Malvinas/Falklands war - Alleged attack on HMS Invincible

[RF]

Enrique, thank you very much for sharing this with all of us.

Had you obtained any hits on the British ships firing under those circunstances it would have been really remarkable. A good display of self-initiative!

Yes, very fortunate for the British that you didn't have a considerable number of these 155 mm guns to shoot at the ships. A bigger and easier target for air interdiction but still a far bigger threat to the ships.

[marcelo_malara]

Enrique:

You can read a brief post about how ship to ship shooting is calculated here http://kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 25&p=18594.

As you said, you have simplified the problem, because you are stationary. You only had to compute enemy movement, getting course, speed, bearing and range, all from radar. One problem of calculating this manuallly, is that the deflection (deflection in degress = speed across / range, see the post above) varies continuously, because speed across depends on target angle (angle between bearing to the target and its course), which varies continuously too, along with the range. This is the reason why to solve properly the problem, you need a rangekeeper that continually recalculates the problem as the paramaters vary. Anyway, with the method you were using, and correcting to fall of shot, you are technologically with an about 1915 fire control system.

What remains unclear to me, is how did you manage to "harmonize" radar beam and gun (make the radar beam converge with the firing line at a determined distance). I understand that with triangulation, you can determine, from the target´s and gun´s bearing as seen from the radar, an angle for the gun to aim to the target. The question is, this angle must have a point of reference from where to start measuring the angle. What did you use? True North? Magnetic North?

Kind regards

[reydelcastillo]

Marcelo good question ,I'm getting old , I need to think how Eduardo did it ( rememeber he was the one that had the idea and the one we need to blame for ,he came with pen and paper every day) , next time I see him I'll let him know that " He " was using an old method .-
Radra was pointed north ( Magnetic ) , Artillery is Pointed North Geographic - you can either go Magnetic and make the correction on the desviation by chart ( chart on map shows deviation by year ) or you can go streight geographic by Topographic method - When you make corrections you set yourself as if you are sitting on top of the artilelry piece and you make corrections from that imaginary position not from the radar- All this thoughts are made in loud voice until I remember how he did it -
Another thing , with the radar we had bearing in Degrees and distance in nautical miles , distance in nautical miles can be only as short as of a tenth of a mile ( 1/10 ) there you have an error of at least 180 meters .- accuracy 1/10 of a nautical mile -
another think I said Joicetick as with the one kids play , but it's not a joystick its a "Tracking Ball "- that is how it's call in the radar -
Speed was calculated in nautical miles , but was not provided to the artillety piece since they were not to fire until we instructed to do so , they only recieved the following :
Bearing in Artillery Degrees , Range in Meters witch they convert to elevation angle , and the moment to fire was given by us .- Prediccion was done at the radar -
I'll keep on thinking and I'll go to read the link you gave me - Thank You Marcelo -

[marcelo_malara]

Thanks Enrique, I understand now. I presume they had surveyed the gun emplacement with a theodite to find True North (or topo North as you are calling it). Has all this been ever published anywhere?

Regards

[Bgile]

Artillerymen are usually very fussy about getting their location correct, with an accurate grid location. They have instruments to facilitate that, and make cuts to known geographic features. Generally the map will show true north and magnetic variation, but calculating that is part of their course curriculum, at least in US practice.

[reydelcastillo]

No it has never been Publish , it has been mention in several War related Books , both British and Argentinians .-
One of the British Ships ( in it's Historical Book ) has a nice mention about this and it's the drawing that I have mention which shows the Ship and were the shots had hit arround the ship , and this is the book i'm looking for but I don't remember which HMS Ship it was - Other Argentinian Books also have mention this .-
The Radar belong to Tripple A Unit GADA 601 , responable for the Air Defense .- The 155 mm was added to the GA 3 ( Artillery Group 3 ) that had only 105 mm canons ( Otto Melara) -

The 155 mm was not supose neither authorized to make it to the Islands .- And here comes what I said about the Ratencatch Report ( No nowbody is going to come , they live to far away ) - And they came - LeuTenant Coronel Balza Comander of Artillery Group 3 ( and Years later Comander in Chief of the Army ) when he cross to the Islands with his Artillery Unit , realized that there was no Big Caliber Canons availabel in the Isands - He sugested the Superiority in the islands to bring heavy Artillery - His request was denied , so he got in touch with a friend of Him in the Air Force back in Mainland and ask him the favor to bring one 155 mm ( on a C 130 flight ) without telling anyone - So it did happen - And that is how we ended with 3 in the islands -

[reydelcastillo]

Artillerymen are usually very fussy about getting their location correct, with an accurate grid location. They have instruments to facilitate that, and make cuts to known geographic features. Generally the map will show true north and magnetic variation, but calculating that is part of their course curriculum, at least in US practice.

That is correct Sir , I remember 30 / 35 years ago we had to do all the measurments by foot with a measure tape .- It took 2 days of walking and calculations to have a complete Topograpfic Artillery Position ( Just for One Battery ) - Back then we relay a lot on the experience of the Foward Artillery Observer , if you had a good Observer in front line and a wise Fire Artillety Center , that Observer should place first shot long 200 Meters / Yards , the secind shot had to have already the correction on bearing and had to hit 100 Meters/Yards Short .- and the third shot with all the battery after a correccion of adding 50 should hit the target - That's back then , today I would not know were the switch to turn on the Computer is -

[reydelcastillo]

It would be very interesting if a Member of the Royal Navy could tell us how they chose their Targets in the Islands , Could also tell us if the Helicopters seen taking off the Ships were the one in charge of Observing the Naval Bombardment - And if what I remember seen a ship farther away , was he in charge of protecting those involved in the Naval Bombardment -

Thank You Very Much -

[RF]

The 155 mm was not supose neither authorized to make it to the Islands .-
- He sugested the Superiority in the islands to bring heavy Artillery - His request was denied , so he got in touch with a friend of Him in the Air Force back in Mainland and ask him the favor to bring one 155 mm ( on a C 130 flight ) without telling anyone - So it did happen - And that is how we ended with 3 in the islands -

Why was the 155's not authorised or permitted? Why was the request for them denied?

[RF]

It would be very interesting if a Member of the Royal Navy could tell us how they chose their Targets in the Islands , Could also tell us if the Helicopters seen taking off the Ships were the one in charge of Observing the Naval Bombardment - And if what I remember seen a ship farther away , was he in charge of protecting those involved in the Naval Bombardment -

Thank You Very Much -

This tactical detail is unlikely to be disclosed to any great extent as the information in Britain is ''classified'' namely cannot be disclosed under the Official Secrets Act. I would expect that the precise targetting and target selection would be made by the senior naval and air officers of the British Task Force, which would be based from information obtained through the military intelligence services including GCHQ at Cheltenham and other sources. The latter will include both SAS and SBS which had a secret presence on the Falklands throughout most of the conflict period. It is likely that other intelligence sources and facilities were obtained from Chile, where again there were unofficial reports in the British press that the SAS were operating from a location near Punta Arenas. In common with standard British practice this will neither be confirmed or denied by the British officially.
The other aspect to this are the US intelligence services - it is obvious co-operation existed with the British, the US had official presence in Buenos Aires whereas Britain had severed diplomatic relations. Again the full extent of that co-operation, including at tactical level over Argentine plans/dispositions on the islands will never be publicly disclosed, not even in the USA.

[reydelcastillo]

Thank you Sir , understood what may be under " Secret Act "
Regarding 155 mm , well initially remember what is under Ratenbatch report : The thought that British Troops were not suppose to come down " it was too far away "
My personal thought is that because one of the most important " Suppose " was wrong , and if you have plan based on this " wrong suppose " , there was no need for heavy artillery , there was no need for Light Tanks , there was no need for many other things that later on the conflict we found out that we needed them - .-

Just because you were not " suppose " to make that long trip to recover the Islands -

Regards Enrique

[reydelcastillo]

After we found out that the Fleet was heading south , that there was a blockade in place , the only way to supply the Islands was by air with C 130 , and as it was mention with the " Suppose that nobody was coming " -We found ourself in a hurry to give priority to some things , So Superiority decided that Heavy Artillery did not have priority in the Islands at that moment , Priority was given to bring in more troops , amo- food -

[RF]

The failure to plan the emplacement of substantial heavy artillery at the time of the invasion was clearly a major tactical blunder. Given the assumption that British counter-strikes wouldn't happen because of the distance, that assumption could have been re-inforced by such artillery emplacements precisely to act as a deterrent to counter-strike: not just a case of distance, but heavy firepower at the end of that distance as well.

Another tactical blunder was the failure to place firepower at Goose Green and Fox Bay, itself the result of a failure to appreciate that the sea channel separating the two main islands could be used by ships to mount a seaborne landing in the area of San Carlos Bay. Relying on Skyhawks operating from mainland Argentina was not a substitute for that ommission.

One factor that may be understandable as a failure on the part of Argentine planning is that there are areas in Britain where the terrain is very similar to the Falklands, which were (and are) used as troop training grounds by NATO. One particular area is Pembroke in Wales, and if you do visit Britain at any time reydelcastillo have a look at Pembroke and see for yourself. Obviously at the time there was no way for the Junta to appreciate this, but it was a major factor in Margaret Thatcher's decision that Britain could and would retake the Falklands.

[reydelcastillo]

Agree with you Sir .- And Blunders are paid with blood -

[reydelcastillo]

Some other short stories about the Conflict - While we wait on stories from the British Side -

May 01 , in the afternoon British Ships came for the first time close to shore for Naval Bombardment , seen on the screen , seen with my eyes as I step ot of the radar on top of Sapper Hill , Argentine Aircraft ataqck , ship retrieve from the area to come back at night - ( first and only time ships seen by naked eye )
On that afternoon , the Roland was station at the bottom of SApper Hill to protect the Radar , the Commanding Officer , buddy of mine also latter tells me : When the ships came close and you told us about it , we waited for them - He engaged a British Ship with the Roland that afternoon , then he switch to visual mode , the ship was at the farthest distance he could shot , knowing he had only 12 or 14 misils availables , and that the war had just started , he doubted about shooting - added to that the shot would have to go very low and his thought was , if something comes in its way , even a wave it will not reach the target I would have wasted a misil -

He had engaged a British Ship , and because the reasons exposed he did not shoot - We don't know if it would have hit , but it is an interesting story about the Conflict -
Never again British ships came with in range neither of Rland or of 105 mm canosn -

Sir I have to make a trip now , I'll get back on line on Saturday in the afternoon , have a nice day -
We will be waitting for accounts of the Conflict from the British Soldiers .- I mean British Soldiers / British Navy Man / British Air Man -