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Tiornu

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July 14, 2005 at 5:56 am in reply to: Battleship Questions #2095518

Tiornu
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Bismarck was not a particularly good design, achieving rough parity with foreign contemporaries only by means of being larger. She had good mobility, her firepower was okay, and her protection was poor.
France’s Richelieus suffered from excessive shell dispersion and a lack of heavy AA. Otherwise the design was extremely good.
KGV’s armor was very good, her weaponry was not. She really lacked in range.

July 14, 2005 at 4:38 am in reply to: Battleship Questions #2095530

Tiornu
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All the modern US battleships were well designed, in my opinion. If I had to finger a weakness, I’d say they were merely adequate in armor protection. Regarding mobility and firepower, they were exceptionally good.

July 13, 2005 at 9:55 pm in reply to: Battleship Questions #2095606

Tiornu
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We can easily segue back to battleships. The Alabama was very close to the point of Dennis’s landfall, but I haven’t heard she took any damage. Her sistership Indiana was one of the ships caught in Typhoon Cobra, the one that sank three destroyers in Dec 1944. Indiana had her steering disabled and one engine knocked out. I can assure you, I am very glad I did not have to personally witness any of it.

June 13, 2005 at 8:00 am in reply to: This is precious #2044876

Tiornu
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Is the issue hotter because people still refer to Belgrano as a battleship? I can’t see anyone getting so overheated about the loss of a 45-year-old light cruiser.

June 8, 2005 at 7:26 pm in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2045461

Tiornu
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The closest cruiser to Turkey that I can think of is the Greek Averof.

June 1, 2005 at 12:13 pm in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2046616

Tiornu
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You’re thinking of Eugene Ely who flew a Curtiss biplane off USS Birmingham in 1910 and landed aboard USS Pennsylvania in 1911. (Both these ships were cruisers.) Ely died in a plane wreck in 1911, six months before Texas was launched. It was on 9 March 1919 that Texas became the first American battleship to launch an airplane, a Sopwith Camel piloted by Lt. Comdr. Edward O. McDonnell.

May 31, 2005 at 4:39 am in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2046781

Tiornu
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Texas had VTE. She hardly compares in age with the likes of Constitution and Victory, and though she remains afloat, she has no official affiliation with the USN.
Well, to push the bounds of this discussion a little further, what about HMS Excellent? Is she still “afloat”?

May 26, 2005 at 9:31 am in reply to: 24 May 1941 #2047487

Tiornu
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Yes, the Germans went into the war with a navy that was hardly optimized for the scenario they were facing. The Bismarcks were conceived at a time when the anticipated foe was a Baltic power or perhaps France, and Hitler had secured via treaty a fleet equal to that of France. Honestly, I’m not sure what naval deployment was anticipated for a war against France. (Scharnhorst, on a really big trolley, steaming across the Ardennes….) In WWI, the Germans had found gainful employment for their battle fleet to the east, and I wonder how Barbarossa might have developed had the Germans taken a similar approach in 1941. The Soviets had nothing that could have stood up to Tirpitz, but the Germans opted instead to play small ball (baseball reference!) and depend on mines and coastal craft. I can’t say this was a poor choice, and it definitely had the intended result, but that doesn’t stop me wondering.

May 26, 2005 at 9:16 am in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2047489

Tiornu
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“May have been others, maybe not.”
There are no other Constellations listed in DANFS.

May 25, 2005 at 6:07 pm in reply to: 24 May 1941 #2047539

Tiornu
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I don’t think I can agree with you there. The ones who got the real lesson from this operation were the Germans. I can’t identify a single major change in RN practice arising from the “lesson” of Hood’s loss, while Rhienubung ended any German pretense to high-seas raiding by their warships. Never again did a warship go out on an Atlantic cruise. The more expendable AMCs did, but warships were subsequently restricted to sortying after specific targets–and that didn’t turn out to well either.

May 25, 2005 at 10:10 am in reply to: 24 May 1941 #2047581

Tiornu
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Yes, I agree. If I were handicapping such a fight, I would favor the British forces. Neither Hood nor PoW was individually a match for Bismarck (Hood because she was unmodernized and PoW because she was so green), but together they were more powerful than the German side.

May 8, 2005 at 8:26 pm in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2050695

Tiornu
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Sahara was fiction? Well, I must admit, it seemed kind of flashy for a documentary….
As I understand it, Arizona is not in commission but in “ordinary,” and no, I don’t know what that means.
In America, the following battleships are still afloat: Texas, North Carolina, Massachusetts, and Alabama. A storm will occasionally push NC onto a mud bank, but I think she’s normally afloat.

May 8, 2005 at 10:11 am in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2050773

Tiornu
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“where constitution has no roll in the us navy and is left commisioned for historys sake.”
I don’t see how this distinguishes between the two. Is Victory maintained for practicality’s sake? Did she see any action during the Falklands?
Here are some other Oldies that remain in existence in some form or other.
The Russian cruiser Avrora, completed 1903, is in very nice shape as a museum ship.
Chile’s Huascar of 1865 is still around as a museum, I believe.
As many as two relics of the Russian Bronenosets class monitors (1865) may linger, probably no longer recognizable, one as a floating workshop and the other as a pontoon at the Kronshtadt Yacht Club.
Another 1865 monitor, John Ericsson, remains as a barge or something in Sweden.
The “world’s first torpedo boat,” Rap of 1873, is now a museum in Denmark.
According to a recent movie, a Confederate ironclad survived the American Civil War and escaped to the Sahara Desert. However, I suspect this is fiction.

May 8, 2005 at 7:28 am in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2050798

Tiornu
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My memory tells me Mikasa is not afloat but set in a bed of concrete. But my memory tells me many things: for example, Samuel Beckett was murdered in the cathedral while waiting for Godot.

May 6, 2005 at 7:36 am in reply to: Old ships still flying the flag. #2051052

Tiornu
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Didn’t Victory survive a bomb hit in WWII?
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