Naval Battles Discussion

The real blow to the Japanese aviation pool was at Guadalcanal, which became a meat grinder in terms of airmen, sailors, and ground troops.
The Japanese were aware of American naval appropriations, but they were, frankly, delusional regarding their ability to take on American military strength.

I wouldn’t rate the Japanese airman losses at Midway as all that severe. I believe they lost 110 carrier aviators while the Americans lost 100. The Americans could make good their personnel losses more readily than the Japanese, but the loss of four premier carriers–that was something that the IJN never recovered from. I believe the Japanese completed only four purpose-built carriers during the entirety of the Pacific War.

But those were the top aviators. It was the Japanese side which admitted, that that corps did not recover from that blow really. Those carriers operated from the start of war and there was no time to replace personal losses till Midway really. The Japanese had hoped otherwise, but they missed the US-CVs in Honolulu. The main target of the Midway attack had been the US CVs. To finish that threat may have had given the heavy tasked Japanese carrier force some time for respite and recovery. I do not know, if the Japanese had any real idea, that in 1941 the USA had started to built 22+ CVs already?!

I wouldn’t rate the Japanese airman losses at Midway as all that severe. I believe they lost 110 carrier aviators while the Americans lost 100. The Americans could make good their personnel losses more readily than the Japanese, but the loss of four premier carriers–that was something that the IJN never recovered from. I believe the Japanese completed only four purpose-built carriers during the entirety of the Pacific War.

During the battle for Midway the USN lost one carrier, the USS Yorktown.

The Japanese lost all four carriers of the Midway strike force, comprising the Akagi, Hiryu, Kaga and Soryu.

Sauron

To replace a carrier takes about one year. To train some similar capable pilots and specialists takes several years. The Imperial Japanese Navy never got the time to recover from that losses. So in the hindsight ‘Midway’ is labeled the turning point in the Pacific War.

Just noticed the reference to the Canberra. I guess you all know she was the RAN Canberra.

Sauron

During the battle for Midway the USN lost one carrier, the USS Yorktown.

The Japanese lost all four carriers of the Midway strike force, comprising the Akagi, Hiryu, Kaga and Soryu.

Sauron

Off Samar, the Americans lost the destroyers Johnston and Hoel, the destroyer escort Samuel B Roberts, and the escort carrier Gambier Bay to gunfire. The escort carrier St Lo later fell victim to the very first wave of kamikazes. The major losses for the Japanese were the heavy cruisers Chokai, Chikuma, and Suzuya. The most interesting loss may be Suzuya’s, as she was destroyed by a bomb that didn’t hit her; a splinter came aboard and started a fire among her oxygen torpedoes, and the resulting explosion wrecked the ship.
The OoB for the entire Leyte battle is available at
http://www.navweaps.com/index_oob/index_oob.htm

The story of the escort carrier surviving an attack from major Japanese warships probably is the incident off of Leyte Gulf wherein a bunch of escort carriers, destroyers, and destroyer escorts were suddenly face to face with a bunch of Japanese battleships and cruisers and the Americans put up SUCH a ruckus with ships running all over the place and planes attacking and torpedoes in the water everywhere that the Japs backed off, thinking they had come across amajor surface force of the American Navy and fell back to regroup…unfortunately the Americans did NOT come through unscathed, losing one escort carrier and I believe 2 DE’s in the process, but succeeded in keeping the heavy Japanese force from disrupting the allied landings on Leyte….while meanwhile, to the north, Halsey was trying to get his Iowa class battleship (not sure which one….thinking New Jersey) into range to fire on one of the Yamato class heavies…and fell about 50 miles short of doing so (boy would THAT have been a battle of heavyweights!!) before being recalled to protect the invasion force….
ah, history…and the ‘what if’ category remains conjecture on our parts….

M

“The Quincy, Vincennes, Astoria and Canberra were sunk.”
That was the Battle of Savo Island, the greatest defeat ever suffered by the USN at sea. Quincy, Astoria, and Vincennes were all from the New Orleans class, a very good design intended to show increased resistance to gunfire. Shows what happens when the right tools are used in the wrong way.

“I recall there was a battle also when a small auxiliary carrier survived a very large japaneese attack.”
It sounds like you’re describing the Battle off Samar, when a group of converted merchant ships/aircraft carriers woke up one morning to find the largest battleship in the world was sitting in their parlor. There’s a recent book, Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors, which has gotten rave reviews for describing this mismatch–a handful of destroyers and escorts charging an enemy force of four battleships, multiple cruisers, and destroyers.

“I recall also that an american pilot in a critically damaged plane, decided to crash his plane into a japaneese cruiser and sank it.”
This story arose at the Battle of Midway about a pilot named Richard Flemming who crashed onto the cruiser Mikuma. Unfortunately, it’s made up. Flemming was shot down, but he didn’t crash the cruiser. Even though this was early in the war, there had already been a case of a damaged Japanese airplane that crashed onto USS Enterprise, though without causing damage. There were more incidents of planes hitting ships in WWII than you might expect.

I recall there was a battle also when a small auxiliary carrier survived a very large japaneese attack. Unfortunately I dont have access to WW2 history books at the moment, so I cant look any of this up. I recall also that an american pilot in a critically damaged plane, decided to crash his plane into a japaneese cruiser and sank it. That might be how the japaneese got the idea that one dead pilot for a sunk enemy ship was a good tradeoff (kamakazi)

One of the battles that intrigues me most is First Guadalcanal, where American cruisers took on Japanese battleships and bested them.

A little bit ironic?! 9th August 1942
The Quincy, Vincennes, Astoria and Canberra were sunk.
The fear of daylight bomber attacks saved the “day” and in this case the night.

One of the battles that intrigues me most is First Guadalcanal, where American cruisers took on Japanese battleships and bested them.

Ask the Romans about that. They did disprove your claim.
It is a similar thing with a cruiser and a destroyer. The destroyer may be faster and more agile, but against a superior warship it is never in control of the situation. (limited to the pre-SSM age)

The Romans trumped the tactic of ramming with an invention called the beak, which was a ramp that swiveled around and was hinged so that ramp could fall down on to a ship, and had a spike at the end of the ramp so that it stayed fasted to the ship. So they basically said, go ahead and ram us, will just board your ship, kill you, and watch our ship sink.

When ever large groups fight in battle, whether it be ships, men, airplanes, whatever, they will always fight better in organized formations. But the fact remains that in a ship ramming battle, the faster ships will have control of this situation and always have the advantage.

Ask the Romans about that. They did disprove your claim.
It is a similar thing with a cruiser and a destroyer. The destroyer may be faster and more agile, but against a superior warship it is never in control of the situation. (limited to the pre-SSM age)

In those days they fought in formations and had to keep their station at first.

When ever large groups fight in battle, whether it be ships, men, airplanes, whatever, they will always fight better in organized formations. But the fact remains that in a ship ramming battle, the faster ships will have control of this situation and always have the advantage.

So youre saying heavier ships will always win a ramming battle over lighter ships? Be serious. A light ship, and by that I mean around 20 tons, will have plenty of energy to smash though any wooden ship of that day. And a faster ship will always be able to outmaneuver into the side of a slower ship.

In those days they fought in formations and had to keep their station at first.

Did you ever heard something about kinetic-energy?!
When this kinetic-energy is concentrated to the bow, it broke the soft sides of wooden sides of shipswith ease or pushed away the lighter-ships.

So youre saying heavier ships will always win a ramming battle over lighter ships? Be serious. A light ship, and by that I mean around 20 tons, will have plenty of energy to smash though any wooden ship of that day. And a faster ship will always be able to outmaneuver into the side of a slower ship.

Ill be honest, I dont know how fast triremes went, noone does because exact desciptions of their design do not survive, so we are forced to piece together fragments of information about them. As I said, I do know how fast the Galleys of the Battle of Lepanto went, up to 8 knots, and they were huge, double the length of a trireme and quite wide. Its only logical that if to ships are in a ramming battle, the faster ship has much greater advantage. I fail to see the greeks use a design developed over hundreds of years for the sole purpose of ramming being only 2 knots faster than a much larger ship that was not optimised for speed at all. We know for example that the oarsmen on triremes sat on greased seats that allowed the oarsmen to slide back and forth the way oarsmen on modern rowing sculls do. This is a feature that would only be used if a ship was able to hit very high speeds that would have to afford a large range of movement for the oar to impart power while moving at speed.

Did you ever heard something about kinetic-energy?!
When this kinetic-energy is concentrated to the bow, it broke the soft sides of wooden sides of shipswith ease or pushed away the lighter-ships.

Thus, based on Thukididis, the developer of the trireme was a Korinthian by the name of Ameinoklis and the ship was first developed around 705 BC

I said it before, Ill say it again, the Phoenicians were the first known to use the trireme.


http://www.cedarland.org/ships.html

Ill be honest, I dont know how fast triremes went, noone does because exact desciptions of their design do not survive, so we are forced to piece together fragments of information about them. As I said, I do know how fast the Galleys of the Battle of Lepanto went, up to 8 knots, and they were huge, double the length of a trireme and quite wide. Its only logical that if to ships are in a ramming battle, the faster ship has much greater advantage. I fail to see the greeks use a design developed over hundreds of years for the sole purpose of ramming being only 2 knots faster than a much larger ship that was not optimised for speed at all. We know for example that the oarsmen on triremes sat on greased seats that allowed the oarsmen to slide back and forth the way oarsmen on modern rowing sculls do. This is a feature that would only be used if a ship was able to hit very high speeds that would have to afford a large range of movement for the oar to impart power while moving at speed.

Since I am asking for sources on your claims, I must supply the thread with some sources for mine:
Thus, based on Thukididis, the developer of the trireme was a Korinthian by the name of Ameinoklis and the ship was first developed around 705 BC for the purpose of beating the pirate ships that were devastating the Aegean trade routes. The trireme was better equiped and faster than the ships used mostly during that time (more specificaly: the Penticontor [50 oarsmen in one row] and the diireme [100 oarsmen in two rows and most favored in the Ionian coast]).

The trireme was used across the Aegean and the Eastern Mediteranean Sea from 700 to 300 BC. Mind you, that many of the ships of the Persian Fleet in Salamis were also triremes of the Ionian Greeks. But it was tactics that won the day.

There are many references in the works of Thukidides, Herodotus, Aisxylos and Ploutarxos.

In Greece they were build with Fir tree since it is lighter (the trade ships were build with pine tree because it wouldn’t rot easily)
The total weight of the ship was 45 tonnes, the ram weighted 200 kgrs and the speed only with the sail was about 5 knots. normal speed with the oarsmen was 8 knots with a maximum of 10knots. The crew was 200 with 170 on the oars 16 were the deck crew and 14 were soldiers (archers, etc).

The most usuful visual reference we have are : The Lenorman sculture from the Acropolis (410-400BC) and a few presentations on gravestones held in the National Museum of Greece in Athens (Dimoklides), or the one held in Munich (Dimitrios) where there is a representation of the stern.

The end of the triremes was the naval battle of Amorgos (322BC) when 240 Athenian triremes were beaten by heavier but more modern Macedonian ships (tetriremes, pentiremes, etc)