Naval History Forums

The pocket battleship design was approved by Admiral Zenker then C-in-C of the navy. They used diesel engines because of the great difficulties in WWI of refueling raiders. Germany did not have any overseas bases. The new ships were designed to get maximum efficiency in 10,000 tons. Firepower, speed...

I didn´t mean that it was a third class ship. I think it was ahead of its time in many aspects and was a great achievement for its designers. The problem in my modest opinion, it´s that war brke out too soon, and that left with no time practically to experiment more and try put new design possibilit...

Let me rectify. Top speed achived during battle: 29.3 knots. Source: Paul Kus - Maschinenobergefreiter on board Admiral Graf Spee "During the battle, engines from two engine rooms belonging to the same shaft were coupled to achieve the highest possible speed. Engine rooms 1 and 3 on one screw a...

In Montevideo, Uruguay 1 February 2010 Captain Langsdorff`s log book became available in a Spanish edition. This book is a precise word by word, day by day translation of Captain Langsdorff's log book (kriegstagebuch). It carries indisputable evidence of the failure of full-time diesel propulsion to...