Naval History Forums

I don't know what all those kill statistics are supposed to prove. Of course Hartmann had far more kills than any non German ace and he certainly had far more combat experience than any non German ace as had all those over 100 German aces who shot down more than 100 aircraft but if you put them on ...

Late edit: - and because the damage presented by Ikeda seems dubious, I find it difficult to believe his damage assessment and drawing alltogether, as he is the only source mentioning this. Why arent't there any near misses and splinter damage ? All the "Hits" drawn on the aft part of the...

Alecs, I read Bill's posts in detail. My point is not whether the shells did or did not detonate, and it is not about whether Mr Lundgren's analyses and speculations about damage effects and ultimate causes of sinking are correct or not. The only point I'm making is that the new Japanese data turned...

And he parenthetically wonders whether the wreck might not perhaps be that of HIEI, which sank in the same general vicinity. Exactly... Thus there is some difficulty in confirming the damage based on the wreck. ..... Please note my earlier comment that Bill did not at all dispute the number of hits...

..... Read Lundgren's article for full details. He drew his data from surviving Japanese damage control records. B I know Byron; I read his article. There is a rather long discusion on this on the navweapons forum. Bill Jurens amongst others was quite skeptical about the conclusions and the damage ...

I wonder how well-trained the crews of those shore batteries were? No doubt they put the best trained crews with the 16" guns and put the 'B Team' on the old 10" and 12" guns. Presuming they followed the logical best policy, which isn't always the case. Even then, it takes a well-tra...

That's my understanding, on the number of hits. I think Kirishima did just fine; 20 or so hits by 2700 pound shells at the distance that battle was fought, would have put any ship in a bad way. This has been discussed several times on the forum... It is unlikely - the battle report of Washington me...

Hello Byron, Again, I think Mass fired formidably well that day. There are at least 2 newer French books which cover the matter. Both present the sinking of the French destroyers that day. Massachussets fired 23 salvos, and obtained several near misses. The explosions aboard the French DDs mentione...

Hi Karl, I guess South Dakota is so over rated because of G&D book. Allthough they pointed several problems, overall they named the class "best treaty batleship" or something like that, and in other places mentioned they were "much better than larger and more expensive designs of...

Good Lord, not this again ..........

B

alecsandros wrote: I thought you were just being ironic :)

I doubt Baden would have had realistic chances against Washington...

..... Hi Alecs. You're actually right: I was being ironic. But the question was asked .....

B

If I read the discussions going on, than we have first the statement anything flying the Stars and Stripes will win over best what had the swastica painted on. If some one proves the contrary than it doesn't matter because it's irrelevant. ..... By no means, sir. I just find the idea of pitting TIR...

If I read the discussions going on, than we have first the statement anything flying the Stars and Stripes will win over best what had the swastica painted on. If some one proves the contrary than it doesn't matter because it's irrelevant. ..... By no means, sir. I just find the idea of pitting TIR...

It seems to me that all this debate about TIRPITZ versus NEW MEXICO begs the real issue. The greatest danger to TIRPITZ would be the several 16in coastal batteries covering the sea approaches to NY. They were very accurate, largely impervious to any TIRPITZ return fire, and represented a real threat...

The fitting of delay coils to the 14/45 and 14/45 armed US battleships in 1935 resulted in an improvement in true mean dispersion to the point that the 14in guns were equivalent to the new 16/45 and 16/50. This was validated by analysis of the battle practice results from 1936 through 1941, whereby ...