A better model for the submarine war?

[stoat]

Originally posted by Lars:

But again, note the biggest killer of carriers. Subs.

Subs were also big killers of carriers in the Pacific. USS Wasp and USS Hornet were both done in by subs as were Japanese carriers like Junyo, Shokaku, Taiho, Taiyo, Unyo, Chuyo, Shinyo, Unryu, and Shinano.

[dicedtomato]

Imagine (with apologies to John Lennon)

Imagine all the U-boats

sweeping the Royal Navy from the sea

Subs with nuclear engines and torpedoes

and anti-grav technology

Imagine the Germans use the Z-Plan

no steel left for plane or tank

Alchemy makes all the metals

for magic ships that never sank

Imagine all the U-boats

ruling the world today....

DT

[Rolend]

Originally posted by xwormwood:

While regarding captial ship losses from subs we sholdn't forget that at least in the early war years many torpedos didn't worked / exploded when they hit their target. The above mentioned list of ship losses would be quite longer if this torpedo-problem had been discovered earlier.

Notice my post about the cruiser sunk by the Brit nuc. sub using conventional torpeados. Seems they fired at least 3(most likly 4) 2 hit the Cruiser and exploded one hit another ship and damaged it but it did not explode. Here I thought they fixed that problem LOL.

I still contend that many of the carriers sunk by U-boats were on convoy duty and thus as likly to be hit as a merchant. As ASW got better it got harder and harder for the U-boats to even sink merchants. At the start of the war the Germans had maybe 30 U-boats in the convoy lanes and were sinky ships like crazy. It is funny how by the time they had 300 of them that total tunage dropped drasticaly, this was beacuse the allies became MUCH better at ASW.

Also I contend that convoys were lucky to make 15 knots, where as a war fleet could sustain 20 to 25 knots. That does not sound like much but it made a huge differance in the time a U-boat had to setup an attack. Also U-Boats were best when they could attack on the surface then dive to get away. Lets see those U-baots try making regular surface attacks against a war fleet where every ship could shoot back. I am sorry but I am just not convinced, I believe had the Germans made a concerted effort to attack war fleets instead of merchants in a very short time they would not of had any U-boats left to attack anything.

[SeaMonkey]

Sorry guys, I think this model is alright, not perfect, but adequate.

Belligerents should have the option of warship attack doctrine or merchant raiding, simple as that.

Subs were adept at both roles. From historical data, subs accounted for 189 warship sinkings from 1939 to 45. Now tell me that's irrelevant.

[Lars]

Originally posted by Rolend:

Notice my post about the cruiser sunk by the Brit nuc. sub using conventional torpeados. Seems they fired at least 3(most likly 4) 2 hit the Cruiser and exploded one hit another ship and damaged it but it did not explode. Here I thought they fixed that problem LOL.

Heh, have you read about the Argentinian one?

Surprised the Brits didn't pick up all the cussing on their sonars.

[anoldman]

Wow! Head to head Grognards!! Cool! *joke*

Very interesting info. Swung by the boards today to cry about the current state of my email game vs. my worthy foe: Etienne G. (Not sure board name?)

So... EG invests some tech in Subs, gets L3. First time I have played someone vs. sub investment. All I can say is... OUCH! :eek:

Granted he had Italians with him, but I think he could have swept aside my Royal Navy with his two L3 subs alone! Wow, even ships retreating into the ports were like ducks.

Anyhoo, just wanted to say, "WoW" ... L3 subs.. L4 or 5 would be flat out scary...

--AOM

[dicedtomato]

The statistics aren't irrelevant. But they aren't useful, either. So 189 warships were sunk - out of how many attempts? 500? 5,000? 50,000?

Even a cursory reading of WWII sub warfare will tell you that a sub skipper who sank a capital ship became a front-page hero. Nothing heroic in SC2; there are lots of ocean squares to maneuver in, and few CA counters to screen CVs. The sub attacks the carrier, the carrier gets blasted, the sub is unharmed. That's not the way it worked, whatever the fantasies of Donitz.

The problem with SC2 is that the subs are identical to surface ships. They can't bombard, and they can occasionally evade attacks, but otherwise they behave the same and they're used the same way.

DT

Originally posted by SeaMonkey:

Sorry guys, I think this model is alright, not perfect, but adequate.

Belligerents should have the option of warship attack doctrine or merchant raiding, simple as that.

Subs were adept at both roles. From historical data, subs accounted for 189 warship sinkings from 1939 to 45. Now tell me that's irrelevant.

[SeaMonkey]

"The problem with SC2 is that the subs are identical to surface ships. They can't bombard, and they can occasionally evade attacks, but otherwise they behave the same and they're used the same way."

DT....hummm....have you looked up the definition of identical, lately? How about "similar"? Subs are classified as naval vessels in most navies of this planet? Why the classification?

Sorry, I need a more logical argument than this statement to change my opinion.

Ohhh and how many shells fired from surface vessels hit their target everytime? % of attempts ,...please.

[Blashy]

Originally posted by dicedtomato:

The statistics aren't irrelevant. But they aren't useful, either. So 189 warships were sunk - out of how many attempts? 500? 5,000? 50,000?

Even a cursory reading of WWII sub warfare will tell you that a sub skipper who sank a capital ship became a front-page hero. Nothing heroic in SC2; there are lots of ocean squares to maneuver in, and few CA counters to screen CVs. The sub attacks the carrier, the carrier gets blasted, the sub is unharmed. That's not the way it worked, whatever the fantasies of Donitz.

The problem with SC2 is that the subs are identical to surface ships. They can't bombard, and they can occasionally evade attacks, but otherwise they behave the same and they're used the same way.

DT

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by SeaMonkey:

Sorry guys, I think this model is alright, not perfect, but adequate.

Belligerents should have the option of warship attack doctrine or merchant raiding, simple as that.

Subs were adept at both roles. From historical data, subs accounted for 189 warship sinkings from 1939 to 45. Now tell me that's irrelevant.

</font>

[Guest Mike]

Yeah but those are not the stats of the attempts TRIED, which is what was asked for.

It only takes 1 x depth charge to sink a sub too, but that's a kind of pointless bit of information.....

[Lars]

Originally posted by dicedtomato:

The statistics aren't irrelevant. But they aren't useful, either. So 189 warships were sunk - out of how many attempts? 500? 5,000? 50,000?

Go back to the page I linked and look at the top where it shows losses by pre-war percentage.

Losses in pre-war ships - 161 (48%)

Sure you can build more, and they did. But they don't do you much coming down the ways in '44-'45 if you're kaput in '42, which was a very bad year for the RN.

[Lars]

dbl

[ May 22, 2006, 06:44 AM: Message edited by: Lars ]

[Sombra]

Subs are simply deadly today and were in the past

Germany never really realized their full potential in the WW2 . As players we can.

The german navy calculates that you need per sub 4-5 destroyers for to hunt it down in conflict. If you don´t have this advantage you catch it.

One of the reason that german navy went heavy on subs in the baltic sea.

[Rolend]

Originally posted by Blashy:

Dave gave the stats, it accounted for about 37% of all warships sunk by the Germans.

1 out of 3 is VERY indicative of subs being able to sink warships. I'm not surpised, it only takes ONE torpedo.

To be honest I think that number shows a complete failure of the U-boats to effect surface fleets, after all the German war fleet was taken out of the war very early and they didn't have any long range bomers effective enough, so that only left U-boats and yet they only acounted for 1 out of 3, very sad stat if you ask me.

There is no amount of stats that you can toss out there that will convince me that had the Germans focused in on war fleets instead of merchants that it would of changed much. Sure they would of sunk a few more capital ships (and lost even more U-boats faster) but not near enough to change a thing and MUCH more supplies would of made it to England and Russia. Focusing in on the RN instead of merchant shipping would just meant an earlyer death for the U-boats.

Now tell me that had they poured all the resoucres pre war into U-boats instead of their surface fleet and had 300+ U-boats at the start of the war, thus being able to shut down ALL merchants coming in as well as allowing them to keep the RN at bay then you won't get an argument out of me.

[Lars]

But what are you going to have to do with those supplies that do make it? Consider the other side of the war.

RESULTS OF THE AMERICAN PACIFIC SUBMARINE CAMPAIGN OF WORLD WAR II

First, the naval losses. The US had warships as a priority target for the first part of the war.

Additionally, U.S. submarines sank 700,000 tons of naval ships (about 30% of the total lost) including 8 aircraft carriers, 1 battleship and 11 cruisers.

There's what 288 total subs serving did to the IJN. Keep in mind that the actual effective number of subs out there at any one time was much, much lower, and most of those subs didn't show up till later when merchants were priority, so very few subs accounted for a lot of warships.

Then there's this little goodie. Salient point bolded.

The submarine offensive gravely weakened a second pillar of Japanese power: the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). As previously discussed, 30% of total Japanese Navy losses were caused by U.S. submarines. Submarines played another important role in reducing IJN capabilities. Damage to ships, caused in part by submarines, significantly increased ship repair time in Japanese shipyards, thereby reducing opportunities for new construction. The Japanese Navy spent 12% of its construction budget on ship repairs in 1943 and 1944; the figure increased to 34% in 1945.(29) Additionally, the submarine campaign had two important second order effects on the Japanese Navy. First, the necessity to build merchant ships to replace losses resulted in a reduction of potential naval construction. Private shipyards devoted to naval construction fell from 44% of the total in 1942 to 30% in 1943.(30) Secondly, the requirement to build escort ships and naval transports (also to replace merchant losses) reduced the potential to build more powerful combatants. As a result, while the IJN used 14% of its construction budget for escorts and transports in 1941, the percentage shot up to 54.3% in 1944.(31) More astonishing, the need for escorts and merchants was so grave, that after 1943, the Japanese Navy started construction on no ship bigger than a destroyer!(32) Finally, the American stranglehold on imports, in this case, iron ore, proved fatal to any long term ability to build adequate numbers of warships to replace losses.(33) By September 1944, the Japanese had so little steel that naval construction fell precipitously.(34)

Actually, I could have bolded the whole thing.

Your yards are full of dinged up ships, you need to replace losses, you can't build anything to hit back, and it just keeps snowballing…

[Rolend]

Lars giving me facts about the Pacific does not sway me at all. First the Japanese were VERY inflexable when it came to war doctrin and did VERY little in the way of ASW until it was WAY to late. I am convinced that no matter how the Germans had used their U-boats after ealry 43 it would not of made a differance beacuse by that time the the US and England had made great progress in ASW and even though the total number of U-boats had jumped a LOT, total tonage sunk by U-Boats began to drop.

Now could they had made a larger inpact ealryer in the war if they had much larger numbers? You bet but they only had 25 U-boats working West of England at the start of the war and they were very effective. However had they been used against surface fleets instead of unarmed and for the most part unescorted merchant convoys those 25 U-boats would not of lasted long attacking fully armed surface fleets.

No matter how effective they would of been against surface fleets their numbers were WAY to small to make a differance in the RN and would of reduced the U-boat fleet to nothing in NO time thus leaving them with NO options at all. There only real impact in such small numbers could only be against merchants and thus imho were used correctly.

[Lars]

Well, we'll just have to agree to disagree then.

[dicedtomato]

Just one last comment, and we'll let this thread come to its merciful end. When you're looking at alternate history, you need to ask yourself WHY history turned out the way it did.

I just finished "Shattered Sword", the definitive account of the Battle of Midway. Popular history says the Japanese lost the battle because of stupid decisions by the Japanese commander. Yet it turns out that a lot of Nagumo's decisions were necessary because of Japanese equipment and doctrine, which he had no control over.

Donitz was not stupid. If he could have swept the Royal Navy from the sea, and left the convoys defenseless, then it's hard to believe that he wouldn't have done so. The fact that he didn't is a clue that he didn't have the capability. Maybe the technology, the geography and the raw materials weren't there.

DT

[Lars]

Or maybe he was just an ideologue, given that he followed the same plan that was a loser in the last war. Wouldn't have been the first.

[dicedtomato]

Thanks, Lars, for demonstrating the classic mistake of alternate history: The war would have turned out differently if only HE [insert name] had made a different decision. But it turns out that more often than not, HE had good reasons for making his "wrong" decision.

It's possible that the Japanese wouldn't have lost four carriers at Midway if the carrier hangars had not been fully enclosed, or if the elevators from the hangar to the deck had been faster. Does that mean that if SC2 were expanded to the Pacific, the game should assume that the Japanese redesigned their carriers in 1935?

At a certain point, you have to stop and say, "this is the way things were. And if I do it differently, than I'm not simulating WWII". It's interesting that people want to change German sub doctrine, but no one wants to assume that the French had better infantry in 1940.

DT

[Lars]

Was the topic at hand.

btw, no need to re-design the Jap carriers. Just don't spread them and the rest of the fleet all over the Pacific in an ill-conceived plan.

"You hit somebody with your fist and not with your fingers spread" - Heinz Guderian

[ May 22, 2006, 01:57 PM: Message edited by: Lars ]

[Guest Mike]

Originally posted by dicedtomato:

At a certain point, you have to stop and say, "this is the way things were. And if I do it differently, than I'm not simulating WWII". It's interesting that people want to change German sub doctrine, but no one wants to assume that the French had better infantry in 1940.

That's not true - ppl want the OPTION to change German sub doctrine, just like they want the option to change German industrial/research doctrine, or French strategic doctrine in 1940 to attack instead of defence - and heck if the French last long enough then why not up-equip them??......

My initial point is that _I_ do not think that SC handles any aspect of submarine warfare very well......or much else in the naval area at all really.

the RN is limited to a couple of handfuls of large whips which means that convoys are toast if they all get sunk - yet it was not the large ships that protected the convoys!

And the idea that U-boats were going to sink the entire fleet of the RN 's major ships is also silly.

However it's all hard coded into the game unfortunately, and not a "simple" matter of changing scripts or combat factors.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

The problem with the "bloody" CRT/algorithm is that

in SC2 ships are represented by a (relatively) few

fleet counters (with BB/CV or CA on them), while in

reality ships were scattered all over the map, in

task forces of all variety and quantity. The U-boat

arm, even if equipped with a decent number of Type

XXIs, isn't going to be able to sweep the seas clean

of British ships (tho I am of the position that Type

XXIs would have been a very nasty surprise if un-

leashed earlier), because in the real war the British

aren't going to have a big fleet of theirs sitting

there in the middle of the ocean exchanging depth

charges for torpedoes against a U-boat wolfpack

for a solid week.

Instead the Type XXIs will unleash a few fish as

the British fleets zip by, maybe hitting a few

capital ships but they aren't going to kill every

single vessel in that fleet-the British wouldn't

be that stupid. Same thing if the British had

the advantage-except in this case the Germans

were stupid enough to keep sending out-

classed subs out to their doom from mid '43 onward.

But a third of your subs gone in just one week?

No effin' way.

What to do about that alone? Either reduce damage

both ways (but with a chance for a rare critical

hit, dependent on tech), and/or create more fleets

for both sides, albeit with reduced damage. But

that won't work because there are just so many

ports to go around (and you can't stack in ports

at the moment, tho you probably should be able to).

[Guest Mike]

Make ships harder to damage, but repairs take much, much longer, and they take much longer to rebuild morale and effectiveness?

[Rolend]

@Stalin yes and that brings us back to subs and Liam's sugestion to lower the U-boats attack and up its dive ability, thus making U-boats less effecitve against surface fleets and more effecitive against convoys as they were in real life, unless of course you belive like Lars who thinks a hand full of U-boats could of sunk the entire RN