@@goodman4966 none currently, but plenty in the past, and a few friends currently. Last family member in the Navy was a great uncle who found himself in the engine rooms of HMS Royal Oak when U-47 showed up...
The Z plan had one massive flaw; the British response to actual German building programmes. British survival was based on her merchant fleet and the security of the merchant fleet was dependent on the Royal Navy. Britannia's sword and shield was sea-power; Germany was a continental power and would win or loss on land. Thanks to an intelligence source inside the German Navy design department the Royal Navy had some idea of what the Germans were thinking about. The British were well aware that the Germans, Italian and Japanese were in breach of the Naval treaties but were not in a position to openly or privately protest about it. The pre-war proposed minimum British 1942 fleet was for 20 battleships & battlecruiisers with the 2 Revenge class battleships (that were in the Reserve Fleet in 1939) having been scraped or reduced to training duties. The fleet was to include 12 aircraft carriers (2 as peace time training ships), 70 cruisers and 198 destroyers. There was to be a greatly increased trade defence force with the oldest light cruisers converting to AA cruisers and older destroyers converting from fleet roles to ASW and AA escorts. New designs of versions of types of deep sea and coastal escorts and the increasing tempo in their peacetime construction (but inadequate to the massive wartime needs).
I'm sure there were many smart people doing estimates and analysing the best course of options. 198 ships though, that I can't ignore. You could've just thrown in two destroyers for good measure, but no, the English had to screw it, didn't they?
@@klobiforpresident2254 reminds me of MHV's most recent video showing relative timelapse of US vs Japan WWII warships. ... Like someone was just churning out US DDs and DEs.
Do not forget the US 'Two-Ocean Navy' plan of the same time period which would have built an fleet of approximately the same size as mention for the RN with the more elderly units still hanging around for secondary roles. Given economic realities, the Z-plan was a pipe dream as the German economy could not out build the British at all and the US could out build both combined once it got cranked up. So the real problem with the Z-plan was it would antagonize the UK and the US both who could out build you and could build very solid designs if they could avoid idiots like Jackie Fisher (not a problem in WWII as both navies did suffer from another Jackie Fisher). The Japanese building plans would have the same effect, UK and US ramp their building plans. Given the tendency for German and Japanese designs to have some real ly bad design features that the UK and US mostly avoid, both Germany and Japan have fewer and overall inferior ships to the UK and US.
[Eager young aide sticks his head around the door of the naval design department] AIDE: Admiral Doenitz wants more Sparkreuzers [Naval designers sadly shake their heads and begin folding their complicated plans for gigantic battleships into paper boats...]
The Axis did not have enough oil to properly fuel even the Italian battle fleet. If the Plan Z fleet had been built, it would have been forced to stay in port for most of the war, much like the Japanese battle fleet was inactive in the Pacific during much of the war.
Ensign Nemo maybe having designs like the Revenge class battleships which were coal powered and with Poland vast coal supply they may have stood a chance of being useful. But for all the axis navies they suffered through the entire war with a crippling lack of fuel
What most do not know, was that lack of fuel transport was also the ultimate limiting factor for the assault on Japan by the USA. The amount of fuel required to take even a tiny island was mind numbingly stupendous and there simply were not enough tankers till middle of 1945.... @@themadhammer3305
w8stral yeah, the planned invasion force for the invasion of Japan was monstrous, it makes sense that fuel was an issue. Between Britain and the US they maybe could have chucked enough tankers together after VE day but the logistics involved were still mind boggling even for the two largest navies in the world.
Although I agree for the most part, one serious problem is that Stalin was paranoid about the British prior to Operation Barbarossa, and would probably have sold Germany fuel throughout their war with Britain (and by extension Italy, making the Mediterranean even more dangerous); even the possibility of a victory at sea may have convinced the Germans not to attack the Soviets until after a British defeat. There's a reason no one could convince Stalin to prepare for a German attack in 1941 when all signs pointed towards an obvious, imminent invasion.
How would you get the OIL to Germany from Russia at the time? Would have to do a crash course build in tankers which did not exist for going from the Caspian to Black sea and then up the Danube. Hrmm... When was the Caspian connected to the Black sea again? When was the Danube connected to the Rhine again? ... Yea, wouldn't work. Timing is wrong. But a Railroad transport for quite a bit of it... There is a reason the Persian and Texas were so important. All that oil is right next to the coast. @@BrigadierBill
Because a treaty Soviet entered after ww1 forbids any aircraft carrier from passing through the Dardanelles. Some cruisers do carry recognizance aircraft/s, ehum...
@@igoryst3049 "Kuznetsov" is the same hybrid with the ramp... Soviet admirals have been prepared to win the past war in the maximal scale. They improvised with idea of the lone aircraft carrier/raider
You're being too generous to Plan Z by comparing it to the High Seas Fleet. The HSF consisted of ships that were comparable or in some cases superior to their closest Royal Navy counterparts. That's not really the case for Plan Z.
RedXlV for Battlecruisers? Sure, but the actual Battleships of the high seas fleet were pretty bad until the Bayern class in comparison to the Royal Navy Battleships, the German guns were consistently of a smaller calibre and thus more limited in capability than the British, and the layout of such guns was often horrendous(Hexagonal turret layout is gross)
Not sure I can agree there. Call me bias and I guess I could be. But apart from the outlying terrible designs on both sides (I'm looking at you, so called "Invincible" class)... The British ships were ahead of the German classes. Can hardly blame the Germans. The British ship building industry was the thing of legand. They started the race for Dreadnaughts and never really lost the lead. German armour was excellent. British was arguably as good. British power plants were much better in every respect, especially overall efficiency. Guns were of larger caliber. Obviously I'm talking about capital ships. As a purely qualitative argument. I think the British ships had a technical lead of a couple of years at least. Before factoring in the size and quantity of British ships. That said. I'm no expert (my knowledge is much more 30s and 40s and geo-political rather than technical). So any good source on the subject is one id enjoy reading. Also *Whisper's* The German ships were cooler. Especially Von-Derr Tann, Sydlitz and Baden.... Other than Warspite. Because. Warspite.
@@deeznoots6241 Calibre isn't everything - 18" of Yamato wasn't that superior to 16" of Iowas, Bismarck's 15" wasn't overwhelming to British 14" from KGV which itself (can be argued) was quite comparable, if not better, than Rodney's 16". Sorry to break it to you, but British shipbuilding SUCKED - compared to other powers their ships were overengineered and obsolete at the same time. Quadruple turrets like those on PoW were constant cause of trouble and British battleships were just about slowest of the bunch. Only the Soviets trailed behind by significant margin.
what he is totally missing is how germany always builds ships that (even today) on paper look bigger than other countries ships of the same class and with smaller caliber guns, but in reality these ships are well balanced and just worked. they can take enormous damage and they can accurately hit the enemy unlike british ships which somehow always end up exploding from being hit by a single shell or rocket (ww1, ww2, falklands), rolling over when taking in a bit of water eg. from a torpedo hit, to outright sinking because they hit a single mine and can't stop the flooding. german ships just work better than that, maybe because they are better balanced. just looking at the datasheet doesn't tell you that but reality proved them right.
Why would plan z be completed with battleships and battlecruisers? It takes up to 1948 to get completed,weren't battleships and battlecruiser obsolete by 1944?
Your mentioning of competition for finances and natural resources between the competing branches of the Heer, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine and the Waffen SS reigns so true, in a regime which was purposefully designed and administered to compete within itself at every level, makes me think of another aspect which I never appriciated: 'Had the Z Plan been completed as intended, fuel consumption by the Kriegsmarine would have more than quadrupled between 1936 and the completion of the program in 1948, from 1.4 million tons to approx 6 million tons. On top of this the Kriegsmarine would have to construct some 9.6 million tons worth of fuel storage facilities for enough fuel reserves to allow just one year of wartime operations; longer conflicts of course necessitating an even larger stockpile.'
You have to account for the fact that the nazis had long term plans. Their goals were not just revenge for WW1. Their true goals were a complete reordering of the german nation. Which meant creating new structures from scratch like the SS. In time a sort of stability would be reached. But short term it would be chaotic until a clear set of rules between party state and secret police/paramilitary force was reached. Problem is this happened in the midst of a war. Also the nazi movement was the result of two forces. The far right paramilitaries of Weimar Germany(Freikorps) merging with the more occult mystical ultranationalist movements ie the Thule organisation. These two forces due to their chaotic and bloody birth were bound to have a hard time reaching an understanding with traditional government structures. The nazis could never completely abandon their roots. If anything the chaotic style of leadership was still preferable to the de facto civil war of early Weimar Germany. You no longer had street battles in Berlin. Well not between germans in any case.
I remember reading somewhere that the Graf Zeppelin's design was based on the design of Akagi, I just don't know WHICH version of Akagi it was designed from.
Plan Z suffered from a number of fundamental flaws. First, it took little to no account of a British response in terms of warship production. The British would not have simply stood idly by and allowed the Germans to complete such a fleet. Second was the fact that Germany was incapable of making the Z Plan a reality. In plain non-Vulcan English, Germany lacked the resources- both human and natural- to build, operate, and maintain a large army, navy, and air force, and was thus not a "world" power. What's more is that the Germans would not ever become a world power until such time as she had ready access to abundant natural resources- and those resources could only have come from the east; meaning the Soviet Union. War with the Soviet Union would have required the largest and most powerful army and air force that the Germans could field, and the resources from that could only have come at the expense of the navy. Lastly was that senior German leaders failed to realize that a negotiated peace with Britain- or even victory over her- could not alleviate Germany's lack of natural resources. Nor could it help Germany in what clearly was an impending war with the Soviet Union. Indeed, victory over Britain would have made Germany responsible for overseeing the feeding of, and security over the British people- and Germany was unable to do that over conquered Europe.
ManiliaJohn01 - you are so ignorant.... German's LAST concern was feeding anybody except GERMANS. They would starve of just plain murder excess number, like they did in Poland and further East. Germans were literally ploundering all supply and production, including agriculture.
@@piotrd.4850 You don't understand what was written, and call John ignorant. We call this irony. Even with all that 'plunder' Germany could not hope to build a fleet to challenge the Royal Navy for control of the channel. Even with all that 'plunder' people were going hungry and Germany could not meet the needs of the war. Where Britain had spent centuries developing overseas territory, supporting the industrialization(Is it hilarious when people claim the US colonies went to war because they were being 'exploited' when they'd been developed and supported to the point they out-produced many European states already by the 18th century.) all it's colonies/possession and building a merchant marine big enough that all could trade with each other, Germany had just gone to war again and again and again... and made continental Europe poorer by contrast every time, much as France and Spain did before it. Continentals (and to be fair post-war Britons) are like that though, revering Empires for the territory they've conquered and the people they've killed rather than the things they've built. Regardless, nothing John said was wrong. People make a very big deal out of Germany's few naval successes in the world wars but tend to ignore the fact that none of these ever even came close (by an order of magnitude or two) to leveling the field in terms of combat capable warships. 'Plunder' is hard to turn into warships, it takes years to develop the capability at shipyards and those were years that the Germans didn't have.
@@giupiete6536 I'm afraid that you don't understand - I was commenting on John's ridiculously naive concept of [..] Indeed, victory over Britain would have made Germany responsible for overseeing the feeding of [..] . It would have been other way round and doesn't have anything in common without building anything or not! As of matching UK naval power - don't you understand they DIDN'T HAVE TO LEVEL PLAYING FIELD? Britain was already overstretched and still maintained idea of outbuilding next two competitors. Therefore every single major German warship would cause disproportionate response, therefore strain, on British economy and shipbuilding capability, because that's what they were - fans of disproportionate response. How many naval assets had e.g. Tirpitz alone tied? Every Lion-class battleship would mean that much resources taken away from aircraft, tanks.... Anyway, what boggles the mind is opinion of people who were THIS close to defeat despite horrendous number of German blunders and on more than one occasion. For most of the war, Germany and Germans were whipping asses left and right like nobody's business - in the war, which they themselves had no concise concept of fighting and winning! It took obscene amount of resources and research to protect convoys against flimsy, uncoordinated, poorly informed and armed U-boot fleet whose communication were read. Hell, had they somehow had torpedoes of Japanese quality it would end then and there for Great Britain. Even "loosing' reportedly "hopeless" war Germany dismantled two large world powers, as seen now, effectively turning them into vassals, mortally wounded third (USSR) and thoroughly obliterated anything of value in Poland and similar countries. This kind of thinking by their opponents largely contributed to German successes and actually belittles enormous human and economic cost to stop them - it took whole 2nd half of the war with mammoth effort from literally entire industrialised world to reasonably stop and push back against "capability and resource lacking" Germany. I happen to know for a fact, that same reasoning as yours was behind Churchill's decision to dispatch Prince of Wales to Singapore and similar sentiments were onboard, until it was blown out of the water by then underestimated Japanese.
@@piotrd.4850 The British had an Empire it could draw from. The Anglo-German Naval Arms Race barely put a dent in the Empire's economy while it nearly crashed Germany's. Starving a people into extermination is an excellent way to paint a target on every single soldier/Officer on the Isles. They would not enjoy being on the island when everyone wants you dead. The resistance movements of the UK would be crippling to Germany's control of it, along with the Royal Navy that would have sailed to Canada to regroup and fight back.
@@piotrd.4850 The British had planned to seed Germany with anthrax if worst comes to worst. I'm pretty sure they would've struggled to feed their population when all their cows died from the anthrax laden cakes. Sure, this would result in chemical response, but Germany had no major bomber arm to actually deliever the chemicals, and the V-1's and V-2's were far too expensive and off limited range to use as a replacement.
The thing about the GZ's casemate secondaries. They were the result of an error, with the original design having 8 150mm casemates in single mounts. The doubles were a mistake.
Specifically, the ship's designer had the idea of saving some weight by replacing the 8 single casemates with 4 double casemates. Miscommunication with the shipyard resulted in replacing the single mounts with doubles on a 1-for-1 basis.
The real issue with the "German tillman ships" is simple. Where to build them. The Germans where barley able to build the Bismark class, they would have needed to effectivly build all new drydocks to make the things.
@@piotrd.4850 "Attention Royal Navy, we are creating a huge dry dock to obviously create a huge ship in clear violation of the treaties." The reply? The Royal Navy starts to modernise and build more ships.
Sincerely glad you were not A/ a time traveler, and B/ so minded as to give aid to the German navy. Much happier with you where you are, providing sound historical analysis and information. Thoroughly enjoy your work, Cheers.
Drachinifel, thanks for the thorough documentary. Your comment about the Graf Zepplin being used during a surface duel reminds me of the carrier that appears in the "Battleship" game. As we both know, most carriers had no where near the deck and hull armor to survive several hits from 16, 15, or 14 inch guns. I think the guy who came up with the Graf Zepplin carrier/cruisers concept must have come up the "Battleship" game. 😆 I think that if Grand Admiral Raeder had of been able to lock his master, Der Fuehrer, in a rubber room, with a ball of string, until at least 1945, Germany would have had a better fleet. I agree with you that they should have been practical and frugal with the designs and ships that they built. Don't waste time and Reichmarchs on useless super-cruisers, enlarged Deutschland class pocket battleships, or super-destroyers. And they should forget the expensive super-Bismarck class. So Stick with building all 6 Admiral Hipper class cruisers, do at least 4 Bismarck class battleships, 4 Scharnhorst class battle-cruisers, and 4 sensibly designed Graf Zepplin carriers.
One factor that must be recalled with 'pie in the sky ' Plan Z was that Hitler never intended for it to be actually used. He really thought his posturing and diplomatic domination over the British government would continue. He had waved the hype of the army and air force so well that these paper tigers would still serve. The Nazi regime has perhaps 12-18 month head start on France, Britain and all the other European powers. The margin of victory in France was supplied by the Czech arms handed to him in Munich. When he turned on the Soviet Union a year later the hollow nature of his army and logistics train was reveled. Hitler in 1941 was believing his own propaganda!
As I've heard said on occasion, there were times when Hitler himself was the best "ace in the hole" the Allies had. Thank God he decided to make the German navy follow this plan, instead of first building up the U-Boat arm in case of a sooner-than-expected war, and then constructing the surface fleet. As it was, with just 60 U-Boats at the start of the war, it was still a damn close-ran affair. If they'd had 90 or 120 boats at the start of the war, enough to where Doenitz could have almost immediately kicked off effective wolfpack operations, things might have ended very differently indeed. A very good read as to what they were able to accomplish with very limited numbers of submarines is "Operation Drumbeat", a detailed account from both sides of the U-Boat offensive against the US East Coast in the first part of 1942 after the US entry into the war. They were very nearly able to bring shipping to a complete halt, thanks in no small part to some utterly boneheaded decisions on the part of the US and USN, and Admiral Ernest King's Anglophobia, ignoring intelligence and operational advice from the RN. In many ways, it was a worse defeat than that suffered at Pearl Harbor.
Half of those rumors come from German Generals who basically wanted to cover the tracks of their own mistakes by claiming that they could have one without Hitler. And Hitler made about as many good decisions as a made bad decisions. Though thanks to his ideology he made a few pretty stupid decisions.
Later in the war the Allies abandoned attempts to support Hitler's assassination because they were worried someone more suited to command would take over.
The same could be said for the U boats as has been said for plan Z . If they were there in greater numbers effective counter measures would have been implemented earlier. The American reluctance to convoy, the British reluctance to release aircraft for submarine patrols, the British tendency to chase around the ocean in hunter killer groups would all go away quicker in the face of earlier losses. With luck it might even get King fired. Knowing more submarines were being built might have gotten some corvettes on the slipways earlier.
It could be argued that Hitler's late 1930s international strategy was not based on war but on expanding German territory and influence by picking off individual countries with treaties, intimidation and/or bluff. The threats of invasion by the German army and terror bombing by the Luftwaffe were part of this too. The Z Plan would have allowed for a continuation of this via "gunboat diplomacy", especially for countries heavily reliant on shipping for food and/or their economy and/or with vast overseas empires (ie all western European countries in those days). Hence the Z Plan's emphasis on commerce raiding and cruisers, which could have gone - and did go - all over the world, not just a battlefleet to match Britain's. Also, it would have allowed Germany to bombard those hard to reach countries such as France, Britain etc from the sea. One by one each could have fallen into line behind Germany with no actual war, just the threat of it or a display only. The strategy worked for the militarisation of Germany contrary to the Versailles Treaty, the military reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Anschluss with Austria, the incorporation of the Sudentenland, and the occupation of Czechoslovakia. The fact that Poland (and later, other countries) said "no" to German intimidation was the beginning of the end to this strategy (though it continued up until the invasion of the USSR), which would also have been a reason why the Z Plan was terminated.
The inescapable reality that the German surface fleet faced in both world wars was that their geographic position was just about as bad as it could get (with Britain able to control all the exits from the North Sea) and that a nation with faced "continental" threats far more serious than any maritime counterparts was never going to be able to devote the economic resources necessary to successfully challenge the Royal Navy for the control of those exits. This was as true in 1938 as it was in 1898, and both Raeder and Hitler, with the example of 1914-1918 in front of them, should have realized what Wilhelm II never did. A "fleet in being" was necessary to hold sufficient heavy units of the RN in home waters, reducing possible convoy escorts, but this could have been done by building BISMARK and TIRPITZ as additional units of the SCHARNHORST class (although with a 15" main battery) and rearming SCHARNHORST and GNIESENAU with twin 15" turrets as soon as possible. Screen them with 4 light cruisers and a dozen destroyers and that should be sufficient for the purpose of keeping an equal number (probably more) of British battleships, battlecruisers, cruisers and destroyers at Scapa Flow. The HIPPER class should have been built as additional (hopefully improved) units of the DEUTSCHLAND class and, paired with "M" class cruisers, sent out to attack the North Atlantic convoy routes. With eight, rather than three, dedicated commerce raiders, and each of those with a capable consort, this would have required virtually every convoy to be escorted by a pair of cruisers, or a cruiser and capital ship, unless all the "pocket battleships" were known to be in German home waters. Other than that . . . BUILD MORE U-BOATS!
Drachinifel, you are clearly an engineer or perhaps more precisely a Naval Architect. Excellent video, thanks. The concluding comments promptly whacked it all into place. As an aero eng, what you said about navalising ME109 vs FW190 resonates. Naval aircraft need to be robust and for all its other qualities the Messerschmitt was anything but.
As far as naval aircraft; yes a modified 190 would have been a better choice for a single engine navel fighter than a modified 109, however, the Bf-110 would have been a better choice overall as a pre-existing aircraft. It's wheel track was wide and thus stable, it had two engines which would give some redundancy over water, and had much lighter wing loading than either the 190 or 109. It was also capable of flying as a heavy fighter or fighter bomber. Hard to think of anything else in German service that would work better than the 110 for this role until a proper naval fighter could be drawn up.
It is always fascinating to read comments about the fantasy that was Plan Z. The idea was adopted in late January, 1939. By that time, the German Naval Ordnance department (on 31 December, 1938) had already issued a report, 'The Feasibility of the Z Plan,' which pointed out that requirements in materials and manpower were so great that the whole of German industry would need to be committed to it. In other words, no weapons production for the army, and no aircraft production for the Luftwaffe. At the time the plan appeared, the Kriegsmarine were still sorting out technical problems with the Scharnhorst class yet, apparently, Germany was going to build six 56000 ton battleships, ten 21000 ton battlecruisers, and four aircraft carriers, as well as large numbers of cruisers, destroyers, and U-boats, by 1947. As Hitler always viewed the Soviet Union as his primary enemy, does anyone really, seriously, consider that he would have regarded devoting Germany's entire industrial potential to building a large fleet as having any merit at all? Honestly, the very idea is utterly ludicrous.
'Perhaps the worst idea of the war' ... i'm not sure a bad landing gear design was quite on the level of invading russia in winter but i respect your opinion.
Hey, Great Video Only one suggestion: The Spähkreuzer is spoken with an “e” Like this: Speh-Kreuzer Meaning spotting-cruiser A Spah(r)Kreuzer would be a saving-cruiser and is likely not what you intended to say 😅
The Deutschland (I refer to these as the Panzerschiffe) class ships were a good bet. Sure, they couldn't effectively counter a cruisers division, or trade broadsides with battlecruisers (wait-yes they could), but those were few and far between and panzerschiffe were cheaper. Also, diesel ships didn't need to wait to "build steam'" after being in harbor, and so were far quicker to react to calls to battle. Otherwise, Germany might've needed a class of cheap, standardized, fast tankers, and the fuel to keep them topped off stored at Kiel or Brest. Or an Oil tank farm in Norway with enough crude to amount to a strategic reserve. To allow these far cruising raiders to reach safe harbors when necessary, a U-flotilla would issue forth and meet them in the approaches. PzS had ammo limits, but extraordinary long range. They're big enough to carry Seetakt, or Gufo. I would suggest replacing the mixed secondary batteries with the navalized 12.7cm FlaK40/L56 in singles or twins, depending on space. No torpedoes. Land them all. Replace the tonnage saved with the 4cm Bofors AA Cannon, already in production for the KM. With eight 5" DP (the flak 40 was a very good gun) replacing the secondary battery, and a couple dozen 40mm Bofors (singles and twins) replacing all 37mm and 20mm leFlaK, they'd be better able to defend themselves against a wide range of probable threats. Also, KMS Deutschland aside, it would be easier to lose a PzS to attrition, than it would to lose a Bismarck. I would so want the two Graf Zeppelins (or Peter Strasser or whatever), despite their drawbacks, if I intended to make long distance surface forays against allied convoys. The big rifles would be switched out for 12.8cm sFlaK40 in Doppelafette with significant savings in topweight. Battleships. Tirpitz is a nice ship, but, again, replace the 3.7cmFlaK with the 4cm M28 and reduce secondary battery to rationalize it to a single caliber capable of dual purpose engagement. The what and how of its deployment would be the main consideration of the OKM. Send out the two Bismarcks with the two Scharnhorsts and the two Graf Zeppelins, get them through the allied cordon and free in the Atlantic . . .and what next? Commerce raiding? You're already doing that cheaply with the PzS. All I can think of is guarding your own convoys or invasion fleets. Or seeking out the enemy, looking for Gotterdamurung . . . or his carriers. Yum yum! Germany could underwrite the Italian Regolo type ultralight cruisers and the cheap, modular, Gabbiano convoy ASW escort. German efforts would, instead, be used to beef up its mosquito fleet (gotta love those Benz powered E-100 speedboats) and maritime air patrols. They'd keep the Tommies hopping, keep them honest (heavily escort all coastal traffic) and out of the Bay of Biscay. I'm with you on the Me109T. I think it might've been easy to adapt to the launch cradle (attachment points or something), but the Fw190A, with its radial engine and wide stance, seems made for the carrier fighter role. There were some fine Italian planes, too, that might've lent well to conversion. These would be lighter, but some were excellent performers. Since the stringbag was so successful, early on, the Navalized Stuka would seem like a dream machine for intruder and torpedo bomber pilots. Compare it to the Dauntless. German Destroyers were interesting, but problematic. The new, high pressure (1000psi or something along those lines), superheating, steam powerplant the cause of Prinz Eugen's woes) was not yet mature enough to be altogether dependable. It was the right direction, engineering-wise . The USN used that system very well in the ''60s and 70s. Better to build more cheap escorts and E-boote. My opinion is that the 15cm/149mm gun was a mistake for Destroyers. Any main armament on a tin can should be AA capable. So build the Regolo in large numbers and arm them with the FlaK40 and a bunch of either 3.7cm or 4cm AA autocannon. U-Boote are the "other" fleet, of course. The Typ VIIC is versatile, small of silhouette, and maneuverable, but had so many drawbacks as part of a strategic blockade that it would have to be replaced on the slips with a better idea. Too bad the Walther boat closed cycle system was impractical until the 2000s. Of course, if we're waiting till late '44 or early '45 we can employ large numbers of the Typ XXl. Again, it's not perfect, but it'll do for a while. A possible use for Heavy Destroyers comes to mind. Mining and interdicting Baltic trade and military shipping. A fast DD Flot could dash up and in, drop mines, and back to German ports before dawn. It would not likely work well in restricted waterways or close to large air bases, but, as a stab in the dark, it might world well enough.
The concept of the Panzershicffe was good. It even shows in that they where effectivly "Super Cruisers" Before the ideal was a thing. But no. They where not going to trade boardsides with battleships. Not because of there guns (Which would be really light for a battleship fight) but because of armor. They where brilliant Anti-Cruiser ships however. but even then. 1 heavy and 2 light cruisers lost a fight against one but still managed to do enough damage to stop her from continuing on with her mission. Which was the real problem. Surface convoy raiding was stupid.... hell even if you where doing to do it. It would arguably be better to go the french direction and just make long range Destroyers to do it.
@@captainseyepatch3879 pre WW2 there were ballrooms rented in the US and large scale naval wargames run regularly by both civilians and naval personnel for public entertainment, I remember reading that one game that was played fairly regularly was the Single Deutschland class panzerschiffe against a small group of UK or French cruisers. The Panzerschiffe was 40% wins with 3 cruisers, but against four this changed to it losing in roughly 80% of encounters. reports of these games were monitored by Royal Navy officers attached to the Washington Embassy, and you can presume Kriegsmarine and US counterparts did too and may have contributed to the make up of the forces hunting the Graf Spee
A great video! I mostly agree with your assessment, though I did catch one little error. Technically, the USS Gambier Bay used its deck gun against a cruiser during the Battle off Samar, but that is a minor historical footnote. Keep these great videos coming, I'm learning a lot of interesting naval history from your productions.
I understand a lucky hit blew up a heavy cruiser - not bad going. But the Battle off Samar was very much *not* how a naval battle was supposed to be fought!
I'm always amused at the vignette in the intro at the :22 mark. The secondary battery fires and there is a burst of paperwork blasted out as well. "Um, Captain, you know all those fitness reports and fuel requisition forms I was supposed to have filed today?"
"Shoot whoever decided to use the 109, and instead use the exciting new 190." My thoughts from the second a naval 109 was mentioned. Yes i know I'm late, shush.
Its simple, they shouldve just built tons and tons of naval bombers instead, then proceeded to level the Royal Navy from the air, before paradropping in Dover and bringing some 40 width tank divisions over. I mean, a strategy games meta will translate to the real world right?
The Fieseler Fi 167 was the Graf Zeppelin's original attack aircraft and was purpose-designed for carrier use. It's performance was by all accounts equal to and handling far better than the modified Ju-87s. However, it suffered from one fatal flaw: it was a biplane. This was mainly a problem not because of performance, but because it didn't have the "modern" appeal of a monoplane.
EDIT/ADD-ON: I’d be very interested to see what a navalized FW-190 would look like and how it would perform...it’s definitely got the landing gear configuration for it, and it’s actually small enough that you might not even have to re-design it with folding wings (I think). And even if we’re going with the earliest versions with the 2x20mm MG-FF’s and 4x7.92mm MG’s and a radial engine, that *seems* like it could be at the very least pretty lethal to things like the Fulmar or Firefly, and potentially even a decent adversary to a Wildcat or Hurricat...provided of course that the navalization process doesn’t add enough weight to meaningfully impact the original FW-190’s performance and handling. Rewatching this video, I came upon your “how I would do it” segment at the end...specifically, your ideas regarding destroyers with a standard hull and 5 mounting points for either twin guns or (presumably triple, but potentially quad) torpedo tubes. At which point the “World of Warships player” part of my brain began chuckling in a devious (and somewhat aroused) fashion. See, I know you *probably* meant for either variant to have a mixture of guns and torps, but my mind couldn’t resist the idea of an all-gun or all-torpedo ship. So, basically, either the KMS Hamburgumo or some nameless abomination with either 15 or 20 torpedo tubes. If either of those made it into WoWs, the memes would be LEGENDARY.
The extended wing BF109 fighters that were 3/4 completed when the carrier was cancelled were completed with high altitude engines and oxygen systems and performed quite well. The landing gear was significantly strengthened to the point of eliminating the pilots worrying about gear failure would have probably been a major maintenance problem in carrier operations while still being overly narrow.
Admiral Raeder and Admiral Doenitz both wanted a modified plan to subtract 19 surface ships (10 Destroyers / Gun Boats, 3 Light Cruisers, 4 Cruisers and 2 Battleships) to produce 78-85 Type 7 and Type 9 U-Boats. The plan never made it past Raeder's desk from a conversation with Hitler stating U-Boats were out dated Naval Tech. If the Kriegsmarine would have had half that number of extra U-Boats (39 more) for a total of around 80 U-boats instead of only 39 in 1939, the British Isles likely would have been economically strangled and thus forced to the armistice negotiation table around the same time as France was being over-run.
Plan Z was a pragmatic plan for what the Germans knew at the time. Had battleships as the corner stone but also had a sizable group of carriers and subs as auxllary. Obviously with hindsight we would say they should have made it Carrier focused but we didnt really know that until Midway at the earliest
I think Plan Z would be a failure if they really work on it. From it's ridiculous size and Nazi Germany unpreparedness for war, it would be impossible to make it happen. And, it would be hard to maintain such fleet without enough supplies and oil which Germany is kinda lack of it during the war. And btw, can u pls review IJN Satsuma, i'm kinda curious about Japan's pre-war dreadnought
Even without war and assuming enough money would go into it... Building +11 Battleships, 4 Carriers, and a shit ton of other ships would have been way beyond german ship building capacity... Also You would need a Navy of a couple 100k men which drains the manpowerpool quite significant. With such a massive build up in the german navy, the british and french navies would not sit by and stare but would build and research as well, thus probably not gaining anything in number disparity for the german kriegsmarine
It could be done, in theory. In practice Germany was a land power thus the resoruces were alocated to the Heer and the Luftwaffe, the Krigsmarine was the underfunded branch.
@@Masterchiefkf3 not really fair to say a German response. But very true to say a Nazi response. Though more so later in the regime as things went to shit. Before then the summary execution of officers was rare. Also. This isn't just a Nazi thing. * Warning. Sweeping statement *: this is true of all dictatorships. Political backing for the dictatorship or its country make little to no difference. Napoleon in France. Stalin (well just bout all rulers) in Russia, Hussain in Iraq etc.
Ricky Breckenridge Try “every single non-German battleship built in the 1930s/40s”. AoN wasn’t something unique to American fast battleships. The British made extensive use of AoN from the Nelson-class onwards, and the Japanese, French and Italians went for AoN in their new naval construction (despite some claims to the contrary). Not that this matters because by the late 30s/40s battleships were obsolete and strategically worse than useless.
@@bkjeong4302 Late to this party, but I wanna say something about the British AoN scheme. It was fucking insane. Put it this way, the KGV Battleship for the Brits was immune to the Iowa's guns from the range where the Iowa would be vulnerable to the KGV's quad 14" guns. The KGV's quad 14" guns were superior to many of the old 15" and 16" guns used on older ships.
Great exposition of the plan - and lots of comments below about shortcomings such as inadequate shipyards, lack of oil, and exorbitant cost. More than one person commented that Germany, from unification in 1870 through World War II, was a land power, and that it could never hope to match the Royal Navy one-on-one, or the RN and the French navy in combination (although Vichy relieved Hitler of that concern). But, like the mentally unstable Wilhelm II with his delusions of grandiosity, Hitler's delusions were just that - although I will say that, thanks to a booming German economy between 1870 and 1914, Wee Willy at least got HIS fleet built. However, kaiser and fuehrer were alike in this respect: their navies were too precious to engage in large fleet actions most of the time (Jutland being the exception [and, naturellement, the Drachinifellian Battle of the Texel]), so except for random sorties of one to a few ships, the rest stayed in port . . . where they made excellent targets. As for the designs, taken as works of art, some of the ships - most, perhaps - were quite beautiful, unlike some of the hideous things coming off the ways in the US. Thus endeth the screed for the day.
A thought comes to mind. Are the larger of the proposal H designs really all that efficient, considering a ratio of tonnage to armament and armor when you compare them to say Tillman 4-2. It's a bit pointless, considering both the H44 and Tillman 4-2 are about as practical as any given superweapon in the Ace Combat series.
You didn't go deeply into the Battleships, the new dock bassins, Raeder did have dug out, in preparation, still on the spot, today. I would like to hear more about that.
I would have down seized raiders to focus on fleet support with frigates and Corvettes that could also do fast attack or raiding missions along side submarines
Wonder what if Germany and Italy did more technological sharing. The Germans might have been able to build a triple turret for their battleships in that case (and the Italians a good V engine for aircraft)
Actually...... I've just had a thought (after watching this on and off for a while now): Hitler may have wanted 'a fleet to rival the British Navy" but.... where was he planning on actually KEEPING this huge fleet? We're an island nation so we've got a lonnnnnnng coastline to build ports on. Germany may have some large ports already (Hamberg, Kiel, Bremerhaven etc) but those are civilian ports. Hitler may have been an EPIC loony but I don't reckon he'd want to have his big, new, shiny fleet anywhere NEAR civilian ports, where some clumsy foreigner could crash into them
It's only a little difference in pronounciation but in this case it matters: your Version sounded like "Sparkreuzer" which could be translated as "budget cruiser" :-)
Did Germany even have the manpower to man all these ships? I am of course making abstraction of the unfortunate fact that Germany had only a few ports, all close together in the North...
No names were given to the H class battleships. I think your referring to the monstrous H44 design. That beast was over 1,000ft long with 8x 20" guns in 4 twin turrets.
Indeed. A subtype of the H44 design was planned with the 12 320mms aforementioned. The four turrets were planned in a Bismarck- style layout, but instead of giant 20 inchers, it would carry the smaller 320s. Think of it as the Scharnhorst vs the planned Gneisenau layout. Scharnhorst (numerous smaller guns, ie Kurfurst) vs the Gneisenau (few large guns, ie standard H44.)
No, this ship type was supposed to a subtype of the “final stage” of the Z plan. If you look at the original comment, I mention 12 320mms in four turrets. For clarification, two are superfiring at the bow and two superfiring at the stern. Therefore, it would have a full broadside of 12 guns.
For the Graf Zeppelin's goal of using aircraft to hunt down scattering convoy ships after an attack, it would make more sense to just use a cruiser carrying an above-average amount of catapult aircraft. Which from a certain point of view the Graf Zeppelin was, just very, very above average. Seaplane bombers will sink unarmored merchant ships just fine while carrier or land based bombers can be off doing something more useful.
For all the focus on raiding convoys with its surface fleet, did the German Navy manage to attack a convoy with its surface warships even once during the war?
Yes. JW51B. A force of two heavy cruisers and six destroyers tried to attack a convoys escorted by 5 destroyers. The destroyers successfully protected the convoy until a covering force of two light cruisers arrived. One German heavy cruiser was damaged, and a destroyer sunk, in exchange for one British destroyer and a minesweeper. As a result, Hitler decided to scrap his 'useless' heavy surface fleet and install their guns as shore batteries. Battle of the Barents Sea.
The main problem with the Z plan is of course if Hitler had dedicated all Germanies resources and attention to the Kriegsmarine as this would require, by 1942 he would have also insisted by on super dreadnaughts waffen weapon 2 KM long and displacing a million tons.
The biggest problem with the plan was the lack of shipyard capacity, understandably those in occupied countries were reluctant to build warships for Hitler. The lack of frigates is notable, commerce raiders don't have to be big.
Why couldn’t? They have triple turrets on the Bismarck and Tirpitz, 4 triple turrets with 15 inch guns, also couldn’t they have had triple turrets on the Hipper class. Also could the Bismarck and Tirpitz been refit with 16 inch guns ?
For anyone with an interest in this subject, I would like to recommend a great book: "Third Reich Victorious - Alternate Decisions of World War 2", edited by Peter G. Tsouras. Each chapter is a representation of how things in WW2 might have progressed given slightly different decisions. The first fascinating chapter is titled "The Little Admiral: Hitler and the German Navy." In this alternate history, while on his way to join the German army in WW1, Hitler ends up sitting on the train next to a Chief Petty Officer in the German Navy on his way back to duty from leave home. This man convinces Hitler to go with him to Kiel to join the German Navy instead. Service in the Navy instills discipline and focus on Hitler. His hatred of Jews is replaced with an intense hatred of England, most especially the British Navy. When Hitler comes to power, he commits the resources to build a larger, more effective German surface and submarine fleet, with the specific objective of defeating England.
@Brandon_37 In the story when Hitler expresses his hatred for Jews for the first time, his Chief Petty Officer gives him a good chewing out, and secretly asks a navy officer who is Jewish to help diffuse his prejudice by working with him. Also, through the course of the story, Hitler develops a near pathological hatred of all things England, especially the British navy. Historically, Hitler's hatred of Jews led as many as Jewish scientists as could to flee Germany and Europe. They ended up in the West working on technology and the atom bomb for the Allies.
It's pretty clear Germany did not have the resources to build a navy to challenge France let alone Britain which had the capacity to outbuild German 3 to 1 in ships. The 200,000 tons of warships built prior to WW2 would have been better spent on 200 x 1000 ton submarines with the naval design capacity invested in the design of Battleships and Cruisers invested in better submarine design, particularly sonar, radar, schnorkel, quiet engines and better torpedos. This process could have been done with much better security, with stockpiles of parts stores for quick assembly in the manner used later in WW2. Germany could have used a "we are not preparing for war" narrative publicly whilst stealthy building capacity. Battleships were obsolete at the end of WW1.
This only works if Britain keeps wasting money on battleships while Germany realizes that’s a stupid idea. The thing with pointless battleship construction in WWII was that it was done by BOTH sides.
In my opinion, for the Reich the best solution would probably be to build as much destroyers as possible, for defending the coast, and stay as close as possible to the shore. But they didn't start the war with the idea of defending the coast as best as possible, but defeating the world, so whatever they do, they would lose anyway.
Seems like a reasonable assessment of it. If wargaming is too be believed, some sort of triple turret was thought up(which I’d like to see the document in question cause I don’t believe wargaming without evidence). Though I’d say it’s impossible to say how effective they would be in order to disagree with your analysis because at the end of the day, we can only theorize how effective or ineffective they may have been. Real life could’ve turned out differently vs theory. That’s my two cents on plan Z. Though would love to see more of Plan Z ships in WoWS. On a side note, you should try ultimate admirals dreadnaught, sounds like you’d have a good time designing ships or laughing at(or analyzing) the AI designs.
@@wolfsoldner9029 according to the pact. The information I read doesn't say if said sketches were ever delivered to the soviets though. Its possible that war gaming found them in some archive they won't tell us about. I suspect that the design we see in wows are WG educated guess on what they may have looked like(unless the preliminary sketches mentioned earlier turn up to confirm).
Notwithstanding the fact that Germany can fight a war very well and develop some very astute machines of warfare, just from a bureaucratic point of view how the hell could the Third Reich ever be considered to be able to take over the world ! I don't know how many countries you have to invade & plunder in order to pay for this monstrosity of a fleet from which half the ships seem 'pretty damn sinkable' by what the Allies fielded already ! Should have just built that U-Boat Fleet that Karl doenitz wanted, not build battleships any smaller or bigger than the scharnhorst class but give them 15 inch guns & and at least build an escort carrier that can carry an air wing of fighter-bombers and surface attack planes . The expertise of which could have come from their good friends in the Japanese Navy !
It was an incredibly naïve assumption for the Germans to think that they could build lots of bigger and better ships without a response from the other naval powers. What would have happened is a another naval arms race like the one that occurred before ww1. One side would launch a new ship and, within a year or two, their rivals would launch something that was better or at least equal and, thanks to the limitations of the Treaty of Versailles, there was no way that the Germans could ever catch up
You are wrong about the Bf 109. Its problems with the landing gear have been massively exaggerated in older literature. The Bf 109 suffered no higher take off and landing accidents than the Fw 190. That said, it is likely that an improved Bf 109 called the Me 155 would have been used. This would have had a wider landing gear.
Having come up with the Bismarck class, it always puzzled me why instead of wasting time trying to design new ships after only a couple of hulls (well we all know about the Nazi obsession with willy waving), everyone else once they had a workable design of battleship would order four or five before moving onto the next class. If the Germans had ordered four to six Bismarcks, they probably would have built most if not all of them providing a useful homogenous 'Battle Squadron' rather than sending them out on commerce raids utterly outnumbered and vulnerable. Whenever you change designs to go with a new class (like the 'H' class) there is an inevitable delay until the plans are finalized, whereas one set of plans can be duplicated to build multiple ships more quickly. Germany and it's Kriegsmarine were time poor pre war (of course they didn't really know it I accept), and in order to ramp up the fleet to a useful size quickly more Bismarcks sooner would seem a smarter move. Had they entered the war with extra Bismarcks, then up-gunning the Scharnhorsts to 15" guns becomes more likely as they will constitute a smaller percentage of the overall Battle Fleet and could thus be spared for the period needed to refit them.But then we are talking about the Nazis after all...
The Kriegsmarine seemed to like iterating within the designs as well. Admiral Scheer was effectively a sub-class compared to Deutschland, Prinz Eugen likewise was different in a number of ways to Hipper. If they built 6 Bismark's the last one would probably be completely different to the first. Even Bismarck and Tirpitz had substantial differences.
@@Drachinifel Agree completely. We did much the same, the KGV class also had differences from first to las units, but the class was ordered fairly close together, and as aq result the differences were mostly topside and quick to institute. The hulls were mostly the same and so they could be built from the same plans. Ships then had to be built from the bottom up and the sooner you start the sooner you finish. Jam today would have been more sensible than Jam tomorrow. Admiral Raeder thought he had a decade to play with, almost everyone else knew it was coming in a couple of years at most. The RN was making plans for War from the mid 30s, b way of keeping older ships in reserve and intact rather than scrapping them when phased out (Hermes being a case in point) as a means of boosting ship numbers if and when war broke out. Raeder had a great vision, but he took his eyes off the ball with the Z plan. failing to see what was happening around him and dreaming of 'unbuildable' ships when he should have concentrated on the present. Hind sight is wonderful though.
a big part of it was yard space. I believe their was something like 4 slipways in the whole of Germany that could build a battleship sized hull. two were used for the Bismarck, and two for the graf zeppelin CVs. since it took 3 years from laying the keel to launching the hull (plus another year of fitting out), their is no reason why the ship design bureau cant keep busy in those three years tinkering with the design as requirements, technology and projected environment changed. the brits and US had much more yard space, and thus could lay down 4 or 5 ships at once, hence the larger classes
How about 8 S & G's as built plus 8 with the 3 twin "15" turrets, 8 improved Hipper's and 20 or so M class? Add at least 60 decent destroyers and 150 or so E-boats. That's it. No other battleships, carriers, pocket battleships, etc. Then mix in A LOT of U-boats.
As early as December, 1938, a senior marine architect in the Kriegsmarine's naval ordnance department published a report 'The Feasibility of the Z Plan' demonstrating the impossibility of the whole thing. Whoever produced the Plan seems to have assumed that the whole of German industry, in terms of resources, raw materials, and production capacity, would be devoted solely to warship production for around ten years. So, there would be no expansion of the army or air force, therefore no successful campaign in the west, no French bases from which to operate and, most significant of all where adolf was concerned, no possibility whatsoever of a campaign in the east. The whole thing, start to finish, was nothing more than fantasy.
@@dovetonsturdee7033 Fully agree. What I posted above was just my long held thoughts on what of made a bit more sense for the KM. None of it was likely to happen.
if there was no war in 1939 the lion class of battleships would have been completed and I believe the order was for 4 or more ships and let's say hms vanguard was built as well . All this means is that no matter how long they waited , all that would have happend is Britain would still have navy 3 times the size of Germany's fleet with working cv s not the useless graf zeppelin's
germnay didn't have enough oil to run all of their panzers or planes. They could have never maintained large scale naval operations with a large surface fleet. Their fleet would have sat in port due to lack of fuel just like the Italian Navy.
The Bismarck wasn´t a big ship compaired what the british normal ships was. It´s like teeling Britain wanted to gain again domination of the sea against the USA by introducing 3 carries of invisible class against all the nuclear US Navy carriers
Something I never understood about the Graf Spee and her like... How on earth are you expected to be an effective raider with that kind of speed? It seems to me, for her mission, she really needed to do closer to 32 knots, or better.
At the time of her original design the staff quietly pretended Renown, Repulse and Hood didn't exist, and no-one else had fast battleships at the time.
@@Drachinifel Well, to be fair, considering the limitations, there are hardly any options for more. The only other options were a) A standard heavy cruiser with around 203 mm guns, officially designated as a battleship according to the treaty of Versailles. Or a slower coastal defense ship, that is essentially useless for any other purpose. Also, aside from those 3 battlecruisers, fast battleships weren't really a thing yet (With the Queen Elizabeths making at best 24 knots) because of the treaties halting battleship constructions. The first fast battleships would follow up around 3 years later, and were still sginificanty smaller than those finished during WW2.
@@josynaemikohler6572 they made the best with what they had, but they also has to know that a war with anyone who had or could build battlecruisers at least would end badly.
Me who change all deutchland class in hoi4 into großdeutchland heavy cruiser and use the panzerschiff icon for the heavy cruiser so i feel im still using panzerschiff:pathetic
The Germans were forever coming up with pie in the sky plans for all their services. Giant battleships for the navy, huge bombers for the air force and giant tanks and artillery for the army. All these plans apparently didn't take into account the amount of materials needed to build them. The fuel needed to move them or the personnel needed to operate them. Outside of a few giant rail based artillery pieces and two battleships none of these plans ever came to anything. They build no carriers, had no long range heavy bombers and the few giant tanks they did build were useless because of lack of fuel and poor reliability. (Not to mention there wasn't a bridge in Germany that could support their weight). The Nazis had a tendency towards gigantism and these hairbrained plans satisfied this tendency.
@@frost9041 Oh absolutely. The Signal men on that bucket are horribly incompetent or hallucinate about torpedo boats. But the spotters might accidentally see the difference if the ship is large enough
@@lok3kobold oh no I don’t think you relise the true horror that ship was it see a pack of fucking seagulls and signal that the whole Luftwaffe and raf are attacking it
@@felix_halcs123 *After* Hitler invaded Poland on the 1. of september The UK sent an ultimatum to Germany to stop hostilities, which Hitler didn't. On the 3. since Hitler didn't respond, both France and Britain declared war.
To be fair, if Hitler didn’t start World War II, Stalin would’ve done it anyway a year or two later, if not over Poland than possibly over the Baltic countries or Finland, or maybe picking a fight with Japan over Manchuria. Ultimately, it was the Munich Agreement that led Hitler to think he could get away with taking Danzig off of Poland without the UK or France intervening (and he was right - while war was declared, they refused to actually try and counterinvade Germany and help the Poles directly, largely due to the formidable defenses of the Siegfried Line, though the fact that French strategy was pretty much dependent on fighting defensively like in the previous war didn't help, especially when the Germans demonstrated that they weren't going to allow themselves to be bogged down into a war of attrition again if they had any say in the matter). By his own admission, had the UK and France been more firm in opposing the occupation of the Sudetenland, he wouldn't have made a similar ultimatum to take Danzig from Poland, which led to war when Poland refused and the UK and France finally put their foot down.
I feel like he received a cancer diagnosis and went full Walter White so he could see his destruction of the world before it got him, then got bored halfway in amd just intentionally made poor decisions to get it over with quicker...
I think, beside being a funny comment, it's not quite comparable as in WW1, the German fleet could not break out of the North Sea. The situation was completely different in WW2, with France and Norway occupied and the existance of an airforce.
Well the only reason it didn’t work was because the only bigger fleet in the world was the british who could easily contaminate the high seas fleet in the north sea. Not to mention the lesser supply
@Rauschgenerator except during plan Z, france would probably have had its shit together by then, and Norway would have 100% modernized. Nevermind Poland would have modernized by then
The Germans were stupid to hand their fleet over at the end of WWI. And in WWII the Brits unleashed the World War again, before the Germans could establish a fleet in being. But anyway the Royal Navy is dead like the entire west.
Raeder: "Okay, so you want another High Seas Fleet that can challenge the Royal Navy? Hitler: "Yeah." Raeder: "Okay, then just give us until about 1948-ish and we might just be ready." Hitler: "Don't worry. I'm not going to war until then." **The German Reich has declared war on Poland** Raeder: *_"Sigh..._* U-Boats it is." Dönitz: "Somebody said U-Boats?"
What is interesting is that Wilhelm II built his entire battle fleet of dreadnoughts and super-dreadnoughts in eight years, along with doubling the numbers of cruisers and destroyers in the High Seas Fleet. So, it was possible for Germany to build a formidable fleet in less than a decade... in theory. Of course, the real situation is that German industry in general was very poorly run under the Nazis, who were generally ill-educated brutes, or well educated people who were detached from reality. Add to that the material requirements of rebuilding a military fro scratch are very high compared to the stead state of arming of the German Army prior to WWI. That is to say that the Army was already mostly armed and only a few major weapons systems were added. The new Wehrmacht needed a lot of everything and add to that whole new families of weapons systems like tanks, armored vehicles, self-propelled guns, etc. As well as building an air force from scratch. So the material demands on the German economy for re-armament in 1933-1939 was far higher than 1906-1914. All that said, yes, Germany could have built a large fleet quickly had it truly been a priority.
Please ensure all Q&A questions are posted as replies to this post. :)
Drachinifel
do you have family in Royal Navy now or in the past!
@@goodman4966 none currently, but plenty in the past, and a few friends currently. Last family member in the Navy was a great uncle who found himself in the engine rooms of HMS Royal Oak when U-47 showed up...
GJ mate .
Was the japanese 100mm AA effective as an AA gun, and how about its ability against surface targets? (Also pls do a guide on the (Aki)duckys, thanks)
Are you ever going to do something like this for the IJN? They had some pretty interesting designs, like the B-65 cruisers.
The Z plan had one massive flaw; the British response to actual German building programmes. British survival was based on her merchant fleet and the security of the merchant fleet was dependent on the Royal Navy. Britannia's sword and shield was sea-power; Germany was a continental power and would win or loss on land. Thanks to an intelligence source inside the German Navy design department the Royal Navy had some idea of what the Germans were thinking about. The British were well aware that the Germans, Italian and Japanese were in breach of the Naval treaties but were not in a position to openly or privately protest about it. The pre-war proposed minimum British 1942 fleet was for 20 battleships & battlecruiisers with the 2 Revenge class battleships (that were in the Reserve Fleet in 1939) having been scraped or reduced to training duties. The fleet was to include 12 aircraft carriers (2 as peace time training ships), 70 cruisers and 198 destroyers. There was to be a greatly increased trade defence force with the oldest light cruisers converting to AA cruisers and older destroyers converting from fleet roles to ASW and AA escorts. New designs of versions of types of deep sea and coastal escorts and the increasing tempo in their peacetime construction (but inadequate to the massive wartime needs).
This bears repeating, the single greatest flaw of the Plan assumed no-one else would change or expand their forces to account for it.
I'm sure there were many smart people doing estimates and analysing the best course of options. 198 ships though, that I can't ignore. You could've just thrown in two destroyers for good measure, but no, the English had to screw it, didn't they?
@@klobiforpresident2254 reminds me of MHV's most recent video showing relative timelapse of US vs Japan WWII warships. ... Like someone was just churning out US DDs and DEs.
Do not forget the US 'Two-Ocean Navy' plan of the same time period which would have built an fleet of approximately the same size as mention for the RN with the more elderly units still hanging around for secondary roles. Given economic realities, the Z-plan was a pipe dream as the German economy could not out build the British at all and the US could out build both combined once it got cranked up.
So the real problem with the Z-plan was it would antagonize the UK and the US both who could out build you and could build very solid designs if they could avoid idiots like Jackie Fisher (not a problem in WWII as both navies did suffer from another Jackie Fisher). The Japanese building plans would have the same effect, UK and US ramp their building plans. Given the tendency for German and Japanese designs to have some real ly bad design features that the UK and US mostly avoid, both Germany and Japan have fewer and overall inferior ships to the UK and US.
@@charlesbaker7703
Yeah, when watching that and his other videos about the balance of power in the Pacific … it's scary.
I love your pronounciation of Spähkreuzer, it sounds like Sparkreuzer witch would translate into Discount Cruiser and thats kinda fitting ;)
The proper pronunciation should be more like Shpare-croizer, which is amusing enough to an Anglophone.
😁
Poundland doesn't do Cruisers... but if we did...
[Eager young aide sticks his head around the door of the naval design department]
AIDE: Admiral Doenitz wants more Sparkreuzers
[Naval designers sadly shake their heads and begin folding their complicated plans for gigantic battleships into paper boats...]
I honest to God thought he actually meant discount cruisers-
The Axis did not have enough oil to properly fuel even the Italian battle fleet. If the Plan Z fleet had been built, it would have been forced to stay in port for most of the war, much like the Japanese battle fleet was inactive in the Pacific during much of the war.
Ensign Nemo maybe having designs like the Revenge class battleships which were coal powered and with Poland vast coal supply they may have stood a chance of being useful. But for all the axis navies they suffered through the entire war with a crippling lack of fuel
What most do not know, was that lack of fuel transport was also the ultimate limiting factor for the assault on Japan by the USA. The amount of fuel required to take even a tiny island was mind numbingly stupendous and there simply were not enough tankers till middle of 1945.... @@themadhammer3305
w8stral yeah, the planned invasion force for the invasion of Japan was monstrous, it makes sense that fuel was an issue.
Between Britain and the US they maybe could have chucked enough tankers together after VE day but the logistics involved were still mind boggling even for the two largest navies in the world.
Although I agree for the most part, one serious problem is that Stalin was paranoid about the British prior to Operation Barbarossa, and would probably have sold Germany fuel throughout their war with Britain (and by extension Italy, making the Mediterranean even more dangerous); even the possibility of a victory at sea may have convinced the Germans not to attack the Soviets until after a British defeat.
There's a reason no one could convince Stalin to prepare for a German attack in 1941 when all signs pointed towards an obvious, imminent invasion.
How would you get the OIL to Germany from Russia at the time? Would have to do a crash course build in tankers which did not exist for going from the Caspian to Black sea and then up the Danube. Hrmm... When was the Caspian connected to the Black sea again? When was the Danube connected to the Rhine again? ... Yea, wouldn't work. Timing is wrong. But a Railroad transport for quite a bit of it... There is a reason the Persian and Texas were so important. All that oil is right next to the coast. @@BrigadierBill
"An Aircraft Carrier is not a Cruiser"
Tell that to the Soviet Union/Russia.
Because a treaty Soviet entered after ww1 forbids any aircraft carrier from passing through the Dardanelles. Some cruisers do carry recognizance aircraft/s, ehum...
@@bjorntorlarsson i think he said about "Kiev" Aircraft carrier/cruiser hybrids
@@igoryst3049 "Kuznetsov" is the same hybrid with the ramp... Soviet admirals have been prepared to win the past war in the maximal scale. They improvised with idea of the lone aircraft carrier/raider
The Japanese top that in audacity by calling their current carriers "destroyers".
@@IrishCarney this is the same sort of handwavy behaviour that had the Italians flying aircraft under the banner of the Order of Malta
You're being too generous to Plan Z by comparing it to the High Seas Fleet. The HSF consisted of ships that were comparable or in some cases superior to their closest Royal Navy counterparts. That's not really the case for Plan Z.
RedXlV for Battlecruisers? Sure, but the actual Battleships of the high seas fleet were pretty bad until the Bayern class in comparison to the Royal Navy Battleships, the German guns were consistently of a smaller calibre and thus more limited in capability than the British, and the layout of such guns was often horrendous(Hexagonal turret layout is gross)
Not sure I can agree there. Call me bias and I guess I could be.
But apart from the outlying terrible designs on both sides (I'm looking at you, so called "Invincible" class)...
The British ships were ahead of the German classes.
Can hardly blame the Germans. The British ship building industry was the thing of legand. They started the race for Dreadnaughts and never really lost the lead.
German armour was excellent. British was arguably as good.
British power plants were much better in every respect, especially overall efficiency.
Guns were of larger caliber.
Obviously I'm talking about capital ships.
As a purely qualitative argument. I think the British ships had a technical lead of a couple of years at least. Before factoring in the size and quantity of British ships.
That said. I'm no expert (my knowledge is much more 30s and 40s and geo-political rather than technical). So any good source on the subject is one id enjoy reading.
Also
*Whisper's* The German ships were cooler. Especially Von-Derr Tann, Sydlitz and Baden.... Other than Warspite. Because. Warspite.
@@deeznoots6241 Calibre isn't everything - 18" of Yamato wasn't that superior to 16" of Iowas, Bismarck's 15" wasn't overwhelming to British 14" from KGV which itself (can be argued) was quite comparable, if not better, than Rodney's 16". Sorry to break it to you, but British shipbuilding SUCKED - compared to other powers their ships were overengineered and obsolete at the same time. Quadruple turrets like those on PoW were constant cause of trouble and British battleships were just about slowest of the bunch. Only the Soviets trailed behind by significant margin.
what he is totally missing is how germany always builds ships that (even today) on paper look bigger than other countries ships of the same class and with smaller caliber guns, but in reality these ships are well balanced and just worked. they can take enormous damage and they can accurately hit the enemy unlike british ships which somehow always end up exploding from being hit by a single shell or rocket (ww1, ww2, falklands), rolling over when taking in a bit of water eg. from a torpedo hit, to outright sinking because they hit a single mine and can't stop the flooding. german ships just work better than that, maybe because they are better balanced. just looking at the datasheet doesn't tell you that but reality proved them right.
Why would plan z be completed with battleships and battlecruisers? It takes up to 1948 to get completed,weren't battleships and battlecruiser obsolete by 1944?
The Bismarck's Achilles Keel :P
Anto 😑
Kiel?
From now on I'm using the term "Bismarck's Rudder" Instead of "Achilles heel"
Your mentioning of competition for finances and natural resources between the competing branches of the Heer, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine and the Waffen SS reigns so true, in a regime which was purposefully designed and administered to compete within itself at every level, makes me think of another aspect which I never appriciated:
'Had the Z Plan been completed as intended, fuel consumption by the Kriegsmarine would have more than quadrupled between 1936 and the completion of the program in 1948, from 1.4 million tons to approx 6 million tons. On top of this the Kriegsmarine would have to construct some 9.6 million tons worth of fuel storage facilities for enough fuel reserves to allow just one year of wartime operations; longer conflicts of course necessitating an even larger stockpile.'
You have to account for the fact that the nazis had long term plans. Their goals were not just revenge for WW1. Their true goals were a complete reordering of the german nation. Which meant creating new structures from scratch like the SS. In time a sort of stability would be reached. But short term it would be chaotic until a clear set of rules between party state and secret police/paramilitary force was reached. Problem is this happened in the midst of a war. Also the nazi movement was the result of two forces. The far right paramilitaries of Weimar Germany(Freikorps) merging with the more occult mystical ultranationalist movements ie the Thule organisation. These two forces due to their chaotic and bloody birth were bound to have a hard time reaching an understanding with traditional government structures. The nazis could never completely abandon their roots. If anything the chaotic style of leadership was still preferable to the de facto civil war of early Weimar Germany. You no longer had street battles in Berlin. Well not between germans in any case.
Thank you for your informative reply@@florinivan6907
Regards
Rob
High Seas Fleet Mk2 Electric Shipaloo.
The royal navy is going to fuck you
William Beavis
*mark 2 Naval Superiority Boogaloo
2' 18" "heavily-armed Raeders"? There was only 1.
I remember reading somewhere that the Graf Zeppelin's design was based on the design of Akagi, I just don't know WHICH version of Akagi it was designed from.
Germans went in 1935 to japan and inspected the akagi
@@sander6438It would most likely end up like the akagi, sunk by American/ British AirPower
Plan Z suffered from a number of fundamental flaws. First, it took little to no account of a British response in terms of warship production. The British would not have simply stood idly by and allowed the Germans to complete such a fleet. Second was the fact that Germany was incapable of making the Z Plan a reality. In plain non-Vulcan English, Germany lacked the resources- both human and natural- to build, operate, and maintain a large army, navy, and air force, and was thus not a "world" power. What's more is that the Germans would not ever become a world power until such time as she had ready access to abundant natural resources- and those resources could only have come from the east; meaning the Soviet Union. War with the Soviet Union would have required the largest and most powerful army and air force that the Germans could field, and the resources from that could only have come at the expense of the navy. Lastly was that senior German leaders failed to realize that a negotiated peace with Britain- or even victory over her- could not alleviate Germany's lack of natural resources. Nor could it help Germany in what clearly was an impending war with the Soviet Union. Indeed, victory over Britain would have made Germany responsible for overseeing the feeding of, and security over the British people- and Germany was unable to do that over conquered Europe.
ManiliaJohn01 - you are so ignorant.... German's LAST concern was feeding anybody except GERMANS. They would starve of just plain murder excess number, like they did in Poland and further East. Germans were literally ploundering all supply and production, including agriculture.
@@piotrd.4850 You don't understand what was written, and call John ignorant. We call this irony. Even with all that 'plunder' Germany could not hope to build a fleet to challenge the Royal Navy for control of the channel. Even with all that 'plunder' people were going hungry and Germany could not meet the needs of the war. Where Britain had spent centuries developing overseas territory, supporting the industrialization(Is it hilarious when people claim the US colonies went to war because they were being 'exploited' when they'd been developed and supported to the point they out-produced many European states already by the 18th century.) all it's colonies/possession and building a merchant marine big enough that all could trade with each other, Germany had just gone to war again and again and again... and made continental Europe poorer by contrast every time, much as France and Spain did before it.
Continentals (and to be fair post-war Britons) are like that though, revering Empires for the territory they've conquered and the people they've killed rather than the things they've built.
Regardless, nothing John said was wrong. People make a very big deal out of Germany's few naval successes in the world wars but tend to ignore the fact that none of these ever even came close (by an order of magnitude or two) to leveling the field in terms of combat capable warships. 'Plunder' is hard to turn into warships, it takes years to develop the capability at shipyards and those were years that the Germans didn't have.
@@giupiete6536 I'm afraid that you don't understand - I was commenting on John's ridiculously naive concept of [..] Indeed, victory over Britain would have made Germany responsible for overseeing the feeding of [..] . It would have been other way round and doesn't have anything in common without building anything or not! As of matching UK naval power - don't you understand they DIDN'T HAVE TO LEVEL PLAYING FIELD? Britain was already overstretched and still maintained idea of outbuilding next two competitors. Therefore every single major German warship would cause disproportionate response, therefore strain, on British economy and shipbuilding capability, because that's what they were - fans of disproportionate response. How many naval assets had e.g. Tirpitz alone tied? Every Lion-class battleship would mean that much resources taken away from aircraft, tanks.... Anyway, what boggles the mind is opinion of people who were THIS close to defeat despite horrendous number of German blunders and on more than one occasion. For most of the war, Germany and Germans were whipping asses left and right like nobody's business - in the war, which they themselves had no concise concept of fighting and winning! It took obscene amount of resources and research to protect convoys against flimsy, uncoordinated, poorly informed and armed U-boot fleet whose communication were read. Hell, had they somehow had torpedoes of Japanese quality it would end then and there for Great Britain. Even "loosing' reportedly "hopeless" war Germany dismantled two large world powers, as seen now, effectively turning them into vassals, mortally wounded third (USSR) and thoroughly obliterated anything of value in Poland and similar countries. This kind of thinking by their opponents largely contributed to German successes and actually belittles enormous human and economic cost to stop them - it took whole 2nd half of the war with mammoth effort from literally entire industrialised world to reasonably stop and push back against "capability and resource lacking" Germany. I happen to know for a fact, that same reasoning as yours was behind Churchill's decision to dispatch Prince of Wales to Singapore and similar sentiments were onboard, until it was blown out of the water by then underestimated Japanese.
@@piotrd.4850
The British had an Empire it could draw from.
The Anglo-German Naval Arms Race barely put a dent in the Empire's economy while it nearly crashed Germany's.
Starving a people into extermination is an excellent way to paint a target on every single soldier/Officer on the Isles. They would not enjoy being on the island when everyone wants you dead. The resistance movements of the UK would be crippling to Germany's control of it, along with the Royal Navy that would have sailed to Canada to regroup and fight back.
@@piotrd.4850 The British had planned to seed Germany with anthrax if worst comes to worst. I'm pretty sure they would've struggled to feed their population when all their cows died from the anthrax laden cakes. Sure, this would result in chemical response, but Germany had no major bomber arm to actually deliever the chemicals, and the V-1's and V-2's were far too expensive and off limited range to use as a replacement.
The thing about the GZ's casemate secondaries.
They were the result of an error, with the original design having 8 150mm casemates in single mounts.
The doubles were a mistake.
Specifically, the ship's designer had the idea of saving some weight by replacing the 8 single casemates with 4 double casemates. Miscommunication with the shipyard resulted in replacing the single mounts with doubles on a 1-for-1 basis.
@@RedXlV seems like something you might want to clarify but hey that's just me
The real issue with the "German tillman ships" is simple.
Where to build them.
The Germans where barley able to build the Bismark class, they would have needed to effectivly build all new drydocks to make the things.
so what. just build a dry dock. it's not a big deal.
@@swunt10 It could take time in that day and age, be vulnerable to sabotage during construction and served as huge announcement of intentions.
@@piotrd.4850
"Attention Royal Navy, we are creating a huge dry dock to obviously create a huge ship in clear violation of the treaties."
The reply? The Royal Navy starts to modernise and build more ships.
Sincerely glad you were not A/ a time traveler, and B/ so minded as to give aid to the German navy. Much happier with you where you are, providing sound historical analysis and information. Thoroughly enjoy your work, Cheers.
Drachinifel, thanks for the thorough documentary. Your comment about the Graf Zepplin being used during a surface duel reminds me of the carrier that appears in the "Battleship" game. As we both know, most carriers had no where near the deck and hull armor to survive several hits from 16, 15, or 14 inch guns. I think the guy who came up with the Graf Zepplin carrier/cruisers concept must have come up the "Battleship" game. 😆 I think that if Grand Admiral Raeder had of been able to lock his master, Der Fuehrer, in a rubber room, with a ball of string, until at least 1945, Germany would have had a better fleet. I agree with you that they should have been practical and frugal with the designs and ships that they built. Don't waste time and Reichmarchs on useless super-cruisers, enlarged Deutschland class pocket battleships, or super-destroyers. And they should forget the expensive super-Bismarck class. So Stick with building all 6 Admiral Hipper class cruisers, do at least 4 Bismarck class battleships, 4 Scharnhorst class battle-cruisers, and 4 sensibly designed Graf Zepplin carriers.
One factor that must be recalled with 'pie in the sky ' Plan Z was that Hitler never intended for it to be actually used.
He really thought his posturing and diplomatic domination over the British government would continue. He had waved the hype of the army and air force so well that these paper tigers would still serve.
The Nazi regime has perhaps 12-18 month head start on France, Britain and all the other European powers. The margin of victory in France was supplied by the Czech arms handed to him in Munich. When he turned on the Soviet Union a year later the hollow nature of his army and logistics train was reveled. Hitler in 1941 was believing his own propaganda!
As I've heard said on occasion, there were times when Hitler himself was the best "ace in the hole" the Allies had. Thank God he decided to make the German navy follow this plan, instead of first building up the U-Boat arm in case of a sooner-than-expected war, and then constructing the surface fleet. As it was, with just 60 U-Boats at the start of the war, it was still a damn close-ran affair. If they'd had 90 or 120 boats at the start of the war, enough to where Doenitz could have almost immediately kicked off effective wolfpack operations, things might have ended very differently indeed. A very good read as to what they were able to accomplish with very limited numbers of submarines is "Operation Drumbeat", a detailed account from both sides of the U-Boat offensive against the US East Coast in the first part of 1942 after the US entry into the war. They were very nearly able to bring shipping to a complete halt, thanks in no small part to some utterly boneheaded decisions on the part of the US and USN, and Admiral Ernest King's Anglophobia, ignoring intelligence and operational advice from the RN. In many ways, it was a worse defeat than that suffered at Pearl Harbor.
Half of those rumors come from German Generals who basically wanted to cover the tracks of their own mistakes by claiming that they could have one without Hitler. And Hitler made about as many good decisions as a made bad decisions. Though thanks to his ideology he made a few pretty stupid decisions.
Later in the war the Allies abandoned attempts to support Hitler's assassination because they were worried someone more suited to command would take over.
The same could be said for the U boats as has been said for plan Z . If they were there in greater numbers effective counter measures would have been implemented earlier. The American reluctance to convoy, the British reluctance to release aircraft for submarine patrols, the British tendency to chase around the ocean in hunter killer groups would all go away quicker in the face of earlier losses. With luck it might even get King fired. Knowing more submarines were being built might have gotten some corvettes on the slipways earlier.
@@Drachinifel late in the war hitler was suffering from a illness (likely schizophrenia) & meth from what i remember so....
@@Drachinifel Too true. Imagine a Donitz or Rommel in charge. Heaven forbid.
It could be argued that Hitler's late 1930s international strategy was not based on war but on expanding German territory and influence by picking off individual countries with treaties, intimidation and/or bluff. The threats of invasion by the German army and terror bombing by the Luftwaffe were part of this too.
The Z Plan would have allowed for a continuation of this via "gunboat diplomacy", especially for countries heavily reliant on shipping for food and/or their economy and/or with vast overseas empires (ie all western European countries in those days). Hence the Z Plan's emphasis on commerce raiding and cruisers, which could have gone - and did go - all over the world, not just a battlefleet to match Britain's. Also, it would have allowed Germany to bombard those hard to reach countries such as France, Britain etc from the sea.
One by one each could have fallen into line behind Germany with no actual war, just the threat of it or a display only.
The strategy worked for the militarisation of Germany contrary to the Versailles Treaty, the military reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Anschluss with Austria, the incorporation of the Sudentenland, and the occupation of Czechoslovakia. The fact that Poland (and later, other countries) said "no" to German intimidation was the beginning of the end to this strategy (though it continued up until the invasion of the USSR), which would also have been a reason why the Z Plan was terminated.
The inescapable reality that the German surface fleet faced in both world wars was that their geographic position was just about as bad as it could get (with Britain able to control all the exits from the North Sea) and that a nation with faced "continental" threats far more serious than any maritime counterparts was never going to be able to devote the economic resources necessary to successfully challenge the Royal Navy for the control of those exits.
This was as true in 1938 as it was in 1898, and both Raeder and Hitler, with the example of 1914-1918 in front of them, should have realized what Wilhelm II never did.
A "fleet in being" was necessary to hold sufficient heavy units of the RN in home waters, reducing possible convoy escorts, but this could have been done by building BISMARK and TIRPITZ as additional units of the SCHARNHORST class (although with a 15" main battery) and rearming SCHARNHORST and GNIESENAU with twin 15" turrets as soon as possible. Screen them with 4 light cruisers and a dozen destroyers and that should be sufficient for the purpose of keeping an equal number (probably more) of British battleships, battlecruisers, cruisers and destroyers at Scapa Flow.
The HIPPER class should have been built as additional (hopefully improved) units of the DEUTSCHLAND class and, paired with "M" class cruisers, sent out to attack the North Atlantic convoy routes. With eight, rather than three, dedicated commerce raiders, and each of those with a capable consort, this would have required virtually every convoy to be escorted by a pair of cruisers, or a cruiser and capital ship, unless all the "pocket battleships" were known to be in German home waters.
Other than that . . .
BUILD MORE U-BOATS!
Drachinifel, you are clearly an engineer or perhaps more precisely a Naval Architect. Excellent video, thanks. The concluding comments promptly whacked it all into place. As an aero eng, what you said about navalising ME109 vs FW190 resonates. Naval aircraft need to be robust and for all its other qualities the Messerschmitt was anything but.
Have been binge watching this channel while playing World of Warships during our lockdown.
As far as naval aircraft; yes a modified 190 would have been a better choice for a single engine navel fighter than a modified 109, however, the Bf-110 would have been a better choice overall as a pre-existing aircraft. It's wheel track was wide and thus stable, it had two engines which would give some redundancy over water, and had much lighter wing loading than either the 190 or 109. It was also capable of flying as a heavy fighter or fighter bomber.
Hard to think of anything else in German service that would work better than the 110 for this role until a proper naval fighter could be drawn up.
650 mm guns in twin turrets? Um, that is larger than the Yamato at 460.
Don't forget 12 800mm Gustaw guns on H-45 😈
It is always fascinating to read comments about the fantasy that was Plan Z. The idea was adopted in late January, 1939. By that time, the German Naval Ordnance department (on 31 December, 1938) had already issued a report, 'The Feasibility of the Z Plan,' which pointed out that requirements in materials and manpower were so great that the whole of German industry would need to be committed to it. In other words, no weapons production for the army, and no aircraft production for the Luftwaffe. At the time the plan appeared, the Kriegsmarine were still sorting out technical problems with the Scharnhorst class yet, apparently, Germany was going to build six 56000 ton battleships, ten 21000 ton battlecruisers, and four aircraft carriers, as well as large numbers of cruisers, destroyers, and U-boats, by 1947.
As Hitler always viewed the Soviet Union as his primary enemy, does anyone really, seriously, consider that he would have regarded devoting Germany's entire industrial potential to building a large fleet as having any merit at all?
Honestly, the very idea is utterly ludicrous.
'Perhaps the worst idea of the war' ... i'm not sure a bad landing gear design was quite on the level of invading russia in winter but i respect your opinion.
June is winter?
Hey, Great Video
Only one suggestion:
The Spähkreuzer is spoken with an “e”
Like this: Speh-Kreuzer Meaning spotting-cruiser
A Spah(r)Kreuzer would be a saving-cruiser and is likely not what you intended to say 😅
and now I'm off to world of warships. damn good video.
The Deutschland (I refer to these as the Panzerschiffe) class ships were a good bet. Sure, they couldn't effectively counter a cruisers division, or trade broadsides with battlecruisers (wait-yes they could), but those were few and far between and panzerschiffe were cheaper. Also, diesel ships didn't need to wait to "build steam'" after being in harbor, and so were far quicker to react to calls to battle. Otherwise, Germany might've needed a class of cheap, standardized, fast tankers, and the fuel to keep them topped off stored at Kiel or Brest. Or an Oil tank farm in Norway with enough crude to amount to a strategic reserve.
To allow these far cruising raiders to reach safe harbors when necessary, a U-flotilla would issue forth and meet them in the approaches. PzS had ammo limits, but extraordinary long range. They're big enough to carry Seetakt, or Gufo.
I would suggest replacing the mixed secondary batteries with the navalized 12.7cm FlaK40/L56 in singles or twins, depending on space. No torpedoes. Land them all. Replace the tonnage saved with the 4cm Bofors AA Cannon, already in production for the KM. With eight 5" DP (the flak 40 was a very good gun) replacing the secondary battery, and a couple dozen 40mm Bofors (singles and twins) replacing all 37mm and 20mm leFlaK, they'd be better able to defend themselves against a wide range of probable threats. Also, KMS Deutschland aside, it would be easier to lose a PzS to attrition, than it would to lose a Bismarck.
I would so want the two Graf Zeppelins (or Peter Strasser or whatever), despite their drawbacks, if I intended to make long distance surface forays against allied convoys. The big rifles would be switched out for 12.8cm sFlaK40 in Doppelafette with significant savings in topweight.
Battleships. Tirpitz is a nice ship, but, again, replace the 3.7cmFlaK with the 4cm M28 and reduce secondary battery to rationalize it to a single caliber capable of dual purpose engagement. The what and how of its deployment would be the main consideration of the OKM.
Send out the two Bismarcks with the two Scharnhorsts and the two Graf Zeppelins, get them through the allied cordon and free in the Atlantic . . .and what next? Commerce raiding? You're already doing that cheaply with the PzS. All I can think of is guarding your own convoys or invasion fleets. Or seeking out the enemy, looking for Gotterdamurung . . . or his carriers. Yum yum!
Germany could underwrite the Italian Regolo type ultralight cruisers and the cheap, modular, Gabbiano convoy ASW escort. German efforts would, instead, be used to beef up its mosquito fleet (gotta love those Benz powered E-100 speedboats) and maritime air patrols. They'd keep the Tommies hopping, keep them honest (heavily escort all coastal traffic) and out of the Bay of Biscay.
I'm with you on the Me109T. I think it might've been easy to adapt to the launch cradle (attachment points or something), but the Fw190A, with its radial engine and wide stance, seems made for the carrier fighter role. There were some fine Italian planes, too, that might've lent well to conversion. These would be lighter, but some were excellent performers. Since the stringbag was so successful, early on, the Navalized Stuka would seem like a dream machine for intruder and torpedo bomber pilots. Compare it to the Dauntless.
German Destroyers were interesting, but problematic. The new, high pressure (1000psi or something along those lines), superheating, steam powerplant the cause of Prinz Eugen's woes) was not yet mature enough to be altogether dependable. It was the right direction, engineering-wise . The USN used that system very well in the ''60s and 70s. Better to build more cheap escorts and E-boote. My opinion is that the 15cm/149mm gun was a mistake for Destroyers. Any main armament on a tin can should be AA capable. So build the Regolo in large numbers and arm them with the FlaK40 and a bunch of either 3.7cm or 4cm AA autocannon.
U-Boote are the "other" fleet, of course. The Typ VIIC is versatile, small of silhouette, and maneuverable, but had so many drawbacks as part of a strategic blockade that it would have to be replaced on the slips with a better idea. Too bad the Walther boat closed cycle system was impractical until the 2000s. Of course, if we're waiting till late '44 or early '45 we can employ large numbers of the Typ XXl. Again, it's not perfect, but it'll do for a while.
A possible use for Heavy Destroyers comes to mind. Mining and interdicting Baltic trade and military shipping. A fast DD Flot could dash up and in, drop mines, and back to German ports before dawn. It would not likely work well in restricted waterways or close to large air bases, but, as a stab in the dark, it might world well enough.
The concept of the Panzershicffe was good. It even shows in that they where effectivly "Super Cruisers" Before the ideal was a thing.
But no. They where not going to trade boardsides with battleships. Not because of there guns (Which would be really light for a battleship fight) but because of armor.
They where brilliant Anti-Cruiser ships however. but even then. 1 heavy and 2 light cruisers lost a fight against one but still managed to do enough damage to stop her from continuing on with her mission. Which was the real problem.
Surface convoy raiding was stupid....
hell even if you where doing to do it. It would arguably be better to go the french direction and just make long range Destroyers to do it.
@@captainseyepatch3879 pre WW2 there were ballrooms rented in the US and large scale naval wargames run regularly by both civilians and naval personnel for public entertainment, I remember reading that one game that was played fairly regularly was the Single Deutschland class panzerschiffe against a small group of UK or French cruisers. The Panzerschiffe was 40% wins with 3 cruisers, but against four this changed to it losing in roughly 80% of encounters. reports of these games were monitored by Royal Navy officers attached to the Washington Embassy, and you can presume Kriegsmarine and US counterparts did too and may have contributed to the make up of the forces hunting the Graf Spee
A great video! I mostly agree with your assessment, though I did catch one little error. Technically, the USS Gambier Bay used its deck gun against a cruiser during the Battle off Samar, but that is a minor historical footnote. Keep these great videos coming, I'm learning a lot of interesting naval history from your productions.
I understand a lucky hit blew up a heavy cruiser - not bad going. But the Battle off Samar was very much *not* how a naval battle was supposed to be fought!
Kromaatikse
That hit has been disproven (and it was claimed by a different CVE anyways).
I'm always amused at the vignette in the intro at the :22 mark. The secondary battery fires and there is a burst of paperwork blasted out as well. "Um, Captain, you know all those fitness reports and fuel requisition forms I was supposed to have filed today?"
"Shoot whoever decided to use the 109, and instead use the exciting new 190." My thoughts from the second a naval 109 was mentioned. Yes i know I'm late, shush.
Its simple, they shouldve just built tons and tons of naval bombers instead, then proceeded to level the Royal Navy from the air, before paradropping in Dover and bringing some 40 width tank divisions over. I mean, a strategy games meta will translate to the real world right?
The Fieseler Fi 167 was the Graf Zeppelin's original attack aircraft and was purpose-designed for carrier use. It's performance was by all accounts equal to and handling far better than the modified Ju-87s. However, it suffered from one fatal flaw: it was a biplane. This was mainly a problem not because of performance, but because it didn't have the "modern" appeal of a monoplane.
EDIT/ADD-ON: I’d be very interested to see what a navalized FW-190 would look like and how it would perform...it’s definitely got the landing gear configuration for it, and it’s actually small enough that you might not even have to re-design it with folding wings (I think). And even if we’re going with the earliest versions with the 2x20mm MG-FF’s and 4x7.92mm MG’s and a radial engine, that *seems* like it could be at the very least pretty lethal to things like the Fulmar or Firefly, and potentially even a decent adversary to a Wildcat or Hurricat...provided of course that the navalization process doesn’t add enough weight to meaningfully impact the original FW-190’s performance and handling.
Rewatching this video, I came upon your “how I would do it” segment at the end...specifically, your ideas regarding destroyers with a standard hull and 5 mounting points for either twin guns or (presumably triple, but potentially quad) torpedo tubes. At which point the “World of Warships player” part of my brain began chuckling in a devious (and somewhat aroused) fashion.
See, I know you *probably* meant for either variant to have a mixture of guns and torps, but my mind couldn’t resist the idea of an all-gun or all-torpedo ship. So, basically, either the KMS Hamburgumo or some nameless abomination with either 15 or 20 torpedo tubes. If either of those made it into WoWs, the memes would be LEGENDARY.
High seas fleet two electric boogaloo
The extended wing BF109 fighters that were 3/4 completed when the carrier was cancelled were completed with high altitude engines and oxygen systems and performed quite well. The landing gear was significantly strengthened to the point of eliminating the pilots worrying about gear failure would have probably been a major maintenance problem in carrier operations while still being overly narrow.
Everything you said is utter bullshit.
@@manilajohn0182
Says the ignorant twat.
Admiral Raeder and Admiral Doenitz both wanted a modified plan to subtract 19 surface ships (10 Destroyers / Gun Boats, 3 Light Cruisers, 4 Cruisers and 2 Battleships) to produce 78-85 Type 7 and Type 9 U-Boats. The plan never made it past Raeder's desk from a conversation with Hitler stating U-Boats were out dated Naval Tech. If the Kriegsmarine would have had half that number of extra U-Boats (39 more) for a total of around 80 U-boats instead of only 39 in 1939, the British Isles likely would have been economically strangled and thus forced to the armistice negotiation table around the same time as France was being over-run.
Plan Z was a pragmatic plan for what the Germans knew at the time. Had battleships as the corner stone but also had a sizable group of carriers and subs as auxllary. Obviously with hindsight we would say they should have made it Carrier focused but we didnt really know that until Midway at the earliest
finally you pulled me in... subbed!
I think Plan Z would be a failure if they really work on it. From it's ridiculous size and Nazi Germany unpreparedness for war, it would be impossible to make it happen. And, it would be hard to maintain such fleet without enough supplies and oil which Germany is kinda lack of it during the war.
And btw, can u pls review IJN Satsuma, i'm kinda curious about Japan's pre-war dreadnought
Surely with the benefit of hindsight if you were in charge you would just say 'build aircraft carriers'
Or stick to subs. Germany had no chances of getting a carrier thanks to the Luftwaffe.
But I found images of the possibility. Of using modified FW190s for the Torpedo role on the German Carriers
Even without war and assuming enough money would go into it... Building +11 Battleships, 4 Carriers, and a shit ton of other ships would have been way beyond german ship building capacity... Also You would need a Navy of a couple 100k men which drains the manpowerpool quite significant. With such a massive build up in the german navy, the british and french navies would not sit by and stare but would build and research as well, thus probably not gaining anything in number disparity for the german kriegsmarine
It could be done, in theory.
In practice Germany was a land power thus the resoruces were alocated to the Heer and the Luftwaffe, the Krigsmarine was the
underfunded branch.
Very frank," Shoot whoever thought about using the 109." I died laughing. Lol
Collin Gibson if my understanding of pop culture/stereotypes is right, it’s also a very German response to what was a very stupid idea.
@@Masterchiefkf3 not really fair to say a German response. But very true to say a Nazi response. Though more so later in the regime as things went to shit. Before then the summary execution of officers was rare.
Also. This isn't just a Nazi thing. * Warning. Sweeping statement *: this is true of all dictatorships. Political backing for the dictatorship or its country make little to no difference. Napoleon in France. Stalin (well just bout all rulers) in Russia, Hussain in Iraq etc.
They forgot to make Plan Z lemon scented, that’s why it failed.
I feel old for understanding that refrence.
@@atfyoutubedivision955 FINALLY SOMEONE GETS IT
You forgot have the battleships switched to a all or nothing armor scheme
Iowa and Montana and other American battleships *thumbs up*
Ricky Breckenridge
Try “every single non-German battleship built in the 1930s/40s”. AoN wasn’t something unique to American fast battleships. The British made extensive use of AoN from the Nelson-class onwards, and the Japanese, French and Italians went for AoN in their new naval construction (despite some claims to the contrary).
Not that this matters because by the late 30s/40s battleships were obsolete and strategically worse than useless.
@@bkjeong4302
Late to this party, but I wanna say something about the British AoN scheme. It was fucking insane.
Put it this way, the KGV Battleship for the Brits was immune to the Iowa's guns from the range where the Iowa would be vulnerable to the KGV's quad 14" guns.
The KGV's quad 14" guns were superior to many of the old 15" and 16" guns used on older ships.
Great exposition of the plan - and lots of comments below about shortcomings such as inadequate shipyards, lack of oil, and exorbitant cost. More than one person commented that Germany, from unification in 1870 through World War II, was a land power, and that it could never hope to match the Royal Navy one-on-one, or the RN and the French navy in combination (although Vichy relieved Hitler of that concern). But, like the mentally unstable Wilhelm II with his delusions of grandiosity, Hitler's delusions were just that - although I will say that, thanks to a booming German economy between 1870 and 1914, Wee Willy at least got HIS fleet built. However, kaiser and fuehrer were alike in this respect: their navies were too precious to engage in large fleet actions most of the time (Jutland being the exception [and, naturellement, the Drachinifellian Battle of the Texel]), so except for random sorties of one to a few ships, the rest stayed in port . . . where they made excellent targets. As for the designs, taken as works of art, some of the ships - most, perhaps - were quite beautiful, unlike some of the hideous things coming off the ways in the US. Thus endeth the screed for the day.
I was under the impression that the SP-1 scouts were replacements for the cancelled M cruisers, not part of the Z plan. And were re-ordered Z DD's.
haha, love the graphics, hahaha. The quality of posts in the comments is fantastic....thanks guys, I really appreciate it
A thought comes to mind. Are the larger of the proposal H designs really all that efficient, considering a ratio of tonnage to armament and armor when you compare them to say Tillman 4-2. It's a bit pointless, considering both the H44 and Tillman 4-2 are about as practical as any given superweapon in the Ace Combat series.
You didn't go deeply into the Battleships, the new dock bassins, Raeder did have dug out, in preparation, still on the spot, today.
I would like to hear more about that.
I would have down seized raiders to focus on fleet support with frigates and Corvettes that could also do fast attack or raiding missions along side submarines
Truly interEsting - a lui ghosting suggestion, the Spaehkreuzer are pronounced in german as "Spekreuzer", spahen means scouting
Wonder what if Germany and Italy did more technological sharing. The Germans might have been able to build a triple turret for their battleships in that case (and the Italians a good V engine for aircraft)
oh, I remember, no war until 1948, or the british will capitulate after the luftwaffe decimates the british air force.
Actually...... I've just had a thought (after watching this on and off for a while now): Hitler may have wanted 'a fleet to rival the British Navy" but.... where was he planning on actually KEEPING this huge fleet? We're an island nation so we've got a lonnnnnnng coastline to build ports on. Germany may have some large ports already (Hamberg, Kiel, Bremerhaven etc) but those are civilian ports. Hitler may have been an EPIC loony but I don't reckon he'd want to have his big, new, shiny fleet anywhere NEAR civilian ports, where some clumsy foreigner could crash into them
I was going to make a comment but I forgot what I was going to say😞
Edit: Oh I remember has anybody played Atlantic Fleet
Yes
@@kms_scharnhorst new Mexico ohio montana graf zeppelin and british armored merchants (the one that u sunk)
@Drachinifel Great Summary!
7:47 Späh = Spaeh ; ä != a
This is why I only got a B grade in German :)
It's only a little difference in pronounciation but in this case it matters: your Version sounded like "Sparkreuzer" which could be translated as "budget cruiser" :-)
@@guidobolke5618 that would be quite the funny confusion
Just call it the Spy-kreuzer.
@@mathiasbartl9393 You mean "Spei-Kreuzer" ? :-)
Did Germany even have the manpower to man all these ships? I am of course making abstraction of the unfortunate fact that Germany had only a few ports, all close together in the North...
There was a planned ship called the Grosser Kurfürst that had 12 320mm guns in triple turrets
No names were given to the H class battleships. I think your referring to the monstrous H44 design. That beast was over 1,000ft long with 8x 20" guns in 4 twin turrets.
Indeed. A subtype of the H44 design was planned with the 12 320mms aforementioned. The four turrets were planned in a Bismarck- style layout, but instead of giant 20 inchers, it would carry the smaller 320s. Think of it as the Scharnhorst vs the planned Gneisenau layout. Scharnhorst (numerous smaller guns, ie Kurfurst) vs the Gneisenau (few large guns, ie standard H44.)
No, this ship type was supposed to a subtype of the “final stage” of the Z plan. If you look at the original comment, I mention 12 320mms in four turrets. For clarification, two are superfiring at the bow and two superfiring at the stern. Therefore, it would have a full broadside of 12 guns.
Source?
@@TheLesserWeevil lol his source is world of warships.
For the Graf Zeppelin's goal of using aircraft to hunt down scattering convoy ships after an attack, it would make more sense to just use a cruiser carrying an above-average amount of catapult aircraft. Which from a certain point of view the Graf Zeppelin was, just very, very above average. Seaplane bombers will sink unarmored merchant ships just fine while carrier or land based bombers can be off doing something more useful.
And the life expectancy of such a ship in the Atlantic would be?
I have often wondered if the clue is in the name .Like "Z" sounds how urgent?
For all the focus on raiding convoys with its surface fleet, did the German Navy manage to attack a convoy with its surface warships even once during the war?
Yes. JW51B. A force of two heavy cruisers and six destroyers tried to attack a convoys escorted by 5 destroyers. The destroyers successfully protected the convoy until a covering force of two light cruisers arrived. One German heavy cruiser was damaged, and a destroyer sunk, in exchange for one British destroyer and a minesweeper. As a result, Hitler decided to scrap his 'useless' heavy surface fleet and install their guns as shore batteries. Battle of the Barents Sea.
there was also Operation Berlin where Scharnhorst and her sister Gneisenau manage to sink around 22 Merchant ships before returning home
Can we look at super cruisers please?
The main problem with the Z plan is of course if Hitler had dedicated all Germanies resources and attention to the Kriegsmarine as this would require, by 1942 he would have also insisted by on super dreadnaughts waffen weapon 2 KM long and displacing a million tons.
The biggest problem with the plan was the lack of shipyard capacity, understandably those in occupied countries were reluctant to build warships for Hitler. The lack of frigates is notable, commerce raiders don't have to be big.
It’s evil, it’s diabolical! Sniffs It’s lemon scented! This plan z CANT Possibly FAIL!!!!
23:24
*laughs in world of warships*
Graf zeppelin is quite a beast when it comes to brawling in wows
Why couldn’t? They have triple turrets on the Bismarck and Tirpitz, 4 triple turrets with 15 inch guns, also couldn’t they have had triple turrets on the Hipper class.
Also could the Bismarck and Tirpitz been refit with 16 inch guns ?
For anyone with an interest in this subject, I would like to recommend a great book: "Third Reich Victorious - Alternate Decisions of World War 2", edited by Peter G. Tsouras. Each chapter is a representation of how things in WW2 might have progressed given slightly different decisions. The first fascinating chapter is titled "The Little Admiral: Hitler and the German Navy." In this alternate history, while on his way to join the German army in WW1, Hitler ends up sitting on the train next to a Chief Petty Officer in the German Navy on his way back to duty from leave home. This man convinces Hitler to go with him to Kiel to join the German Navy instead. Service in the Navy instills discipline and focus on Hitler. His hatred of Jews is replaced with an intense hatred of England, most especially the British Navy. When Hitler comes to power, he commits the resources to build a larger, more effective German surface and submarine fleet, with the specific objective of defeating England.
I would rather not call this as "realistic" because this is already considered fiction.
@Brandon_37 In the story when Hitler expresses his hatred for Jews for the first time, his Chief Petty Officer gives him a good chewing out, and secretly asks a navy officer who is Jewish to help diffuse his prejudice by working with him. Also, through the course of the story, Hitler develops a near pathological hatred of all things England, especially the British navy.
Historically, Hitler's hatred of Jews led as many as Jewish scientists as could to flee Germany and Europe. They ended up in the West working on technology and the atom bomb for the Allies.
The metal used to build Bismarck and Tirpitz would have built another 80 U-Boats. Enough to have strangled UK’s supply lines and won the war.
Even if they had built more U-boats they'd still lose
It's pretty clear Germany did not have the resources to build a navy to challenge France let alone Britain which had the capacity to outbuild German 3 to 1 in ships.
The 200,000 tons of warships built prior to WW2 would have been better spent on 200 x 1000 ton submarines with the naval design capacity invested in the design of Battleships and Cruisers invested in better submarine design, particularly sonar, radar, schnorkel, quiet engines and better torpedos.
This process could have been done with much better security, with stockpiles of parts stores for quick assembly in the manner used later in WW2.
Germany could have used a "we are not preparing for war" narrative publicly whilst stealthy building capacity.
Battleships were obsolete at the end of WW1.
This only works if Britain keeps wasting money on battleships while Germany realizes that’s a stupid idea.
The thing with pointless battleship construction in WWII was that it was done by BOTH sides.
@@bkjeong4302 All of this presupposes that Britain was Hitler's primary enemy, which wasn't the case.
In my opinion, for the Reich the best solution would probably be to build as much destroyers as possible, for defending the coast, and stay as close as possible to the shore. But they didn't start the war with the idea of defending the coast as best as possible, but defeating the world, so whatever they do, they would lose anyway.
In my estimation, the WW2 German fleet already outclassed the High Seas Fleet by a mile.
Nah. The high seas fleet wasn't that far down. I can't imagine scapa flow is more than half a mile deep? 😒
Is it possible to get the sources for this video?
One of the interesting things about World war II is how the Germans frittered away their surface fleet in small disconnected actions.
Seems like a reasonable assessment of it. If wargaming is too be believed, some sort of triple turret was thought up(which I’d like to see the document in question cause I don’t believe wargaming without evidence). Though I’d say it’s impossible to say how effective they would be in order to disagree with your analysis because at the end of the day, we can only theorize how effective or ineffective they may have been. Real life could’ve turned out differently vs theory. That’s my two cents on plan Z. Though would love to see more of Plan Z ships in WoWS.
On a side note, you should try ultimate admirals dreadnaught, sounds like you’d have a good time designing ships or laughing at(or analyzing) the AI designs.
The germans triple turrets in wows are based on triple turrets the germans designed for the soviets.
@@wolfsoldner9029 according to the pact. The information I read doesn't say if said sketches were ever delivered to the soviets though. Its possible that war gaming found them in some archive they won't tell us about.
I suspect that the design we see in wows are WG educated guess on what they may have looked like(unless the preliminary sketches mentioned earlier turn up to confirm).
Notwithstanding the fact that Germany can fight a war very well and develop some very astute machines of warfare, just from a bureaucratic point of view how the hell could the Third Reich ever be considered to be able to take over the world !
I don't know how many countries you have to invade & plunder in order to pay for this monstrosity of a fleet from which half the ships seem 'pretty damn sinkable' by what the Allies fielded already !
Should have just built that U-Boat Fleet that Karl doenitz wanted, not build battleships any smaller or bigger than the scharnhorst class but give them 15 inch guns & and at least build an escort carrier that can carry an air wing of fighter-bombers and surface attack planes .
The expertise of which could have come from their good friends in the Japanese Navy !
Can you look at the Battle class destroyers?
Great work
It was an incredibly naïve assumption for the Germans to think that they could build lots of bigger and better ships without a response from the other naval powers. What would have happened is a another naval arms race like the one that occurred before ww1. One side would launch a new ship and, within a year or two, their rivals would launch something that was better or at least equal and, thanks to the limitations of the Treaty of Versailles, there was no way that the Germans could ever catch up
You are wrong about the Bf 109. Its problems with the landing gear have been massively exaggerated in older literature. The Bf 109 suffered no higher take off and landing accidents than the Fw 190. That said, it is likely that an improved Bf 109 called the Me 155 would have been used. This would have had a wider landing gear.
Having come up with the Bismarck class, it always puzzled me why instead of wasting time trying to design new ships after only a couple of hulls (well we all know about the Nazi obsession with willy waving), everyone else once they had a workable design of battleship would order four or five before moving onto the next class. If the Germans had ordered four to six Bismarcks, they probably would have built most if not all of them providing a useful homogenous 'Battle Squadron' rather than sending them out on commerce raids
utterly outnumbered and vulnerable. Whenever you change designs to go with a new class (like the 'H' class) there is an inevitable delay until the plans are finalized, whereas one set of plans can be duplicated to build multiple ships more quickly.
Germany and it's Kriegsmarine were time poor pre war (of course they didn't really know it I accept), and in order to ramp up the fleet to a useful size quickly more Bismarcks sooner would seem a smarter move. Had they entered the war with extra Bismarcks, then up-gunning the Scharnhorsts to 15" guns becomes more likely as they will constitute a smaller percentage of the overall Battle Fleet and could thus be spared for the period needed to refit them.But then we are talking about the Nazis after all...
The Kriegsmarine seemed to like iterating within the designs as well. Admiral Scheer was effectively a sub-class compared to Deutschland, Prinz Eugen likewise was different in a number of ways to Hipper.
If they built 6 Bismark's the last one would probably be completely different to the first. Even Bismarck and Tirpitz had substantial differences.
@@Drachinifel Agree completely. We did much the same, the KGV class also had differences from first to las units, but the class was ordered fairly close together, and as aq result the differences were mostly topside and quick to institute. The hulls were mostly the same and so they could be built from the same plans. Ships then had to be built from the bottom up and the sooner you start the sooner you finish. Jam today would have been more sensible than Jam tomorrow.
Admiral Raeder thought he had a decade to play with, almost everyone else knew it was coming in a couple of years at most. The RN was making plans for War from the mid 30s, b way of keeping older ships in reserve and intact rather than scrapping them when phased out (Hermes being a case in point) as a means of boosting ship numbers if and when war broke out. Raeder had a great vision, but he took his eyes off the ball with the Z plan. failing to see what was happening around him and dreaming of 'unbuildable' ships when he should have concentrated on the present. Hind sight is wonderful though.
a big part of it was yard space. I believe their was something like 4 slipways in the whole of Germany that could build a battleship sized hull. two were used for the Bismarck, and two for the graf zeppelin CVs. since it took 3 years from laying the keel to launching the hull (plus another year of fitting out), their is no reason why the ship design bureau cant keep busy in those three years tinkering with the design as requirements, technology and projected environment changed. the brits and US had much more yard space, and thus could lay down 4 or 5 ships at once, hence the larger classes
How about 8 S & G's as built plus 8 with the 3 twin "15" turrets, 8 improved Hipper's and 20 or so M class? Add at least 60 decent destroyers and 150 or so E-boats. That's it. No other battleships, carriers, pocket battleships, etc. Then mix in A LOT of U-boats.
As early as December, 1938, a senior marine architect in the Kriegsmarine's naval ordnance department published a report 'The Feasibility of the Z Plan' demonstrating the impossibility of the whole thing. Whoever produced the Plan seems to have assumed that the whole of German industry, in terms of resources, raw materials, and production capacity, would be devoted solely to warship production for around ten years. So, there would be no expansion of the army or air force, therefore no successful campaign in the west, no French bases from which to operate and, most significant of all where adolf was concerned, no possibility whatsoever of a campaign in the east.
The whole thing, start to finish, was nothing more than fantasy.
@@dovetonsturdee7033 Fully agree. What I posted above was just my long held thoughts on what of made a bit more sense for the KM. None of it was likely to happen.
if there was no war in 1939 the lion class of battleships would have been completed and I believe the order was for 4 or more ships and let's say hms vanguard was built as well . All this means is that no matter how long they waited , all that would have happend is Britain would still have navy 3 times the size of Germany's fleet with working cv s not the useless graf zeppelin's
germnay didn't have enough oil to run all of their panzers or planes. They could have never maintained large scale naval operations with a large surface fleet. Their fleet would have sat in port due to lack of fuel just like the Italian Navy.
Bah BB it’s the DD that float my boat.
Awesome keep it up😀
What about t22
The Bismarck wasn´t a big ship compaired what the british normal ships was.
It´s like teeling Britain wanted to gain again domination of the sea against the USA by introducing 3 carries of invisible class against all the nuclear US Navy carriers
THIS PLAN Z CAN'T POSSIBLY FAIL
Will there be a video for Cape Matapan?
Eventually :)
Something I never understood about the Graf Spee and her like... How on earth are you expected to be an effective raider with that kind of speed? It seems to me, for her mission, she really needed to do closer to 32 knots, or better.
At the time of her original design the staff quietly pretended Renown, Repulse and Hood didn't exist, and no-one else had fast battleships at the time.
Wishful thinking...
@@Drachinifel
Well, to be fair, considering the limitations, there are hardly any options for more. The only other options were a) A standard heavy cruiser with around 203 mm guns, officially designated as a battleship according to the treaty of Versailles. Or a slower coastal defense ship, that is essentially useless for any other purpose.
Also, aside from those 3 battlecruisers, fast battleships weren't really a thing yet (With the Queen Elizabeths making at best 24 knots) because of the treaties halting battleship constructions. The first fast battleships would follow up around 3 years later, and were still sginificanty smaller than those finished during WW2.
@@josynaemikohler6572 they made the best with what they had, but they also has to know that a war with anyone who had or could build battlecruisers at least would end badly.
Me who change all deutchland class in hoi4 into großdeutchland heavy cruiser and use the panzerschiff icon for the heavy cruiser so i feel im still using panzerschiff:pathetic
The Germans were forever coming up with pie in the sky plans for all their services. Giant battleships for the navy, huge bombers for the air force and giant tanks and artillery for the army. All these plans apparently didn't take into account the amount of materials needed to build them. The fuel needed to move them or the personnel needed to operate them. Outside of a few giant rail based artillery pieces and two battleships none of these plans ever came to anything. They build no carriers, had no long range heavy bombers and the few giant tanks they did build were useless because of lack of fuel and poor reliability. (Not to mention there wasn't a bridge in Germany that could support their weight). The Nazis had a tendency towards gigantism and these hairbrained plans satisfied this tendency.
good point
Even the spotters on the Kamchatka could tell that those ships where not torpedo boats
I wouldn’t count on that. If by some chance they did, they will signal they spotted torpedo boats anyways.
@@frost9041 Oh absolutely. The Signal men on that bucket are horribly incompetent or hallucinate about torpedo boats. But the spotters might accidentally see the difference if the ship is large enough
@@lok3kobold oh no I don’t think you relise the true horror that ship was it see a pack of fucking seagulls and signal that the whole Luftwaffe and raf are attacking it
@@andrewgraham6006 "We are sinking!"
*everyone liked that*
"Wait, no, we're fine!"
*sigh*
@@Ealsante oh no false alarm one of the crew men accidentally turned a tap on
"There won't be a war."
[Starts largest war in history]
That guy was literally Hitler.
@@felix_halcs123 But Hitler started the war...by invading Poland
@@felix_halcs123 *After* Hitler invaded Poland on the 1. of september The UK sent an ultimatum to Germany to stop hostilities, which Hitler didn't. On the 3. since Hitler didn't respond, both France and Britain declared war.
To be fair, if Hitler didn’t start World War II, Stalin would’ve done it anyway a year or two later, if not over Poland than possibly over the Baltic countries or Finland, or maybe picking a fight with Japan over Manchuria. Ultimately, it was the Munich Agreement that led Hitler to think he could get away with taking Danzig off of Poland without the UK or France intervening (and he was right - while war was declared, they refused to actually try and counterinvade Germany and help the Poles directly, largely due to the formidable defenses of the Siegfried Line, though the fact that French strategy was pretty much dependent on fighting defensively like in the previous war didn't help, especially when the Germans demonstrated that they weren't going to allow themselves to be bogged down into a war of attrition again if they had any say in the matter). By his own admission, had the UK and France been more firm in opposing the occupation of the Sudetenland, he wouldn't have made a similar ultimatum to take Danzig from Poland, which led to war when Poland refused and the UK and France finally put their foot down.
I feel like he received a cancer diagnosis and went full Walter White so he could see his destruction of the world before it got him, then got bored halfway in amd just intentionally made poor decisions to get it over with quicker...
The ww1 reparations started the war
"A High Seas Fleet if you will.... because that worked out so well the first time"
The salt and sarcasm is palatable
I think, beside being a funny comment, it's not quite comparable as in WW1, the German fleet could not break out of the North Sea. The situation was completely different in WW2, with France and Norway occupied and the existance of an airforce.
Flash doors? Who needs them?
Well the only reason it didn’t work was because the only bigger fleet in the world was the british who could easily contaminate the high seas fleet in the north sea. Not to mention the lesser supply
@Rauschgenerator except during plan Z, france would probably have had its shit together by then, and Norway would have 100% modernized. Nevermind Poland would have modernized by then
The Germans were stupid to hand their fleet over at the end of WWI. And in WWII the Brits unleashed the World War again, before the Germans could establish a fleet in being. But anyway the Royal Navy is dead like the entire west.
Raeder: "Okay, so you want another High Seas Fleet that can challenge the Royal Navy?
Hitler: "Yeah."
Raeder: "Okay, then just give us until about 1948-ish and we might just be ready."
Hitler: "Don't worry. I'm not going to war until then."
**The German Reich has declared war on Poland**
Raeder: *_"Sigh..._* U-Boats it is."
Dönitz: "Somebody said U-Boats?"
I have this mental image of Doenitz crashing through a wall when Raeder said "U-boats."
@@evanhunt1863 *"OH YEAAH!!" but in german*
@@Paludion so you mean "AU JAAAA!!!"?
@@Paludion German Kool-Aid Man.
ADMIRAL Kool-Aid Man, I should say.
What is interesting is that Wilhelm II built his entire battle fleet of dreadnoughts and super-dreadnoughts in eight years, along with doubling the numbers of cruisers and destroyers in the High Seas Fleet. So, it was possible for Germany to build a formidable fleet in less than a decade... in theory. Of course, the real situation is that German industry in general was very poorly run under the Nazis, who were generally ill-educated brutes, or well educated people who were detached from reality. Add to that the material requirements of rebuilding a military fro scratch are very high compared to the stead state of arming of the German Army prior to WWI. That is to say that the Army was already mostly armed and only a few major weapons systems were added. The new Wehrmacht needed a lot of everything and add to that whole new families of weapons systems like tanks, armored vehicles, self-propelled guns, etc. As well as building an air force from scratch. So the material demands on the German economy for re-armament in 1933-1939 was far higher than 1906-1914. All that said, yes, Germany could have built a large fleet quickly had it truly been a priority.