RF wrote:
I don't think it is a certainty that Ark Royal's planes could have slowed down Bismarck - without the rudder hit Bismarck would be getting closer to being in range of Luftwaffe air cover, plus U-boat support. Vian's destroyers couldn't torpedo their target even with it almost stationery and under the cover of darkness. By the morning of 27 May Bismarck would be in a position of being almost home while Ark Royal becomes more exposed to being found and attacked.
... On May 26th 21:00, Bismarck was at 1300km (700 nm) distant from Brest.
Her cruising speed was 20kts (36km/h), thus requiring ~ 35hours to get into Brest. Maximum speed during the final Swordfish attack, if post-action reports of interogated crew members are to be believed,
was around 24kts prior to the 2nd torpedo hit. As the 3rd aerial torpedo hit occured very rapidly after the 2nd, we do not know by how much did it reduced Bismarck's maximum speed at the time, but some reduction must have happened.
Effective Luftwaffe range was around 4-500km for anti-ship operations, and given the storm through which Bismarck and her pursuers were moving, it is debatable weather land-based bombers operating 500km from home would be able to discover and attack the British fleet [and the demonstration came on May 28th, when 100+ bombers launched failed to discover the bulk of British ships , concentrating instead on 2 fuel-depleted destroyers]
Nonetheless, to get witing 500km of Brest, Bismarck needed to navigate 800 more kilometers, or 22 hours from May 26th 21:00... a lot of time while under enemy surveillance and in range of an enemy carrier.
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