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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 29, 2017 18:32:10 GMT -6
Yes, the landing needed to succeed and those battlewagons were the last ships available to prevent the bombardment of the airfield (which was allowing supplies and reinforcements to be unloaded during the day). It's a hell of a campaign to study. Operation shoe string... Absolutely. The battlecruisers were the only ships that had the speed to get to Guadalcanal and return before daylight, that's why they were used. It has always been interesting to study the whole Solomon's campaign and remember some of the information my dad passed along, what he could remember.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 29, 2017 18:33:50 GMT -6
FYI:
The optimal waterline length for maximum speed for a destroyer is 1.79 times the square root of the waterline length; for the fast battleship it is 1.19 times the square root of the waterline length.
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Post by director on Jul 29, 2017 19:33:15 GMT -6
Basically it went like this:
There aren't many places south of New Guinea that are big enough and flat enough for an airfield. The Japanese located one such, on Guadalcanal, and started construction. If they finished it, aircraft could restrict the shortest shipping path from the US West Coast to Australia. So the US put together a 'very' scratch group of light forces and the Marine division, and landed. They got a seaplane base and harbor at Tulagi and the unfinished airfield on Guadalcanal.
A detachment of Japanese ships (mostly heavy cruisers) immediately responded and kicked the stuffing out of Allied naval forces off Savo Island without attacking the troop convoy. US carriers had pulled back, fearing just such a night-time attack. The Japanese ran troops and supplies in at night and the Allies ran troops and supplies in by day under aircover from Henderson Field. Neither could control the waters for more than 12 hours, so neither could unload much. The Japanese organized supply runs by DDs, and in the process wore out or damaged a sizable fraction of their entire DD force.
It was soon seen that the airfield was the key. Japan needed to knock that out, drive in major reinforcements and retake it. They tried air attacks (from carriers and from Rabaul) and it didn't quite work, though they lost a good fraction of their airpower (including carrier squadrons) in the process. They tried bombarding the airfield with cruisers and DDs and it didn't work. So they committed major fleet units, at a cost of a good chunk of their remaining fuel reserve. Bombardment by battleships did come within a hair of wiping out the airfield and its aircraft, so before the Japanese BBs could come in again and finish the job, the US committed a scratch force of cruisers and DDs. It was slaughtered, but did succeed in crippling one BB and forcing the Japanese to postpone the bombardment one night.
The absolute last bottom of the barrel of US surface forces were the two very precious modern BBs and a few DDs. They were detached from carrier cover but couldn't arrive for 1st Guadalcanal. When the Japanese came back, four American DDs were sunk, BB South Dakota shot up and BB Washington almost single-handedly sank a Japanese BB and drove the cruisers and DDs away.
After 2nd Guadalcanal the Japanese tried running in a major troop convoy anyway (thinking the airfield was dead), but it was sunk by aircraft. After that, Guadalcanal was a stalemate tilting in the Allied favor until Japan pulled all her troops out.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 30, 2017 9:14:35 GMT -6
One issue to bring up about the Solomon's campaign is the supportability of the area for military operations. This area was, in the words of one author, hostile to 20th century man and had no physical infrastructure for his use. There were few roads, few equipped harbors and not one city to speak of. Every thing you needed to fight a war had to be brought in by ship including food, vehicles, weapons, communications and medical supplies. It was an island war, with hostile terrain.
Guadalcanal was eight miles long and twenty-five miles wide. The US only occupied a small area around Lunga Point which is where they built the three airfields. They also occupied the beach up and down the north shore. Most of Guadalcanal was never explored or occupied. Without air support, bases could not be protected and this was the vital link to the whole area strategy. Due to range limitations, air bases had to be placed in distances reachable from each other and this was the mistake the Japanese made. Once the decision after phase one of their Southern operation was made, to move southeast to cut off Australia from the US, the so-called FS line, the Japanese had to begin to develop bases down the Solomon's chain. The Japanese were not adept at preparing bases quickly and efficiently which hindered their operations.
The issues with finding a suitable air base location hinged on drainage and disease and due to the lack of humans on the islands, there was no way to know which suitable areas had the key features necessary. The most important geographic characteristic of an air base was it combat radius for its aircraft. Each base had to be within the combat radius of another. It pilot language its called "fighter range". Bombers just could not survive alone in the air, they had to have fighter coverage. Keep in mind that fuel consumption doubles in combat.
The two biggest airfield complexes for the Japanese were Rabaul on New Britain and Wewak on New Guinea. For the Allies, it was the New Hebrides and Townsville in Northern Australia. Soon after operations started in the South Pacific, Port Moresby was added as a base complex The Japanese had also developed bases, four, at Bougainville and three on New Guinea. There were smaller airfields used as emergency fields. The bases on Rabaul were over 5000 feet in length and could operate about 450 aircraft.
Strategically, New Guinea and the Solomon Islands separated the Australian continent from the Central Pacific. Possession of the area would provide command of the air and sea which would give the nation in possession a stepping stone to the north or south. This was its importance.
For the Japanese, their singular mistake, in my opinion was not occupying and developing a fighter base on Munda before occupying Guadalcanal and developing that base. They had to do this before we occupied Guadalcanal because after that, they could not get the base on Munda built and maintained due to proximity to Henderson Field. This was a cardinal mistake because with the new Model 32 Zero, which had a larger and more thirsty engine and more ammunition, the range decreased. No longer could the Zero's escort the bombers over Henderson and stay for any length of time. This increased bomber losses and fighters, which due to problems of shipping, meant that the air wings on Rabaul deteriorated very quickly. The Japanese failed to remember that the enemy always has a say in your plans and that no plan survives contact with the enemy. It never occurred to the Japanese, or if it did, they did not pay attention, that we would discover their base on Guadalcanal and invade the island.
The key to the Solomon Island operations was logistics. We could develop bases, supply them and manage them much faster than the Japanese. We also had a chain of coast watchers who would warn the command at Guadalcanal and New Caledonia of ship movements and aircraft headed south. We also had a radar installed on the tower on Henderson field. These gave us warning of an impending attack.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 30, 2017 11:06:20 GMT -6
In my previous post, I spoke of combat radius. Ok, what is that? Well, it is the maximum range that an aircraft can fly with ordnance. Generally for fighters, its the radius of action from takeoff to objective and return with minimum reserve. However, air combat will decrease this radius due to the fact that in combat you are generally at full throttle all the time, this will consume a lot of fuel quickly and this was reason for the adoption of external fuel tanks. Here are some quick facts about the fighters used in the Solomon Island campaigns.
A6M2 Navy Type 0 Model 21- 1160 miles normal, 1930 maximum. Generally a 300 mile radius when launched from a carrier and 500 - 600 from a land base.
A6M3 Model 32 - 1477 miles max but generally 20% less than the Model 21- These were the Zero's assigned to Rabaul.
F4F-4 765 miles max. With an external tank, range was 1050 miles with a combat radius of 245 nm., with two tanks 325 nm.
From Rabaul to Guadalcanal in a straight line, was 581.77 nm. That equals about 1163.54 nm. From Rabaul to Munda was 392.17 nm.
The Model 32 lost about 620 miles in range due to the newer engine and was not entirely suitable for the Solomon Island operations.
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Post by garrisonchisholm on Aug 2, 2017 0:38:01 GMT -6
Silly Austrians for fighting with dreadnoughts at night anyway. We need a naval corollary for Vizzini's great blunders. As a final note for the OP, and regretting I did did not think of it immediately, I submit to you that given the Austrian's were fighting the Italian Navy; "Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!" - covers it just fine. (...and, however, ignoring the fact that the Sicilian then immediately died...)
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Post by rimbecano on Aug 2, 2017 4:15:36 GMT -6
"Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!" Ahahahahaha! Hahahahahaha! Ahahaha-hahahuck! Thunk.
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Post by director on Aug 2, 2017 17:56:15 GMT -6
There is of course the old joke about the WW2 navies (which is quite unfair to the Italian Navy; short on fuel as it was, its light forces fought hard and well):
The British like their stout. The Americans drink bourbon. The Germans love beer. The French are partial to wine. The Japanese sip sake. The Russians are devoted to vodka. But the Italians stick to port...
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 2, 2017 17:59:19 GMT -6
Silly Austrians for fighting with dreadnoughts at night anyway. We need a naval corollary for Vizzini's great blunders. As a final note for the OP, and regretting I did did not think of it immediately, I submit to you that given the Austrian's were fighting the Italian Navy; "Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!" - covers it just fine. (...and, however, ignoring the fact that the Sicilian then immediately died...) Careful there, my grandfather was from Sicily.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 2, 2017 18:02:19 GMT -6
There is of course the old joke about the WW2 navies (which is quite unfair to the Italian Navy; short on fuel as it was, its light forces fought hard and well): The British like their stout. The Americans drink bourbon. The Germans love beer. The French are partial to wine. The Japanese sip sake. The Russians are devoted to vodka. But the Italians stick to port... Actually, it's Chianti that we love.
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Post by cv10 on Aug 2, 2017 19:45:30 GMT -6
This is more land-based, but here's a wag from World War I.:
An Allied sentry is on duty and he hears footsteps approaching. "Halt! who comes there!" the sentry demands. "A soldier of the King" says a voice. "Advance Englishman, and be recognized!" the sentry orders. The same sentry hears more footsteps approaching. "Halt! Who comes there!" He demands again. "Un Soldat français!" says a voice. "Advance Frenchman, and be recognized" the sentry orders. The sentry hears even more footsteps. "Halt! Who comes there!" the sentry demands. "Who the hell wants to know!" a voice demands back. "Advance American, and be recognized" the sentry replies.
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Post by bcoopactual on Aug 3, 2017 7:18:57 GMT -6
I like this one I saw online as well about WW2 although I removed the unflattering response for the Italians.
“If you encounter a unit you can’t identify, fire one round over their heads so it won’t hit anyone.
“If the response is a fusillade of rapid, precise rifle fire, they’re British.
“If the response is a s**tstorm of machine-gun fire, they’re German.
“And if nothing happens for five minutes and then your position is obliterated by support artillery or an airstrike, they’re American.”
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Post by director on Aug 3, 2017 11:50:17 GMT -6
bcoopactual - and if your position is then overrun by a mass of screaming maniacs, they're Japanese.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 3, 2017 12:27:53 GMT -6
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Post by cv10 on Aug 3, 2017 13:53:35 GMT -6
bcoopactual - and if your position is then overrun by a mass of screaming maniacs, they're Japanese. and if your position is smashed by hundreds of rockets and overrun by a human wave, they're Russian,
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