Japan was not too helpful, no tech detail and didn't use cats.
Biplane era was ending by 35, with Spit and 109 first flights.
Graf Zep was based on Furious and Co. All nations in parallel evolution, removed multiple take off decks with faster air.
The Germans build carriers, instead of battleships, prior to WW2
- Thread starter ravenscroft
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Japan was not too helpful, no tech detail and didn't use cats.
Biplane era was ending by 35, with Spit and 109 first flights.
Graf Zep was based on Furious and Co. All nations in parallel evolution, removed multiple take off decks with faster air.
... sry ... but ... not really answering my question.
You are still talking of GRT numbers.
But I'm asking for Displacement numbers
As only the latter would be looked at from foreign (british) navys due to the numerous naval treaties.thaddeus
Donor
combine both the above ideas across a wide universe of ships (for instance they converted approx. 100 large-ish commercial ships to Sperrbrecher mine-clearing ships/guard ships)
my prior speculation was for a fleet of tankers/supply ships of the Dithmarschen-class that could handle seaplanes under wartime conversion and helicopters if available.
Maritime aviation offered a solution, and there was extensive collaboration with civilian airlines in the development of long-range flying, oceanic navigation, and radio communications.31 However, land-based aircraft operating from Germany lacked the range to operate beyond the North Sea.32 Only naval aviation could operate over the ocean, but the few seaplanes carried by the Panzerschiffe were limited to operating in good weather. A carrier’s far larger air group could operate in poorer conditions, offering a substantial increase in capability, and the navy was willing to concede cruiser tonnage to build carriers, should it be allowed to join the London Treaty. The shift from a battle line to raiding groups required more smaller carriers rather than one or two large ones. To operate with the Panzerschiffe they needed to have considerable endurance (12,000 nm at 20 kt) and be capable of sustained high speed for air operations. They also needed the equivalent armament and protection to ward off destroyer attacks.33
Yep, it's an evolutionary learning process, so at what point in the timeline the KM goes carrier will also influence the flow on. From that start point you have a TL of development to massage. Look at Langley, 1920, 16.5 knots but still in 1927 flying of its Vought 's at anchor. So, if they start earlier, with a basic platform they have a longer window of experience. So many what ifs to consider and I've pretty much run my own view up the masthead in the MFK thread. How it flows will be in context of any start point selected. Q in this thread is to confirm1. that the KM goes down the carrier concept, then pick your start point while cascade onto how much and how good the efforts that result are. My issue that makes me so cynical and leaning towards the budget CV option, however much you may disagree, is simply a reflection of several things.
- Hitlers is the head honcho at the apex of the power pyramid of Nazie Germany. His entire system of control is to form overlapping and competitive blocs in constant competition, so that he gets called upon to make the final arbitrary decisions, thus maximizing his power at the apex. The competing military and industrial factions are optimized to push their own agenda in that environment, and actively work against the KM interest in many ways.
- Goring is clear number two in the Reich, and the Luftwaffe is just a platform for personal egotism, and he is resistant to anything that stops its expansion or limits it on principle and carriers are such an area.
- The KM as a body was shaped by the WW1 experience where the HSF was reduced to impotence by the RN distant blockade strategy. Methods of subverting a repeat of this means either a Plan Z size navy which isn't even slightly conceivable in a rearming Germany or finding a way around the RN plans. Commerce warfare against the vital merchant marine is realistically the only strategic option, but how?
I probably don't have the resources to give a good quantifiable and defendable answer that could satisfy you., so take that with a grain of salt. In those situations, I revert to a historical comparison as a start line. In this case its worth looking at SS Scharnhorst 18,000 GRT in 1934 was converted by the IJN in 41, to a 190m 17,500 standard tons carrier, 22knots,27-33 aircraft, 8x 5-inch etc. CVE Shinyo so that might be a comparable yardstick to make your own assessment. Sorry T.
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I have always thought that the only way that a WW2 Germany could have an use it's carriers would be to have it's pre-WW1 colonies in Africa and the Pacific to base them out of. Plus those colonies would need to be built up to support those ships as well with naval bases. Inside the Baltic they're going to get swarmed and sank trying to get out into the North Sea because the construction of those carriers would have the Royal Navy forcing the air asset issue with the RAF and seeing a large force of bombers for naval patrols and attacks. You'd see more land based torpedo bombers being added to the forces of the Dutch, Norwegians, etc as well. All sorts of anti-shipping forces that are MUCH easier to build up than the carriers themselves.
Would the Germans realise that in the mid 1930s when making the decision?
My suspicion is that they might not since OTL they weren't very interested in marine aviation and air-launched torpedoes, so may have overlooked this downside.
But as you said, there was a lack of strategic direction, conflicts between Luftwaffe and Navy (which probably sounds familiar to the FAA supporters) and the Luftwaffe was more immediately useful in a close air support role. But then maybe they decided that dive bombers were good enough against ships and don't have a Mediterranean coastline to worry about, so why muck about with torpedo bombers? And in principle they could buy them from Italy if they looked useful.
The few carriers they do build are hunted down by the Royal Navy. The lack of suitable carrier aircraft for the Germans would put them at a major disadvantage.
It first flew in 1937, unless you are suggesting a huge amount of foresight by the Germans, its not getting into service in Germany per WW2 and maybe not until a couple of years in depending on circumstances, like for example Germany being unwilling to accept its shortcomings like lack of armour and not try to "improve" it.
Some notions of how German y might use 2-3 smaller carriers operational in or from 1939.
Operations in the North Sea and up to Iceland: Supporting or covering raiders headed to the Atlantic. The carriers don't accompany them, they conduct periodic anti reconnaissance sweeps in conjunction with submarines and surface ships. These are to temporarily blind the RN, and keep them uncertain about what the German actions are for. This includes ambushing British ASW aircraft looking for submarines headed for the Atlantic from Germany or later the Norwegian ports.
.... Cover the littoral operation along the Norwegian coast. interfering with British reconnaissance, and tactical air support of the landing force are two separate missions they might conduct. Ferry missions to get Luftwaffe aircraft further north is another.
...Harassment raid on Brit airfields on Iceland. Maybe sink a ship or two there.
If you want to get really frisky, then harassing the Arctic convoys.
Separately there's Baltic ops, extending air support further north and east along the Baltic coast until the Luftwaffe rebases deeper into the Baltic region.
Getting really out there, have one of these small or medium size carriers caught overseas in September 1939, and shelter interned in Japanese or Italian ports until they can rejoin the war
Operations in the North Sea and up to Iceland: Supporting or covering raiders headed to the Atlantic. The carriers don't accompany them, they conduct periodic anti reconnaissance sweeps in conjunction with submarines and surface ships. These are to temporarily blind the RN, and keep them uncertain about what the German actions are for. This includes ambushing British ASW aircraft looking for submarines headed for the Atlantic from Germany or later the Norwegian ports.
.... Cover the littoral operation along the Norwegian coast. interfering with British reconnaissance, and tactical air support of the landing force are two separate missions they might conduct. Ferry missions to get Luftwaffe aircraft further north is another.
...Harassment raid on Brit airfields on Iceland. Maybe sink a ship or two there.
If you want to get really frisky, then harassing the Arctic convoys.
Separately there's Baltic ops, extending air support further north and east along the Baltic coast until the Luftwaffe rebases deeper into the Baltic region.
Getting really out there, have one of these small or medium size carriers caught overseas in September 1939, and shelter interned in Japanese or Italian ports until they can rejoin the war
The RN with swordfish, US with devastator and the IJN with B5N, which is at "a major disadvantage"??
Apart from hull numbers, and plane numbers on those hulls, AGAIN first flew in 1937, even if you have German-Japanese industrial/military relationship being much more than OTL, the idea that an aircraft that goes into service in 37 in another country will be available to a German navy in 1939-1941 in significant numbers as to somehow be a major weapon seems "unlikely"...
This point miss that the AGN agreement anticipated that Germany would build carriers
Guys can I just make a general observation about the 'Conceptualizing' of operational employment of carriers by the KM you might want to consider.
IMHO I won't say that responses are a bit blinkered, but I would observe that much of what some on the thread have present seem a bit weighted in the light of historical precedent and hindsight. When comments are made, there persists a general bias towards reflecting modern employment options and concepts proven by Midway and later, without a real reflection on the fact that all this wasn't really known YET. When trying to shape a carrier-based KM consider the intrinsic shaping its professional core endured from WW1 and how it affects its operational planning and concepts for employing a carrier arm. The distant blockade was effective in reducing a powerful navy largely to irrelevance in operational terms, constrained by both geography and the Kaisers policies of employment. It's resurgence in the 20s and 30s included finding means to bypass a repetition of this occurring again. That they may produce a novel approach (pocket battleships anyone?) or not be a reflection of our modern perspective does not mean that they won't pursue what we could consider a sub-optimal approach, doesn't mean it won't happen lacking our hindsight.
Command is the art of the possible, and with the industrial and political constraints faced in Nazi Germany, they will develop concepts and plans shaped by this truism. If they go down that line, without our hindsight and benefit of knowledge the acquisition or employment of Carriers will reflect this, not modern operational carrier theory. Why are so many assuming that they are going to grab bag 25+knot designs or see them deployed forward into the Atlantic in the support of surface forces? Just because that's a modern perspective on carrier use? Limited size or limited speed doesn't mean that they won't have ineffective concepts for the use of less capable platforms, similar to those covered by Carl above. (👍) Even here that gives tactical flexibility to KM surface ops.
I offer you these thoughts of employment for 4-5 small Scharnhorst or Potsdam style conversions and see if that doesn't raise a few questions in your mind, or how it would have made the allies options more complex in response. Remember too, using that same historic hindsight I quoted, on how effective the small carriers operating in numbers, can be without the larger tactical objective seemingly implicit in the attack carrier mindset. (Think the landings at Operation Torch, or the Taffies of Leyte Gulf)
- Imagine Operation Wesserbung, the invasion of Norway supported by 3-4 small carriers. Local air superiority anyone? The Allies lost regardless anyway but imagine the greater cost if the KM had its own localized air support not reliant on the Luftwaffe. How would the Fulmars, Gladiators and Swordfish have fared against 20-60 Me109s on call? Would the IKM have employed them as fighter farms in that role? Remember they still really didn't have an effective TBR in 1940.
- What happens to the Arctic convoys if there are 3-5 Shinyo analogs are shuttling around Kola and the Norwegian Arctic waters, safe sheltering under Luftflotte Fives cover, then concentrated and employed to support selective operations. 60+ Me109s to suppress local aircover in conjunction with major bombing effort by LF5 or covering a surface action group led by Tirpitz et. al.? Creates operational planning problems for the RN, doesn't it? They don't need the high-speed carriers to be effective, 20-22 knots would do the job.
- My old bugbear, raids on Murmansk or more effective support of Finnish/German efforts against the Kola Peninsula (this time with better/more German troops)?
- Suppose they use these in a more raid type objectives, with only small specific exposures outside of land-based air cover for a short time. Punch a hole in screening forces to release a raider into the NA or cover its return. An attack to support an attempt to occupy Iceland perhaps? Short sharp exposures to a limited objective, then withdrawn to rearm and replace AC and losses under a land-based aircover. With 4-5 small platforms there is some redundancy available in employment, unlike single deployment of a GZ type carrier as options.
For me finally, I will say that thinking about it offers intrinsically interesting and not necessarily obvious implications. As an Allied Planner I can't help but feel exploring that potential fully is going to make my job so much harder.
I hope you enjoy my monolog and thoughts and hope it generates some interesting ideas and responses. Great Brainfood for enjoyment. Regards T.
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And if it had been multiple carriers, with no battleships, even Dudley Pound would have smelt a very large rat.
Plus we are talking about the navy that 95% completed a carrier and then, even after Pearl Harbour, used it for timber storage throughout the war.
But why would Japan help Germany? Germany has been providing arms to China and is on reasonably friendly terms with the soviet union who they are having border disputes with.
It makes more sense to stick with naval dive bombers, and maybe get some land based topedo bombers from Italy. The dive bombers will work reasonably well against cruisers and smaller ships and will mess up older battleship upperworks. As important, the Germans are already thinking about them.
I don't know much about Italian torpedo bombers in the 1930s. What were the options early enough for German adoption?
nbcman
Donor
Italy didn’t start using their SM.79 planes as torpedo bombers until after their entry into WW2. But those planes were produced in the mid1930s. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savoia-Marchetti_SM.79_Sparviero