Erich Raeder's "The Battle of the Atlantic"

In July 1941 German Admiral Erich Raeder began planning for what he called "The Battle of the Atlantic". Raeder’s plan was a rehash of Admiral Hipper’s 1918 plan to sacrifice the German navy in futile battle. Reader’s goal was to attack the Royal Navy in one unwinnable battle with the hope of causing it such severe damage that it would hamper their operations for the rest of the war. Raeder wanted to commit all of the ships the Kriegsmarine had available to this colossal battle. Raeder, in order to avoid a repeat of the Graf Spee, wanted the ships involved in the action to make sure that they fight to the absolute last shell and either win or be destroyed. By late 1941 Hitler called off the operation because he did not think the navy was strong enough and he did not think it was worth losing every single German warship.
Here is a list of all the ships I think may have been involved in the operation if it had of been launched. Question marks are next to any ships is I am unsure of.
Kriegsmarine
4xBattleships
Battleship Gneisnau
Battleship Scharnhorst
Battleship Bismarck? (If Operation Rheinubung not launched)
Battleship Tripitz
2xPre Dreadnoughts
Battleship Schleswig-Holstein
Battleship Schlesian
5xHeavy Cruisers
Cruiser Lutzow? (Damaged)
Cruiser Admiral Scheer
Cruiser Admiral Hipper
Cruiser Prinz Eugen
Cruiser Seydliz?(only 95% complete)
1xAircraft Carriers
Graf Zeppelin?(incomplete)
U-Boats
In December 1941 there were 12 U-Boats in the area of Gibraltar and 15 covering the rest of the Atlantic
6xLight Cruisers
25xDestroyers
Royal Navy
6xBattleships
HMS King George V
HMS Prince of Wales
HMS Duke of York?
HMS Nelson?( In Gibraltar area June-Sept 1941 then after that in Britain for repairs)
HMS Rodney
HMS Revenge?
1xBattle cruisers
HMS Hood?( If Operation Rheinubung not launched)
9xHeavy Cruisers
HMS Berwick
HMS Cumberland
HMS Kent
HMS Suffolk
HMS Devonshire
HMS Shropshire
HMS Sussex
HMS Dorset shire
HMS Norfolk
4xAircraft Carriers
HMS Ark Royal?( In Mediterranean after May 1941 and Sunk in November 1941)
HMS Furious
HMS Victorious
HMS Eagle?(Refitting Oct 1941-Jan1942)
3xEscort Carriers
HMS Audacity?( Sunk Dec 21[SUP]st[/SUP] 1941)
HMS Attacker
Hms Chaser?(Launched Jan 1942)
30xLight Cruiser
Over 100 Destroyers

 

The Lutzow was sent to the Soviets as partial payment since Germany had fallen behind.

 

I notice you left out all the old battleships for the British yet included the pre dreadnaughts for Germany. The Revenge and Repulse are also left out.

 

I think Lutzow here refers to the ex-Deutschland which is not otherwise listed. She and sister Scheer were redesignated heavy cruisers in 1940. Lutzow had been torpedoed in Norway but was repaired by mid-1941. Which reminds me, we should not discount British submarines either. British subs torpedoed 25% of German battleships (1 of 4), 33% of heavy cruisers (2 of 6), and 50% of light cruisers (3 of 6, one fatally (Karlsruhe)).

From this photo the crusier Seydlitz appears close to completion:
File:Seydlitz reconnaissance photo.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Kriegsmarine had only four light cruisers in 1941, two of which, Leipzig and Emden, were useful only for training - though I suppose they had as much combat potential as 1905-vintage pre-dreadnoughts!

In mid-1941 Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were both being repaired from bomb and torpedo damage received in Brest. Prinz Eugen was also bombed after her arrival after Rheinubung (though the scenario might preclude this) and the ships also needed engine/boiler repairs. Cerberus in February 1942 was the first time these three were all operational.

The list also omits Renown (which had been thoroughly modernized), Malaya, and three R class. It seems safe to assume that Queen Elizabeth, Valiant, and Barham would remain in the Mediterranean Fleet based on Alexandria.

 

I have Reader's biography somewhere, must check as this looks completely out of character, he is not a fanatic and a suicide mission in 1941 leaving no surface forces facing the RN off Norway and the Red fleet in the Baltic would be the act of a stupid fanatic. The Royal Navy can afford the losses, as others mentioed that listing doesn't include all possibly available ships, while the Germans are throwing in even the kitchen sink (Schliesen an Schleswig-Holstein are more a liablity than an asset as they would slow the fleet to a crawl eliminating the main advantage the Germans have, superior speed that may allow them to catch an isolated RN squadron and defeat it in detail).
BTW Leipzig and Emden as built are more tha a match for WW1 era British cruisers, and I think that 30 "light cruisers" figure includes at least some C, D and E class, though IIRC Leipzig had suffered some bad damage that was never fully repaired.

 

I had the same thought, in fact at first I thought Erich was posting a "what-if". Hopefully he'll stop back and elaborate on his sources etc. Raeder did make some remarkably fatalistic comments, but they don't seem to have been reflected in his strategy:

"The surface forces, moreover, are so weak and so few in numbers vis-à-vis the British fleet that the only course open to them-presupposing their active employment-is to show that they know how to die gallantly and thereby to create the basis for an eventual rebirth in the future"

"The great aim of the Führer has set forth for the German nation requires the utmost exertion in all places...A navy which undertakes daring actions against the enemy and suffers losses through this will be reborn on an even larger scale. If it has not fought this action, then its existence will be threatened after the war."

I agree a "death ride" would be a futile gesture; even if the weaker force could achieve a one-for-one exchange rate, that still favors the stronger.

Leipzig and Nurnburg were torpedoed in 1939; Leipzig's damage was serious enough that she was relegated to training duties with part of her engineering plant removed and speed reduced to 24 knots. She retained her armament except for half her torpedo tubes, so she could fight a British cruiser if they chose to use her operationally; I just doubt she would be included any more than S and S-H.

 

..., Raeder was about duty and adherence to orders, in the time honoured tradition of the Navy, but in terms of strategy he was quite adamant; his surface raiders were to avoid combat in order to target commerce. From "Grand Admiral":

Pre-war, re: the RN shutting down Germany's overseas trade: "... equalizing things by hitting at British seaborne commerce. Outnumbered as we were, there was no question of trying to meet the great British Navy in open combat; it was our business to avoid such encounters, and by scattering our forces all over the globe, try to strike at holes in the enemy's defenses at sea." He clearly wasn't happy about the circumstances involving the loss of Graf Spee, after Langsdorff having chosen combat with the RN.

In the planning for WESERUBUNG, Hitler wanted the KM in remain in Norwegian waters to support the Army. Raeder wanted his ships in, out and heading back to Germany, avoiding combat.

In 1941-42 Raeder was clear, the enemy would defend the sealanes and their commerce; "...Sooner or later our raiders would eventually wear out, and their importance in the war picture wane. But I hoped that by that time our submarines would be strong enough to take their place against the enemy with even greater effect. Hence, our effort was to organize these operations by our surface raiders to obtain maximum results for as long a time as possible ..."

I don't see any reference or planning for a considered "Death Ride of the KM". That said, well after the fact memoirs have been known to stray away from what's "secret" or in thought to be hidden documents of the day.

 

Thanks for the comments everyone

The source I used was the article “The Failure of German Sea Power 1914-1945 Mahan, Tirpitz, and Raeder Reconsidered” by Herwig, Holger H. He is normally a World War One writer, so what I read may have been off base.

On another note Admiral Hipper's 1918 plan , which Raeder's was based on, called for "an honorable fleet engagement, even if should become a death battle, would be the foundation for a new German fleet, a fleet that would be out of the question in the event of a dishonorable peace". In 1918 Raeder said that Hipper's plan was "a matter of honor and existence" So though Raeder is not suicidal, I still think he would have wanted to see his fleet in action and useful.

 

Thanks, Erich, and by the way welcome to the group. Not sure "useful" is quite the right word though, I suppose it depends on one's definition. Hipper in 1918 was thinking that:

The war was lost.
The battle fleet had made no meaningful contribution and had no prospect of making one.

So in his view the grand gesture was all they had left, for whatever value it had. He also seems to have taken for granted that a new German fleet would be a good thing even though the current one had completely failed to serve the nation's interests*.

Was Raeder in 1941 thinking in such despairing terms? Although the inability to defeat Britain was troubling, Germany was hardly losing the war. She was just embarking on the great campaign that might achieve all the Fuhrer's objectives. There were valid roles and missions for the fleet, including the surface forces; indeed the Russian campaign would give them an important new task, more in line with their capabilities. In terms of the investment of industrial resources, Germany in 1941 was getting far more value from the Kriegmarine than from the Kaiser's Hocheseeflotte.

* worse than failed; the naval race was a major factor in poisoning previously friendly Anglo-German relations and forging the Triple Entente, a rare case in which a massive military investment positively harmed its nation's national security.

 

Two things that may have influenced Raeder’s thinking

1. Raeder may have been thinking that Russia and England will be defeated by 1942 and that the army and air force would have won the war without his navy. This would have left his navy without having gained any glory and looking like a secondary matter in German planning. If Raeder had of launched his "The Battle of the Atlantic" maybe he would have been successful enough to grantee the navy a prominent place after the war.

2. Admiral Tirpitz after World War I said that he thought the German navy could have won the war had they not been in his words “held back” in 1914. Maybe this could have influenced Raeder’s planning to commit the navy to a battle early in the war, instead of waiting.