by David Wragg
Could the Germans have used aircraft carriers for a more effective assault on Crete? Undoubtedly additional air power would have been welcome, and could have reduced the loss of German surface forces in the invasion. On the other hand, would such ships have been able to reach Crete? Even if they managed to pass the British Isles and cross the Bay of Biscay without interference from the Royal Navy or the Royal Air Force, they would have had to clear the Straits of Gibraltar and then pass between Malta and either Sicily or Libya. At the very least, Malta would have had to be invaded or neutralised first before making such a passage in wartime. Once past Malta, the aircraft carrier or carriers would have been vulnerable to attack by both shore-based aircraft from Egypt and from HMS Formidable. Even the latter suffered grievously in the Battle for Crete, and for the second time during the war in the Mediterranean, a British aircraft carrier was damaged beyond local repair and Formidable had to be sent away.
It is difficult to believe that even had aircraft carriers been available, that such a valuable fleet asset would have been risked by the Germans even for a target as tempting as Crete. The ultimate goal, of course, was to make life for British forces in Egypt as difficult as possible with the Suez Canal being the real prize, and always with the tempting possibility that, by changing the balance of power in the Near East, Turkey might have been persuaded to enter the war. With Turkey as an ally, the invasion of the Soviet Union, Operation Barbarossa, would have had an even greater chance of success – indeed, it may even have been that this was the missing but vital link in ensuring success given the forces available to Hitler at the time and the limited amount of time available for achieving the objectives of the invasion. The other vital link in ensuring a successful invasion of the Soviet Union would have been to damage the supply lines through what was then Persia to the USSR. Perhaps these would have been the best target for the aircraft carrier, with ships and long-range maritime-reconnaissance aircraft based on Madagascar hitting at the Allied convoys in the Indian Ocean heading for the Persian Gulf.
THE CHANNEL DASH
Despite the absence of an aircraft carrier, the fast battlecruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau still posed a major threat to British shipping in the Atlantic and the Bay of Biscay. In 1940, they had accounted for twenty-two ships, totalling 116,000 tons. The Royal Navy had forced them to take refuge at Brest, in occupied France, along with the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen, where the RAF had repeatedly bombed them, causing some damage but unable to ensure their destruction with the bombs available at the time. Hitler decided to return the three ships to northern waters where they would be safer, and could be used against the Arctic convoys, but instead of taking the long route around the west of Ireland, on the Fuhrer’s orders, on 12 February 1942, the ships were sent through the Straits of Dover. Delays in detecting the ships and communications difficulties over mounting an attack meant that a force of just six Swordfish from No 825 Naval Air Squadron was all that was available to attack the three ships, which were escorted by a combat air patrol of thirty Luftwaffe fighters.
In the gloom of a late winter afternoon, Lt Cdr Eugene Esmonde took his six aircraft into the air, but instead of the escort of sixty Spitfire fighters that he had been promised, just ten Spitfires turned up. In poor light, they found the three warships and their escort of ten destroyers. The lumbering Swordfish were caught in a hail of fire from the fighters above and the warships below, but they pressed home a torpedo attack. His aircraft badly damaged as pieces were knocked off it in the heavy fire, Esmonde managed to keep the aircraft airborne long enough to launch its torpedo before it crashed into the sea. His target, the Prinz Eugen, managed to avoid the torpedo. All six Swordfish were shot down, with the loss of Esmonde and twelve others out of the eighteen naval airmen involved in the attack. Esmonde was awarded a posthumous VC.
Had the two battlecruisers been accompanied by an aircraft carrier, operating with them from their base in France, undoubtedly their operations against British merchant shipping would have been far more effective. On the other hand, the large expanse of flight deck on the carrier would have meant that it would have been more vulnerable to the RAF’s bombing than the armoured decks and gun turrets of the battlecruisers. This is an important point as the value of the French bases to the Germans cannot be underestimated. As far as the Channel Dash itself was concerned, the carrier’s aircraft would have made little difference as the Luftwaffe managed to maintain a substantial level of fighter cover above the three ships as they approached and then swept through the Straits of Dover.
THE INVASION OF MADAGASCAR
The large French island colony of Madagascar, off the coast of East Africa, was governed by Vichy after the fall of France in 1940. It offered a base for naval and air forces from which they could spread out over the Indian Ocean and attack shipping heading for the Suez Canal, which by 1942 was being used as a roundabout means of supplying British forces in Egypt rather than as a short cut for shipping between Great Britain and the Gulf, India and Australia and New Zealand.
Initially, German commerce raiders used the island as a base, but the difficulty of reaching Madagascar from Germany or Italy, or even from Japan, meant that the Axis powers failed to make full use of the island. Nevertheless, with an aircraft carrier providing air cover, the Kriegsmarine could have deployed surface raiders to the island. Had aircraft been shipped to the island by sea, they could have operated from the shore bases. Possibly, Japanese support could have been provided, but Japanese warships rarely operated west of southern India and Ceylon, the empire having stretched itself to its limits by spring 1942.
As it was, the Allies were sufficiently concerned about Madagascar becoming a base for Axis forces, and unsure about the attitude of the Vichy French, that on 5 May 1942, they mounted Operation Ironclad. The forces deployed by the British were insignificant, but included two modern fast armoured aircraft carriers, Illustrious and Indomitable, as well as the elderly battleship Ramillies, two cruisers and eleven destroyers. By 8 May, the island was firmly secured. The only counter-attack of any significance was by Japanese midget submarines on 30 May, which put Ramillies out of action for several months.
It is inconceivable that Axis forces on Madagascar would have been allowed to stay by the Allies, but the resources deployed would have been far heavier had there been a significant Axis naval and air presence on the island. While it might be an exaggeration to suggest that Madagascar could have played as effective a role in interrupting Allied supplies as Malta did in disrupting the supply lines between Italy and North Africa, it certainly would have been a thorn in the Allied flesh for as long as armed forces managed to stay on the island.
BATTLE OF THE BARENTS SEA
This was a battle that should have been an easy victory for the Germans, with two heavy cruisers and six destroyers attacking a convoy with just five destroyers and five other minor warships as the escort. On 22 December 1942, Convoy JW51B left Loch Ewe for Russia, with fourteen ships carrying 200 tanks, 2,000 vehicles and 120 warplanes, as well as other cargo. The escort was led by Captain Robert Sherbrooke, aged 42 years, in Onslow, accompanied by Obedient, Orwell, Obdurate and Achates, with five other ships including minesweepers. The convoy was spotted by a U-boat that reported it to the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper. The Panzerschiff (although by this time reclassified as a heavy cruiser) Lutzow, and heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper and six destroyers sailed from the Altenfjord on 31 December to intercept. Sherbrooke sent the merchantmen at full speed away from the convoy and led his destroyers straight at the enemy as if to make a torpedo attack. Four times the Germans attempted to attack the convoy, but on each occasion they were forced to withdraw under cover of a smokescreen as the destroyers raced in, driving the Germans beyond range of the convoy and towards a British covering force of two cruisers. This series of actions lasted about two hours. After Sherbrooke was badly wounded, Lt Cdr Kinloch in Obedient took over, mounting a fifth feint towards the enemy, finally turning the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper
away, but not before she had hit Achates and killed her commanding officer. Then the cruisers Sheffield and Jamaica arrived and their shells started hitting Hipper. The German destroyer Friedrich Eckholdt raced towards Hipper but was sunk by Sheffield.
A lack of determination on the part of the Germans led Hitler to demand that the German surface fleet be scrapped, and the German Navy’s C-in-C, Raeder, was forced to resign. That the British destroyers could have been fought off can be judged by the different outcome when HMS Acasta and Ardent were sunk in a hopeless bid to defend the British aircraft carrier, Glorious.
Had an aircraft carrier been present, attacks could have been mounted on the British cruisers and on the merchantmen in the convoy, although naval aircraft would have found fast-moving destroyers difficult to hit either with torpedoes or bombs. On the other hand, would the carrier have become a victim? After all, the German heavy cruisers should have been able to strike at the British destroyers before they got within torpedo range. This was a classic example from the British side of the boldest moves being the safest.
BATTLE OF THE NORTH CAPE
One major battle of the Second World War without any aircraft carrier being involved was the Battle of the North Cape. Had the Germans had a carrier available, it could have made a significant difference, although operations could have been curtailed by the severe weather encountered and which naturally enough affected both sides.
The sequence of events that led to the battle started in late December 1943, when the British Admiralty heard from Ultra intelligence that the battlecruiser Scharnhorst was on short notice for steam. Scharnhorst was reputed to be Hitler’s favourite ship. In 1940, during the withdrawal from Norway, Scharnhorst, and her sister Gneisnau, had sunk the aircraft carrier Glorious.
On 21 December 1943, Admiral Sir Bruce Fraser, Commander-in-Chief Home Fleet, was aboard his flagship, the battleship Duke of York as she entered Akureyri Fjord in Iceland, escorted by the cruiser Jamaica and four destroyers. On receiving the news about the Scharnhorst, he assembled his captains for a conference. His plan was that once refuelled, his squadron, now to be known as Force Two, should head north at 15 knots to conserve fuel, and if they did encounter the Scharnhorst, Jamaica was to remain with the flagship while the destroyers were to divide into two divisions and mount a torpedo attack. Duke of York would open fire at a range of seven miles, initially using star shells.
The bait for the Scharnhorst was Convoy JW55B, while homebound RA55A was leaving Kola with an escort consisting of eight destroyers, three corvettes and a minesweeper. The two convoys were due to cross off Bear Island on Christmas Day. JW55B had a mixed Royal Navy and Royal Canadian Navy escort. Rear Admiral Burnett commanded Force One, the cruiser support for the two convoys, with Belfast, Norfolk and Sheffield.
Fraser took Force Two to sea at 23.00 on 23 December. Ultra decrypts had warned him that U-boats had been ordered to attack JW55B, while Scharnhorst was on three hours’ notice to sail. The Germans had discovered JW55B almost by accident, as the aircraft that spotted them was on weather reconnaissance. Two U-boats, U-601 and U-716 made contact with the convoy on 24 December, but were driven off by the escorts.
Aboard the Scharnhorst, her usual commander, Vizeadmiral Kummetz, was ill and on Christmas Day was replaced by Konteradmiral (Rear Admiral) ‘Achmed’ Bey, an experienced destroyer commander rather than a big ship man. Bey objected to the plans to send the battlecruiser to sea, preferring instead to make the maximum use of destroyers, his weapon of choice despite the poor weather conditions. His orders were not to hazard the Scharnhorst, and he was also free to use destroyers only if he felt that the conditions were right. His orders from Dönitz were that he must ‘disengage if a superior enemy force is encountered’.
Both convoys had their courses altered by Fraser, so that they were heading away from the Norwegian coast and towards the ice, but the change was almost impossible to make because of the bad weather. U-601 continued to track the progress of the convoy, but the Germans remained unaware of the presence of Force Two. Signals between Fraser and the two convoys had been intercepted, but had been misunderstood, while the Germans expected the heavy units to be kept well to the west of the convoy.
Just before 19.00 on Christmas Day, Bey had his flag captain, Kapitan zur See Hintze, prepare to sail, and the German 4th Destroyer Flotilla had the order passed on to it. The five destroyers preceded the battlecruiser as the force steamed out of the Altenfjord, and set off west at 25 knots. In an exchange of communications, Bey was assured that no significant surface force was within 50 miles of JW55B, although the intelligence was out of date, and he informed naval HQ at Kiel that the weather would inhibit the operational efficiency of his destroyers, rolling wildly in the severe weather and high sea state.
Even aboard the Duke of York, slightly larger than the Scharnhorst, at 35,000 tons to 31,800 tons, the motion of the ship was uncomfortable. Despite having the heaviest armour plating of any contemporary battleship, the ship was far from immune to the weather because of her low hull lines, intended to allow her ‘A’ turret to fire forwards. Oerlikon anti-aircraft cannon were swept off the foredeck by the crashing waves coming over the bows, despite the slow speed being made, and cold sea water poured through the rivet holes into the messdecks below. The most forward of the gun turrets, ‘A’ turret, also suffered water ingression, some of it finding its way to the shell room below. Once again, it was the destroyers that suffered the most, and as with the German ships, they would find high speed action impossible unless the sea conditions eased.
Both ships were a compromise. Duke of York had been limited to 35,000 tons by the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922. Originally intended to have 16-in guns, a further treaty limited the calibre to 14-in. Scharnhorst was originally intended to have 15-in guns, but had to make do with 11-in, and although it was always the intention to upgrade her weaponry at a refit, the opportunity never arose.
Very early on 26 December, at 01.30, a signal from the Admiralty based on an Ultra decrypt informed Fraser that a codeword had been flashed to the commanding officer of a battle group, suggesting that an operation was about to begin. The intelligence was ten hours old. Confirmation was not long in coming, for at 02.17 came the signal: ‘Emergency SCHARNHORST probably sailed 1800/25 December.’ A further signal followed almost immediately advising that a German patrol vessel had been warned at 17.15 that the battlecruiser would soon pass outward bound. Then at 04.00, Fraser was told that the ‘Admiralty appreciate that SCHARNHORST is now at sea.’
Fraser was less inclined to keep radio silence than his contemporaries in the Royal Navy, believing that knowledge of the disposition of other fleet units and warning of impending events was far more important. The risk was that signals traffic betrayed both position and intention. Nevertheless, on balance he was almost certainly right bearing in mind the number of occasions when the absence of communication had resulted in failure. Now, unaware that the convoy had been unable to turn west, he was concerned that he was still too far away to help the convoy. He ordered speed increased to 24 knots, then signalled Force One and the convoy to report their positions, even though this meant revealing his own. There was no risk as the Germans either did not intercept the signals or ignored them.
It was only after Fraser had made the signal that he discovered that the convoy was fifty miles south of Bear Island, with Force One 150 miles from the convoy but planning to be within thirty miles of it by 08.17. Force Two was 350 miles from the convoy, and too far away to save it, although it would be able to stop the Germans from returning to their base. Now understanding that the convoy had not turned round, Fraser ordered it to turn north. While the order was received, it took some time to retransmit this to all of the ships in the convoy, and it was not until around 06.00 that the change of course could be made. Bey, meanwhile, was heading due north 100 miles from the convoy, but just 90 miles from Force One. His plan was to attack the convoy as it cleared the North Cape.
The relatively
narrow stretch of water between the edge of the Polar ice cap and the enemy-held shoreline forced a further compromise. At 06.28, Fraser ordered JW55B to take a revised course, heading northeast to avoid being caught between the ice and the Germans.
Bey, meanwhile, who had informed Dönitz of the difficulties suffered by his destroyers, was surprised to receive a signal from the Grossadmiral telling him to leave the destroyers behind if they could not keep station, and attack the convoy with the battlecruiser alone. This was contrary to the Konteradmiral’s own instincts and experience.