Was Bismarck a bad investment?

And people wonder why sailors have a certain stereotyped image... :lol:

 

Worse imagine tell people you were sunk by HMS PANSY or TULIP or CHRYSANTHEMUM...

 

Or took a torpedo in the stern from the Pansy.

No more I promise.

 

The RN once had a vessel named Cuirass, so try walking into a sailor bar and telling eveybody that you serve on the Cuirass. Instant bar fight!

 

Ok, here are some...

HMS Xenophobia (thanks Ricky)
HMS Xenomorph
HMS Xerox (sponsored by)
HMS X-Mas
HMS X-Ray
HMS Xylitol
HMS Xylophone
HMS Xmouth (ok, I have to admit, this was rather bad one).

And with Y...
HMS Yacht
HMS Yahoo
HMS Yank
HMS Yarmouth
HMS Yeast (sponsored by bakers guild)
HMS Yellow
HMS Yemen
HMS Yeti
HMS Yogurt
HMS Youngster
HMS Yucca
HMS Yummy

Pick your favourite ones

 

The only X-name for an RN ship, apart from X-1 etc, is Xenophon, which was used only once.There were other requisitioned vessels that came with X-names, like the yacht Xarifa--has a rather romantic look to it, eh? And then of course there was the captured Italian MAS boat which some wry individual renamed XMAS.
The Y's are interesting because you can come up with some genuine candidates. Your Yarmouth suggestion, for example, has at least six precedents in RN service. York is the most common Y-name, not surprising, but that would not be usable.
Here are my eight Y-names.
Yarborough
Yewbow
Yeoman
Yale
Yare
Yorkist
Ypres
Yataghan
I thought about Yorick, but I'm not sure the RN is keen on famous corpses. Also, they probably wouldn't name a ship after a race of filthy brutes. (I'm referring to Yahoos, not Yanks.) There was a requisitioned Yucca, by the way.

 

Cuirass, huh? Maybe it was believed that her sailors would be steeled by having to constantly defend themselves in bars - kinda like Johnny Cash's "A Boy Named Sue"

 

How about Yarrow?

 

Wow. I can't find a single Yarrow ever in RN service. It would seem a natural choice.

 

It was almost a 2 for 1 Trade...even more...as the Bismarck should have finished the POW of too(the had gottent eh chance twice!)!
Fortunatly the good old Admiral deceided something different!
I wonder what would have happened if the Bismarck sunk the POW too?
What would have happened if they sunk the Norfolk and the Sufolk wich were shadowing the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen for so long?
The battles around the Bismarck were actually quite fortunate for the Royal Navy and could have ended somehat more disastrous for them too!

 

I think chasing after POW would have been asking for trouble.

Bare in mind although Hood had known failings (ie weak deck armour) Bismarck still basically got lucky in the Denmark Straights.

POW failings at the Denmark Straight have I believe generally been over stated. It is true that she was having severe problems with her armament but she was by no means a push over. Chasing after POW risks getting into a slugging match where the two could potentially beat each other into a pulp. If this happens Bismarck looses since she is a lot further from home than POW.

As for taking out Norfolk and Suffolk, it ain’t going to happen. Their both hovering at the edge of Bismarck’s weapons range. If she makes and run at them they have the speed to hold the range open.

 

hmm...the Bismarck scare the hel out of the british to sent dozens of ships after it...so that means the U-boats will have a field time killing the merchant ships...if there are enough U-boats, great distraction for the germans, they should have make good use of it, but that would only help them by a few days...

 

You'd have to kill one hell of a lot of Merchant ships before the rate of exchange for loosing Bismarck looked favourable.

 

The Bismarck operation cost the Germans more merchant ships than the British.

 

How do you mean?
After the POW's retreat most of her guns were out of order!!!
In their second encounter again most of her guns failed...
I don't think the Bismarck got lucky...POW got very Lucky...Hood was Cursed in the first place by having a commander called Vice Admiral Holland....He Bluffed and lost his bet!

 

I wouldn't say he bluffed, he knew he had to close the distance quickly and very nearly did so, from what the documentary based around the last expedition has said he was within a miniute or so of getting out of the danger zone for Hood - maybe Tiornu can comment on this??

 

The RN had a stated preference for it's commanders to fight at ranges in the 13-16,000yd band. Hood was apparently entering this band when she started her final turn. The turn presented a very specific angle to incoming shells which allowed them a penetration through the upper belt followed by a penetration through the midships deck system which was not as strong as the decks directly over the magazines. However, since the shells were traveling somewhat longitudinally down the hull of the turning ship, it was possible to get near the magazines without penetrating the protection meant to give the mags some extra protection.
No one can say with certainty the precise path taken by the fatal 38cm shell, but in all likelihood, the path was one that opened only because of Hood's turn or one that would not be possible as the range got inside 16,000 yards.
If Hood had completed her turn and was steaming roughly parallel to Bismarck, her belt would have been easily penetrable by German 38cm shells, but the shell trajectory would not have been likely to produce catastrophic hits. This was itself one of the facts that made the RN prefer these ranges. The RN wanted fights to turn into long, grinding duels, not short, dramatic events. I wouldn't be surprised if Holland, at the time of the hit, was thinking, "Ah, if we can just complete this turn, we're sure to win."

 

I believe POW was down to about seven guns when she broke off. I don't believe she ever got all ten going at once but to say but to say she didn't any guns at all is a gross exaggeration. If Bismarck chases POW there is an excellent chance that the two will beat each other into a pulp. Remember that while her final battle showed Bismarck to be a hard ship to sink she was a relatively easy ship to disable.

 

the POW's guns were intermitent due to technical problems not related to the battle, however at no point was she defenseless.

Furthermore the Bismarck was under strict orders to avoid fights with other capitol ships and to break out at all costs. Therefore at first she had no intention of pressing the fight against POW

What changed the situation was a strike which ruptured the fuel tanks causing her to lose fuel. This reduced her top speed and meant she had to return back to harbour by running the gaunlet of waiting allied ships.

I believe she also passed an opportunity to refuel previoiusly which affected her stratagy

FNG

 

I think it was an opportunity lost rather than passed. I think a split hoze prevented Bismarck from topping up her tanks in Norway.

It is also worth remembering that Bismarck had technical problems of her own. The reliability of German shells at this stage of the was was not impressive. POW took a direct hit to her bridge which killed or wounded many of the men there but because the shell didn't go off people in the chart room directly below weren't aware of this until blood dripped down a voice tube!