Wake-Walker : To engage or not to engage ?

[Cag]

Hi All

Hi Alberto the morning battle was never part of the threat of CM. Toveys despatch has nothing to do with the threatened charge, I'm afraid that is something you wish to link it with.

Again you assume the cruisers were meant to join the battle and ignore evidence of follow and flank mark. His position at 05.41 has no relevance on PoW re engaging Bismarck.

Again despite agreement that Norfolk did not turn away at 05.41 you persist in re asserting it, her course was parallel to Bismarck, the movements of Norfolk at 03.00 or 05.41 are not relevant to Wake-Walker not re engaging Bismarck with PoW due to gunnery problems, insufficient work up or possibly pushing an enemy away from your C in C.

I'm afraid again you play silly games Alberto, you suggested Pounds fuel signal was because he feared WW would run for Scapa! Pounds fuel message was described as the worst signal ever sent, if he sent that type of signal twice it could be described as inept. However it does not mean that I hold the same view of Pound that you obviously hold of WW, don't tar me with the same brush.

Best wishes
Cag.

[RF]

Hi Alberto, you're entitled to your opinion

Absolutely.

You are attempting here on this thread to join your own personal opinion of Wake Walkers character and your opinion as to whether he should have engaged on the morning of the 24th with a threat made about a different operational moment and tactical function of PoW, not the Norfolk, on the afternoon/evening of the 24th.

Having followed all the threads on this and related matters I have to agree with this.

We all understand your view of Wake-Walker, we all accept it.

Not really. Wake-Walker is very long deceased and in no position to defend himself. It is that which I find distasteful.

As mentioned above by Cag the mission of Wake-Walker was to shadow Bismarck and guide in the Home Fleet to secure Bismarck's destruction. He was not specifically ordered by anybody to engage Bismarck either on his own or in conjunction with Hollands' force. Hood and POW were strong enough to tackle and degrade Bismarck so that it would never reach port. That Hood was sunk was not the fault of Wake-Walker. I doubt whether Norfolk and Suffolk opening fire from where they were would have saved Hood, moreover after Hood sank and POW disengaged if those two cruisers were left in a shoot out with Bismarck the risk is of losing contact with Bismarck - particulary if Wake-Walker has to manoeuvre to avoid Bismarck's fire.

If Hood had not blown up and both capital ships were fully engaged then there is a case for supporting fire from Norfolk (but not Suffolk as the principal shadowing ship). Equally Holland's six destroyers with their torpedo armament could also eventually join in the action.

As for Holland himself his expectation was that once Bismarck was under heavy sustained fire the Prinz Eugen would be left for Wake-Walker to destroy. BUT that would only be when their shadowing mission was clearly over - by that I mean Bismarck being unable to escape or break off the action.
In the event Norfolk did eventually open fire to help Tovey himself to finish the job. Neither Wake-Walker or Captain Martin of Dosetshire had been ordered to do this, they did so on their own initiative.

[Alberto Virtuani]

Cag wrote: "the morning battle was never part of the threat of CM."

Hi Mr.Cag,
I already asked you: do you think that a CM for the missed re-engagement would NOT have looked at Wake-Walker behavior during the battle ?

you wrote: "despite agreement that Norfolk did not turn away at 05.41 you persist in re asserting it,"

Which agreement ? You have not been able to show a credible map showing a "parallel course" while Pinchin's Plot has been largely DEMONSTRATED for everybody to be totally unreliable by now, I hope.....
Norfolk Strategical Map shows a course 215°, slightly DIVERGING from enemy and in any case the previous course (240°) was the right one to engage.....YOU shoud agree with Antonio reconstruction, done using only agreed bearings (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8231&start=30#p76360).....
This turn from 240° to 215° (at the "enemy in sight" time) is key to understand W-W attitude, as well as his message at 05:50.

you wrote: "I'm afraid again you play silly games Alberto, "

I'm afraid you are.

RF wrote: "Wake-Walker is very long deceased and in no position to defend himself. It is that which I find distasteful."

Hi RF,
I'm sorry for you, but we are reconstructing the history of this battle and the military behavior of participating officers. I fully understand British don't like the truth that is coming out of this "can of worms", "cover-up" included.

I have nothing personal against W-W or Leach as human beings, I just consider them very poor soldiers, from historical viewpoint. If dead people cannot be criticized almost all history MUST be re-written, avoiding to criticize Caligula, Gengis-Khan, Hitler and Stalin because the poor cannot defend themselves......

I find distasteful that Holland can be criticized by historians, when he died doing his duty.
I find distasteful that Pound can be criticized ("inept" or "pusillanimous" or "stupid") but Leach and Wake-Walker cannot. I guess Pound is dead too: can he defend himself ?
Why have you lightly accepted these words referred to Pound signals and speeches, while you are astonished at my judgement regarding the behavior of 2 or 3 officers, that was clearly not in line with the "Nelsonian traditions" ?

you wrote: "the mission of Wake-Walker was to shadow Bismarck "

Again, if this was true (however, I have NEVER seen the operational orders with which W-W was ordered ONLY to shadow and flank-mark, carefully avoiding any confrontation in any situation..... ), then why did Tovey invent the misleading point 17, incorrectly saying that the cruiser were not able to join the battle because they were too far behind ?

It would have been much easier (and honest) to plainly say that two heavy cruisers were at sea ONLY to shadow and flank-mark, as you try to say now.....


Bye, Alberto

[Cag]

Hi All

Hi Alberto your question was answered regarding the morning engagement and afternoon re engagement question.

As you know you in a previous thread you asserted Norfolk turned away at 05.41 and retracted this once challenged. Pinchin plot is not the question here...... Norfolks track on it is. Where is your proof of a falisfied track if it is similar to the tactical plot one? Was 10nm from Hood correct or was 15nm? Answer.......neither.

As for your last remark as regards games, no further comment required.

I'm amazed you find criticism of Holland or Pound distasteful but the attempt at blackening the names of Leach Wake-Walker or Tovey, (not to mention Pound Churchill etc accused of creating and inciting a cover up) is ok?

Did Wake-Walker Leach and Tovey lay their lives on the line in the exact same way that Admiral Holland or Captain Kerr did? Did Leach make the same ultimate sacrifice? Yet we have here on this forum a continued effort to call into question the fighting spirit of Wake-Walker to enable a link to be made to another event, even suggesting he was making an alibi at 05.50 for an unexpected event which occurred at 06.00 or in answer to a signal about re engaging Bismarck made in the afternoon.

I have the utmost respect for all those who took part in this battle no matter on which side they fought or role played, from the lowest seaman to Admirals Pound and Lütjens. We are very lucky that we can sit at a keyboard and discuss the actions of these men, as we did not face the kind of dangers they did, day in day out for years.

But there seems to be a systematic ongoing witch hunt which has nothing to any criticism of Admiral Holland.

Best wishes
Cag.

[Alberto Virtuani]

Cag wrote: "Where is your proof of a falisfied track if it is similar to the tactical plot one?"

Hi Mr.Cag,
Here you are with the proof: Pinchin's Plot track for NF (similar to what ???) is FALSE because it does not allow to respect the known logged or signaled bearings to PoW (220° at 05:50 and 230° at 6:00).
You are (for your admission) unable to show a complete alternative to Antonio map (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8231&start=30#p76360) in which the 215° course (as per NF strategical plot) is perfectly reconciling the two bearings (and all the others, of course ).


No further comment is needed to your statement about me criticizing Leach and Wake-Walker, please read my answer to RF above.


Bye, Alberto

[Antonio Bonomi]

Hello everybody,

I think it is better to explain the logic I used to open this thread and to attach the above original messages.

The first message I have attached is the famous one sent to Wake-Walker by the Admiralty, asking him his intentions to re-engage with the PoW, and I do not think it was a normal way to act by the Admiralty to send messages like that to Flag Officers at sea.

That message response was the reference during the Court Martial attempt made by Adm Pound and defeated by Adm Tovey strong reaction and final position about it. That was the subject of Barnes/Admiralty response to Adm Tovey point 23 on his dispatches explaining the reasons why Wake-Walker did not re-engage, definitively the only known subject of the Court Martial threat against RearAdm W.F. Wake-Walker.

No one ever mentioned the missing engagement of RearAdm Wake-Walker in the morning battle being a subject of a potential charge to him or a reason for an inquiry or a court martial attempt.

But, ... as we all know very well now, ... the " Cover Up ", ... the Hood Second board, ... together with Adm Tovey dispatches point 17, ... worked all in the direction to hide and modify the real distances of Suffolk and Norfolk from the enemy, ... with the clear intention to remove any potential reason for an additional threat in that direction against Capt Ellis and RearAdm Wake-Walker.

The question now is very easy.

If there was no problem on Suffolk and Norfolk positions during the battle start, ... if they were doing exactly what was expected from them in that situation, ... why they felt the need to modify their positions and consequently hide the truth ?

It is more than obvious that the problem was clearly existing, and the heavy cruisers position was changed, while the responsibility of their " new " positions putting them not in condition to participate to the battle was loaded unfairly to ViceAdm Holland missed orders to them.

It is logic that by doing so they demonstrate very evidently that if they had been in position to engage and open fire, ... they should have done it if in condition to do it, ... and in fact as a confirmation, Adm Tovey felt the need to justify to the Admiralty why they did not do it on his dispatches point 17 using the distance of around 15 sea miles, ... so out of firing range as justification for their missed enemy engagement.

Elementary, ... just elementary, ... and well demonstrated as you can see.

So, ... in my opinion, ... the second message at 05:50 from the Norfolk to the Admiralty must be evaluated on this contest, ... since it was sent just immediately after the " Enemy in sight ! " message the Norfolk sent at 05:41, ... immediately followed by the turn from course 240° ( converging ) to a course 215° ( diverging ), ... enlarging the distance from the enemy and very evidently showing no intention to engage the enemy and wait for the events to develop further more before taking any initiative.

Surely it was not a Nelsonian type of manoeuvre, ... just the opposite, ... and possibly that message was providing a reason to have done it ... because the enemy appeared to have turned to port, so toward the Norfolk.

It is very curious to realize that on the same moment Suffolk was having a " mirage " officially, ... and turned away too, ... and we realized only lately thanking Capt Ellis autobiography that there was no " mirage " at all, ... and he did that manoeuvre for another reason.

This Norfolk 05:50 sent message was never attached or mentioned into any official report or book, ... it was " expunged " from the message list provided with the CS1 official report, ... and I have found it only thanking to the list of the Admiralty received messages provided by Dunmunro recently, ...

Bye Antonio

[Herr Nilsson]

...
But, ... as we all know very well now, ... the " Cover Up ", ... the Hood Second board, ... together with Adm Tovey dispatches point 17, ... worked all in the direction to hide and modify the real distances of Suffolk and Norfolk from the enemy, ... with the clear intention to remove any potential reason for an additional threat in that direction against Capt Ellis and RearAdm Wake-Walker.
...

Hello Antonio,

my main problem with your reasoning is, that it is just one way to read the sources. It's just your (and probably Alberto's...who else?) opinion, that you're right, but obviously you couldn't convince any other....including me. I can understand your frustration, but if you need an explanation why no one can follow you, I suggest to you (and all others) to (re)read:

1) The Court Martial for the Denmark Straits -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6728

2) Denmark Strait and RN Articles of War -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=5830

3) Hit on POW compass platform -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6276

4) The Norfolk and Suffolk tracks at Denmark Strait -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8231

5) The Plot -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6495

6) Cover up synopsis -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6799

7) The Court Martial for the Denmark Strait -> viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6728

You will realize that there are a lot of, and above all, very reasonable different explanations and most of them seem to be more likely.
My impression is that we never had any "discussion" in the past years and that has probably silenced a lot of former participants. Due to lack of time I myself tend to think twice now before I do post anything....and most times I don't, because I know it isn't worth the effort. Come to think of it, de facto I'm pretty much silenced as well.
In my opinion you've made the - let me call it - "mistake" to ignore valid objections completely. In any case that's not the way to convince someone.
Furthermore I'm not sure whether Alberto does you a disservice to you with his tactical posts (I mean to say: most readers are not stupid.) In any case that's not the way to convince someone.

...as we all know very well now,...

No we don't and that's not the way to convince someone.

Happy New Year!

[alecsandros]

@Herr Nilson

"No we don't and that's not the way to convince someone. "

To convince someone of anything, that one must first be opened to reason, have the virtue of fairness, and be realistically willing to learn.

Antonio worked for some years now to provide a very clear red line through a dark and shaky historical terrain, for which I am greatly indebted and can not thank him enough. Perhaps he should have worked to paint just the red line, without so much detail and without so much "clarity" (that unerves alot of people still - so I see). Perhaps he should have left the imagination to play a larger part. Perhaps...

While I myself have various un-answered questions (many) about the participant's behavior during battle for Denmark Strait, including speeds, geometrical distances, and above all, quirky decisions taken by both sides, and while I do not completely agree with any version of the events presented so far, I accept and respect the most thorough investigation produced so far, and the undeniable fact that that investigation was opened and continued by Antonio, with help from multiple contributors - Alberto, CAG, Duncan, Marc, Wadinga, Paul , and many others.

I have opted to withdraw from the discussion a long time ago, as it was evident that Antonio's research , published here free of cost (!) is "heard" by deaf ears and is "read" by blind eyes.
Those that could have been convinced have long been convinced (within each ones limits), and those that can not be convinced will never be convinced.

Best ,

[Antonio Bonomi]

Hello everybody,

@ Herr Nilsson,

let me start from the bottom, you wrote :

Happy New Year !

Happy new year to you and all the forum members and I hope that during this year we will be able to move forward and be back on our usual fair way to discuss historical interesting topics related to those naval episodes occurred 75 years ago.

This because it is more than 4 years that we have been discussing this Court Martial attempt story and all the related arguments you very properly linked here above too, and I think that with this one that was the only one missed on the above list, we are done.

I am not frustrated at all and I do not need neither I want to convince anybody, because my intention was to find the truth for myself and for the pleasure of the historical research.
I just wanted to demonstate to myself that my initial intuition was right and find the related evidence about it.
I can tell you I have over achieved my goal by a large amount of evidence, by far well above my initial expectations.

Where they are ? Very simple, they are mostly contained here in :

Cout_Martial_British_books.jpg (116.62 KiB) Viewed 1835 times

Now you as well as everybody else are obviously free to beleive all you like, no problems at all for me.

But if you are coming in this forum to discuss about an argument and like to counter my statements supported by facts and evidences, it is fair and obvious that I am expecting your different version of the story supported by your own version of the facts, with maps and evidence in case of need, ... exactly like I am doing when I state something, ... this is called fairness and an educated approach on a discussion forum.

You may have noticed that since the beginning of this subject I have been personally offended and challenged only by insults and ironic statements, and that tells the whole story about the willingness of certain arrogant and poorly educated persons to be able to discuss about an historical argument.

There are NO " sacred cows " for me, and no one as the right to become arrogant and insult persons only because they are making historical researches about an argument they do not like to be discussed.
It is also clearly against this forum rules, obviously.
If someone has no arguments to counter a well demonstrated fact, this person does not have any right to offend and joke the person that made them with his poor irony and an evident " troll " approach.

I am always willing to evaluate and discuss about every valid objection, assuming it is put forward in a fair way as we were used to do until recently.

Alberto, like me, you, Sean, Duncan, CAG, Alecsandros, ... and everybody else does have his own personality and way to do things, and as long as this does not fall into poor education and arrogancy, that is ok and I hope that sooner or later we will all be able to be back on the way this forum was able to be used by all of us.

Trust me, no one wants or needs to convince anybody, because it will be also a waste of effort in my opinion, because nobody likes to be" convinced " by someone else if it is not convinced by himslef and by the evidence he is able to evaluate, understand and accept.

That is the key of the historical researches, to bring out the documents, maps and evidence about a subject and let the persons make up their own opinion about it.

I remember when I explained to a very competent person what I had collected about this story, and at the end he told me : " If you do not find and demosntate the real reason why all this has been done, it will be hard to beleive it, but with the real reason then everything will be logic and well proved of course ".

If I recall correctly you stated something similar time ago, ... and now the Court Martial attempt is well proved, ... and the rest was done before by me, ... bottom up from the documents alteration to the reasons for it to be, ... and not very easily top down like it was possible to do in few weeks having the proper books and documents written many years ago in my hands already.

Stephen Roskill, like many other British historians explained very well this " regrettable aftermath " ( Roskill definition ), ... and provided us the correct reference for the Court Martial attempt documents, ... and recently another British historian like Graham Rhys-Jones described in summary very well how it was finally managed : " Yet it was Tovey's version which went to the printers ."

I will never took out from them the credits for having published the truth about this story long before I did it, ... the only credit I have and nobody can take out from me, ... is that I went much, much deeper on the whole analysys of all the story and details behind it and put the whole scenario together like no one has ever done before.

But I cannot blame them, ... for not having done it, ... because they are/were British and it was surely not going to be easy for them to do it.

Bye Antonio

[Cag]

Hi All

Hi Alberto, Norfolks track works for me?

Hi Antonio, firstly may I say as much as I respect those who took part in the battle I respect your work and the effort you put into it. But for me questions remain, why would two independent ships independently decide not to engage if they were meant to? Unless their most important tactical role was to maintain contact and leave the action to the heavy ships? We assume because no action took place it was due to negative intentions, to suggest Wake-Walker is making an alibi for not taking part in a battle he had no idea what it's outcome would be is illogical or assumes WW had psychic powers.

I'm afraid this appears to be an attempt to link the morning battle with the admiralty signal and Toveys despatch. However Wake-Walker explains his reasons for not re engaging Bismarck with PoW without need to reference his position at 03.00 or 05.41 or 05.50 or 06.00. The Admiralty accepted his reasons.

The admiralty issues instructions to officers for everything, believe me I know I read them trying to find camouflage instructions, even the ingredient parts of home fleet grey paint is listed.

They are called Admiralty Fleet orders or Confidential Admiralty fleet orders. There are even ones that deal with 'intend' signals etc. The Admiralty asked commanders at sea their intentions or gave information just look at the questions asked of Tom Phillips as he sailed east or those issued during the Norway actions.

Im afraid that sometimes as Alecsandros says {happy new year Alecsandros} that both sides are blind and deaf to the logic of the other sides argument.

Best wishes
Cag.

[Antonio Bonomi]

Hello everybody,

@ Alecsandros,

Antonio worked for some years now to provide a very clear red line through a dark and shaky historical terrain, for which I am greatly indebted and can not thank him enough.

Perhaps he should have worked to paint just the red line, without so much detail and without so much "clarity" (that unerves alot of people still - so I see). Perhaps he should have left the imagination to play a larger part. Perhaps...


While I myself have various un-answered questions (many) about the participant's behavior during battle for Denmark Strait, including speeds, geometrical distances, and above all, quirky decisions taken by both sides, and while I do not completely agree with any version of the events presented so far, I accept and respect the most thorough investigation produced so far, and the undeniable fact that that investigation was opened and continued by Antonio, with help from multiple contributors - Alberto, CAG, Duncan, Marc, Wadinga, Paul , and many others.

Many thanks for your compliments and fairness.

Of course I thank all the other contributors too, because without their challenges and help sometimes, ... my work would have never reached this depth, ... and level of details.

Bye Antonio

[Alberto Virtuani]

Alecsandros wrote: "To convince someone of anything, that one must first be opened to reason, have the virtue of fairness, and be realistically willing to learn......I have opted to withdraw from the discussion a long time ago, as it was evident that Antonio's research , published here free of cost (!) is "heard" by deaf ears and is "read" by blind eyes."

Hi Alec, we are terribly missing your contributions, but we have appreciated you for keeping your word.
Best wishes !

Bye, Alberto

[Herr Nilsson]

Hello Antonio,

you made two very important statements:

Trust me, no one wants or needs to convince anybody, because it will be also a waste of effort in my opinion, because nobody likes to be" convinced " by someone else if it is not convinced by himslef and by the evidence he is able to evaluate, understand and accept.

Of course it's about evidence and not persuasion. I want to accept all of your theory. I really do. I just have learned years ago to verify the work of others, before I can accept it. The evidence so far doesn't convince me. My understanding of certain reports, messages and letters is totally different from yours. I have no idea how you construe the things as you do. Maybe it's a cultural difference, maybe it's just the language barrier between a Italian and a German writing to each other in English. I don't know. Sometimes I think I should simply explain my perspective to Reinhard. I'm pretty sure he would understand it.

That is the key of the historical researches, to bring out the documents, maps and evidence about a subject and let the persons make up their own opinion about it.

Yes exactly, and therefore you can't claim that "...we all know very well now...". I want to make up my own opinion and don't want to be patronized.

[alecsandros]

Best wishes !

Best Wishes to you as well , Alberto , Cag, Antonio,
and to everybody else as well,

[Antonio Bonomi]

Hello everybody,

@ Herr Nillson,

I agree with ALL your above statements.

I strongly encourage everybody to do the same, ... to take the evidence, ... to study them and make up their own opinion about it.

That is the reason why I have always posted everything with the majority of the details I could do, and summarized very frequently everything, providing links to make it easier, like I did recently during my recap.

Surely our own different education and way to study, ... learn and put togheter information, ... and even do the things are different.

But I think that after having done it deeply enough, ... the conclusions should not be much different.

I am sure that Rheinard will like to listen also your opinion about it, ... as I had a great time several times with him either when he was still in Bremerhaven, ... a couple of times, ... as well as very recently with Robert when we went very deeply on this study I am making.

He is a very competent person and it was very easy for me to explain it to him, ... he caught all the aspects of this story very fast and deeply understood all my points very clearly, ... and again, ... his opinion was that I only needed to prove the real reasons why all this was done at the highest level possible into the Official documents.

Now, ... thanking Stephen Roskill, ... I have it too, ... and I really never thought and hoped to be able to have find such type of documents and evidence at that high level still available, ... properly supported by Stephen Roskill that was the Official historian for Royal Navy.

I am sure that next time I will meet Rheinard, we will have a lot to talk about it again, it will be a lot of fun for me to meet again such a real gentleman and highly competent person, with Erminio Bagnasco the best persons I have met in my life about naval warfare competences.

@ all,

I like to share an idea : why we do not plan to get togheter in one place, ... lets say in France somewhere, ... so easy for everybody to be reached, ... for a week end of historical exchanges and fun ?

Bye Antonio