the British ships to fail. Short-cutting all of the safety regs in order to fire faster than was possible. They left all of the safety particions open so they could fire faster. Better they should have aimed better and not kept the powder left everywhere it could do the most harm. Remember when you pull the pin, Mr handgrenaid is no longer your friend.
GreatMindsofEarth As was said early in the video they were built as cruisers. But once they used the name battlecruiser it was inevitable they would find themselves up against much more heavily armoured ships. The two battles really highlight the strengths and weaknesses of this type of ship. Designed to outgun anything they could outrun and outrun anything they couldn't outgun.
Future World of Warship players can learn a lot from this history lesson. Use your vessel in the role best suited to it, unless there is an emergency situation. Otherwise, you are handing any advantage your vessel may possess back over to your enemy.
One of the big issues about the British battlecruisers and their use on the main line slugging it out with battleships is that there was basically no other choice. Not bringing the battlecruisers would have seriously eroded the British advantage in firepower. That brings us to the main issue I have with the British battlecruisers: That they were built at all. Those resources would have been better spent on building proper battleships and more cruisers in stead.
I also agree with u about that the battle cruiser wasn't a flaw, but used for the wrong purpose. I don't know too much about WW1, but I know a lot about WW2 and in ww2 the RN did use there BCs wrong, as u may know the HMS Hood was sunk because of this mistake.
avers fudge Its hard to say whether they used it wrong or whether they wanted to take the Risk bringing Bismark to a fight.... In reality although it is not really seen as such the Hood Vs Bismark was a victory in the end , The Royal Navy had ships to spare the Germans did not and risking a 30 year old battlecruiser in exchange for a brand new 45,000 ton battleship they probably thought was worth it , Lets remember the POW is certainly a match for Bismark in all respects if it was not still on a bloody sea trial... I would be curious to see how the Battle would have fared with the KGV and POW instead of the POW and HOOD , The KGV had proper battleship armor and it is said that POW had no problem Catching Bismark so i have my doubts the Bismark really had a 2 knots speed advantage under full load. POW would still have gunnery problems because it was brand new and had an inexperienced crew , KGV on the other hand worked just fine as was shown against the Scharnhoerst where the only problem was a slight dip in rate of fire due to crew fattigue after 40 mins of battle. We know the 14 Inch guns was able to Penetrate Bismark as she took 3 Brutal hits from the POW that was causing her some serious issues.
+Jason Muir From everything I've read, none of the three hits Bismarck suffered from PoW actually penetrated her main armored belt. The three hits were in the bow above the waterline, the torpedo bulkhead well below the waterline, and a shell that effectively skimmed over the decks and clipped parts of the equipment there. None of those areas had more than minimal armor, as they were either not part of the "vital" areas of the ship protected within the main citadel, or (in the case of the second hit) were in an area protected by the torpedo defense system rather than the armor meant to stop shells. Furthermore, examination of the Bismarck's wreck presents strong evidence against the idea that her armor could have been penetrated so easily. The wreck showed almost no penetrations in the main armor belt, either from KGV's 14-inch guns, or from Rodney's 16-inch guns. The Bismarck's wreck showed ample evidence that many of KGV's shots in particular bounced off the armor rather than doing any major damage. The damage that was done to Bismarck in her final battle came primarily from hits to the superstructure, gun directors, and other areas that knocked out Bismarck's key systems without actually penetrating and destroying them.
Wolfeson28 Although you are absolutely right about the Main citadel being near impenetrable by the KGV 14 Inch guns. I was referring to the hit that ruptured Bismarks fuel tanks and also another hit that penetrated just forward of the Armored belt causing 1000's of tons of seawater to flood the ship. It's also worth noting that Both KGV and POW where no slouches when it came to Armor and had a very nice Armored belt of there own.... The question is i guess whether or not KGV and POW could take the pounding long enough to do a repeat of Bismarks last battle.
+Jason Muir I think there was only a one knot difference in speed between the KGV class and the Bismarck- which probably equalled out in the long run as Bismarck carried a greater weight. The PoW didn't even have a fully trained crew when it was sent to Singapore- especially AA training. I vaguely recall that the PoW's forward four gun turret wasn't working properly, so all of its hits on Bismarck came from its forward two gun turret- I may be wrong on this, but it received seven hits from two ships but gave three back- evens I'd say. I still find it amazing that ships of this size could reach speeds of 35mph.
Sending the Hood after the Bismarck makes perfekt sense as the Mighty Hood was not a battlecruiser in the most common meaning of the word. (A capital ship with battleship guns and cruiser armour and speed). The British definition at the time said nothing about armour, just speed and firepower, so the Hood was classed as a battlecruiser despite having battleship armour. By the more "modern" definitions of WWII she could (perhaps more accurately) be described as a "fast battleship".
like this vid if your hyped for World of Warships :D every vid you put makes me want to play it more :) cant wait to an invincible class battle cruiser (flexible and fast) 'hell yeah!'
The battlecruiser concept was flawed even if they had been used in the role they were designed for. Your rival (i.e. Germany) immediately replaces his commerce raiding/colony threatening armoured cruisers with battlecruisers of his own and you now have poorly armoured masisvely armed ships hunting other poorly armoured massively armed ships and it turns into a lottery. The Battlecruiser concept only works if your rival is unable to build battlecruisers of their own and your battlecruisers can hunt armoured cruisers, but expecting your rival to not reply to your development is just foolish. The Germans had already immediately copied (possibly bettered) the dreadnought and destroyer concepts in the previous decade after all. Battlecruisers make perfect sense for Germany, being better commerce raiders than armoured cruisers. For Britain they only made sense to counter German battlecruisers, and the Germans only developed battlecruisers because the British showed their hand and built them first. In the end neither side used them either for commerce raiding or protection, nor for attacking colonies. They just bulked out numbers in the battlefleets and became fodder for battleships.
+DoddyIshamel not really as Germany lacked the strategic coaling, ammunition stores and radio stations etc to be able to use battlecruisers outside the European theatre even if they wanted to the they could not have fuelled them or had anywhere near the degree of command and control, logistics and intelligence to be able to operate these ships especially as the vast majority of telegraph lines for long distance communication were owned by the British who did completely cut Germany off within the first week of the war and Germany lacked the capability to build their own network. Due to the Geographic position of the British Empire and its overseas based the UK were completely unique in this capability
"See how politicians change the meanings of words, simply to make political points? Tsk, tsk, childish mistake. Just as bad as calling a ship "KM Deustschland". Only ill can come of it." --Captain Crunch, commander of the Crunchberry Ferry, recently renamed: HMS Sugar Bowl.
OK thanks for the info on ship and class but imo your missing 1 point in the game i am hope to 1) learn or 2) get fixed. That is the aiming of your guns onto a ship. now 1st i know and dont want to just point and shot and bang there dead cause it would be the same for me.. BUT HERE THE POINT: zoom in on target look at lt read as enemy ship is a CL 10.5 away heading to the left and shell will take 8.5 sec to reach target ship.. in the zoom there a range finder a exmaple L j L j L j L # j L j L j L j O j L j L j L j L j L j L j L a center mark and 14 hash marks for distance and time i'll leave up and down out the # is were you should move your lead to and fire for effect, But this is not the case you miss by a scale and a half at times so there ready no planing in a shot in battle or a attack is all a guess and zoom not of much used cause you can't keep firing adjust reload fire again adjust your ship will hit something in time. NOW i know Azimuth and fire for affect is or was the way in the world wars but also system like Stadiametric and range sight Marked gave Artillery a fair change of hitting the target.. Please do a video on targeting and aiming, Player at start of game fire blindly between island in hole of hitting a player going that way , not what would happen in a real battle but its a game and ammo is free to used.. Its a very good game and has great future love DD and CL cleveland a good ship. but i can aim to not only save my life but that of my team mates HELP Please thank you for the videos so far. you have done so many you must have insight into this.. I want to do better so anyone with a helping hand let me know at jjmmurphy@hotmail.com
Ironic that the Kongo is a British ship then. Seriously though the Invincible was the first battle cruiser ever made, so its makes sense the ones after are stronger.
I will say I really enjoy this series, I have been sitting here all day watching it. (My husband thanks you for the break).
Good program!
I think this is your best RUclips video. It's also the one where you speak a great deal. The information you verbally give us is better than anything we get out of the documentaries.
Your analysis of the battlecruiser problem is elegant and correct. I hope you give us more of that. I want to know what you think, not documentary videos.
PaulfromChicago Thank you :D most of my more recent videos in this series have shifted to this format :)
Chase did you know that there was another british capital ship here during the battle of the falklands the pre dreadnought hms canopus and she saved the battlecruisers from being shot up at there moorings. Was beached in whale bone cove and fired the 1st shots Of the battle and the aft guns scored a hit! The hit was what made von spee turn out to sea.
I love these clips you put together Chase.
Thomas Hockin and thank you :)
Thanks for putting this video together and sharing on youtube. I found it very informative and insightful, learning more about the history and role of the ship. I recently traced a family relative who served as a signalman on the invincible. The huge loss of lives (on both sides) and the manner in which people died at sea was truly tragic and such a waste of lives.
Yet another great video. Can't wait for a video on the County class cruisers, my favorites. The black and white top and side shot is of the Indefatigable class, their bigger, faster, and more poorly armored successors. The armor plate bolted over the amidships turret barbettes is the easiest way to tell them apart from the Invinceables 😊
What I took away from the bit about turret lay out:
They put the turrets like that to *intensify forward firepower!*
I really enjoy these videos! Thank you Chase!
great informative series look forward to seeing more :)
The problem was powder handling shortcuts taken for rate of fire. Specifically bringing powder up from the magazines before it was to be used and leaving hatches open for ease of handling.
Wrote that before I got to 17:00.
+Philip Edwards The over storing of cordite was endemic amongst all British warships of the time, for centuries the RN had put great emphasis in rate of fire so were misusing the barbet system. Beatty had two options; he could have stayed a certain distance away from the German fleet as his ships' guns had- on paper at least- a greater range, or he could get in close, making his battlecruisers less vulnerable to plunging fire. Sadly, he did neither.
Staying at range would probably not have been practical anyway. The range advantage of the British guns were not that significant and the effective range is more governed by the optical rangefinders than the guns themselves and at that point the Germans were superior.
Argumentative Piece of shit
Not saying you're wrong, but the Battlecruiser was never intended to be used in the main battle line, they were intended to be an Uber-cruiser, so superior to other cruisers as to render them obselete.
Had they never been used at Jutland, they would have been seen as a success.
Argumentative Piece of shit
Again, I'm not saying you're wrong, the British Battlecruisers were just too lightly armoured for use in any kind of fleet action, while the German Battlecruisers were an effective part of the High Seas Fleet, as seen at Jutland.
The Seydlitz, the most heavily damaged survivor of Jutland is a testament to that designs worth.
Excellent video. Robert Massie's "Castles of Steel" and "The Great War at Sea" by Richard Hough have good information on the battlecruisers, and their misuse. They also discuss how the Germans learned proper ammunition handling and flash safeguards at the Battle of Dogger Bank in 1915. SMS Seydlitz was nearly destroyed in the same way that Invincible and the others would be at Jutland.
Really been enjoying your series. Im using a 3 yr old laptop that strains in World of Tanks so applying for Warships Beta isn't valid for me. Hope the game comes out soon. Find your vids, clear language, no swearing and multiple sources of information is well combined with gameplay and game mechanics.
Brian Laxson :) thank you and I hope to provide you with more ^_^ so stay tuned
World of Warships - Know Your Ship! - Invincible Class Battlecruisers - Episode 35
I love your videos, keep them coming!
Ryan Korte Thank you will be making loads more :)
great series and very good info... Thanks
William2020a Thank you ^_^
The problem was not just that day, but from the beginning. If you are going to give ships battleship grade guns, then it needs battleship grade protection. It would also be a good idea to not negate flash protection.
Thanks for this iCG, fascinating insight into battle cruisers. I view them (probably incorrectly) as an old 5th or 6th rate ship of the line.
Moggster23 You're very welcome :)
The issue with them as rapid response squadrons was rather or not they could make enough of them. If you only have 1 squadron for the whole of the pacific it's not going to work very well. A larger number of lighter ships are more flexible. Chasing down surface ships they could do well but they couldn't do much else, especially after the danger to merchant ships became submarines they weren't of use anymore. Instead destroyers and even lighter corvettes became more prominent.
RDF: Rapid Deployment Force, best explaination of a Battlecruiser I've ever heard. Tip O' the Hat.
Rapid Disastrous Failure would also be fitting :P
um...that fits Armed Merchant Cruisers...like the Olympic and Britanic, more than a properly deployed BC. When used as intended, as a long range commerce raider, they could have a profound impact. As the German Pacific force did prior to Japan's intervention..
I wonder how they'd've done as oil powered vs coal..
Panzerdeal BC´s were not intended as long range commerce raiders. They were (the British at least) intended to hunt long range commerce raiders. And while they are excellent cruiser killers, they are also way overpriced for the job. Keep in mind that most British BCs were as expensive as battleships or more!
And airplanes were not intended as weapons of war...but it happened. Aircraft carriers were not intended as landing craft...yet I refer you to the landing assault carriers used by the marines...notably memorable is the Iwo Jima class...
Tragically, it was that same mind set that doomed HMS HOOD during WWII, when she was sent out to stop the BISMARCK. She was the biggest and last of the "battlecruiser" type built by the British, possessing the same philosophy flaw that her predecessors had. Fast, powerful, but fragile. Hood was supposed to get a major refit, but was pressed into service by the outbreak of the war. When confronted with the Bismarck, she was destroyed because battlecruisers were never designed to go mano-a-mano with BATTLESHIPS, since they had no hope of hanging in against heavy shells that could easily pierce their 'cruiser' armor.
Very excellent video
Randy Johnson Thank you :)
Can't wait for your 60 minute video on intrepid
thats sort of like kisier class how the guns are placed
What are those objects on the side of the hull, that come down from the deck to near the water line?
Margaret Fortune. A late reply I know but if you are talking about the poles that line the flanks of the hull they are supports for anti torpedo nets usually deployed while the ship was at anchor.
Hope these beauties are put into World of Warships.
It would be nice to have all the authentic WW1 warship footage, After that CGI footage.
I wonder whether theyre going to put these along with Hood in their own line since theyre not quite cruisers and not quite BBs. Either way, I imagine they'll have a stunning rate of fire (for BBs) but will get citadel'd like crazy
Probably not as there´s already precedent for putting battlecruisers in the Japanese battleship-line: The Kongo class for instance. (No matter how much the Japanese insist that the Kongo´s were upgraded to battleships, they weren't. They had no where near enough armour to be properly classed as a battleship.)
I think the battlecruisers were flawed in that they were as expensive as battleships. That makes it far too risky to use them separately as they could get trapped and destroyed without support. In addition to the risks their expenses made it so that there were so few in number they couldn't deal with multiple raiders without spreading themselves too thinly.
Don't think of it that way. Think of it like this, they were used for a purpose they were not supposed to be used in, it's not that the ships themselves are bad for all reasons, they were actually good at what they were supposed to do.
What were they supposed to be used for? As scouts it was risky because they were so costly so naval admirals were reluctant to push them into unfamiliar waters. The one thing they did do well is chase down raiders but they couldn't do much outside of that. They were meant also as escorts but escorts is all about numbers and the cost made them too few for escort duty.
There are several reasons why 3 British battlecruisers were lost on that day, lack of armour and ammunition handling goes without saying, but what isn't realized is that British cordite (the shell propellant) was unstable and apt to flash rather than burn and it deteriorated with age, German cordite was much more stable. Also the deployment of the ships contributed to their destruction, battlecruisers were designed to fight smaller enemy ships with speed to catch them and speed to escape if something the same size should come into view, but what naval commander could resist putting as many big guns as possible into the line of battle? All the battlecruisers advantages were therefore lost.
CBT announced. CBT starts and NDA ends on the 12th. Don't believe me? Check.
Its quite amusing but sad that Britain always seemed to invent everything, but was always out-competed in their designs later on. Things like the Ironclad, Drednought and Tank were revolutionary and changed warfare forever but little old england could never keep up.
Things not invented by British designers like the Aeroplane, Machine gun and Tea were developed brilliantly by the British to the point of domination.
Anyone else see a trend here?
A very good point indeed! :)
Jamraptor. Hi Cant think of to many naval battles the Royal Navy has lost in the past fine hundred years. The Challenger 2 is still understood to be among the very best in the world. I don't think you could name better frigates or subs in any modern navy. Even on D Day the only allied tank capable of taking the Germans on was the Firefly a British modified tank.
I think you have made a fool out of yourself. Better luck next time.
Is that really true though? The enemies the UK was facing knew up to a decade in advance they were going to be facing/instigating a huge war and spent huge portions of their GDP on their militaries to buff them up and get the best designs possible. The Kaiser was half bankrupting Germany to build up a massive fleet whilst the nazi's and Japan spent half their budget on the military and had years and years to prepare. Meanwhile the UK like the US and France were simply occasionally updating their ships, tanks, etc, to keep up to times, often sacrificing capability for decreased cost.
Wanderer628 I think what you've identified is the difference between the military policies of fascist dictatorships compared to liberal democracies. Britain often invented things as a way of making things more efficient, comfortable and effective, as a pose to a focus on aggressive warmongering/arms races.
look at what the british invented for carriers in the jet age. angled flight deck, steam catapult and the light system (forget the name) used by planes to land safely.
I'm a big fan of the German battlecruisers. They didn't have the insane speed of the Royal Navy battlecruisers, but they were still fast. Their armament wasn't that much behind their British counterparts, and they could take a pounding and continue to fight.
Indeed. Tirpitz stated that the primary responsibility of a warship is to remain afloat. Their ships were built accordingly.
SpaceGhost1984 Yeah and I think it was a good principle. I'd say similar things about American and British carriers in WWII. The Royal Navy knew that the Fleet Air Arm had sub-par aircraft (early part of WWII British carrier aviation was really behind the curve), but it would take too long to design/built/put into service better ones, so the first thing they did was build really tough carriers. The US Navy put a strong emphasis on fire fighting, damage control, and stuff like isolating fuel and ammo stowage. Our carriers took a beating before they went down. Japan, who admittedly hardly had any purpose built carriers, didn't armor theirs like Britain, or emphasize damage control/fire fighting or safety like the US Navy. Their ships took a few hits and became unsalvageable bonfires that had to be abandoned, or just sank outright.
Captain_Dorja it seems like the only durable carriers the ijn had were the shokaku and the zuikaku. but there were only two of them. shokaku survived major battle damage from 1000lb bombs at coral sea and Santa Cruz and only the torpedo strikes from USS cavalla during the battle of the Philippine sea proved fatal. the shokaku's damage control was among the best in the kido butai. during the battle of Santa Cruz possibly as many as 6 1000lb bombs may have hit her, those bombs being powerful enough to damage a battleship. she survived somehow and went on to fight at the Philippine sea battle. they are still in my opinion the best class of carrier the Japanese ever put to sea. damage control is a very important factor in a ships survival at sea and a good captain will train his crew on damage control and have regular drills done to ensure they know how to contain any damage they suffer.
Back in the day, the British High Command thought that the faster you fired your guns the more power you delivered! Unfortunatly there came a down side to that in that the safety devices in the shell and powder delivery systems as using them slowed the firing of the guns. So the safety devices were bypassed and to get the speed that the High command wanted.
This put the shells and powder bags in the companion ways to get the speed wanted!! That worked well in practice but in actually doing this in combat was real dumb as any hit would set off the powder and end the fight quickly. "Something seems to be wrong with our ships today"
Thomas Hockin Yup, too many shortcuts = disaster. They actually could have avoided the ships sinking had they actually kept to safe handling
Considering the RN was born at a time were this shoot reload as quick as you can logic was effective. It wasn't suprising they continued to do so. But let's not forget the German navy was a new development and it had only ever known a world of large rifles and thick armour, not to mention Germanys army was already the best at gunnery in mainland Europe.
Nice job this ship looks like the fuso class bb maybe it was the same designer
alex ho I think the Japanese designers of the Fuso had access to British designs when they were designing their Kongo class battlecruisers
Really interesting thanks :)
Richard B :)
Very Cool Series. Have you done the LST, as in D-Day and up into Vietnam (when my uncle served aboard one)?
iChase what do you think of PT Boats, or to be more specific, the possibility of implementing them in WoWs as a small premium Destroyer?
Julopabene Bananenplantage I think the devs have said it won't happen
:(
Hey chase,
maby you could do a episode about the sms seydlitz or the deffinger class.
these cruisers dit survive a hell of a load damage, and the sms seydlitz was eaven quit active during the war.
its turrets got burnd out a few times and survived the war, to be scuttled with the hole fleet.
Roeno1997
last sentence is about the sms seydlitz
befor i forget nice episode. didn't know a load of thins
I agree. The derflinnger was raged as the best ww1 battle cruiser so i would like to see an episode on it
What class is this ship going to be in the game? Maybe the crusier class?
Jim Nicholas I'm guessing an early tier UK battlecruiser line (although battlecruisers are not currently implemented as their own line)
holy fuck the superstructure facing the thunnel at 2:30 really triggers my ocd
right at the thunnels on the front superstructure it slopes left and on the bottom it slopes right
mah ocd
The biggest flaw the British battlecruisers had were that they were not that much less expensive than proper battleship. The Lion class (if I remember correctly) was more expensive than contemporary battleships.
I don't think the cost could be a flaw, if they had only been used to hunt down and catch enemy cruisers then the class would have been perfect (the Hood initially hunted for the Graf Spee in WW2, if she had caught her the fight would have been very one sided!). But pressing them into the main line in a battleship encounter seems reckless, and not building fast battleships and then having to rely on a battlecruiser to catch the Bismark was more a result of lack of ship building in the Royal navy pre-WW2.I think the best description of a battlecruiser was a battleship with less armour fitted and instead more engines added, in that case they never were going to be (much) cheaper, but its an expensive ace card to play against any cruisers trying to raid your shipping.
I respectfully disagree tough you do have a point. The Battle of the Falkland Islands during WWI was a perfect example of battlecruisers used the right way. The German cruisers had no chance at all against the British battlecruisers. However, and here is what I mean by their cost being their biggest flaw, the job could have been done just as well by a large cruiser task force at a much lower cost. If the battlecruisers had not been built, the British would either have more battleships or vastly larger number of cruisers in stead.
Now, definitions/classifications of ships have never been a particularly exact science. The German battlecruisers for instance had lower calibre guns than battleships, but vastly more armour than the British battlecruisers. At the battle of Jutland the Germans only lost one battlecruiser, the SMS Lützow, and that only after it took 24 heavy calibre hits and sunk one British battlecruiser and an armoured cruiser (HMS Invincible and HMS Defence). And even then most of her crew survived.
The Hood is a very interesting example of classification-confusion. By the definitions of WWII she was a fast battleship! The British called her a battlecruiser because she had battleship guns and cruiser speed. (The British definition at the time said nothing about armour). She reached her impressive speed not by sacrificing armour (as the Lion class battlecruiser for instance) but simply by having enormously powerful engines.
I think we agree on the two most important points tough.
1: British-type battlecruisers (battleship size and guns, cruiser speed and armour) should never have been used on the main battle line. They are utterly unsuited to face battleships (or even German-type battlecruisers apparently).
2: British-type battlecruisers are fantastic cruiser killers! Used for their intended purpose, they are absolute beasts.
The one point we disagree on is if they are actually worth their immense cost. I think they aren't. The fact is that the British battlecruisers were more expensive than their proper battleship sisters. You could get a cruiser AND a battleship for the price of one battlecruiser. Had those resources been evenly split between cruisers and battleships, you would have gotten a far stronger main line as well as a far larger number of cruisers to counter the enemy cruisers with, and I think that would have been a much more efficient use of funds.
the brits didn't build them thinking they would be in any cheaper, it was all to do with tactics and how they wanted to use their fleet of battlecrusiers that ended up terribly flawed, they didn't really care that much about the cost in those days
True, the brits were well aware of the cost of these machines and did think they were worth it when they made them. And their downfall were mostly due to how they were (mis)used at Jutland. As I said, they worked excellently at the Falklands.
However, I still maintain that those resources would have been better spent on battleships and cruisers as the battlecruisers really weren't worth the investment even when used properly.
That´s what it always boils down to: Bang for the buck. (They DID provide a lot of bang at Jutland, but not in a good way :P )
I'll bet that's not the way they were taught to load those shells? That's what they said and you and at the end then to. 1800 yards is only a little over a mile vs Big Mo's 16" guns at over 20 miles.
Mr. Midshipman It was a philosophy to fire as quickly as possible (some have suggested it was to compensate for rather poor fire control) so it resulted in many shortcuts being taken
Your comparing the first ever battlecruisers to the last untied states battleship that came 30+ year after?
Calemb Jackman I never heard of those ships, "last untied states battleships" They should tied em up and they wouldn't been the last then.
The last to be designed and built.
They are the last if they aren't planning to builed anymore.
Enjoyed this vid. a lt thanks :)
Richard B Anytime :D
Hold on, so those Dreadnought Era battlecruisers have actually fought two Scharnhorst class BB and a Deutschland class pocket battleship????
Andry Randrianantoandro no, there were 2 sets of ships with those names, the ones in ww1 that the Invincible and Indefatigable fought were armoured cruisers.
HMA Victory thank you for the information, I didn't know that
so whats the diff between a Battlecruiser and a heavy cruiser?
Larger guns. I believe heavy cruisers had max caliber of 9 to 10 inch guns.
Heavy cruisers were far smaller wih smaller caliber guns - 8 inch usually. Battlecruisers were the size of battleships with battleship arnament with high speed but thre armor was as bad as cruisers
Hi Vince =^^=
I'm a fourth generation US Navy vet and I love military weapons history so here's a basic breakdown of naval terminology and ship type classification.
Here's a list of ship types with explanations following =^^=
Fleet Types:
Escorts, Cruisers, Capital, & Super Capital.
Ship Types:
Escorts:
The lightest ship types of a battle fleet including corvettes, frigates, & destroyers.
Cruisers:
Medium weight warships including light cruiser, escort cruisers (anti aircraft artillery) & heavy cruisers (aka armored cruisers).
Capital:
These are the heavies including light battlecruisers (aka pocket battleships), battlecruisers, dreadnoughts, super dreadnoughts, fast battleships, battleships, light carriers, & fleet carriers.
Super Capital:
There are very few warships that occupy this special class of warship. They evolved during WWII. The only nation with functioning super capital warships currently is the US Navy's super battle carriers.
During WWII these only included the IJN (Japanese) super battleships Yamato, Mushashi, & super carrier Shinano. KMS (German) super battleships Bismarck & Tirpitz. The Japanese I400 class submersible carriers could be argued as being a super ship type.
Some history:
A heavy cruiser (CH) or armored cruiser (CA) is a lighter ship type compared to the capital ship type of a battlecruiser (BC).
Battle fleets, like any other military entity, function based on offense and defense countering one another. IE you build a ship to carry out a specific function and I in turn build a new warship or modify my current warships counter to it.
So how does that apply to your CH vs BC question? Well when light and heavy cruisers made their debut in the navies of the world, naval architects began thinking of a counter to these new warships.
The Royal Navy's First Sea Lord, Admiral Jackie Fisher, proposed a new capital ship type based off of the battleship. He did this for numerous reasons but two that stand out are that he did not want his primary capital warships, his battleships, tied up chasing faster cruisers. Something they were ill equipped to do. Furthermore he needed his battleships to engage enemy battleships. That said, he needed a faster, bigger, heavily armed warship to decisively kill enemy cruisers then to assist the main battle line in putting steel onto enemy capital warships.
So he looked at current battleships and devised a variant that reduced their armor to levels below that of a battleship but above that of armored cruisers, while retaining their heavier capital armament.
This reduction in armor weight allowed this new ship type, dubbed battlecruisers, to quickly engage and destroy attacking cruisers.
Differences:
Heavy cruisers typically displaced (weighed) between 8,000 to 12,000 tons. They were armed with 8" primary gun mounts (we don't refer to them as turrets) with torpedoes, and the following dual purpose (anti air/anti surface) 5" secondary mounts, 40mm, 20mm, and .50cal mounts.
CH/CA were designed to participate in large fleet & task forces operations or act alone in independent operations if need be. They could counter light cruisers leading destroyer squadrons and were also adept as commerce raisers.
Battlecruisers displaced anywhere between 10,000 to 46,000+ tons (though they could in theory be heavier) and mounted primary guns ranging in caliber from 11" to 15". Secondary dual purpose 5" guns, and various triple A dual purpose auto cannon and small arms.
Where CH/CA were design to hammer lighter cruisers and escort vessels the BC were designed as a bigger hammer to smash cruisers.
Hope this helps explain the differences =^^= if you have any questions please ask. I tend to get wordy lol
Take care =^^=
Lionwolf0777 tyvm
You bet =^^=
As anyone who's played world of tanks knows, mobility without armor is fine so long as you play to your advantages.
The British Admiralty was a bit stuffed up its own arse it seems in learning how to use such things.
Maddog3060 Exactly X_x
Time and time again, new strategies have "failed" because of backward uses by outmoded commanders. When the concept of commandos was first put forward, lots of them were wasted in futile frontal attacks, and battles of attrition. The same issue here with battlecruisers.
The problem was, the temptation to use them to help search out the enemy, in the days before radar. And the temptation to subsequently add their considerable firepower to the attack, putting them in harms way.
They replay the same problem, in WW2 with the Hood.
There's a lot of misconception about the so called failed design of the BCs.
Current data research is revealing exactly why the BC designs failed at Jutland and it had nothing to do with their designs which were appropriate for the fleet actions they were to participate in.
The reason they exploded as they did was that Royal Navy gunners and ammunition handlers were instructed by gun captains to have stocks of ammunition and powder laid out unprotected so as to facilitate a higher initial ROF (Rate Of Fire). They also compromised the safety of the ship by leaving the ammunition elevators open.
When their armor was defeated and these gun mounts (we gunners do not call them turrets) armor defense was compromised, the resulting propellant fire would result in a catastrophic casualty failure of the compartmentalization safety protocols. The fire would kill everyone and vaporize everything inside as well as spread to the main mags. Once the warheads onboard the heavy projectiles detonated the overpressure wave and thermo energy wave would seal the fate of the warship. It's a horrific cascade failure.
The WWI BC designs were sound but somewhere at sometime the weapons division culture became complacent and that will more than likely get you and your shipmates killed.
Regarding the HMS Hood. Modern studies have found that her keel was over burdened by all of the modernization and life extension refits the RN had performed on her.
When she was in a heavy sea state it was not uncommon for her weather deck to completely submerge.
When the Bismarck was detected she was such a great treat to the supply lifeline to keep Britain in the fight at a time when she was the only European nation left standing against the leftist Nazis, that every warship was dispatched.
There was not a convey escort that could stand against a super battleship being deployed as a surface commerce raider. What's more is that left alone she could have wiped out entire convoys by herself.
When Hood was deployed against Bismarck it was done so out of necessity knowing she was outclassed. This only points to the courage of both crews. The Bismarck did my way to engage Hood and the Hood crew was cautious about going after a super BB.
Veterans on both sides sad they were surprised when both capital warships ran into one another and both were concerned.
Hood did not die due to incompetence, she was destroyed out of a necessity to save the countless lives of merchantmen and the life of the UK.
I love these kinds of historical discussions. Especially the naval forces since I'm a fourth gen navy vet =^^=
Super BB? She had 8 15" guns making Bismarcks Fire power = to hoods. The only difference was Bismarck was far more heavily armoured, and her new reloading system ment she could fire rounds faster, speed was about the same. Plus I would argue it wasn't a hopeless attack as prinz Eugen could easily go down if struck by a 14"/15" shell. Furthermore as you are awear Prince of Wales at ten 14" guns more powerful than the old MK I 15" was present, with hood. Prince of Wales further more could manage 28knots and had a fancy new reloading system as well, also it's armour was = if not greater than bismarcks. If any thing the british would have tatical advantage it was extreme luck Bismarck 15" shell hit hoods less armoured back half. It was also lucky that prince of Wales aft quadruple turret malfunctioned.
Lionwolf0777 The ammunition handling practices present throughout the Royal Navy during WWI were a crucial factor in the loss of the 3 BCs at Jutland. However, it was the lack of armor on the ships themselves that allowed German fire to reach the improperly handled powder. Consider that the four Queen Elizabeth-class ships were also under heavy fire for an extended period in the same battle. They undoubtedly handled their ammunition in the same dangerous way, but their armor was strong enough to prevent enemy shells from reaching it.
The real problem with the battlecruiser concept, as implemented by the British, was that they never considered the prospect of those ships having to face comparable enemy vessels. They were designed to fight their way through cruiser screens made up of existing armored cruiser designs, which they could easily do. But as typically happens in warfare, once one side comes up with a good idea, the other side will start copying it. This meant that the British BCs instead had to fight screens of enemy BCs with similar armaments, which they were not designed to handle. That's the reason that the concept of a "balanced ship" became so prevalent; if a ship carries armor strong enough to resist the fire of its own weapons, then it should in theory be able to stand up to a similar ship on the other side. The British BCs were not balanced, whereas the German BCs were. While the German BCs were undergunned and slow by British standards, they fared better in a battle between comparable ships because their balanced design was able to handle it.
what is the next ship for know your ship ichase gaming??
when will the next know your ship episode come out?
Alex Peery I will try to get to an episode on the Nagato during this week :) but first I've got to set up other things
iChaseGaming why that when will the independence class aircraft carrier i am inpatient
keep it together alex
Alex Peery I'll try my best to do the Indy after the Nagato
iChaseGaming thanks
vary interesting , i would say the BCs where a good idea , but maybe they where used in a bad way as well?
I think the British should have two BB lines as they that had Dreadnaughts and Battlecruisers
+bohba13
Battlecruisers were "dreadnoughts". Two main characteristics of a "dreadnought" were turbine power plant and all-big-guns armament rather than class.
Origami Chiken I'm using the dreadnaught term to refer to the slower more heavily armored and armed BBs the royal navy had. A battle cruiser has a totally different role than a dreadnaught, a CC is a cruiser with BB guns made to respond quickly to threats and chase down wounded or slow cruisers, a dreadnaught is a BB with large guns, and lots of armor, making it slow and powerful, whereas the CC, designed for speed, had less armor, one of the key components of a dreadnaught is armor, something most CCs lacked.
bohba13
From what i've read, the whole concept of a dreadnought was - speed is the best armour. "Dreadnough" was not a class of ship like cruiser or battleship. It was a design concept. Comparing "dreadnought vs battlecruiser" makes little sense as battlecruisers WERE dreadnoughts. Just the same as turbine powered all-big-guns battleships were dreadnoughts.
The fact that Germans outdid British in this whole "dreadnought" matter is entirely different can of worms.
Alright, I'm just saying this as many of the US BBs, especially the NY class and Wyoming class are Dreadnaughts and are quite slow when compared to the kongo class battle cruiser / fast BB and the Myogi, both lack armor like that of the NY and Wyoming, but exchange that for speed
"I thought Jutland would remind you to watch tour p's and q's"
There is a certain irony that despite being the largest and most experienced Navy in the world at the time, the Royal Navy didn't perform well during WW1. They won the naval war more by virtue of sheer numbers than anything else. By contrast, the Germans were superb despite their own Navy being quite new.
Always makes me wonder if all the honour and tradition (a poweful force in of itself) stopped the Naval architects from being as innovative as ze germans.
I think the Royal navy were incredibly innovative in their designs, the Dreadnought was the best result of that. But we also had some whacky ideas, the battlecruiser was a good idea in the way it was deployed in the Falklands but not in a battleship scouting role. For innovative have a look at the proposed HMS incomparable, a light battleship with 20 inch guns and a 35 knot speed - really cannot see the logic in going so far with the concept! Fortunately the war ended before they could be built (and they were converted into aircraft carriers), the idea was to use them in shallower waters I believe.But in a way concentrating on speed was ahead of its time, fast forward to the WW2 and battleships that could not achieve 25-30 knots were found to be just to slow for anything other than defensive duties. I don't think the gunnery was poor in the Royal navy either, the Falklands for example was a case of rough seas and fighting downwind of the smoke (Spee deliberately did his best to gain every advantage - surprised though we did not close in, but maybe Sturdee was playing it safe and using his range advantage). Really all gunnery ranges had increased rapidly far beyond the targeting, in WW2 the targeting caught up somewhat.In speed vs armour the Germans certainly got a better ratio (our Elizabeth class battleships though were excellent), but there is/was a certain tradition in the Royal Navy of single minded concentration on the destruction of your foe, and carrying larger guns than armour was just another aspect of it.
Well In the battlecruiser department anyway.. just been reading about HMS Argus- she was essentially the worlds first carrier, an insane innovation for the time.
Well In the battlecruiser department anyway.. just been reading about HMS Argus- she was essentially the worlds first carrier, an insane innovation for the time.
'Royal Navy didn't perform well during WW1'
Really? How is that? Because a few more ships were sunk at Jutland? Did the Soviets really lose WW2 because the Germans killed millions more of the Red army than they did? The RN won the majority of the sea combat and could afford the losses it too easily, whilst every loss the Germans suffered was virtually irreplaceable. Much the same narrative in WW2.
At the end of this, they tell the problems that caused the British ships to fail. Short-cutting all of the safety regs in order to fire faster than was possible. They left all of the safety particions open so they could fire faster. Better they should have aimed better and not kept the powder left everywhere it could do the most harm. Remember when you pull the pin, Mr handgrenaid is no longer your friend.
God damnit Beatty, this is your fault!
hope we will get into the beta :D
"speed is armour"
German gunnery was superior at the Falklands. Lucky for Sturdee that the heaviest gun they had was 8.2"
Well, they were NOT named well.
These were pursuit vessels, not sluggers. The British Navy should have listened to that.
GreatMindsofEarth As was said early in the video they were built as cruisers. But once they used the name battlecruiser it was inevitable they would find themselves up against much more heavily armoured ships.
The two battles really highlight the strengths and weaknesses of this type of ship.
Designed to outgun anything they could outrun and outrun anything they couldn't outgun.
Future World of Warship players can learn a lot from this history lesson. Use your vessel in the role best suited to it, unless there is an emergency situation. Otherwise, you are handing any advantage your vessel may possess back over to your enemy.
One of the big issues about the British battlecruisers and their use on the main line slugging it out with battleships is that there was basically no other choice. Not bringing the battlecruisers would have seriously eroded the British advantage in firepower. That brings us to the main issue I have with the British battlecruisers: That they were built at all. Those resources would have been better spent on building proper battleships and more cruisers in stead.
I also agree with u about that the battle cruiser wasn't a flaw, but used for the wrong purpose. I don't know too much about WW1, but I know a lot about WW2 and in ww2 the RN did use there BCs wrong, as u may know the HMS Hood was sunk because of this mistake.
avers fudge Its hard to say whether they used it wrong or whether they wanted to take the Risk bringing Bismark to a fight....
In reality although it is not really seen as such the Hood Vs Bismark was a victory in the end , The Royal Navy had ships to spare the Germans did not and risking a 30 year old battlecruiser in exchange for a brand new 45,000 ton battleship they probably thought was worth it , Lets remember the POW is certainly a match for Bismark in all respects if it was not still on a bloody sea trial...
I would be curious to see how the Battle would have fared with the KGV and POW instead of the POW and HOOD , The KGV had proper battleship armor and it is said that POW had no problem Catching Bismark so i have my doubts the Bismark really had a 2 knots speed advantage under full load.
POW would still have gunnery problems because it was brand new and had an inexperienced crew , KGV on the other hand worked just fine as was shown against the Scharnhoerst where the only problem was a slight dip in rate of fire due to crew fattigue after 40 mins of battle.
We know the 14 Inch guns was able to Penetrate Bismark as she took 3 Brutal hits from the POW that was causing her some serious issues.
+Jason Muir From everything I've read, none of the three hits Bismarck suffered from PoW actually penetrated her main armored belt. The three hits were in the bow above the waterline, the torpedo bulkhead well below the waterline, and a shell that effectively skimmed over the decks and clipped parts of the equipment there. None of those areas had more than minimal armor, as they were either not part of the "vital" areas of the ship protected within the main citadel, or (in the case of the second hit) were in an area protected by the torpedo defense system rather than the armor meant to stop shells.
Furthermore, examination of the Bismarck's wreck presents strong evidence against the idea that her armor could have been penetrated so easily. The wreck showed almost no penetrations in the main armor belt, either from KGV's 14-inch guns, or from Rodney's 16-inch guns. The Bismarck's wreck showed ample evidence that many of KGV's shots in particular bounced off the armor rather than doing any major damage. The damage that was done to Bismarck in her final battle came primarily from hits to the superstructure, gun directors, and other areas that knocked out Bismarck's key systems without actually penetrating and destroying them.
Wolfeson28 Although you are absolutely right about the Main citadel being near impenetrable by the KGV 14 Inch guns.
I was referring to the hit that ruptured Bismarks fuel tanks and also another hit that penetrated just forward of the Armored belt causing 1000's of tons of seawater to flood the ship.
It's also worth noting that Both KGV and POW where no slouches when it came to Armor and had a very nice Armored belt of there own....
The question is i guess whether or not KGV and POW could take the pounding long enough to do a repeat of Bismarks last battle.
+Jason Muir I think there was only a one knot difference in speed between the KGV class and the Bismarck- which probably equalled out in the long run as Bismarck carried a greater weight. The PoW didn't even have a fully trained crew when it was sent to Singapore- especially AA training. I vaguely recall that the PoW's forward four gun turret wasn't working properly, so all of its hits on Bismarck came from its forward two gun turret- I may be wrong on this, but it received seven hits from two ships but gave three back- evens I'd say.
I still find it amazing that ships of this size could reach speeds of 35mph.
Sending the Hood after the Bismarck makes perfekt sense as the Mighty Hood was not a battlecruiser in the most common meaning of the word. (A capital ship with battleship guns and cruiser armour and speed). The British definition at the time said nothing about armour, just speed and firepower, so the Hood was classed as a battlecruiser despite having battleship armour. By the more "modern" definitions of WWII she could (perhaps more accurately) be described as a "fast battleship".
like this vid if your hyped for World of Warships :D
every vid you put makes me want to play it more :)
cant wait to an invincible class battle cruiser (flexible and fast) 'hell yeah!'
The battlecruiser concept was flawed even if they had been used in the role they were designed for. Your rival (i.e. Germany) immediately replaces his commerce raiding/colony threatening armoured cruisers with battlecruisers of his own and you now have poorly armoured masisvely armed ships hunting other poorly armoured massively armed ships and it turns into a lottery. The Battlecruiser concept only works if your rival is unable to build battlecruisers of their own and your battlecruisers can hunt armoured cruisers, but expecting your rival to not reply to your development is just foolish. The Germans had already immediately copied (possibly bettered) the dreadnought and destroyer concepts in the previous decade after all. Battlecruisers make perfect sense for Germany, being better commerce raiders than armoured cruisers. For Britain they only made sense to counter German battlecruisers, and the Germans only developed battlecruisers because the British showed their hand and built them first.
In the end neither side used them either for commerce raiding or protection, nor for attacking colonies. They just bulked out numbers in the battlefleets and became fodder for battleships.
+DoddyIshamel not really as Germany lacked the strategic coaling, ammunition stores and radio stations etc to be able to use battlecruisers outside the European theatre even if they wanted to the they could not have fuelled them or had anywhere near the degree of command and control, logistics and intelligence to be able to operate these ships especially as the vast majority of telegraph lines for long distance communication were owned by the British who did completely cut Germany off within the first week of the war and Germany lacked the capability to build their own network. Due to the Geographic position of the British Empire and its overseas based the UK were completely unique in this capability
"See how politicians change the meanings of words, simply to make political points? Tsk, tsk, childish mistake. Just as bad as calling a ship "KM Deustschland". Only ill can come of it."
--Captain Crunch, commander of the Crunchberry Ferry, recently renamed: HMS Sugar Bowl.
Oops looks like you know already!
OK thanks for the info on ship and class but imo your missing 1 point in the game i am hope to 1) learn or 2) get fixed. That is the aiming of your guns onto a ship. now 1st i know and dont want to just point and shot and bang there dead cause it would be the same for me.. BUT HERE THE POINT: zoom in on target look at lt read as enemy ship is a CL 10.5 away heading to the left and shell will take 8.5 sec to reach target ship.. in the zoom there a range finder a
exmaple L j L j L j L # j L j L j L j O j L j L j L j L j L j L j L a center mark and 14 hash marks for distance and time i'll leave up and down out the # is were you should move your lead to and fire for effect, But this is not the case you miss by a scale and a half at times so there ready no planing in a shot in battle or a attack is all a guess and zoom not of much used cause you can't keep firing adjust reload fire again adjust your ship will hit something in time. NOW i know Azimuth and fire for affect is or was the way in the world wars but also system like Stadiametric and range sight Marked gave Artillery a fair change of hitting the target.. Please do a video on targeting and aiming, Player at start of game fire blindly between island in hole of hitting a player going that way , not what would happen in a real battle but its a game and ammo is free to used.. Its a very good game and has great future love DD and CL cleveland a good ship. but i can aim to not only save my life but that of my team mates HELP Please thank you for the videos so far. you have done so many you must have insight into this.. I want to do better so anyone with a helping hand let me know at jjmmurphy@hotmail.com
"invincible" way to Jynx your own ships Britain -_-
Can I get a rip in the chat
HMS Not-So-Invincible. :P
falloutghoul1 well to be fair it smashed Admiral Spee's fleet at the Battle of the Falkland Islands
The "Invincible" is not really that invincible
When opposed to the Japanese Kongos, the Invincibles are kind of lame
The kongo class came after the lion class (so were far more improved) and when compared with hood the Kongo is lame as a BC.
Ironic that the Kongo is a British ship then. Seriously though the Invincible was the first battle cruiser ever made, so its makes sense the ones after are stronger.
*****
You have responded to the wrong guy. I would suggest actualy looking at their name and picture more closer next time.
So, HMS Incapable, and HMS Unusable were never built ? So sad...
Ok, I'll punish myself for that, sry. ^^
Should have named one HMS Inflammable after Jutland.