Bismarck rams an Iceberg after sinking the HMS Hood

[kclcmdr]

WI the KMS Bismarck, after sinking the Hood and escaping the two shadowing British cruisers in the fog bank off Iceland and Greenland, inadvertently crashed into an iceberg (The curse of the Titanic) fifty miles off Greenland....

After the Bismarck damage crew closes the hatches of the region that suffered the iceberg ripping her front starboard hull for at least fifty feet across and five feet wide...

The Admiral and Captain of the Bismarck now has a difficult decision..

The Bismarck has taken over One Thousand Tons of freezing Atlantic Ocean waters and she is suffering a list of ten degrees to starboard and thus slowing down her speed to only twenty-five knots with her pumps just barely keeping up..

The earlier alert from her damage crew also reports that one of their fuel bunkers is still leaking and is now contaminated by salt waters leaking back into the bunker...

Do they try to reach Brest, France as best speed or return back to Bergen, Norway or one of the fjords of Norway as the Bismarck continues to take on more of the Atlantic waters into her hull and cause an appreciable list that will hamper the integrity of her ability to fight..

Or

Will the Admiral and Captain order the Bismarck to beach herself onto the shores of Greenland, Iceland or order her scuttle while the majority of the crew is off-loaded to the KMS CA Prinz Eugen while the rest of the crew gets onto the surviving rescue raft while Admiral Gunther Lutjens goes down with the Bismarck ????

Or does the German Admiral order the Bismarck to turn about and do one last battle with the British Cruisers that were shadowing her for one last battle royale ???

 

[Insider]

Iceberg, Goldberg... whatever! It was a jew who sunk Bismark. It was jewish plot from the start!

 

[BlueTrousers]

It isn't credible for Lütjens to accept a solution that involves surrendering the flagship of the Kriegsmarine without contributing to the war effort. They're going to try to make it back to port, or else stand and fight against the Royal Navy.

I think it would play out similarly to OTL. The difference will be that Bismarck meets her end in the engagement of 24th May against Prince of Wales, Norfolk and Suffolk, whilst Prinz Eugen slips away.

End result is that the Prince of Wales gets a somewhat better name than OTL - here she stood alone against the mighty Bismarck and avenged the Hood, instead of OTL's tragic story. There are probably more survivors than OTL, as the U-boat scare that caused the rescue to be called off would be averted.

With the search for the Bismarck ending in her sinking, the search for the Prinz Eugen can begin, and that's unlikely to go well for the Germans. The mustered forces of the Royal Navy are flush from victory, and more than capable of handling a cruiser. There's a decent chance that they can find and kill her, too.

 

[ghappy1000]

What happens to icebergs in general, now they had effectively destroyed one or two significant German warships? And, would the Royal Navy be drawn towards the course of these icebergs and lurking u boats despite the possibility of accidental damage occurring? Also, I would expect the British to lose a cruiser, but this is a better trade off when Bismarck and Prinz Eugen get sunk simultaneously. Besides, would Prince of Wales be damaged sufficiently that it would be sunk [if we assume another lucky hit from an iceberg or torpedo, with mines and bombs being unlikely]? Finally, would this course of navigation be possible with intercepting the Hood and returning to base in France or Norway? Of course, it would be too severely damaged to proceed to France. Any warships in a suitable position to intercept damaged Bismarck en route to Norway? [The answer to the last question should be obvious.]

 

[Sior]

The iceberg is immediately drafted into the Royal Navy as the good ship HMS lollypop!

 

[Blackfox5]

It isn't credible for Lütjens to accept a solution that involves surrendering the flagship of the Kriegsmarine without contributing to the war effort.

It is a pet peeve of mine when people misuse the term flagship. Of course Bismarck is a flagship of the German Navy since Admiral Lutjens is on it commanding the operation. An admiral is a flag officer, so the Bismarck is a flagship. If the admiral is not the Bismarck though, it's not a flagship. And many other vessels in the German navy are also flagships - because there are admirals commanding fleets from there.

Any ship can be a flagship. When the USS Yorktown sunk, and the Admiral Fletcher transferred his flag to the USS Astoria, the flagship of Task Force 17 changed from the Yorktown to the Astoria. That's the ship the rest of the fleet is taking orders from.

I think what you really mean is that the Bismarck is the "pride of the fleet" or other such nebulous status.

Misuse of the term flagship seems to be a result of Star Trek: The Next Generation constantly misusing the term and referring to the Enterprise as a "flagship" despite not being part of an operational fleet alongside it and not having an Admiral on board to command said fleet. The writers seemed to think the term was merely an honorific and didn't know it has an actual military definition.

I now return you to the regularly scheduled program.

 

[Ming777]

It is a pet peeve of mine when people misuse the term flagship. Of course Bismarck is a flagship of the German Navy since Admiral Lutjens is on it commanding the operation. An admiral is a flag officer, so the Bismarck is a flagship. If the admiral is not the Bismarck though, it's not a flagship. And many other vessels in the German navy are also flagships - because there are admirals commanding fleets from there.

Any ship can be a flagship. When the USS Yorktown sunk, and the Admiral Fletcher transferred his flag to the USS Astoria, the flagship of Task Force 17 changed from the Yorktown to the Astoria. That's the ship the rest of the fleet is taking orders from.

I think what you really mean is that the Bismarck is the "pride of the fleet" or other such nebulous status.

Misuse of the term flagship seems to be a result of Star Trek: The Next Generation constantly misusing the term and referring to the Enterprise as a "flagship" despite not being part of an operational fleet alongside it and not having an Admiral on board to command said fleet. The writers seemed to think the term was merely an honorific and didn't know it has an actual military definition.

I now return you to the regularly scheduled program.

As for Star Trek, it appears to be a legacy of the Gene Roddenberry's attempt to nerf the military aspect of Starfleet.

 

[Saphroneth]

As for Star Trek, it appears to be a legacy of the Gene Roddenberry's attempt to nerf the military aspect of Starfleet.

Worf: "Oh, NOW you want to shoot them."

-every darn week.

 

[BlueTrousers]

I think what you really mean is that the Bismarck is the "pride of the fleet" or other such nebulous status.

You are of course quite right. I was employing the term casually - though certain ships are specifically designated as flagships. The South Dakota springs to mind, with modifications to the design to accommodate an admiral and staff. Still, no admiral, not technically a flagship.

 

[robcraufurd]

I think what you really mean is that the Bismarck is the "pride of the fleet" or other such nebulous status.

But use of the word "flagship" to mean "something that is or is held to be the best of its kind, specifically the major product, model (etc.) in an organisation's range" dates back to 1933. As such, it's neither the result of TNG (1987) nor being used incorrectly here.

In answer to the question, if the ship is too badly damaged to risk battle they're more likely to head for neutral, US-occupied Greenland than British-occupied Iceland. The ship and crew would have been interned, but they wouldn't have had to scuttle immediately to prevent it falling into enemy hands- and may not have had the opportunity to do so before America captures it on entering the war.

 

[Shaby]

If the torpedoes failed to make an impression against Bismarck's hull I really don't see a chunk of ice doing better than that.

Any damage the ship suffer will likely be less significant than what she already received as a consequence of multiple hits by explosive projectiles.

 

[Dilvish]

This scenario could actually turn out to be a problem for the Allies. What happens if icebergs develop a taste for warships? Or even big famous ships in general (first Titanic, now Bismarck)? Icebergs might start roaming the North Atlantic sea lanes, hunting for warships. And who has 99.9% of the warships in the Atlantic? The Allies. The 'bergs could even venture south, relying on the warmth to melt themselves, giving a lower, less obvious, profile.

 

[Shaby]

But the solution is obvious.

Make ships of ice.

 

[Saphroneth]

But the solution is obvious.

Make ships of ice.

Catapult-rated Lancasters! Mosquito carrier fighters! Half the fridges in America plundered for their condensers!
Sail her right through a minefield to clear it!


(...will someone pull Geoffrey Pyke off that flagpole?)

 

[usertron2020]

Iceberg, Goldberg... whatever! It was a jew who sunk Bismark. It was jewish plot from the start!

Iceberg, Goldberg, Goldstein...Its all a plot against Big Brother!

Any ship can be a flagship. When the USS Yorktown sunk, and the Admiral Fletcher transferred his flag to the USS Astoria, the flagship of Task Force 17 changed from the Yorktown to the Astoria. That's the ship the rest of the fleet is taking orders from.

You mean of course Task Force 17, not the "fleet" as a whole, since Fletcher passed on command to Spruance once he left the Yorktown, right? And proving him the better man than Nagumo when he had the Akagi blown out from under him.

Misuse of the term flagship seems to be a result of Star Trek: The Next Generation constantly misusing the term and referring to the Enterprise as a "flagship" despite not being part of an operational fleet alongside it and not having an Admiral on board to command said fleet. The writers seemed to think the term was merely an honorific and didn't know it has an actual military definition.

There is also a long standing tradition in Star Trek (TOS & NG) of using unfit senior officers to "pull rank" to take command, leading to disaster until Our Heroes arrive to save the day. Though there WAS one single episode where the Enterprise D had a temporary CO assigned.

In answer to the question, if the ship is too badly damaged to risk battle they're more likely to head for neutral, US-occupied Greenland than British-occupied Iceland. The ship and crew would have been interned, but they wouldn't have had to scuttle immediately to prevent it falling into enemy hands- and may not have had the opportunity to do so before America captures it on entering the war.

Letting it fall into the hands of the USA just 6-7 months before US entry (though they'd have no knowledge of that of course) is not a good idea.

If the torpedoes failed to make an impression against Bismarck's hull I really don't see a chunk of ice doing better than that.

Was the armor covering every last part on the underside? Could it withstand the F = MV[size=-4]2[/size] impact of a 42,000 ton warship traveling at 17 to 32 knots colliding on its underbelly in incompressible water against umpety-ump thousands of tons of solid iceberg? When you slam yourself into a mountain, even one of ice, I say bet the ranch on the mountain.

Any damage the ship suffer will likely be less significant than what she already received as a consequence of multiple hits by explosive projectiles.

Unless its anywhere near the site of the damage.

I voted for the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen to "CHARGE!" Couldn't help it. I play tested on a massive game board the Bismarck breakout, and totally confounded the British players by charging at the first sight of anything my lookouts saw. And the British players continually assumed I would attempt to break-off, as Lutjens attempted. Instead I played Admiral George Armstrong Custer.

As a result, the British player kept trying to attack and close en echelon, while I went straight into the British guns Light Brigade style. I sank three RN light cruisers JUST as Norfolk and Suffolk showed up. I sank THEM just as the Hood and Prince of Wales showed up. By fantastic luck, at absolute maximum range, I set off the Hood's (poor Hood!) magazines and blew up the ship (rolled a 20 on a D-20 to Hit, and for damage I rolled the same number). The Prince of Wales then closed and jammed her guns just as it opened fire (missed), and by the time they unjammed them the German ships wrecked her with pointblank fire. Then the Prinz Eugen finished her off with torpedoes (the Bismarck suffered some minor damage but that was all).

After suffering a Swordfish attack with no damage, then the next ship to pop up was the Victorious herself escorted by four destroyers! The British players explained that they kept expecting me to turn away, so they wanted to keep the Victorious close for aerial pursuit (I was really beginning to wonder about these guys). The destroyers were quickly dispatched, along with the Victorious, but not before a torpedo strike on the Bismarck that did little damage.

Every time I wanted to break off but those damned British fleets kept popping up one after another. No sooner did the Victorious go down than the King George V and Rodney arrived. Then I got stupid. With both German ships faster than the British battleships, instead of running away I closed for the attack. I knew the Rodney was the most dangerous, so I had both ships pile on her. Another mistake as Rodney's badly placed turrets jammed while the KGV was closing. I still poured it on the Rodney as the Rodney unjammed her guns and the KGV at last got within 14" range and opened fire.

The Prinz Eugen let loose with her torpedoes on both her port and starboard sides (both she and the Bismarck were splitting the space between the British. The KGV on the port side and the Rodney on the starboard, allowing the Germans maximum firepower. The torpedoes caused such an extreme list on the Rodney she couldn't fire her main guns easily, and the fire from the Germans was leaving her in a sinking state.

By this time the Prinz Eugen was sinking (she had been blocking the KGV from the Bismarck's LOS and vice-versa). At this point the KGV and Bismarck were left to duke it out. But except for some underwater damage from the Prinz Eugens torpedoes the KGV was relatively intact, while all the fighting the Bismarck had gone through had left her in a very bad state, except for her main guns. Her speed was down to 10 knots, her superstructure was wrecked, the bridge was gone, the secondaries mostly gone, and she was taking on water. The Rodney did not go down quietly into the night before gouging out the heart of the Bismarck.

So after exchanging salvoes at pointblank range the KGV ended up with losing her two forward main gun turrets (the aft guns were intact) and some moderate damage added to the secondaries. Her speed was only off by some 10 knots. Meanwhile, the Bismarck was sleeping with the fishies.

The game master ruled it as a strategic British victory, with the convoys initially unaffected. The KGV would be in dry-dock for 18 months. However, with the near destruction of the British Home Fleet, the butterflies (changes, he said), would be huge. He didn't go into detail, as he wasn't into ATL, but he listed things like "sending more Revenge-class BBs to the Atlantic, losing Malta, keeping more American BBs in the Atlantic longterm, stuff like that. I might have added "affecting Torch", maybe having Hitler sending out the Tirpitz (the Germans lost strategically but like Jutland they took the honors). Maybe.

Above is why I HAD to vote to charge. Though with all that underwater damage the Germans sure as hell aren't going to be rolling any "D20"'s.

 

[Lost Freeway]

Iceberg, Goldberg, Goldstein...Its all a plot against Big Brother!



You mean of course Task Force 17, not the "fleet" as a whole, since Fletcher passed on command to Spruance once he left the Yorktown, right? And proving him the better man than Nagumo when he had the Akagi blown out from under him.



There is also a long standing tradition in Star Trek (TOS & NG) of using unfit senior officers to "pull rank" to take command, leading to disaster until Our Heroes arrive to save the day. Though there WAS one single episode where the Enterprise D had a temporary CO assigned.



Letting it fall into the hands of the USA just 6-7 months before US entry (though they'd have no knowledge of that of course) is not a good idea.



Was the armor covering every last part on the underside? Could it withstand the F = MV[SIZE=-4]2[/SIZE] impact of a 42,000 ton warship traveling at 17 to 32 knots colliding on its underbelly in incompressible water against umpety-ump thousands of tons of solid iceberg? When you into a mountain, even one of ice, I say bet the ranch on the mountain.



Unless its anywhere near the site of the damage.

I voted for the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen to "CHARGE!" Couldn't help it. I play tested on a massive game board the Bismarck breakout, and totally confounded the British players by charging at the first sight of anything my lookouts saw. And the British players continually assumed I would attempt to break-off, as Lutjens attempted. Instead I played Admiral George Armstrong Custer.

As a result, the British player kept trying to attack and close en echelon, while I went straight into the British guns Light Brigade style. I sank three RN light cruisers JUST as Norfolk and Suffolk showed up. I sank THEM just as the Hood and Prince of Wales showed up. By fantastic luck, at absolute maximum range, I set off the Hood's (poor Hood!) magazines and blew up the ship (rolled a 20 on a D-20 to Hit, and for damage I rolled the same number). The Prince of Wales then closed and jammed her guns just as it opened fire (missed), and by the time they unjammed them the German ships wrecked her with pointblank fire. Then the Prinz Eugen finished her off with torpedoes (the Bismarck suffered some minor damage but that was all).

After suffering a Swordfish attack with no damage, then the next ship to pop up was the Victorious herself escorted by four destroyers! The British players explained that they kept expecting me to turn away, so they wanted to keep the Victorious close for aerial pursuit (I was really beginning to wonder about these guys). The destroyers were quickly dispatched, along with the Victorious, but not before a torpedo strike on the Bismarck that did little damage.

Every time I wanted to break off but those damned British fleets kept popping up one after another. No sooner did the Victorious go down than the King George V and Rodney arrived. Then I got stupid. With both German ships faster than the British battleships, instead of running away I closed for the attack. I knew the Rodney was the most dangerous, so I had both ships pile on her. Another mistake as Rodney's badly placed turrets jammed while the KGV was closing. I still poured it on the Rodney as the Rodney unjammed her guns and the KGV at last got within 14" range and opened fire.

The Prinz Eugen let loose with her torpedoes on both her port and starboard sides (both she and the Bismarck were splitting the space between the British. The KGV on the port side and the Rodney on the starboard, allowing the Germans maximum firepower. The torpedoes caused such an extreme list on the Rodney she couldn't fire her main guns easily, and the fire from the Germans was leaving her in a sinking state.

By this time the Prinz Eugen was sinking (she had been blocking the KGV from the Bismarck's LOS and vice-versa). At this point the KGV and Bismarck were left to duke it out. But except for some underwater damage from the Prinz Eugens torpedoes the KGV was relatively intact, while all the fighting the Bismarck had gone through had left her in a very bad state, except for her main guns. Her speed was down to 10 knots, her superstructure was wrecked, the bridge was gone, the secondaries mostly gone, and she was taking on water. The Rodney did not go done quietly into the night before gouging out the heart of the Bismarck.

So after exchanging salvoes at pointblank range the KGV ended up with losing her two forward main gun turrets (the aft guns were intact) and some moderate damage added to the secondaries. Her speed was only off by some 10 knots. Meanwhile, the Bismarck was sleeping with the fishies.

The game master ruled it as a strategic British victory, with the convoys initially unaffected. The KGV would be in dry-dock for 18 months. However, with the near destruction of the British Home Fleet, the butterflies (changes, he said), would be huge. He didn't go into detail, as he wasn't into ATL, but he listed things like "sending more Revenge-class BBs to the Atlantic, losing Malta, keeping more American BBs in the Atlantic longterm, stuff like that. I might have added "affecting Torch", maybe having Hitler sending out the Tirpitz (the Germans lost strategically but like Jutland they took the honors). Maybe.

Above is why I HAD to vote to charge. Though with all that underwater damage the Germans sure as hell aren't going to be rolling any "D20"'s.

Was the game, by any chance, designed by a certain Ovaron97?

 

[kclcmdr]

If the torpedoes failed to make an impression against Bismarck's hull I really don't see a chunk of ice doing better than that.

Any damage the ship suffer will likely be less significant than what she already received as a consequence of multiple hits by explosive projectiles.

It's not the iceberg above the waves that is the issue...

It's what's below...

 

[Saphroneth]

That game of Usertron's sounds like it took a very dim view of the turrets of the British ships. I'm fairly sure PoW didn't have a complete turret jam lasting for over half an hour! (Extreme range about 25,000 metres, pointblank range 8,000 metres, PoW at a retreating angle to keep the range inside the immune zone is nearly as fast as Bismarck)

 

[usertron2020]

Was the game, by any chance, designed by a certain Ovaron97?

Argh! HE wrote "Raid on Scapa Flow"!? Yecch! No, this was way back in the 80s. The results were due to fantastic luck on my part (The Force and the Dice were with me) and horrible tactics (as I described) by the two British players. The deployments by the British were historical, by their own choice. I chose to hug the polar ice pack, which was a big risk since I could only keep traveling on a course between 90 and 270 degrees. Any moment even slightly north and I myself would have rammed the icebergs.

I was immediately spotted by the British players (good for them) but it went all down hill from there for them. If they'd only fallen back on a reverse course from the very beginning I'd have been dog meat, and MY tactics would be shown to be foolish.

 

[Saphroneth]

Argh! HE wrote "Raid on Scapa Flow"!? Yecch! No, this was way back in the 80s. The results were due to fantastic luck on my part (The Force and the Dice were with me) and horrible tactics (as I described) by the two British players. The deployments by the British were historical, by their own choice. I chose to hug the polar ice pack, which was a big risk since I could only keep travel on a course between 90 and 270 degrees. Any moment even slightly north and I myself would have rammed the icebergs.

I was immediately spotted by the British players (good for them) but it went all down hill from there for them. If they'd only fallen back on a reverse course from the very beginning I'd have been dog meat, and MY tactics would be shown to be foolish.

...actually, I have a question.
If they were on both sides of you... why could you engage them both? WW2 battleships aren't ships-of-the-line, they use the same guns to engage port as they do starboard...