3rd Cumulative WW2 History Quiz

[Admiral Kutzov]

something to do with the torpedos?

 

[meisen]

I thought nonconformist had it. What about the Germans capturing Seal's own code books when the sub was captured? And using these British code books to read some of the RN naval cyphers?

 

[Adler17]

Admiral Kutzow is very near, so I give him the honour to give the nxt question.
The HMS Seal was a minelaying submarine but had also several torpedoes. In this time the German Kriegsmarine had severe problems with their torpedoes. They were too often not exploding. In the Norway campaign there were because of this 35 Uboat attacks on British capital ships (cruiser and bigger) which were not swuccessful because of the dud torpedoes. Otherwise it could have been a graveyard for the British fleet. But when the German planes captured HMS Seal they also found intact torpedoes. With these torpedoes the German crise was over.
That´s why the capture of UB was so important.
BTW the US had nearly the whole war the same problems like the Germans in the beginning.

Adler

 

[nonconformist]

The problem with Germany's torpedos, I seem to remember, that they were taught to use them on the Magnetic pistol setting, to explode them under the keel of capital ships, to cause more damage.
This worked fine in Germany's training at Kiel, but once far North where the earth's magnetic field was distorted, it was a different story.

 

[Adler17]

Indeed. That´s why the Germans used the conventional method again until the problem was solved. However these were also not so good and the problem was finally solved after the capture of HMS Seal/ UB.

Adler

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

I'll edit this with a question later tonight, pressed for time now

EDIT:

Best I could do for a casual question. Hope it's not too easy.

 

[meisen]

The British also had problems with their torpedo magnetic exploders if I remember correctly. Both the British and Germans quickly recognised they had problems and developed corrective measures. The USN leadership, on the other hand, was in complete denial and blamed the sailors for the failure for something like a year. They also had problems with magnetic exploders. But in addition to those, the triggering device was too flimsy and their regular contact exploder failed to function much of the time. After wasting a year blaming the crews, they then took almost another year before they finally fixed the problem towards the end of 1943.

 

[sydhe]

The map looks like Manhattan, but I don't know any thing else about it. Did they hope to hit it by V-2?

 

[privatehudson]

I'm going to guess that it was a map relating to the expected effect of an Nuclear bomb.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

It is a map of Manhattan with a nuclear blast radius effect overlay. Sydhe is on the right track for part two of the question.

 

[nonconformist]

They were working on a long range jet bomber that could take off from Japan, IIRC.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

they were, but not the answer I was looking for. The luftwaffe map was a curve...

 

[cidknee]

ummm i dont think they were going to send them by conventional bomber. Im guesing V2 or such

 

[steviejay]

the Germans did have plans for a nuke to be dropped on NY using conventional bombers. although the project name is lost on me atm (I even think the plane was called America) I believed they experimented into usings jets to allow planes to drop their payload.

IIRC they also looked into the next gen of V weapons, the V3 to carry a nuclear payload but I think that was never more than a twinkle in a German scientists eye

 

[privatehudson]

The V3 was a massive cannon built in France which was designed to bombard London wasn't it?

Anyway most of this is speculation since it's still debated amongst historians whether the Germans ever built an nuclear bomb. They certainly came up with a number of plans for aircraft or similar that could in theory bomb New York but it's far from certain whether they had progressed far enough before the war ended to adapt some of those for use in a nuclear raid.

However we do know that Heisenburg very likely overestimated the ammount of material that might be needed in such a device so it's likely that whatever pipe dreams they did have would involve something able to carry or deliver a major payload.

 

[nonconformist]

Well, the fear of a nuke was "officially" calle doff when the German's reserves were captured by the Red army.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

The answer I'm looking for has a naval background. should I post it?

 

[meisen]

Naval background? A nuclear missile launched by a submarine off shore?

 

[steviejay]

The V3 was a massive cannon built in France which was designed to bombard London wasn't it?

heh, I ain't gonna go toe to toe with your historical knowledge man, I'll agree with you.

although I'm certain I read somewhere about the development of a "new" rocket which would have been able to attack the American East Coast.

anyway, it has a naval background? is it similar to what the Luftwaffe had in mind to bomb the Panama Canal? planes fly one way, drop the bombs then the crew are forced to abandon their planes in the ocean and get picked up by U-boats?

 

[privatehudson]

I've heard about such plans for a rocket in the past too, although like most Nazi super projects it was more desperate fantasy than realistic weapon.