IJN Soryu's and USS Wasp's Durability and Usefulness

[CV12Hornet]

Longer range allows the IJN shooting to find the range to start more quickly and their fire solution to be acquired more quickly. The Standards haven't had their upgrades yet so by the time they start firing ranging shots, BatDiv1 may have the range. Pre-war, the IJN had trained exactly for this kind of long-range gunnery duel, and this is 1942 so they should be pretty good at it.

If that doesn't work and nothing else does, Yamato and the Nagatos can run away and lead the Standards on a wild goose chase - straight into a carrier or a destroyer strike.

This probably breaks every rule in the IJN's book, but Yamamoto liked to gamble and do weird things.

Japanese battleship doctrine was to open fire at 37,000 yards, which was not all that far off from American doctrine to open fire at 34,000. Regardless, neither navy expected such extreme-range fire to be decisive; both planned to close the range, though the Japanese less so than the Americans.

Further, the Japanese were considerably slower in adapting to changes in range and bearing, due to their fire control systems being considerably less automated than American. The Americans knew this and wanted to take advantage by hard maneuvers that their own FCS could handle without losing the solution but the Japanese would need to laboriously compensate for.

Regardless, it's a moot point. The Americans aren't bringing up their battleships from the West Coast and the Yamamoto isn't sticking his Main Body out in front of the First Air Fleet.

 

[HMS Warspite]

1. The PROBLEM was the shell fusing. The sensitive nose fusing of the 28 mm shells tended to go off just at muzzle exit of the US 28mm/70 guns. The US quad mounting borrowed feed from the Swedish naval mounting but was more BRITISH than Dutch in its evolution.

2. They captured the Dutch naval mount.

3. The civil war / Midway comparison aside is interesting in illustrating how fanbois never dig into the details of why their favorite "what if" is never possible, because of ignored and unpleasant "facts".

4. Battleship gunnery duels are time measured in flight times of shells, cycling speeds, and NOT in ship's cruise or battle speeds. In a nine minute gun duel HIJMS Kirishima had a 5 knot speed edge on the USS Washington. The USS Washington KILLED her. Nine salvoes cycled, in nine minutes, shell flight times were between 7 and 11 seconds. Ranges about 7,000 to 10,000 meters.

5. Radar advantage and fly outs for US shells at the 15,000-25,000 meters ranges to be expected? That is 25 to 40 seconds flyout every MINUTE with about 8%PH to Japanese shell flyout of 25 to 40 seconds with 4-5%PH every minute and a half. The American shells are heavier and they (surprisingly, because the American fuses were TERRIBLE.) have better fusing. Japanese ships would be in serious trouble. That includes the Yamatos.

6. Not true. USNAS doctrine was de-deck the enemy aircraft carriers first. Then go for kills on any enemy surface ships. What happened at Midway? Nagumo's flattops were wrecked and then Kurita was dive bombed. Then the Combined Fleet ran for their lives.

As for the Japanese doctrine of attrite and decrease.

Any navy that does not understand that it is the effectors and not the platform characteristics, is doing it wrong. See my comments about battleship GUNNERY and why it is the shells and not the battleships that matter.

About gunfire...

7. That is about what the USN concluded. Also the British and French and even the Japanese. (See Yamato comment below.)

8. The HIJMS Yamato was missing at 29,000 meters at Samar. That is about 18 miles.

How? They are on fire, burning down.

Not true as IJN doctrine in naval avuation was more offensive then USN airoperation, dictating a proportionate defense as well on friendly forces when endangered by enemy airforces, so the USN with 3 CV's will be forced to stay in fighterrange of the main surfaceforce to provide at least a portionate form of aircover at the same time as going into the attack, The main USN handicap will be the need to free enough fighters to fly CAP over their own CVTG('s) as well as the battleline units, with the limmited number of fighters present, so the attackers will do with little, or perhaps no aircover to try to get lucky.

Second problem would be the stationary nature of the slow battleline which in formation would not exceed much more than 18 knots at best in a smooth calm sea, so the CVTG will be forced to adjust to the same sort of pace in general, or loose their BB's when rushing forward, with the possibility the batlteline will get attacked in return unopposed. (BB's still seen as main tool for a battle as the scenario explained.)

My choice would be to junk the BB's at all and let then get either away, or take their own chances and do what Spruance actually did, perhaps at the coast of loss of all BB's if needed as they were useless anyway. As US tctical commander I would engage just the Kido Butai only untill it was eitehr destroyed as a fightingforce, or you yourself wereto get destroyed and completely ignore the BB's which could neitehr outrange you, nor outpace you. Use seed as tactical advantage and strike where you can do most effectively on targets that mattered, which in this case were the Japanese CV's only.

In the scenario where the US CVTG was bound to the main BB force, expect a serious loss for little to gain, as the IJN could and would strike the CVTG first when detecting it and with all force as doctrine prescribed. After this the lack of aircover would result in a total attricion of USN surfacefroces which could neither retreat fast enough, nor attack on their own terms.

 

[McPherson]

Not true as IJN doctrine in naval avuation was more offensive then USN airoperation, dictating a proportionate defense as well on friendly forces when endangered by enemy airforces, so the USN with 3 CV's will be forced to stay in fighterrange of the main surfaceforce to provide at least a portionate form of aircover at the same time as going into the attack, The main USN handicap will be the need to free enough fighters to fly CAP over their own CVTG('s) as well as the battleline units, with the limmited number of fighters present, so the attackers will do with little, or perhaps no aircover to try to get lucky.

Operationally both navies preached, find first, strike first. So... based on the fighting results and the actual naval employment at Coral Sea and Midway, one can state unequivocally that the above description is wrong.

Second problem would be the stationary nature of the slow battleline which in formation would not exceed much more than 18 knots at best in a smooth calm sea, so the CVTG will be forced to adjust to the same sort of pace in general, or loose their BB's when rushing forward, with the possibility the batlteline will get attacked in return unopposed. (BB's still seen as main tool for a battle as the scenario explained.)

This has been answered. The Americans and the Japanese demonstrated battleship / cruiser usage and it is nothing as claimed above.

My choice would be to junk the BB's at all and let then get either away, or take their own chances and do what Spruance actually did, perhaps at the coast of loss of all BB's if needed as they were useless anyway. As US tctical commander I would engage just the Kido Butai only untill it was eitehr destroyed as a fightingforce, or you yourself wereto get destroyed and completely ignore the BB's which could neitehr outrange you, nor outpace you. Use seed as tactical advantage and strike where you can do most effectively on targets that mattered, which in this case were the Japanese CV's only.

The choice was Nimitz's. He decided that the navy which won the air battle would dictate the tempo and range of engagement. To win the air battle, it was only necessary to mission kill the enemy aircraft carrier force. This happened at Midway. Yamamoto ran away after he lost his air cover. Spruance remembered the lesson at Philippine Sea, where the Japanese found him first and struck him first, but he won anyway because the USNAS wiped out the Japanese aviation and the US silent service blew out two Japanese flattops. Mitscher mishandled the air battle and was benched. Spruance settled for the mission kill and the IJN ran again. No air cover. And the American subs were on a flattop hunt.

In the scenario where the US CVTG was bound to the main BB force, expect a serious loss for little to gain, as the IJN could and would strike the CVTG first when detecting it and with all force as doctrine prescribed. After this the lack of aircover would result in a total attricion of USN surfacefroces which could neither retreat fast enough, nor attack on their own terms.

See previous comments. One should really READ what the IJN and USN were doing and why.

 

[Bob in Pittsburgh]

Not due until 1943, and you will notice that these were increases in construction orders after Coral Sea, Midway and Drumbeat? Massive ones

Yes the first Essex and Independence carriers joined the fleet in 1943, So a defeat at Midway may have delayed the inevitable American offensive but it would not have changed the outcome of the war, By mid to late 1942 the US economy was on a full war footing. If something was defense related it was produced. The issue was not orders it was priorities and scheduling, I believe you are referring to a series of decisions in August reorienting priorities. Among other things the latter Essex class carriers were moved up and the Montana class battleships were deferred, never to rise again. At the same time destroyer escorts were moved to the #1 position replacing the LST, which fell to 9th. The driving force in most of these priorities was allocation of three raw materials--aluminum, copper and steel. For capital ships another constraining factor was the number of large shipways capable of constructing large vessels.

Spruance meant that sometimes the Japanese got chased out of there with a couple of flattops surviving or sometimes the result for the IJN was far worse. Never that the IJN could win.

No, he meant a wide range of outcomes including American tactical defeats. Make just one relatively small change to produce a different result. Have McCluskey fail to find the Japanese fleet at 10:15AM. Maybe the Japanese Destroyer doesn't rush off to chase Nautiluses or have her continue depth charging instead of returning to the fleet. Or have him simply run too short of fuel to continue his search. Even if Yorktown's bombers destroy Soryu, by 11:15--11:30 three Japanese carriers would have launched an attack that would have found the American carriers rearming, just like what actually happened to the Japanese. Yes the Americans had early radar so they would have had a few minutes warning of the attack but I would still expect substantial losses. Once again whatever the outcome at Midway I do not see it as changing the ultimate outcome of the Pacific war.

And those numbers are essentially meaningless. The longest range gun hit in history is around 26,000 yards according to Guinness. Well, technically they list it as 15 miles, but either way the range is the same. That has been achieved exactly twice. One hit by Scharnhorst when she hit Glorious at around 26,400 yards and one hit by Warspite when she hit Guilio Cesare at about 26,000 yards. So ranges in excess of 30,000 yards are pretty useless in a naval engagement. Well, unless you just want to waste ammo

Yes long range gunnery was a hit or miss, largely miss affair. Still the denigration of accuracy impacted both sides with accuracy improving as ranges got shorter. I freely admit I am not a gunnery expert but I would expect that Japanese accuracy would improve as they moved into the furthest theoretical ranges of the American guns.
There is no question in my mind that the Japanese would have had the advantage in a mid 1942 battleship match up. Add in the advantage of the Type 93 Long Lance torpedo and the results probably would have been ugly. Leading with the battleships instead of the carriers is not completely far fetched, After all that is what Spruance did at the Battle of the Philippines Sea and Halsey did at Leyte. The theory was they could mop up cripples after the air attacks.

 

[McPherson]

No, he meant a wide range of outcomes including American tactical defeats. Make just one relatively small change to produce a different result. Have McCluskey fail to find the Japanese fleet at 10:15AM. Maybe the Japanese Destroyer doesn't rush off to chase Nautiluses or have her continue depth charging instead of returning to the fleet. Or have him simply run too short of fuel to continue his search. Even if Yorktown's bombers destroy Soryu, by 11:15--11:30 three Japanese carriers would have launched an attack that would have found the American carriers rearming, just like what actually happened to the Japanese. Yes the Americans had early radar so they would have had a few minutes warning of the attack but I would still expect substantial losses. Once again whatever the outcome at Midway I do not see it as changing the ultimate outcome of the Pacific war.

Or Withers' botched submarine deployments and the torpedoes could have worked. The situation one suggested (^^^) is the Tone search plane argument applied to American "luck" which actually was mostly "bad" at Midway. Like Mitscher's incompetence, it smooths out statistically. The likelihood of Japanese victory was nil.

 

[Kantai Kessen]

Regardless, it's a moot point. The Americans aren't bringing up their battleships from the West Coast and the Yamamoto isn't sticking his Main Body out in front of the First Air Fleet.

Exactly. Which is why I won't go into it anymore.