is this a studied tactic in naval warfare after 1900? someone told me that, according to accepted conventions, a warship that comes within a mile of an enemy warship is commited to ramming. is this true? are ships after 1900 even designed for it?
I don't know if there was any official doctrine, but I was able to find these instances from WW2: http://uboat.net/allies/merchants/2762.html Nov. 1, 1943 - USS Borie (DD 215) engaged in a nighttime battle with U-405. Borie succeeded in ramming the u-boat after an hour-long battle. The two ships were stuck together briefly while both crews exchanged small arms fire. Borie sank the next day due to her damaged bow. http://www.navy.mil/navydata/nav_legacy.asp?id=142
Not after 1900, not even in the late 1800s. When steam warships were first developed, ramming offered an opportunity to inflict fatal damage that gunfire did not. There were a few famous rammings in the American Civil War and at the battle of Lissa, but the development of the automobile i.e. self-propelled torpedo gave either attempted rammer or rammee a better option.
I'm not sure how close they were but in one of the battles off Gaudalcanal a US DD was close enough to one of the Japanese battleships that they couldn't fire on the DD. I believe the IJN admiral was killed by 40mm fire that entered through a view slot in the bridge. Neither ship tried to ram from what I've read. On the other hand there's the example of the Glowworm.
There were other instances; DE-51 Buckley versus U-66 and DD-354 Monaghan versus "Midget B." Amagiri and PT-109. Most captains would not make it their primary attack type as it would most likely cause some damage to their ship, but if presented the "opportunity" with less success from other methods (such as having to withdraw enough to let the guns work) it was certainly in an aggressive skipper's playbook.
I think there was a lot of ramming submarines even in WW2, it's a bit ironic that the only ship sunk by HMS Dreadnought, that was designed with long range gunnery in mind and heralded the all big guns era, was by ramming.
key word ''designed''....very great question here, and one I never thought of before [ again ] ...yes JFKs PT boat was rammed[ if I remember correctly, intentionally ]...I would think this would do much damage to the DDs...I'm no expert, but seems like the WW2 ships could take it, <>why would a captain endanger the ship like that, if they couldn't??...I know there are experts here that can give us some details...much thanks all replies
Definitely, it was a fairly common tactic, I've even seen references to escort ships having their bows strengthened for the purpose. Most escorts had a only a few 3" or 4" guns, and a sub's pressure hull is cylindrical and mostly under water even when the boat is surfaced, not an easy gunnery target. Also a damaged sub forced to surface would usually pop up at close quarters. Ramming could definitely damage the ramming ship, as with Borie mentioned about and the Coast Guard cutter Campbell. In WWI the liner Olympic, sister to Titanic, rammed and sank a U-boat. Side note, back in peacetime service, Olympic accomplished one of history's most amazing feats of navigation, crossing the Atlantic without benefit of electronic navigational aids, and approaching American shores in heavy fog, she made a perfect "landfall" - hit the Nantucket lightship dead amidships.
I don't know much about how much thought was given before the war, but there was definitely discussion about strengthening the bows of DDs and DEs in April of 1943.
Didn't the USN and/or the RN also send out orders to at least some of the escorts at one point not to ram?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HNLMS_Schorpioen special rammingships were still used at end of 19th century. Torpedos were "just" invented...but as always..not liberally distributed all over the world with all navies and on all warships....