2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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2nd BATTLE OF SIRTE-22nd to 27th MARCH 1942

British defensive plan
Admiral Sir Philip Vian, commanding the convoy, organised his ships into six divisions plus a close escort for the convoy of five Hunt-class destroyers.

1st Division: destroyers Jervis, Kipling, Kelvin and Kingston
2nd Division: light cruisers Dido and Penelope with the destroyer Legion
3rd Division: destroyers Zulu and Hasty
4th Division: light cruisers Cleopatra (flagship) and Euryalus
5th Division: destroyers Sikh, Lively, Hero and Havock
6th Division: anti-aircraft cruiser Carlisle and Hunt-class destroyer Avon Vale
In case of an Italian surface attack, the first five divisions were to stand off from the convoy to face the enemy while the sixth division laid smoke across the wake of the convoy to obscure it from the enemy. The first five divisions would act as a rearguard to lay smoke and delay the enemy while Carlisle and the Hunt-class destroyers proceeded with the cargo ships to Malta.

The battle
At 14:30 the next day, the British were faced by a pair of heavy cruisers and escorting destroyers. Admiral Vian immediately implemented his plan; the cargo ships and escorts turned away to the south while the light cruisers and remaining destroyers laid smoke and charged the Italians. After an exchange of fire, the two Italian heavy cruisers backed off in an attempt to lure the British toward the incoming main Italian squadron, and at 16:37 they returned to attack with the battleship Littorio, a light cruiser and their screening destroyers.The battle raged for two and a half hours, with the British ships leaving the safety of their huge smoke screen to fire a few volleys and then returning to it when the Italian salvoes got too close. During one of these exchanges, Havock suffered heavy damage from a near-miss when fired at by the Italian battleship, and was ordered to withdraw from the battle line and join the convoy.

At 18:34, Vian decided to send his destroyers in to launch torpedo attacks from about 5,000 yd (4,600 m), the closest the Italians would allow the British to approach. None of the torpedoes found their target, but as Kingston turned she was hit hard by a round which penetrated her boiler room, ignited a fire and temporarily brought her to a halt. The battle began with a 25 kn (29 mph; 46 km/h) wind blowing to the North-west, with the wind continuing to increase during the day; a factor which favoured the gunnery of the larger Italian ships throughout the battle, but the direction of the wind aided the laying of smokescreens by Vian's ships.Lively was also struck by shell splinters from the battleship's main guns that pierced a bulkhead, causing some flooding but no casualties.

The Italian light cruiser Giovanni delle Bande Nere. During the battle, she landed a 152 mm (6.0 in) round on the cruiser HMS Cleopatra′s bridge with her second salvo, disabling the radar and radio.Right at the end of the action, at 18:55, Littorio had been hit by a 4.7 in (120 mm) shell, with negligible damage. Her floatplane caught fire from the blast from a salvo of her after turret at the same time. This led to the claim by the British that one of the torpedoes struck home.

At dusk, about 19:00, the Italians gave up and turned for home. Without radar, they would have been at a significant disadvantage in a night action, as in the Battle of Cape Matapan. The Italians outgunned their British counterparts but they appeared unwilling to close for a decisive blow, perhaps wary of the torpedo threat from the numerically superior British destroyer force.

Battle damage
According to British reports, "HMS Cleopatra was struck on the after part of the bridge at 16:44...", by a 152 mm (6.0 in) hit from the light cruiser Giovanni dalle Bande Nere; 16 seamen were killed. Cruisers Euryalus and Penelope were also damaged, with Euryalus straddled by Littorio at 16:43 and at 18:41.Kingston was hit amidships by a shell from Littorio that killed 15 men of her crew. and left the destroyer dead in the water, with her whaler torn apart, her anti-aircraft guns, searchlight tower and torpedo launchers shattered by the explosion. Some sources claim that she was hit by the guns of the heavy cruiser Gorizia. Although Kingston had an engine in flames and a flooded boiler, she managed however to recover speed, reaching Malta the next day.

Havock was also badly damaged in a boiler by a Littorio near miss at 17:20, suffering eight deaths.[34] Lively was forced to retreat to Tobruk for repairs after a near miss at 18:55 from Littorio′s after turret. Three more destroyers—Sikh, Legion and Lance—suffered lesser damage from 8 in (203 mm) cruiser fire. The Italian fleet expended 1,511 rounds of all calibres upon the British squadron; the only destroyer to open fire was Aviere. The British cruisers had replied with 1,553 rounds and the destroyers with about 1,300 rounds as well as 38 torpedoes. Axis aircraft made continual attacks, mainly against the convoy, throughout the naval action and Royal Navy AA gunners claimed the destruction of seven Axis aircraft and damage to several more.

Follow-up actions
Most of the escort force, now short of fuel and ammunition due to the protracted engagement and unable to find the convoy, turned back for Alexandria. The damaged destroyers and the cargo ships were sent on to Malta, with Carlisle, Penelope and Legion. The next day, they were subjected to continuous air attacks. The cargo ship Clan Campbell was sunk twenty miles from harbour, and the oil tanker Breconshire was too damaged to reach Valletta. Nonetheless, the other two merchantmen, Talabot and steamer Pampas, reached Malta's Grand Harbour virtually unharmed. Pampas had been hit by two bombs but these failed to explode. Penelope attempted to tow Breconshire, but the tow parted in heavy seas. She anchored short of the protective minefields and the destroyer Southwold attempted to take her in tow, hitting a mine in the process. She was eventually towed into Marsaxlokk Bay by tugs.

Intense Axis air raids against Malta on 24–25 March failed to damage the three surviving convoy ships.However, on 26 March, German dive bombers scored bomb hits on all three ships, sinking Talabot and Pampas that day with Breconshire capsizing on 27 March. Much of Breconshire′s oil was salvaged through the hole in her hull. Only about 5,000 short tons (4,500 t) of cargo had been unloaded, of the 26,000 short tons (24,000 t) that had been loaded in Alexandria.


Destroyer HMS Kingston suffered heavy damage from Littorio's main guns during the battle, and while in drydock at Malta she was successively attacked by German bombers which further damaged her, this time beyond repair.
The Italian fleet units were no more lucky after the battle. After failing to destroy the convoy by themselves, they were caught en route to their bases by a severe storm that sank the destroyers Scirocco and Lanciere.While under repair in dry dock at Malta, Kingston was attacked a few days later by German aircraft and suffered further damage, this time beyond repair. She was scrapped at Malta in the following months.

Assessments
Almost all sources with an opinion on the matter have assessed the battle as a British victory, credited to the escort of light cruisers and destroyers which successfully prevented the Italians from inflicting any damage whatsoever on the convoy by staving off an Italian squadron, composed of a battleship and two heavy cruisers, while fending off heavy Axis air attacks. On the other hand, some authors[54] while generally acknowledging the British success, write of the battle as a partial Italian achievement in delaying and turning the convoy aside.

Nearly all sources acknowledge the Italian fleet inflicted significant damage and several casualties on the British squadron while suffering minimal damage and no casualties in return. The action, however, represented a failure on the Italians' part to exploit their advantage and destroy the convoy. Indeed, they were unable to sink or cripple a single cargo ship. This was due to Admiral Vian's vigorous and skillful defence in the face of a superior adversary. The overwhelming strength of the Italian fleet was not fully exploited by Admiral Iachino also because bad weather and lack of radar prevented him from continuing the pursuit of the convoy at dusk.

But when the main objective, to re-supply Malta, is included in the assessment, the outcome is different. The British intention to reach Malta before dawn with a substantial escort was disrupted by the intervention of the Italian Navy. This left the cargo ships exposed to Axis air supremacy.Thereafter, Italian and German aircraft caught the British convoy at sea and chased the surviving steamers to the harbour; more than 80% of the supplies were lost.

Source material extracted from Wikipedia
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

Post by aurora »

With such a quite complex naval action as this-I am more than surprised that no one has ventured to comment on the tactics employed or,more importantly -the outcome. :?
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

Post by alecsandros »

aurora wrote:With such a quite complex naval action as this-I am more than surprised that no one has ventured to comment on the tactics employed or,more importantly -the outcome. :?
It seems very similar in outcome to Pedestal. Most of the supplies were lost...
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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Thank you for the comment Alex but what is your view on the outcome-personally I am with the second set of authors mentioned below; after taking into account the effect of Axis air attacks: -

QUOTE
"Almost all sources with an opinion on the matter have assessed the battle as a British victory, credited to the escort of light cruisers and destroyers which successfully prevented the Italians from inflicting any damage whatsoever on the convoy by staving off an Italian squadron, composed of a battleship and two heavy cruisers, while fending off heavy Axis air attacks.
On the other hand, some authors while generally acknowledging the British success, write of the battle as a partial Italian achievement in delaying and turning the convoy aside".
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

Post by alecsandros »

Well, I read some time ago about Second Battle of Sirte, in Bagnasco's "Littorio Class - Italy's last and largest Battleships".

According to the book , the Royal Navy fought bravely against the odds, and indeed manage to keep the Italian squadron out of the convoy.
The British launched 36 torpedoes and fired a few thousands of 4.7 to 6" rounds against the Italians.

Still, the crucial aspect in Bagnasco's book was the weather. It was a storm, night, and visibiity was usualy below 4-5km. The Italians, lacking radars and suffering heavy from the storm, turned away because the conditions were to bad to discover the convoy. On the way back to port 2 Italian destroyers were lost because of storm damage.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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I do accept that the Italians conducted creditable action in extremely difficult weather conditions; but ran out of time before engaging the convoy.The Italians shot better than the British and only suffered minimal battle damage and did force the convoy to turn south and ultimately scatter.The knock on effect of this British manoeuvre caused them to come under unrelenting air attack in the following morning bringing the loss of destroyer Legion,damaged Breconshire,Talbot and Pampus; and most of the 29000 tons of cargo and oil they carried-Breconshire's oil was saved in part; but only 807 tons were unloaded from the ships due to air attacks and further sinkings in harbour.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

Post by alecsandros »

But what happened after ?
Did they send another convoy ?
Was there another convoy required ?

Making again a comparison with Pedestal : immediately after Pedestal was finished, HMS Furious embarked 31 more Spitfires and ferried them to the island by the end of August. A further transport of some 30 Spitfires was delivered in October by the same carrier.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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Operation Vigorous was a supply convoy (MW-11) that sailed from Haifa and Port Said on 12 June 1942 to Malta.On the evening of 15 June, in view of the strength of enemy air attacks from the extended network of Axis airfields in North Africa, the presence of a large portion of the Italian fleet, lack of fuel caused by diversionary tactics ordered by Adm. Harwood (vice Cunningham) and seriously depleted ammunition stocks, it was finally decided to abandon the operation and return to Alexandria
Last edited by aurora on Wed Jan 07, 2015 2:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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aurora wrote:Operation Vigorous was a supply convoy (MW-11) that sailed from Haifa and Port Said on 12 June 1942 to Malta.On the evening of 15 June, in view of the strength of enemy air attacks from the extended network of Axis airfields in North Africa, the presence of a large portion of the Italian fleet, lack of fuel caused by diversionary tactics and seriously depleted ammunition stocks, it was finally decided to abandon the operation and return to Alexandria
.,.. mid June.... 3 months after 2nd Sirte. That's quite some time.

In this case, can it be said that the few supplies actualy delivered during 2nd Sirte wre enough for Malta to fight on... ?
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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The commander of the Mediterranean Fleet Vice Admiral Henry Harwood decided to organize a massive new refuelling mission in June 1942. To make sure that at least part of the cargo could reach their destination, this time the convoys would be two: one (“Harpoon”), started from Gibraltar, it would come to Malta from the west while the other (“vigorous”), sailed from Alexandria, was coming from the east, the idea was that, faced with two trains simultaneously, the Axis forces, or were divided, allowing each to convoy to face opposition and to limit the acceptable losses, or would concentrate on only one of them, allowing the other to reach the goal undisturbed.Both resulted in bringing in minimal supplies-only two ships from six of Operation Harpoon reached Malta.
NB, It is intended to deal with Operations Vigorous and Harpoon separately after this thread is exhausted
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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According to Bernard Ireland in his book "THE WAR in the Mediterranean 1940-43" :-
"Admiral Cunningham rightly considered Second Sirte as one of the most brilliant actions of the war-if not the most brilliant;but had to advise the Admiralty on the 26th of March- that he had only two serviceable fleet destroyers.The generally larger Italians,with the seas on the port beam had made the steadier gun platforms than the smaller British ships which were corkscrewing and yawing in the quartering sea.What decided the day was not gunnery, but resolution and Vian richly deserved the knighthood that was bestowed on him"
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

Post by alecsandros »

Aurora, reading again about the British convoy attacked at Second Sirte, the impression is that absolutely all of the cargo ships were sunk, either close to the harbor, or while unloading supplies. Is this true ?
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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QUOTE from #1

"Intense Axis air raids against Malta on 24–25 March failed to damage the three surviving convoy ships.However, on 26 March, German dive bombers scored bomb hits on all three ships, sinking Talabot and Pampas that day with Breconshire capsizing on 27 March. Much of Breconshire′s oil was salvaged through the hole in her hull. Only about 5,000 short tons (4,500 t) of cargo had been unloaded, of the 26,000 short tons (24,000 t) that had been loaded in Alexandria".

Yes Alex- they all were sunk but; 4500 tons of Breconshire's oil was salvaged ie almost 20000 tons of cargo lost.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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POSTSCRIPT

Malta and particularly Grand Harbour had been devastated by unrelenting air attacks and during the closing days of April the 11th Submarine Flotilla deployed temporarily to Alexandria,About this time the Luftwaffe transferred 40 divebombers and 45 fighters to North Africa and 60 spitfires were flown in by Wasp and Eagle.The Germans took the view that Malta was no longer a threat to their convoys to North Africa-they had achieved their aim and it was time to move on.This decision was highly questionable.
On 19th May the Manxman brought in a substantial cargo of ammunition.It seemed to mark a watershed with the air raids scaled down and the defenders started to feel that all was not lost but for the Royal Navy there was no such let up.
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Re: 2nd Battle of Sirte-22nd-27th March 1942

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aurora wrote:I do accept that the Italians conducted creditable action in extremely difficult weather conditions; but ran out of time before engaging the convoy.The Italians shot better than the British and only suffered minimal battle damage and did force the convoy to turn south and ultimately scatter.The knock on effect of this British manoeuvre caused them to come under unrelenting air attack in the following morning bringing the loss of destroyer Legion,damaged Breconshire,Talbot and Pampus; and most of the 29000 tons of cargo and oil they carried-Breconshire's oil was saved in part; but only 807 tons were unloaded from the ships due to air attacks and further sinkings in harbour.




IF you remember my comment on the other thread about how to judge whether the author had been overly influenced by the Italian Revisionists, you have fallen into the trap ( AGAIN ).

First, the Italians had a much more powerful naval force, which faced what was essentially the remnants of the Mediterranean fleet - i.e. IF the Italian force had sunk the lesser British force the Eastern Mediterranean would have been open to Italian operations.

Second, the "revisionists'" strike again with ; "but ran out of time before engaging the convoy". They "ran out of time" because they were incompetent and instead of attacking either around (as the British commander feared) or through the smokescreen, they allowed themselves to be distracted by the screen and wasted their own time ! They sat there doing, essentially, nothing. Why ?

There is no doubt of the damage to the convoy (by air), BUT considering the opportunity that the Italian Navy had, Second Sirte was certainly a British naval victory over the odds. What "should" have happened is that the Italians should have gone around the smokescreen and sunk or dispersed the much less powerful RN forced and gone on to directly attack the convoy and sunk that. Apart from the direct naval victory, the Italians would have command of the Eastern Med and the RN would have been hamstrung until a new Mediterranean Fleet could have been cobbled together. You never know, maybe the Italian navy would finally start the occasional bombarding the North African coast as the RN did.

.
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