In his response Mr. Bergerud engages in argument that I believe is
misguided because it is based on an incomplete knowledge of the latest
scholarship on the subject. The work of Jon Sumida and the
soon-to-be-published work of Nicholas Lambert make clear that the
British, while certainly wary of the burgeoning naval might of Germany,
were not consumed with countering the threat posed by the High Seas
Fleet. If they were obsessed with the Germans, then why build
battlecruisers? The answer is concern with imperial defense and the
countering of guerre de course along with having a vessel that was
capable of serving like a battleship, not because of its armor, but
because of its speed and ability to hit at greater range. This is what
Fisher intended. I make this point, because Mr. Bergerud states that we
cannot view the situation in 1914. I agree. Yet having said that, Mr.
Bergerud fails to have an appreciable sense of what British goals were
in the years of Fisher’s first stint as First Sea Lord. If he had, then
he would know that there were several important factors influencing
British policy that were totally unrelated to German building programs.
These include finance, technological developments, and domestic politics
vis a vis social spending.

Furthermore, his assessment of Tirpitz and Wilhelm II being fools that
essentially got what they deserved is unfortunate because it is not only
a gross generalization and misrepresentation, but it borders on
character assassination. If I may, I’d also like to point out that the
British declared war not because of the actions of the High Seas Fleet,
but because the Imperial Army violated the treaty safeguarding the
territorial integrity of Belgium. And as to the building of a
medium-sized navy to deal with “Russia or France”, it appears that the
treaty obligations of both aforementioned countries would have ensured
that the Germans would have had to have a navy capable of dealing with
both Russia and France. Finally I would like to say that “creating the
impression” that you are a threat, does not necessarily mean that an
actual threat is posed, at least as it is perceived by those who make
policy.

Chris Havern

>If I may respectfully disagree with Mr. Francis there was a very big
>difference between the High Seas Fleet and any other European Navy. As Hegel
>reminds us, “quantity changes quality.” It appeared to the British
>government, and not a few German politicians, that the Germans wished to
>challenge British naval supremecy, not just challenge British interests. Any
>fleet would have been a possible “threat” to the UK, but only the German
>fleet as it appeared to be developing (not as it existed in 1914) could
>possibly have threatened the existence of the British Isles themselves. If
>one combines that with the common belief that the German Army was the
>strongest in Europe, it is simple to understand the powerful inducement for
>the immense change in British policy before WWI. The military symmetry of
>the European balance of power was put completely out of kilter by the
>possibility that one nation would be top dog on both land and sea. (The
>Brits, after all, had never attempted to be a dominant land power. When
>Bismarck quipped he’d have the British Army “arrested” if it landed in
>Pommerania, he wasn’t entirely off the mark.) Building the High Seas Fleet
>to the size and at the speed with which it was constructed was one of the
>biggest blunders in the history of modern politics. Had there been only a
>medium sized German fleet, appropriate to deal with France or Russia, I
>doubt that Britain would have declared war in 1914. Instead, the Germans had
>undoubtedly created the impression that they were a threat to Britain,
>France and Russia. In light of Fritz Fischer’s findings, I don’t think we
>dismiss the threat as simple paranoia. The Kaiser and Tirpitz were fools and
>their country paid the price.
>Eric Bergerud, 531 Kains Ave, Albany CA 94706, 510-525-0930
>
>
>

>Aside from the odd statement that “a North Sea force, [was] a direct and
>unambiguous threat to the United Kingdom,” (as if a trans-Atlantic
>force, like the Russian or French guerre de course cruisers, would be
>less of a threat to British interests?) the decision to make a North Sea
>force was deliberate.
>Timothy L. Francis
>Historian
>Naval Historical Center
>email address: Francis.Timothy@nhc.navy.mil
>voice: (202) 433-6802
>
If I may respectfully disagree with Mr. Francis there was a very big
difference between the High Seas Fleet and any other European Navy. As Hegel
reminds us, “quantity changes quality.” It appeared to the British
government, and not a few German politicians, that the Germans wished to
challenge British naval supremecy, not just challenge British interests. Any
fleet would have been a possible “threat” to the UK, but only the German
fleet as it appeared to be developing (not as it existed in 1914) could
possibly have threatened the existence of the British Isles themselves. If
one combines that with the common belief that the German Army was the
strongest in Europe, it is simple to understand the powerful inducement for
the immense change in British policy before WWI. The military symmetry of
the European balance of power was put completely out of kilter by the
possibility that one nation would be top dog on both land and sea. (The
Brits, after all, had never attempted to be a dominant land power. When
Bismarck quipped he’d have the British Army “arrested” if it landed in
Pommerania, he wasn’t entirely off the mark.) Building the High Seas Fleet
to the size and at the speed with which it was constructed was one of the
biggest blunders in the history of modern politics. Had there been only a
medium sized German fleet, appropriate to deal with France or Russia, I
doubt that Britain would have declared war in 1914. Instead, the Germans had
undoubtedly created the impression that they were a threat to Britain,
France and Russia. In light of Fritz Fischer’s findings, I don’t think we
dismiss the threat as simple paranoia. The Kaiser and Tirpitz were fools and
their country paid the price.
Eric Bergerud, 531 Kains Ave, Albany CA 94706, 510-525-0930

> My questions: What was it that so limited the German
fleet? (Inadequate
> bunker space … consumable storage … crew limits … ?) Did their
> designs vary so much from other navies? A deliberate design
compromise for
> some reason? A mistake?
>
> If some one has these answers off the top of their head, I
would like to
> hear them. Don’t put any effort into this … just the questions that
> occurred to me (and were not answered) while reading the book.
>
> Bill Riddle
>
Unless my recollection of long ago read Marder are wrong, the German Navy
chose to devote the weight saved to extra armor. At the time, after all,
there really weren’t very many places for a German dreadnaught to travel to,
so they were indeed designed as a North Sea fleet. Its worth pointing out
that naval engineers of that period still looked upon their creations as
temporary commodities. Advances in technology were coming so fast that a BB
was second class by the time it was launched. (Dreadnaught herself was not
suitable for front line action a mere decade after launch.) HMS Victory was
in service for nearly a century. The USS Enterprise may get close. (Wonder
if we will have a Turner to paint the E has she is towed to anchor for the
last time?) However, replacing whole fleets in the years before WWI was
taken for granted, hence, design specialization made a lot more sense that
it did before or since the first century of ironclads. Rich man’s game.
Eric Bergerud, 531 Kains Ave, Albany CA 94706, 510-525-0930

You thought Nancy Reagan was a bit strange?

See:
http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/980121/wired/stories/charts_1.html

(Story deals with reports of astrological consultation by Russian armed
forces!)

-Brooks

Many thanks to Brooks for his fantastic postings to the list of late. The
Midway class tech history was great, one of the nuclear blast photos from
another posting is now by desktop wallpaper!

Aside from the odd statement that “a North Sea force, [was] a direct and
unambiguous threat to the United Kingdom,” (as if a trans-Atlantic
force, like the Russian or French guerre de course cruisers, would be
less of a threat to British interests?) the decision to make a North Sea
force was deliberate. You are on the right course in that one can save
a lot of space by limiting the space allocated to fuel, berthing, and
food if you don’t need high-endurance ships. You can instead add more
armor or hull redundancies, more damage control equipment, larger fire
control apparatus, and even more ammunition (I leave the specific
differences up to the WW1 naval experts)—all because you don’t need
warships to sail half-way around the world on a regular basis. The
designs were different from the RNs, just as everybody’s designs were
slightly different from everbody elses based on the specific political,
military, financial, economic, and strategic situation.

Timothy L. Francis
Historian
Naval Historical Center
email address: Francis.Timothy@nhc.navy.mil
voice: (202) 433-6802

The above remarks are my opinions, not those of the U.S. Navy or the
Department of Defense

> ———-
> From: Bill Riddle[SMTP:riddleb@fhu.disa.mil]
> Reply To: mahan@microworks.net
> Sent: Wednesday, January 21, 1998 5:37 AM
> To: mahan@microwrks.com
> Subject: The Kaiser’s Fleet
>
> The author states that in 1907 “…British naval strategists
> observed
> with concern that the Kaiser’s new battle-fleet was of such
> limited
> range that it was effectively a North Sea force, thus making it a
>
> direct and unambiguous threat to the United Kingdom.”
>
> My questions: What was it that so limited the German fleet?
> (Inadequate
> bunker space … consumable storage … crew limits … ?) Did
> their
> designs vary so much from other navies? A deliberate design
> compromise for some reason? A mistake?

I don’t have ACES OF THE DEEP but I do own two or three authentic WWII
German charts with the grid system with code letters.

Jurgen Rohwer’s AXIS U-BOAT SUCCESSES 1939-45 (English title; don’t recall
without going home and looking what the ‘auf Deutsch’ version is
called) reproduces the world reference chart set where one can at least
look up the first two letters of an area. We have discussed this chart
system once or twice on MARHST in the past.

I asked if anyone had ever produced, or would be interested in producing,
a computer application (preferably Java) that would convert a grid square
co-ordinate to Lat/Long and back. I got some expressions of interest but
lost all the material when my hard disk died at the end of July 97…

At any rate, for those who aren’t clear on this, the Kriegsmarine issued
charts with a grid system superimposed on them. The grid had two-letter
designations for large squares, covering ocean & coastal areas. Each of
these large squares would be divided into 9 small squares, and each of
those into 9, down about 3 or 4 levels. The alpha code of each square
would comprise a position, and position reports and often log entries were
made in these coordinates rather than lat-long.

Without looking at an actual chart, this is an INCORRECT example for
location, but does show how the system worked:

FIrst two letters denote chart location: example : FH
Looking at Atlantic chart this turns out to be , say , by the west coast
of Africa. The next two letters area for example EC – E puts it into the
center square of the 9 sub-squares of square FH:
ABC
DEF
GHI
and C puts it in the northeast sub-sub-square of subsquare E…..

(Except that without looking at one of the charts to jog my memory, they
may use numbers instead of letters at one level)…

But that is the general idea. Obviously, there is some security in your
position and scouting reports even if they are in plain language, if the
enemy doesn’t have your charts with how to interpret this grid.

-Brooks

USCGC (Roger B.) Taney was decommissioned by the US Coast Guard on 7 Dec
1986 and transferred to the City of Baltimore. She is currently a
historic ship located in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor.

Chris Havern
USCG Historian’s Office
chavern@comdt.uscg.mil

>

HMS ROYALIST commissioned at Greenock on 25th August 1943, and operated
as flagship for escort carriers, to Norwegian coast and against TIRPITZ.
Joined Medi fleet 7/1944 for south of France landings and Aegean
occupation. Early 1945 to East Indies for operations off Sumatra and
Malaya with escort carriers. At surrender of Singapore by Japanese
9/1945. HMS ROYALIST Returned to England 1/1946 to reserve at
Portsmouth.

ROYALIST was formally handed over to New Zealand at Devonport, England,
on 9th July 1956. She arrived at Auckland on 20th December 1956.

ROYALIST breakdown.

When returning from the Far East station after what was to have been her
last tour anyway, ROYALIST had to stop engines on 1st November 1965
after the discovery of serious salt-water contamination of condenser
feed-water, and badly damaged boilers and evaporators (“condenseritis”).
She was steaming past the Solomon Islands, off Bellona Island, about 80
miles south of Guadalcanal at the time, and drifted overnight until
towed 110 miles by the survey ship HMS DAMPIER into open water. ROYALIST
drifted for several days until the Brisbane tug CARLOCK took her in tow
on 7th November. HMNZS LACHLAN arrived from Auckland on 9th November
with much-needed fuel, mail, spares and stores, and escorted ROYALIST
the rest of the way to Auckland. Sufficient steam from one boiler was
raised on 11th November and CARLOCK dropped the tow the next morning.
ROYALIST arrived at Auckland under reduced power on 17th November 1965
and berthed. She was destored and paid off five months prematurely. She
was used as an alongside training ship at Auckland until decommissioned
on 4th July 1966.

ROYALIST had valuable fittings and equipment removed after
decommissioning and was sold in November 1967 to the Nissho Company of
Osaka, Japan, for breaking up. She left Auckland on 31st December 1967
in tow of the Japanese tug FUJI MARU, and arrived at Osaka about four
weeks later.

ROYALIST was the last of ten cruisers to serve in New Zealand since
PHILOMEL arrived at Auckland in July 1914. The full list, in
chronological order of service is: PHILOMEL,CHATHAM, DUNEDIN, DIOMEDE,
ACHILLES,LEANDER, GAMBIA, BELLONA, BLACK PRINCE and finally ROYALIST.

Her breakdown was not our proudest moment!

Source:-“New Zealand Naval Vessels” by R.J. McDougall, 1989, ISBN
0-477-01399-6

“New Zealand Marine News” Vol.19 No.4, Autumn 1968.

Bill Riddle wrote:

> [snip] I believe she was a Pearl Harbor survivor, only to be lost to
> hostile
> action 40+ years later. And as she is now entombed in some of the
> least hospitable water on earth, her memory will soon fade.

I can verify that she was the last Navy survivor of Pearl Harbor. The USCG had
a cutter there which I believe is a museum now. Can’t remember her name.

Mark Perry