The Drydock - Episode 294

00:00:00 - Intro
00:01:01 - The co-reign of William and Mary predates the label HMS, but what would happen if there were another such case of two monarchs in Britain? It's fortunate that both His and Her start with H, thus HMS is unaffected, but in my scenario, would it change to TMS (Their Majesties' Ship)?
00:05:41 - Given the size of the Imperial German Navy compared to the French Navy why didn't the Germans plan a naval invasion of France in 1914?
00:11:54 - Would it have been better for the Japanese to build more heavy cruisers instead of Yamato and Musashi, tactically and resources wise?
00:15:20 - Can you exceed 100 miles range with a battleship gun?
00:20:34 - Could the Alabama have brought up to modernization like Iowa's were postwar, and how long do you think her service could have gone on?
00:28:29 - Given hindsight, would the major navies of WW2 have been better off building the all-or-nothing with a ‘high turtleback’ (as you called it) armour scheme?
00:34:28 - A lot has been made about how the American ships carried heavier guns in the War of 1812 ship duels. Would you say that overconfidence among British captains, and the substandard gunnery of the Halifax/Bermuda squadrons played a greater role?
00:40:30 - British "Anti-Invasion Submarines" in WW2 and potential uses?
00:46:06 - How dangerous was lightning in the age of steam and steel?
00:50:53 - If you were to select one ship to be a museum/war memorial for each of the navies listed below to commemorate their service in World War 2 which ship would you choose and why? (Royal Navy, German Navy, French Navy, United States Navy, Italian Navy, Japanese Navy, Norwegian Navy, Russian Navy, Australian Navy, New Zealand Navy, and Canadian Navy)
00:55:33 - We all hear about piracy in the age of sail around the Barbary Coast and the Caribbean. Are there other hotspots in the time that are less well known?
01:00:01 - During WWII, how close did the Royal Navy come to losing control of the eastern Mediterranean during the Battle of Crete?
01:02:24 - Given the culture of the Royal Navy at the time, what would be the realistic reaction to the officers aboard HMS Victoria and Camperdown had they ignored Tryon’s order which led to the collision?

[@f12mnb]

For the question about a 1914 German amphibious landing on France. In addition to the many concerns raised by Drach, the reality is that the German army was confident they could win a quick land war versus France, because they had done it in 1870-1871 (edited) during the Franco-Prussian war. Don't underestimate the effect of a prior great success. The way the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese war played out had a huge effect on Japanese planning as another example.

[@GrahamWKidd]

That 1970 Franco- Prussian war was a real doozy. The Leopard 1 versus the AMX-30 match up around Metz is infamous!!

[@AGoodOldRebel]

​@GrahamWKidd I remember seeing a really good painting of the "Luftwaffe Death Ride". Those poor F-104 pilots...

[@f12mnb]

@@GrahamWKidd too early to type accurately without my glasses! :)

[@genericpersonx333]

The other big factor is that the German Navy was already where it needed to be in August of 1914 to perform its stated missions. The German Navy's primary mission in a war against France and/or Russia was to secure German waters and shipping from those nations. The Battlefleet did this by remaining on the Kiel Kanal, where it could immediately transfer to the North Sea or Baltic Sea depending on whether the French or Russian fleets proved the more immediately threatening. Meanwhile, Germany's cruisers operating out of African, Chinese, and German ports were all ready to immediately wage cruiser warfare. The only real change in German naval strategy inspired by the British entering the fight was that the German cruisers could no longer operate on the high seas, leading to the U-boat becoming Germany's primary commerce-warfare asset. If the British and Japanese had stayed out of the war, it is probable the German cruisers would have continued to be Germany's main asset on the high seas, fighting French and Russian cruisers for control of the seas while the battlefleets postured in European waters.

[@oceanhome2023]

@@genericpersonx333 Imagine if Germany had kept all of their Colonies ? France doesn’t deserve all of those Pacific colonies !!!

[@manythingslefttobuild]

15:20 Gerald Bull worked on this in various forms, including using ex US navy 16" gun barrels and gun launching projectiles up to 180 km altitude, optimized for altitude rather than range. 'Base bleed' or 'Base burn' is a very small rocket used to reduce drag on the back of projectiles increasing range by 20-35% developed by Sweden in the 1960's.

[@ThatSlowTypingGuy]

I was wondering if anyone was going to mention Project HARP.

[@Philip271828]

Matrix-Churchill wants to know your location.

[@leftcoaster67]

moustache twirl, moustache twirl, grumble, grumble. That's awesome.

[@onenote6619]

There is a half-way house between a standard shell and a rocket-assisted version, called base-bleed. That uses a gas generator to 'fill in' the wake left by it, reducing base drag but not generating thrust. Allegedly that not only extends range by about 20%, but also increases accuracy because overall turbulence is reduced. How that scales to battleship guns is something I would not care to speculate on. A recent 155mm Rocket Assisted Projectile for ordinary artillery managed a 24 mile range. Again, how that scales to a battleship - your mileage may vary.

[@thomasbernecky2078]

Nice use of may vary there.

[@dogsnads5634]

@@michaelhitchcock9255 The current record for an operational, non-guided shell is 72km (44 miles) from a South African G6 firing 155mm rocket assisted shells. Pzh2000 and Archer won't be far behind that figure.

[@boutaric01]

The medieval noblewoman you mentioned was Jeanne de Clisson born Jeanne de Belleville. The Lioness of Brittany. One of her sons, Olivier de Clisson, was also known as The Butcher and became a Constable of France. .

[@SCjunk]

00:46:06 Drac - Sorry mate -ex electrical Engineer here - a steel ship is generally like a faraday cage - same with a strike on an airplane, okay there are circumstances for example crews of guns where the mount has timber or linoleum anti slip decks could cause a problem. The main problem for a steel warship is damage to delicate equipment like Coms and Radar circuitry doesn't like any high voltage on what amounts to adjacent equipotential bonding, however the chances are - for example you're on the bridge of a ship or hanging on for dear life to a companion way rail bonded to the ships steel structure even a million volt /unlimited current appearing suddenly on the steel structure isn't going to look at you and say (sorry about anthropomorphising lightning) "well I'll take the path of MOST resistance through this carbon based life form (average male has 1000Ω resistance bare foot, not wearing rubber shoes), rather than through this low to zero resistance steel sheet and out to salty water". Steel wire at a cross section of 2.5 mm² is 7 to 10Ω per 1000 metres, so multiply that by the thickness of a boiler plate and you get negligible resistance not that 7Ω is anywhere high, but no-where is a ships structure a 2.5 mm² cross section piece of steel wire). So lighting up a human would be like expecting a lamp (light bulb) to light if both terminals were attached to the live conductor. Wood structures are an entirely different matter, water on wooden surfaces water in wood, even water in sap wood of trees is highly dangerous hence you should never shelter under trees in a storm.

[@bluelemming5296]

@SCjunk Based on the some of the descriptions I've read of warship crews in storms, I'd be pretty worried about the amount of salt spray hitting the bridge and the crew on it, especially for people out in the open style bridges so common to British warships (see the video on HMCS Haida for an example of such a bridge). Conditions on many ships could get pretty miserable in bad weather, with water in a lot of places you don't want it, so there is also a water danger in other parts of the ship, perhaps creating additional electrical danger. If I recall correctly, one of the things that the captain of USS Tabberer did to prepare for Typhoon Cobra [1944] was to have his crew build internal protection around his ship's main electrical systems to prevent them from shorting out when water came in - which illustrates that water was expected to come in. I think at least one of the ships that was lost had it's electrical systems shorted out by water coming in - not sure if they didn't know what to do or if their precautions proved insufficient. If we have seawater coming into a Faraday Cage, is it still a Faraday cage? During the storm, one of the crew of the Tabberer spotted a man in the water - whom they subsequently rescued. This let them know that at least one ship had gone down - which caused them to start a very dangerous search for more survivors, they would eventually pull in 55 men in the midst of the Typhoon, an incredible feat of seamanship. This also illustrates that some of the crew were exposed to the elements during the storm, so even on a US ship they couldn't avoid getting wet. I suspect the 1000 ohm resistance you mention is for a dry human being. I'd still expect more of the charge from a lightning strike to go through the steel hull, but I imagine there is still a threat to wet humans from lightning during a storm, people might even be directly exposed to the ocean as water rolls over portions of a ship and thus already in one of the conducting paths to the ocean. Another thing to consider is paint or rust getting between two metal surfaces (perhaps at the point where they are attached), in which case a wet human touching both could perhaps be a lower resistance path. Having said all that, I've heard of lots of lightning strikes on civilian sail boats, but I can't recall any on a 20th century or newer metal naval vessel that actually hurt a human (sensitive equipment, yes, people, no). Maybe somebody with more information can chime in ...

[@benwilson6145]

Worked sea for years , worked with hundreds of people, not one ever said they had been on a ship hit by lightning.

[@bluelemming5296]

Marine insurance data shows about 1 in a 1000 small civilian boats get struck by lightning, with the odds in certain places and for certain types of boats being higher. Multi-hull boats are more at risk, boats in certain places like Florida (which gets a lot of lightning for some reason) are more at risk, and so forth. There's a news story with a video of lightning striking a boat in a marina on KZbin (look up "Video Extra: The shocking moment lightning struck a boat"). I haven't found any data on warships or even large steel hulled commercial vessels yet, much less data on the time period this channel covers. I know they take a lot of precautions with lightning rods and grounding paths in modern ships - there's a fair amount of information out there on that topic. Lightning rods were first used on ships in the 19th century so I imagine most larger ships were well protected in the 20th century. I imagine battle damage could make a warship more vulnerable to lightning, but haven't been able to find any actual incidents.

[@benwilson6145]

@@bluelemming5296 Willing to bet that the small Civilian Boats are in fact sailing Yachts, made of carbon fibre with there mast up!

[@bluelemming5296]

@@benwilson6145 I imagine the vast majority are - and the insurance data suggests the bigger the sailboat the more likely it is to get hit, which probably corresponds to a higher mast. You can look at one breakdown of the numbers by looking up "Striking Lightning Facts" at the boatus site. They do also mention a category they describe as "trawlers and motor yachts" which seems a strange combination - vessels in that category apparently do get hit. I'm guessing the vessels they put in this category are not metal hull vessels - and also have a mast of sorts (for electronics). I haven't been able to find any accounts of metal hull vessels where people were hurt by a lightning strike. There are some individual accounts of losing electrical systems or portions of those systems on such vessels. For example, for what it's worth, one person on Quora says lightning strikes were fairly common in his career as a merchant sailor, but the damage just involved easily replaceable components. Maybe whether or not one sees lightning strikes on merchant ships depends on the part of the world where one sails? I haven't been able to find any insurance data on metal hull vessels to back up the individual accounts. There are web pages that discuss lightning protection systems on offshore oil rigs and cruise ships, but none I could find have actual examples of historical strikes. There is an apparent navy video on lightning protection for carriers, but it has no hard historical data and only simulated video of strikes (as opposed to real video). All this suggests that modern lightning protection systems work really well, especially for steel vessels and offshore oil rigs - which is what I would expect. It is a bit surprising that I can't find any hard data to back up individual accounts - and I can't find any accounts of cases where the protection systems failed for a metal vessel for some reason leading to a serious problem. Seems too good to be true. If you are interested in non-metal vessels, the "marine lightning", "kasten marine", and "discover boating" web sites all have interesting articles. Some things to look up include Siedarc terminals, CMCE lightning de-ionising technology, and the paper "A Critical Assessment of the U.S. Code for Lightning Protection of Boats" by Thompson (1991).

[@marlinstout4180]

On British anti-invasion subs; suppose someone in the civilian yards came up with the idea of taking an X-craft hull, or something like it, but instead of the explosive charges armed them with 4-6 external tubes for Mark XII torpedoes; the same ones used on aircraft like the Swordfish. The result should be relatively quick to build, could probably be built in large numbers, would let you get a lot of torpedo tubes in the water for a given amount of crew (the 33-man crew of a V-class sub could man 8 of these things). Given an X-boat's 500-mile range, that would seem to me to be a good option for a coastal-defense unit; you could base them in pretty much any small port along the coast, they could operate in packs like MTBs, and could make 'hit and run' strikes on an invasion fleet with relative ease. Sneak in, salvo off their torpedoes, run away. How effective do you think such units would be in helping fend off something like Operation Sea Lion?

[@MM22966]

That is pretty much what North Korea and to a lesser extent Iran does.

[@apparition13]

With regards to saving ships, for France I think it would have to be Richelieu since Algerie was underwater at Toulon along with the Dunkerques, Mogadors, and Le Hardis. But frankly, the final classes of French ships were so pretty I'd want at least one of each (Richelieu, Algerie, Dunkerque or Strasbourg, Mogador or Volta, and one or more of the La Galissonniere, Le Fantasque, and Le Hardi classes, maybe even a Le Fier torpedo boat) preserved purely for aesthetic reasons. Put them all together in a naval art museum. Along with CVN-65 Enterprise, Long Beach and a Virginia CGN, a Spruance and Iroquois DD, one of the Koretenaers, a Shirane DDH, a Flyvefisken, and a Durand de la Penne and Absalon when they retire. Which leads to a question for Drach and others, what ships would you want to see in a naval art museum, where the choices are made for aesthetic reasons, just because they are pretty?

[@Dave_Sisson]

The "Dazzle ships" of the First World War.

[@andrewkerr9000]

Shell ranges can also be improved using base bleed (originally 1970s tech), which is a gas generator on the back of a shell. This doesn't propel the shell, but does improve the aerodynamics by filling the vacuum behind it. Ramjet assisted shells go back to early C20. They're very simple, so may better survive being shot out of a cannon. But they do require an air intake.

[@stevevalley7835]

The RN's situation, in the eastern Med in May 41, adds to an alt history scenario that I worked on a few years ago: after overrunning Greece and Crete, Axis forces land in Vichy controlled, Axis leaning, Syria, and drive to the oil fields in Iraq, which was then ruled by an Axis friendly dictator. That scenario fell apart, when, by chance, I heard an audio recording of Hitler talking with a Finnish General. In that recording, made in 42, Hitler says that his meetings with the Soviets in late 40, during the preparations for the invasion of England, left him with the impressions the Soviets wanted a war with Germany, and were looking at overrunning Romania, threatening a major source of oil for Germany. Hence Hitler pivoted from trying to invade England, to invading the Soviet Union in June 41. So much for my scenario of Axis occupation of Syria and Iraq, to get at Iraqi oil production.

[@88porpoise]

The timeline doesn't really work, nor do the forces. The British had retaken Iraq before the Germans secure Greece and moved into Syria almost immediately. They could not have organized and deployed a significant force and deployed it until after the British secured it. Even if the Fascists could have attacked earlier, the Italian Navy simply couldn't have maintained a secure supply line there. Air and Naval assets based in Cyprus, Palestine, and Alexandria would have stymied any attempts at supporting a significant offensive force. While a concerted push by the Italian Navy may have been able to get to Syria, maintaining supply lines was never going to happen. It is simply too far from Greece to Syria with most of that surrounded by British bases.

[@stevevalley7835]

@@88porpoise yes, you are right, the timeline is pretty tight. Allied troops evacuated mainland Greece by about April 30. The coup in Iraq, with the backing of Germany and Italy, was on April 1. Luftwaffe personnel and aircraft were operating in Syria. British intervention in Iraq unhorsed the junta on May 2. The British then invaded Syria on June 8. Crete fell June 1. The unknown is if German resources were not being allocated to Barbarossa, how much faster would the Greek campaign have gone? To make the Syrian landing viable, the Germans would have had to move immediately to suppress offensive operations in Crete, and Cyprus, while the landing and supply convoys steam by, to Syria. Then it's a matter of whether the Germans can drive from Syria to Baghdad faster than the British can make the trip from Palestine.

[@88porpoise]

@@stevevalley7835 How do they "suppress Crete"? and all the air and naval forces that can operate out of Egypt and Palestine? And hold those sealanes while supporting offensive operations (and while the French could sit there twiddling their thumbs for years, actually attacking would require far more resources). Not to mention that if teh Germans can somehow threaten Syria earlier, the British almost certainly respond and take Syria ealier, prioritizing it over Iraq. The best case scenario is they land their initial forces (I don't know how, but maybe with speed and surprise and the British leaders being compeltely incompetent they can). After that, the Italian Navy has to win a straight up battle with the Royal Navy to try to hold teh sea lanes open and, even if the don't lose outright the convoys are going to be subject to constant attacks from all directions. And unlike the British efforts to supply Malta, the Italians cannot afford to lose ships. The idea of a significant German force landing in Syria and conducting offensive operations is about as fanciful as Sealion was.

[@stevevalley7835]

@@88porpoise you could be right. The Axis was never able to really suppress Malta. But then, the forces in Malta and Alexandria took quite a while to strangle the Italian convoys heading for North Africa. The Beaufort torpedo bombers operating out of Malta took frightful losses until they started bringing some Beaufighters along to strafe the ships, to suppress AA fire.

[@88porpoise]

@@stevevalley7835 But Malta is less than 100km from Italy and over 1,500km from British bases from either end of the Mediterranean, much of which distance was Axis controlled and under threat from land-based aircraft. The Axis going to Syria would have the opposite scenario, having to run the gauntlet of British land based aircraft in close proximity to major allied naval bases, including where the British fleet intended to counter the Italian Navy is based.

[@onenote6619]

When you speak of a Prince Albert, I automatically think of the piercing. When you speak of the king above/below the queen in that context, it only becomes more complicated and amusing.

[@scotthill8787]

The discussion of “what if” the Japanese did this or that is entertaining, especially with the well reasoned responses Drach provides. But, IMHO, the enormous ship building capabilities of the United States, as shown by the massive fleet that the USN possessed by 1945, would have swamped anything Japan could have built. Japan recognized that, again IMHO, and built Yamato and Musashi in the theory that quality could overpower quantity. US carrier planes showed the flaws in that strategy. Both ships showed that they could take enormous punishment, but that they also couldn’t avoid that pounding.

[@bluelemming5296]

The strategy made some sense in 1934 when Yamato was designed. At that point, Japan was still using slow biplanes on carriers. The strategy became OBE once mono-wing planes became the norm for the military because compared to biplanes they could go really fast, had a higher operating ceiling, could change altitude more rapidly, and could still carry heavy loads, all of which made aircraft a much more complex and dangerous threat to ships. The Japanese were not alone here. Every navy in the world under-estimated the threat aircraft would pose to ships as aircraft technology improved. Improved aircraft radio also made aircraft more dangerous as they could coordinate their operations more effectively. Not sure what the Japanese had for radios in their military planes in 1934. The Type 96 “Ku” (sky) Mark 2 Radio Set was developed in 1936. If memory serves, the Soviets would still only have roughly 1 in 9 aircraft/tanks equipped with radios at the start of WW2 - which tells us the importance of radios in individual units was not fully understood by at least some nations. The Germans beat the French in 1940 in France as much because of superior communications as anything else, and the Americans/French would in turn beat the Germans in 1944 in battles like Arracourt for much the same reason. These were land/air battles, but good communications were just as critical to sea/air battles. Once aircraft became a lot more dangerous, to keep the battleships competitive they needed both a major upgrade in the quality and quantity of their AA defenses, and a good plan to provide ongoing protection of the capital ships using a CAP - which includes aircraft, training (including long term pilot replacement), sensible procedures, quality radios, and so forth. They also needed to commit to using the battleships early enough to make a difference against opponents with high long term production potential - and to get the critical combat experience that any military force needs to be effective in wartime. He who will not risk can not win. So basically the plan didn't work because they didn't invest the effort to keep it up-to-date in response to a rapidly changing technological environment, and didn't use the ships at the right time and place.

[@mbr5742]

The 28cm K5(E) railroad gun had rocket assistet shells in WW2. Standard round had 62km range, RAP 86km. The RAP was a bit unstable since the charge tended to collapse and range varied a lot. A 31cm smoothbore variant with a fin stabilised sabot round had a 160km range

[@ahseaton8353]

The 100 mile shell question sounds like the problem the modern DD-1000 Zumwalt class had with their two new main guns. The 155mm guns were larger that the traditional 5 inch guns on previous destroyers. With the retirement of the Iowa class, the US Marines still needed gunfire support ships. To meet the Marines range requirements, they went to the higher caliber and desisned a rocket assisted shell for it. As you alluded to, the electronics, etc. for these were non-trivial. When all the testing was done, the rocket shells did meet the Marine requirements, but unfortunately cost $1,000,000 a piece. So, the Zumwalts were quietly cancelled because they basically had no ammo. There is now talk of recommissioning two of the retired Iowas for bombardmemt support.

[@fightforaglobalfirstamendm5617]

The 100 mile shell. We can reach 150 km with a 155mm gun curerntly via firing the gun balistically and adding a fin steer guidance cap on the shell. The round leaves the atmosphere, travels without air resistance and when it returns to the atmosphere its uses the cap to glide the round to target like the Russians do with their FAB 500s.

[@forcea1454]

Zumwalt class were primarily a Spruance replacement, i.e. a fleet speed ASW escort, albeit with greatly improved AAW capabilities because of the greater air and missile threat, with land-attack being tacked onto the program to ensure that it would survive in a post-Cold War world, not an Iowa replacement. Zumwalts died long before the cost of LRLAP ever because an issue. The program was constantly cut, starting out as DD-21 in 2001 with 128 VLS and displacing circa 16,000 tons, with 32 hulls planned, the ships were then cut down to 80 VLS and 13,000 tons, with hulls being reduced to 24, 7 and finally 3. Then the 2009 Radar/Hull study killed off CG(X) and pulled out any Zumwalt-derivatives, meaning the R&D costs were concentrated on 3 hulls. LRLAP was cancelled in 2016, long after the Zumwalt program had died and after the ships had already stripped of many capabilities.

[@AGoodOldRebel]

​@@forcea1454Yup. The USN tried to cram a Cruiser, a Fire Support Vessel and a Visby into the same program box... and then the various good bits got abandoned when the program was canceled. That new radar is roughly the same as the one on the PLAN Type 52. An upscaled 5" or scaled down 8" firing a basic HE shell would have been valuable... but with Burke production being resarted, I fear the navy will be too spooked of risk to even use the new VLS.

[@davidlow8104]

The guided shells were only so expensive because of the cancellation of the class, so it was somewhat of a self fulfilling prophecy.

[@fightforaglobalfirstamendm5617]

@davidlow8104 yes that's true one of the largest issues was scale but we still face the same issue with missiles being far too expensive for the targets they're tasked with and that is due to the cost of the guidance systems. With them having to be extremely small, extremely resistant to G force, and be mass produceable, which means they're very expensive, and that issue still has not been solved.

[@Paludion]

Thank you so much for answering my question ! Yeah, more aircraft carriers (and the planes that goes along with it) would have been a safer bet for the japanese navy, but they probably wouldn't have said no to a few additional heavy cruisers. They would probably have been good escorts for the carriers at least, just like american battleships ended up becoming.

[@73Trident]

Great as usual Drach. Thanks

[@Rdeboer]

For the Russian museum ship I'd go with _Arkhangelsk_ for the sole reason of getting two British Dreadnoughts on the list. 🙂

[@skeltonpg]

About long range 16" McGill U used a 16" 45 gun for high altitude research. It was capable of 93 mi vertically(from memory) and over 110 horizontally

[@davidlewis9068]

As always a great video.

[@mikadoggo7699]

😊 I'm so happy after 5 years to finally have one answered

[@michaelblair2447]

For added range Bull's ERFB (extended range full bore) shells and base bleed were a magical combination.

[@johnlowe37]

Regarding "anti-invasion submarines"... What if you gave them a mission profile similar to an aircraft? They spend most of their time in port at a high state of readiness and are "scrambled" when a target is spotted. They run out to the target, unload their ordnance, and then run back to port to reload and refuel. You wouldn't need much fuel at all. Crews could be a little smaller, and you wouldn't need on-board accommodations.

[@alt5494]

The Marine flagship Battlecarrier Alabama sounds like setting of a fantastic book, or the perfect counter piracy ship.

[@bkjeong4302]

A few more heavy cruisers instead of the Yamatos might actually work since now you actually CAN build a larger number of ships than two, albeit not by much. The big limitation there would be how many turrets and engines the IJN can build. The supercruiser idea….yeah that isn’t really going to work. If anything that’s a worse trade overall than building the Yamatos. For the museum ship idea: if sunk ships are allowed, Zuikaku as a museum ship for the IJN would be rather spectacular, though the fact she was such a pain for the Allies would lead to a ton of political concerns to say the least.

[@jbepsilon]

Big cruisers could be what they'd end up building, considering their obsession with having ships superior to their enemies to compensate for lower numbers. How much bigger would you need to make it to somewhat comfortable be able to beat a 8" treaty cruiser? 20k tons and 10" guns?

[@UthurRytan]

Actually, the shipyards were so cramped that you could only build 1 heavy cruiser followed by another heavy cruiser once the first one had launched in the place of 1 Yamato, and you would strain the Japanese industry to produce twice the machinery sets IRL

[@andersmusikka]

The danger from lightning on a metal ship won't be holding on to railing or similar. The potential difference between different parts of a strongly built metal ship will be very small. Standing on a sturdy steel ladder is likely much better than a wooden ladder. The electricity takes the path of least resistance, which will be through the ladder. For the same reason, I think a metal deck might be safer than a teak one. At least as long as lightning doesn't hit you directly.

[@dougjb7848]

The X craft maximum speed was about 6 knots, and their underwater range was 75-85 miles. It would be hard for them to sneak in, strike, and sneak out completely submerged, and if they surfaced anywhere near the invasion fleet they would be sitting ducks.

[@robcrane3512]

If this role was genuinely proposed for them, I wonder if the idea was to attack barges/shipping that was assembling in French ports, rather than to attack when the invasion force was at sea?

[@graulus8986]

Concerning a German invasion fleet -to France or elsewhere- it might be worthwhile to have a look at the impact of Erskine Childers' novel 'The riddle of the sands' upon the British public in 1903-04. In the book, an English sailing amateur indadvertedly turns into a spy as he uncovers the German Empire's secret preparation of an invasion fleet in eastern Frisia, i.e. just west of Wilhelmshaven, apparently bound for East Anglia and the Isle of Thanet. Albeit fictitious, this 'invasion plan' was, it seems, very helpful in getting the ship building programs of he early 1900's through parliament. N.b.: The practical descriptions of the sailboat chase through the tidal waters of the Wattenmeer are among the best and most real I know of in sailing literature. Sam LLewellyn wrote a sequel in the 1990's, also worth reading

[@raymcconnell4815]

With the ship preservation question i would have like to see USS Saratoga preserved, as she had a good war record and along with Lexington showed the US navy how to best use large fleet carriers during the 1930's war exercises which Drach has already covered very well.

[@Alex-cw3rz]

34:28 it is 100% the number and size of guns, not once did the Americans face a ship armed as much as theirs. HMS Endymion was the only one that was even close and it was one of the most one sided fight of the entire 1812 war, even with the dishonourable actions of the American captain. Endymion completely outclassed HMS President which was the heaviest armed out of all the 6 frigates and had one of the best crews.

[@HansLasser]

About Fisher in 1914. Probably he wouldn't have had to push. An incident in such narrow waters could happen all by itself very easily. Imagine the tension!

[@leonmusk1040]

@18:00 the Swedish have a rocket assisted naval large caliber system with approximately 130 mile range forgotten it's name but more than do-able also some glide rounds were being experimented with using sabots but the biggest problems they ran into wasn't the electronics as much as sobot clearing lose deformed casings tight tended cause more fin strike on separation ruining end of line glide.but that's going back fifteen years the sabot rounds that is the swedish ones about a decade old

[@iamme2072]

If Wikipedia is to be believed, by the time of steam and steel, we were well into the time that grounding rods on ships were added to protect against lightning strikes. They came about by the early/mid 1800's specifically for ships. Fun fact: they added glass balls to lightning rods in the early days. The idea was that the lightning strike would destroy the glass ball mounted inside as an indication that the rod had been struck so the electrical systems could be checked for damage.

[@michaelmoorrees3585]

46:15 - Lightning in steam and steel. Actually, very little damage or electrocution probability. The current is going thru the steel of the ship. Any internal electronics is going to protected; see Faraday cage. Damage to receivers at the end of antennas, including radar, are the only real items that may suffer some damage. The rubber boots stuff is bogus. If your out in a field, being barefoot or wearing rubber boots makes no difference, as that electrical bolt, just travelled 1000s of feet. A half inch of rubber will not even be seen. It will punch thru that thin rubber layer. Voltage equals electrical pressure. Optimum word is PRESSURE. The conductive steel hull, and superstructure of the ship, is your friend. It will route the bolt thru the steel, and to the water.

[@onenote6619]

My experience of lightning prevention suggests that while you can politely encourage lightning to go in a particularly desired direction, every now and again it will will get sniffy and go somewhere entirely unexpected. Then again, on a steel ship, the unexpected direction is probably no worse than the expected one. Unless there are some very high-impedance joints. With the rubber-soled boots, the classic non-contact injury for a landlubber is a near-miss and the high-impedance ground causing a significant voltage difference between the points on which your feet are planted. The boots would protect against the effects of this to some degree, but you are entirely correct that against a direct strike that would be utterly ineffective.

[@RoastedOpinions]

Regarding the 16" naval rifle, if a new gun was designed with modern cannon metallurgy and breech block and a 70 caliber barrel length, would 50 nautical miles with a decent degree of accuracy be possible with a 12" HE shell with discarding sabot without using RAP?

[@HaddaClu]

Regarding the South Dakota's speed issue; hypothetically couldnt that be slightly mitigated by doing a bow extension like what the Italians did with their battleships? If memory serves you mention in one of your prior vids that such an alteration managed to give a surprisingly decent boost to the top speed.

[@DubGathoni]

While this potential true, it would add substantial cost to the equation, making the option less attractive vs reactivating a North Caralina or finishing one of the incomplete Iowa hulls.

[@dougjb7848]

Since comments on the April 22 livestream are disabled, I will use this video to say CONGRATULATIONS! Mini-Drach is adorable. Best to you all.

[@JohnEboy73]

The German Amphibious Invasion reminds me of the fictional Franco-Russian Invasion of the UK 1894 style...!

[@thomasbernecky2078]

Ruh-Roh... I THINK it's pronounced "Wolfhound" here Drach? As always, great info presented in a smart and cogent fashion. Thanks, Drach!

[@robcrane3512]

I wonder if the idea of anti-invasion subs was something touted by Cromwell Varley after he'd built the prototype X-craft at his yard and was trying to get officialdom interested. I've read (somewhere! can't remember where) that it was the Royal Engineers who were most interested at first, with a view to attacking facilities up the Rhine; if correct, other 'non-standard' uses may well have been put forward, too? Or maybe the idea was to attack invasion forces that were assembling in French ports, so more along the lines of a more traditional X-craft operation?

[@laminat0996]

There were LRBA sabot projectiles for 8" guns during Vietnam with range of ~40mi, something similar would surely be possible with 16". Rocket assistance should be upscalable from field artillery too

[@kemarisite]

USS Saint Paul used a saboted 4.125" projectile from its 8" guns to fire out to 70,000 yards. There was a design study to use a sabot to get an Army 11" shell into the 16" gun, but it was never put into production.

[@onenote6619]

The issue is that, if you achieve 100km range, can you do it without expending a lot of your shell capacity on rocket fuel (or leaving it behind with a sabot round)? And if you can, can you hit anything without expending even more capacity on a homing round? And if you can, will it do anything against armour when it hits? And if it will, can you afford to fire it at anything against the most high-priority targets?

[@greendoodily]

Slight variation on the Alabama question; if in the early 1950’s it looks like the Soviet Union really are going to get some battleships, what would the US Navy do, other than reactivating the Iowas? Do they reactivate and modernise some of the older fast battleships? Do they try to complete Kentucky and Illinois? Do they dust off the Montana plans? Or do they go for a completely new design?

[@leonasmith6180]

Hi just wondering if you have covered the Vosper small boats yet ? thanks Leona

[@jesseestrada8914]

Hahaha I am imagining my marine corps of they were told "so we upgrading the lhd with a converted Alabama"

[@notshapedforsportivetricks2912]

Were I going to preserve a french warship, I would choose the Bearn. That way, however bizarre, inappropriate or troublesome a ship I design in the future (I'm looking at you, Charles de Gaulle), I can then point at Bearn and say "We're getting better. See!"

[@Yandarval]

Fisher. Bended knee to the Government. More like a rapid unscheduled fleet exercise "just" happens. Only when the ships are in place, does Fisher tell the Gov.`

[@michaelimbesi2314]

The lightning strike wouldn’t be a problem for anybody standing on a steel deck unless they became part of the conductive pathway to ground. Given that the metal of the ship is in direct contact with conductive seawater, anybody standing on the deck would likely be fine.

[@davidbrennan660]

46:10 Electricity follows the path of least resistance also if you are on the thing of least resistance, and you are of a greater resistance then you will not be the direct path of the current and it will go through it not you… as you are of the same potential as the Voltage ( V=IR is a thing of beauty as a concept and calculation ) so you will not attract it directly, but there will be heating and other effects to the thing you are next to that will likely effect you….. if you are a lesser resistance than what you are standing on… it will use you as part of the direct path… and then you with get hot and take a shock This is why four legged animals have a lower body resistance … a fault voltage path travels through the mass of earth, up a leg, along the body and down another leg to earth if the Earth’s resistance is greater.. Animal can deal with up to 25 V as a rule of thumb and humans 50V without danger to them.

[@derrickstorm6976]

Like how birds can sit on powerlines

[@raymondmollica2498]

Responding to the question about upgrading Alabama, Drach invents the Baytle Barge

[@Sundancer268]

Forgot the Polish, Greek, Dutch Navy's.

[@fearthehoneybadger]

11:54, Aircraft carriers would have been the best choice.

[@seanquigley3605]

Drach, alt history question here. Had the US Airforce high level bomber units been equipped with Tall Boy dropping Lancasters would they have managed to do any damage with near misses?

[@onenote6619]

Thing to bear in mind about Tallboy, Grand Slam (and T12 Cloudmaker) is that they were far more complicated, heavy and expensive than general-purpose bombs. So the question is: more damage on what? A factory or bunker, yes as a damage-per-bomb count, but you would be able to drop far fewer of them. Against a ship in very shallow water again, yes, as demonstrated with Tirpitz. Against a ship in deep water, definitely not. An alternative to Tallboy, developed and used by the USAF is the Disney Bomb - which achieved similar velocities by virtue of rocket assistance rather than being dropped from great heights. Whether that translates to better accuracy - lower altitude says yes, batteries of rockets says no. But they managed to hit submarine pens with the things, so overall the accuracy cannot have been terrible. They might not need Lancasters either - Tallboy was designed for a drop from 5000m altitude. Silverplate B29s were designed to carry the early, heavy nuclear weapons at 9000m.

[@SCjunk]

15:25 Re long range gunnery - Rockets aren't that uncommon these days even down to the size of modern 155 mm in the M109 and Paladium SPGs , but to look at the historical problems look at the Paris Guns of 1918 -and that was a 8/9 inch shell from from a 15 inch barrel lengthened and lined down. Later in WW2 after the 210 mm K12 design the German gun designers proposed a larger 15 inch gun to land the shells in Sussex and South London. But as to accuracy the Paris gun was pretty good for targeting a city bit obviously not for hitting naval assets.

[@Stay_at_home_Astronaut81]

How hard would it have been to increase Washington/North Carolina's speed from 28kts to 30?

[@tomdolan9761]

Amphibious warfare during WW1 was quite rudimentary. The revolutionary German Army technique during the period was the rapid redeployment of large formations by railways.

[@conradswadling8495]

a sub caliber 'sabot' would most likely be too overspun to be accurate to that range

[@Thirdbase9]

Who built the first purpose design landing craft?

[@AGoodOldRebel]

@50:53 Somewhat surpised you didn't consider Surcouf. A massive 8" gun armed Submarine would be quite the experience (and impicitly would mean her mysterious loss was averted)

[@onenote6619]

Against anything but an unarmed (or very lightly armed) merchantman, Surcouf would have come off very poorly in an engagement. She had to surface to engage with guns and it took a while to get those guns in action. As a submarine, even light damage would have been crippling. And her spotting range would have sucked.

[@AGoodOldRebel]

@@onenote6619 All very true. But it would still be quite the impressive ship! (And her history does a decent job of covering the French experience in WW2 as well)

[@bluelemming5296]

@@onenote6619 According to Australian author JE MacDonnell - who was a gunnery officer on several WW2 destroyers - it was quite hard to seriously damage a submarine on the surface with guns. The curved pressure hull tended to cause many shells, especially armor piercing shells, to just ricochet off. The hull was not deliberately armored, but had to be incredibly strong to resist the pressure of the water at depth, which meant high explosive shells were not all that effective. Semi-armor piercing shells seemed to work the best - but it still wasn't easy. The best spot to hit was the base of the conning tower as that minimized the chance of a ricochet and maximized the chance of having the explosion blow into a critical area.

[@AGoodOldRebel]

@@bluelemming5296 You learn something new every day. Thank you very much! I have wondered now and again how a Ship of the Line 'Copper-clad' with heavily sloped sides, a rounded top and sheathed in a thick layer of copper would have performed. Not the same weapon threat, but sounds like it might have worked quite well.

[@Tuning3434]

Coffee ready!

[@fightforaglobalfirstamendm5617]

The 100 mile shell. We can reach 150 km with a 155mm gun curerntly via firing the gun balistically and adding a fin steer guidance cap on the shell. The round leaves the atmosphere, travels without air resistance and when it returns to the atmosphere its uses the cap to glide the round to target like the Russians do with their FAB 500s.

[@richardcutts196]

I'm not sure things were thought out when changing away from primagenator. If the current law had been in place in Queen Victoria's reign then Kaiser Wilhelm II would have become king William V.

[@timandellenmoran1213]

Also, the Irish pirare Grace O'Malley during the reign o Elizabeth l.

[@Hendog1001]

Following a question about modernization of the South Dakota class and the lighting strike question. USS South Dakota quite famously had massive electrical issues at the 2nd night battle of Guadalcanal do you have any knowledge as to what was discovered to be the cause of these massive issues it seems like that is something that should have been found on sea trials…

[@jbepsilon]

IIRC it was firing the guns causing some circuit breakers to trip, and then some people tried to fix it by overriding the breakers resulting in the entire ship loosing power the next time the big guns were fired? No idea why these issues weren't discovered earlier.

[@Hendog1001]

@@jbepsilon thank you for the explanation much appreciated

[@kkupsky6321]

Oh gosh. I forgot to play the drach drinking game. Every time he says “etc et cetera” you drink a vodka and if he says “however” you twirl a joint. And omg. If “square cube” is said…

[@FireFox_60]

You drink a shot of torpedo juice.

[@connorcrowley1]

"Invited" History is written by the winners. 🇳🇱

[@derrickstorm6976]

No it's not because we have now a lot more information than just what the victors would have liked to be known. Only a complete fool says that on a history video

[@benwilson6145]

@@derrickstorm6976 Thankyou, that stupid reply annoys me!

[@AsbestosMuffins]

I wonder if replacing the bursting charge with a nuke counts as decreasing the mass 18:52

[@metaknight115]

People often talk about what would have happened had Yamato been sent to the battle of Guadalcanal, but what if both Yamato and Musashi fought at the battle in both the first and second fight.

[@bluelemming5296]

I think that's exactly the kind of aggressive operation the Japanese needed to do to win strategic victories. Had they really crushed the Guadalcanal operation that might have given the Europe-first folks the opportunity to limit the US navy's Pacific operations, which in turn would have given the Japanese a lot more time to recover from the heavy pilot losses they were taking. As matters stood, the two ships contributed nothing to the war effort and consumed a lot of resources.

[@calvingreene90]

The anti Invasion submarines a small quick and packing a big punch submersible torpedo boats would probably have found useful employment in the Mediterranean.

[@bigsarge2085]

⚓️

[@scottgiles7546]

OMG!! Someone went they/them on HMS!

[@johannderjager4146]

Not really, it's referring to multiple individuals, not non-binary. Question: why do you people obsess over gender-identity to the point you bring it up regardless of whether or not it's actually related to the topic?

[@TheRandCrews]

⁠​⁠​⁠@@johannderjager4146the joke is practically it literally being more than one person. It’s like that one meme with the Spiderman character Venom being they/them because they’re literally two people. Are you really chastising those “you people” you speak of for something in jest. You seem more obsessed

[@SPR-Ninja]

Drach, did you mean Achilles for the NZ museum ship? I didn't think Ajax went over to the NZ Navy? If you did mean Achilles, FYI her Y turret is on display outside devonport Naval base in Auckland.

[@Drachinifel]

Yeah, that!

[@natthaphonhongcharoen]

12:00 But how many steam turbine engines could the Japanese build though?

[@AsbestosMuffins]

pre ww1 ships or ww1 ships getting hit by lightning would be fine probably, not much electronics at all except in the US 48:32

[@nowthenzen]

55:35 Jean Lafitte Born September 25, 1780 France or Saint-Domingue Died c. February 5, 1823 (aged 42) or c. 1875 (aged 95) (presumed) Gulf of Honduras or Lincolnton, North Carolina Piratical career Nickname "The Terror of the Gulf" Type Pirate, privateer, spy, naval artillery officer, slave trader Years active 1810-1823 Not even honorable mention?

[@kidmohair8151]

I don't know if anyone has chimed in yet on this. a quick scan of the comments says no. it's Zhen(uh) for girls and Zha(n) for boys.

[@michaelmoorrees3585]

01:01 - Now you have King Chuck !

[@sharkman2857]

A rocket engine which can survive a gun's acceleration is actually something that people have tried up to this day. In fact, Saddam was attempting to build a "Space Gun" capable of launching a satellite into space, before the US erased that particular project from existence, amongst others. This strays out of my expertise, but I also believe that NASA would *love* to build a space gun of their own, but accelerating anything less sturdy than a lead slug is thus far effectively impossible.

[@gunnersmatemk1119]

The RAP (rocket assisted projectile) was a thing. It was tested in both 5 inch and 16 inch. Though never put into production, it was deemed a success. Former Gunners Mate USN.

[@sharkman2857]

​@@gunnersmatemk1119 Pretty cool. I suppose the G's required to hit orbital velocity are even greater than a battleship cannon.

[@gunnersmatemk1119]

I heard 52 miles was the accurate range, but the cost was crazy. I was a GMM.

[@michaeljacob4287]

AlabamIse?

[@fidjeenjanrjsnsfh]

Underwater damage usually spreads the incoming water longitudinally, which has to be countered by having to take in additional water, on purpose, on the other side. Why not make it so flood water spread transversely?

[@jbepsilon]

I guess because on the inside of the torpedo protection system (TPS) you have things like engine rooms and magazines, which the TPS is trying to protect. If you're envisioning something like big tubes connecting the TPS's on either side of the ship, that has the problem that a) it takes up a lot of space in the middle of the ship and b) if the water can move freely back and forth you get a sort of free surface effect, which, er, is not good for stability. All this being said, there were different engineering philosophies wrt whether you wanted to divide the machinery spaces longitudinally or not. Many navies opted to not have them, with the motivation that while it would reduce the area affected by a hit, it could also cause dangerous instability.

[@benwilson6145]

@@jbepsilon Your right, ger Free Surface Effect, this reduces or eliminates you Stability. Goodbye cruel sea!

[@anatolib.suvarov6621]

Algorithm Engagement Comment. I have to write such things so that the algorithm will share this content with other people!

[@GrahamWKidd]

Attention: 6 Drydocks to 300!! 8,000 to 500K. Livestream at 5am Tuesday Morning AEST.

[@bryansmith1920]

5:41 really Scott Mason, I'm an ex-squaddie, was serving during the falkland war, I was on a work-up exercise in Germany, tactical, our sig guy tuned into listen to debates in Parliament,(a soldiers life depends on MP's)A tory MP suggested the Brit Army Invaded Mainland Argentina, Some of us stood in stund silence, Some Laughed, some went to their bevies and started to write their letters home, Stop playing PC Games, this is real life

[@Trek001]

Question 1 - TMS...? Test Match Special? What does cricket have to do with this?

[@scottgiles7546]

The French would "Mime the channel" against a German landing in 1914? Did I hear that right??

[@derrickstorm6976]

Yes so the Germans would use the wrong channel

[@metaknight115]

Did USS Iowa sink the training cruiser Katori. Sources heavily differ on whether she actually scored hits or simply straddled katori.

[@merlinwizard1000]

26th, 21 April 2024

[@keab42]

I'm looking forward to the chaos that could be caused by a non-binary monarch ascending to the throne.

[@seanquigley3605]

Sheesh folks over 1500 have viewed this and under 200 have liked it? Come on, we can do better.

[@andrewpease3688]

Sovereignty is what ever is convenient. The next but one English and Scottish kings will be Chinese and it will be They majesties ship.

[@christianfranzen7854]

Thanks! Keep butchering the French language🗡

[@verysurvival]

Hopefully UK will be a republic soon and there will be no more of the medieval their majesties ship. Bit weird that the only family that don’t pay tax get to own the tax payers ships.

[@CornishMoose]

The royals do pay tax They pay basically 80% tax on their land holdings (100% with something like a 20% rebate which is their budget for the year). Also, they don't own the ships, same as they don't hold any real power.