Ideal "Norwegian" style small country navy

[Arkenfolm]

Let's say we have a sparsely populated country with a long, rugged coastline similar to Norway or Alaska. Their land borders with potential rivals are sparsely populated and utterly rugged which leads the top military officials to belief in the strength of the navy. Although they have a population 1/4 the size of Norway in 1939 (but with far more mining), their military believes they can concetrate the Army and Air Force along certain points to maximise their impact while using the navy to protect their fjords. They wish to protect their neutrality against the great powers of the region and expect that should a war break out, they'll fight alongside one of those great powers.

So going into World War II, what should their navy look like? The obvious idea is torpedo boats and coastal fortresses combined, but what if they want a capacity to strike anywhere along their coast? Should they think a navy consisting solely of small craft is unacceptable, what would a larger coastal defense ship look like?

Perhaps a seaplane tender (like Yugoslav Zmaj), a similar torpedo boat tender, and a "torpedo boat leader" which I'd assume would be a small coastal defense ship? What would a ship like that look like? Such a navy should be centered on protecting their own coastal shipping but aside from coastal submarines, how much of a surface-going navy can they realistically build?

Is such a fleet too much or can such a small country be aggrandised more in terms of naval force.

 

[CV(N)-6]

A small seaplane tender is a possibility to keep seaplane basing mobile, minelayers are a big one because minefields can ruin anybody’s day. A handful of destroyers is good for protecting neutrality and they can also contribute to defending fjords, as well as being a seagoing force. The biggest thing is to have a bunch of MTB’s, in the small confines of a fjord they can be very deadly, an MTB carrier is good so that your risks to the MTB’s when transferring them is much smaller. Coast defense ships are a waste of money IMO, MTB’s get you more bang for less buck. Submarines are also an option, they can be very effective in narrow fjords and if said fjords hold/if the subs get to Sea in time, they can harry the enemy there.

 

[jlckansas]

Treasury class cutters instead of DD’s, maybe one or two DD as flagships. Treasury class gives you a better balance for the type of operations you would have in this county.
You also want some ships for fisheries protection, they can also double over for longer cruises up and down the coast to check the more remote areas. Something along the size of a corvette, armaments are not as important as endurance and sea keeping.
Subs are good, smaller coastal boats plus some purpose built minelayers to use.

 

[jsb]

What's the expected threat? What's there range from the enemy (ie Alaska -IJN or Norway -KM) ?

Treasury class cutters instead of DD’s, maybe one or two DD as flagships. Treasury class gives you a better balance for the type of operations you would have in this county.

I disagree Treasury class cutters are very expensive for what they give in terms of surface action at short range?

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

What are the seas like? That will have a big difference on your choices. If you're facing arctic storms for 6 months of the year you're going to need proper ships to be able to cope with the conditions, whereas if the seas are mostly calm then smallish patrol boats will do the job.

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

What's the population and how secure are the land borders?

 

[jlckansas]

I disagree Treasury class cutters are very expensive for what they give in terms of surface action at short range?

Surface action in these circumstances are where they would be good. You are not going to be looking at major fleet actions with them, more of a patrolling action. They can double as the fisheries/economic patrol vessels if you don’t have the corvettes, plus use them as flotilla leaders with the corvettes. You could update them with 6” guns and change the 50 cal to 20mm.
Attacking enemy units invading are not their primary missions. That mission is the MTB, submarine, minelayers, and land based guns and air.

 

[jsb]

Surface action in these circumstances are where they would be good. You are not going to be looking at major fleet actions with them, more of a patrolling action. They can double as the fisheries/economic patrol vessels if you don’t have the corvettes, plus use them as flotilla leaders with the corvettes. You could update them with 6” guns and change the 50 cal to 20mm.
Attacking enemy units invading are not their primary missions. That mission is the MTB, submarine, minelayers, and land based guns and air.

The problem is they can't survive near any proper CL/CA (or CDS/BB) and are too slow, they are good colonial sloops or long range escorts but as surface combatants they are worse than DDs and cost nearly the same.

 

[Arkenfolm]

For a larger ship I'm thinking the only thing that makes sense is some sort of destroyer optimised for anti-aircraft warfare (plus maybe with some torpedo tubes) to act as a mobile anti-aircraft platform to shield smaller vessels and the coastal forts and yet also still useful enough to take shots at smaller enemy ships. It can also help escort a seaplane tender or similar vessels.

Or for minelaying vessels, a large one like the Norwegian Olav Trygvasson?

What are the seas like? That will have a big difference on your choices. If you're facing arctic storms for 6 months of the year you're going to need proper ships to be able to cope with the conditions, whereas if the seas are mostly calm then smallish patrol boats will do the job.

Let's just say Deadliest Catch is a good example of the sea conditions and you probably want to use caution at leaving the fjords during most of the year. Probably lots of fog too.

What's the population and how secure are the land borders?

The population is a bit over 600,000 people of whom the majority are spread out over the coast along with a few sizable interior towns. About half of the total population live in or around the largest city (think like the Oslo area for Norway or Anchorage area for Alaska). The road network is at best acceptable, at worst a nightmare to drive in, but it does link to nearby countries. The majority of travel is done by ship or by air (especially by seaplanes). However, the distance to any important regional center is so large and the approach so predictable (going down certain roads and mountain passes) that a naval invasion is ruled just as threatening.

The overall military strategy is to play the great powers off each other and keep to neutrality. They expect a great power to aid them should they get involved in a war and the armed forces are supposed to hold the line until then and minimise damage to the country.

If I'm getting the typical ratio of peacetime soldiers to population right, we should have a military of about 8-10K soldiers and meant to expand in war via conscription to at least 30K. With conditions like these, would 2,500-3,000 sailors sound about right during peacetime for a strategy like this? Obviously fishing is a major economic activity of the country so there's plenty of young men with experience on ships in rough seas and some trawlers and whaling ships available for conversions if need be. That's not a lot of men to crew the ships and work the shore bases so we'd need to be economical with the sort of ships used.

I'd assume a navy this small would limit us to ships with not much more than 200 crew at most? Although a bit larger than that could get a small coastal defense ship packed with 5-inch AA guns to serve as flagship.

The problem is they can't survive near any proper CL/CA (or CDS/BB) and are too slow, they are good colonial sloops or long range escorts but as surface combatants they are worse than DDs and cost nearly the same.

But how much speed is necessary for a fleet that's meant to fight defensively? Doesn't seem like you'd need much more than 25-30 knots for the largest ship (the torpedo boat leader/destroyer).

 

[alspug]

To Protect the entire coastline you need Submarines. Minelayers, MTB's and protect the harbours needed to have commerce with large shore guns. To engage an 8 inch shore battery you need a 12 inch Battleship. So if you have purchased 13.5 inch turrets and guns or 14 inch you can reasonably expect to defeat up to 16 inch Battleships. For pre 1939 the use of carriers will not come into the equation. Purchasing of smaller turrets able to work as DP will come into it. The cost of good Coastal batteries is much lower then that of warships and can be far better armoured.

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

The population is a bit over 600,000 people

You probably don't have a navy in that case.

 

[alspug]

The Following are examples of the size and type of ship that would be suitable for Purchase in 1930's.
Seaplane tender
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMAS_Albatross_(1928) (capable of more then just providing tender duties.)

Submarines

Diane-class submarine (1930) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Argonauta-class submarine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

British S-class submarine (1931) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Minelayers

NMS Amiral Murgescu - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HNoMS_Olav_Tryggvason (This ship design would be a good training vessel as well.)

Patrol vessels/Coastal Escorts
These can range from converted Trawlers to full on torpedo boat destroyers of 600 odd tons like the Spica class.

HNoMS Honningsvåg - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Spica-class torpedo boat - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Motor Gun/Torpedo Boats

MAS (motorboat) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Seaplanes

Heinkel He 115 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Fairey Swordfish - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Supermarine Walrus - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Consolidated PBY Catalina - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Ideally you need enough Submarines to make any opponent scared of being sunk without warning. The Seaplanes are your eye's and also extended attack aircraft.
In reality any merchant of over 5,000 ton can be turned into a good seaplane depot ship. The ability to have a catapult helps.

 

[Arkenfolm]

You probably don't have a navy in that case.

Iceland did with 1/5 of that population (can't find much information on their WWII-era Coast Guard but their early Cold War era Coast Guard had a few relatively sizable ships) and Estonia certainly did with not even twice that population (1.1 million in 1939) and a lot more hostile situation. The border situation I described isn't quite an island but it's close enough to one that it could have an outsized navy relative to its population since to at least half the country, the biggest military threat is a naval invasion. Thus we have something akin to a 1/5 sized Norway.

The Following are examples of the size and type of ship that would be suitable for Purchase in 1930's.
Seaplane tender
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMAS_Albatross_(1928) (capable of more then just providing tender duties.)

Submarines

Diane-class submarine (1930) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Argonauta-class submarine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

British S-class submarine (1931) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Minelayers

NMS Amiral Murgescu - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HNoMS_Olav_Tryggvason (This ship design would be a good training vessel as well.)

Patrol vessels/Coastal Escorts
These can range from converted Trawlers to full on torpedo boat destroyers of 600 odd tons like the Spica class.

HNoMS Honningsvåg - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Spica-class torpedo boat - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Motor Gun/Torpedo Boats

MAS (motorboat) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Seaplanes

Heinkel He 115 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Fairey Swordfish - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Supermarine Walrus - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Consolidated PBY Catalina - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Ideally you need enough Submarines to make any opponent scared of being sunk without warning. The Seaplanes are your eye's and also extended attack aircraft.
In reality any merchant of over 5,000 ton can be turned into a good seaplane depot ship. The ability to have a catapult helps.

Interesting and informative. So something like the Amiral Murgescu or Olav Trygvasson as the flagship, a smaller mine warfare ship or two, a small coastal submarine squadron, maybe a large 600-1K ton torpedo boat, and a collection of smaller torpedo boats like S-boat/MAS boat/PT boat types as the main non-fortress attacking arm? And maybe a seaplane tender assuming budget/manpower allows for it?

Would looking at the OTL Norway OOB and cutting out ships until I get about 1/5 make sense for the OOB?

 

[DrakonFin]

Looking at the Finnish interwar resources, I'd say that a country with just 600K people can't probably realistically afford to buy anything bigger than a destroyer, anyway, so maybe a fleet with

1) maybe two (coastal) destroyers/escorts (with AA and ASW capability, as well as the possibility to fit mine rails on the deck), c. 500-1000 tons,
2) a couple of coastal submarines (maybe size of Finnish Vesikko/German Type II) and then
3) a few minelayers (like, say, the Finnish Ruotsinsalmi class),
4) minesweepers (smaller, maybe wooden hulled vessels that could be Coast Guard in peace time, or even fishing vessels), and
5) a number of MTBs. Add
6) a couple of middling-sized ships for tenders/supply vessels for the submarines and MTBs, and then
7) different auxiliary vessels (could be appropriated from civilian authorities and civilians if needed).

As for a coastal defence ship, I think that it is probably out of the question, budget-wise. Finland, with 3,5 million people, could barely afford two of them, and then they were considered very expensive. Maybe if this nation can buy a legacy monitor from WWI very cheaply from, say, the British and update it some?

If you think like the Finns did IOTL, you prepare for using anything bigger than a rowing boat as a minelayer, in addition to their other roles.

Pictured: A Finnish Thornycroft MTB as a tactical minelayer.

Additionally, you would need

8) coastal artillery with up to, say, 12 inch guns in reinforced structures along the coast. If you have railways running along the coast, or are ready to build them (and if the terrain allows it), you might want to consider building railway batteries that can be moved quickly to support a fixed coastal battery when needed. But then you can sink a lot of money and resources into building coastal fortresses, too. And

9) coastal troops, infantry trained spefically in amphibious warfare in the coastal conditions of this nation, equipped with suitable weapons and means of transport. To be used together with the coastal artillery in the case of an enemy making amphious landings along the coast.

As for aircraft,

10) land based bombers and recon aircraft, and floatplanes operated from bases on the coast. With a country this small, the navy would likely not have an air arm of its own, but there would just be a naval-oriented unit or two within the Air Force.

This, I think, corresponds pretty much to what Estonia had in the 1930s. They had even more and bigger ships than on my list. Here, though, we need to remember that the Estonians "inherited" most of their ships from the Russian Empire, and probably could not have afforded as many and as big ships if they had to build or buy them themselves.

In a TL without Finland getting the OTL coastal defence ships and the Vetehinen class submarines with the Navy Act of 1927, the above could have well been the Finnish WWII navy, too, only with the addition of a few icebreakers and some obsolete, previously Russian small gunboats.

 

[jsb]

we should have a military of about 8-10K soldiers and meant to expand in war via conscription to at least 30K......would 2,500-3,000 sailors sound about right during peacetime for a strategy like this?

This is really tight your land army will eat most of it and I think having 8-10k with 2.5/3k for navy is hard as the army (and AF is it army or navy or both or separate? Or doesn't exist ?) will be small 5-7k is very small to man any coastal defences and run a training army and staff?

The real big one is cost what is your GDP with such a low tax base, can you really afford much of a navy or anything?

Then 2500/3000 sailors only gets you maybe 1/3 as ships crew (when you remove dockyard, training and HQ staff) ? So we are talking 830 men (or maybe 1/2 1500, if you push it for a very reserve home deployed force)?
You need roughly say 100 (old WWI)-138 (RN A class) - 176 (217 in leaders) for WWII O class, I think MTBs (<20 crew) might be more reasonable or very cheap auxiliaries like Flower-class corvette 80 crew?

Iceland did with 1/5 of that population (can't find much information on their WWII-era Coast Guard but their early Cold War era Coast Guard had a few relatively sizable ships)

Yes but even then they are very light crew (19 Ægir class) with one light cheap 40mm gun they are only large due to the weather and as steel is actually relatively cheap for a modern slow ish ship. Iceland for obvious reasons doesn't need an army as well (or an air force due to USAF) and it's much richer by 60/70 than would be the case for 30/40s.....

But how much speed is necessary for a fleet that's meant to fight defensively? Doesn't seem like you'd need much more than 25-30 knots for the largest ship (the torpedo boat leader/destroyer).

The problem is any slow ships will simply die in a fight with heavy invading units, DDs need speed as in the 30s you are still thinking of charging in to fire torps.

For a larger ship I'm thinking the only thing that makes sense is some sort of destroyer optimised for anti-aircraft warfare (plus maybe with some torpedo tubes) to act as a mobile anti-aircraft platform to shield smaller vessels and the coastal forts and yet also still useful enough to take shots at smaller enemy ships. It can also help escort a seaplane tender or similar vessels.

I question the need for AA if the invader has that much air force you are doomed, you also need to think 39-40 not 44-45 in terms of the AA? AA ships that actually work are also going to be very expensive due to new high tech DP guns and even more so fire control
(even big navys had issues you can't even try)

Or for minelaying vessels, a large one like the Norwegian Olav Trygvasson?

Why not just a dual use converted ferry or cargo ship?

 

[DrakonFin]

Why not just a dual use converted ferry or cargo ship?

You can always convert civilian vessels to minelayers, but I think that there is an argument to be made for purpose-built minelayers. Cargo ships and ferries may be too cumbersome and poorly manouverable, etc, and not as efficient in use. The Ruotsinsalmi and Riilahti, built in 1940, alone laid the majority of all Finnish mine barrages during the Continuation War. They were only c. 300 ton ships with a crew of 30-35 and a mine capacity of 100. In this case, something like those ships would be useful and affordable, and could be armed with anti-submarine weapons, too, and used as escorts in a limited role.

 

[jsb]

You can always convert civilian vessels to minelayers, but I think that there is an argument to be made for purpose-built minelayers. Cargo ships and ferries may be too cumbersome and poorly manouverable, etc, and not as efficient in use. The Ruotsinsalmi and Riilahti, built in 1940, alone laid the majority of all Finnish mine barrages during the Continuation War. They were only c. 300 ton ships with a crew of 30-35 and a mine capacity of 100. In this case, something like those ships would be useful and affordable, and could be armed with anti-submarine weapons, too, and used as escorts in a limited role.

I agree but as a small neutral I would want the most for my money and might hope for not having to fight, it might be easier to sell building a small fleet of modern ferries to domestic opinion and if they are designed from the start they would do just as well.

Unlike Finland this nation might want to mine in very bad weather requiring much larger ships anyway, note the size of the ships used by RN for the Northern barrage?

 

[DrakonFin]

I agree but as a small neutral I would want the most for my money and might hope for not having to fight, it might be easier to sell building a small fleet of modern ferries to domestic opinion and if they are designed from the start they would do just as well.

Unlike Finland this nation might want to mine in very bad weather requiring much larger ships anyway, note the size of the ships used by RN for the Northern barrage?

The problem with not having purpose-built minelayers in readiness and necessarily having to pull ships from other uses to be outfitted as minelayers is that you will run the risk of not having them in use when you would most need them, and when you could best use them to your advantage, in the run-up to a conflict when you still have the time to build defensive barrages before the enemy actually has brought its fleet to your waters. In the event, even days could matter.

 

[jsb]

The problem with not having purpose-built minelayers in readiness and necessarily having to pull ships from other uses to be outfitted as minelayers is that you will run the risk of not having them in use when you would most need them, and when you could best use them to your advantage, in the run-up to a conflict when you still have the time to build defensive barrages before the enemy actually has brought its fleet to your waters. In the event, even days could matter.

I was thinking more a state owned ferry company with reserve crews rather than taking in ships for conversion at the start of war, ie it should be possible to have the ferries pre-trained for mine laying say a week once or twice a year and have then fitted for all the gear needed, that is semi-hidden as just cargo handling stuff. They would simply have the mines stored near to the home ports of each ferry (I'm assuming they mostly are short range ferries following a set schedule) as they could then mine within hours of being given the order. Going for RORO (or even rail ferries) would help this but might be too advanced?

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

Iceland did with 1/5 of that population (can't find much information on their WWII-era Coast Guard but their early Cold War era Coast Guard had a few relatively sizable ships)

Half a dozen OPVs doing customs work does not a navy make. The Cod Wars weren't an actual military conflict after all.

Estonia certainly did with not even twice that population (1.1 million in 1939) and a lot more hostile situation.

Their two largest ships had a compliment of 32, and the vast majority of their ships were WWI hand-me-downs (mostly inherited from the Russian Empire).