Topic: The last Battlecruiser.

[CaptStumpy]

Well with all the posting of ships, I thought I'd post on one of my favorites that I wrote up a while back.



The Last Battlecruiser.

A Brief History of the German Battlecruiser SMS Goeben

Specs:

Displacement: 22,616t normal
Length: 611'11"
Beam: 96'10"
Machinery: 4-Shaft Parsons turbines, 24 boilers.
Top Speed: 28 knots on trial
MaxArmor: 10.7" Belt, 8" Bulkheads, 8" Battery, 9" Barbettes, 9" Turrets, 14" Conn.
Armament: 10/11.1" Guns (5 Turrets, Two guns per turret), 12/5.9" Guns, 12/3.45" Guns (which by the way is 88 millimeters but NOT, I repeat not the same as the "dreaded 88" of WWII fame), 4 torpedo tubes (submerged).

An improvement on the Vonn der Tann and the 3rd of the German Battlecruisers (Blucher doesn't really count), Goeben was in the Mediterranean, accompanied by the light cruiser SMS Breslau, under command of Admiral Wilhelm Souchon, at the onset of hostilities between France and Germany. Goeben bombarded Phippeville in French North Africa and then proceeded under admiralty orders to Constantinople.

On the way east they encountered two British Battlecruisers, the Indomitable and Indefatigatible under the command of Admiral Milne. Both forces passed each other with guns trained inboard as Britain and Germany were not yet at war. The Indo, and Indi, turned to shadow the German force but lost contact with them during the night.

Souchon continued to play cat and mouse with the British Fleet after hostilities were declared, the British missing one opportunity to engage him with four armored cruisers because of the fear that four older-type ships would not be able to engage the faster and heavier armed Goeben while Goeben could stand off and pummel the obsolete British Ships. (Note: Admiral's Milne and Troubridge were reprimanded, Troubridge being court martialled but acquitted, for their lack of traditional British Naval pluck. Any damage caused to the Goeben at this point might have enabled Milne's Battlecruisers to catch them, or bottle them up.)

After arriving safely in Constantinople, Souchon successfully assisted in the negotiations to bring Turkey into the war on Germany's side. To show his good faith he took the Goeben out on what he said was exercises and proceeded to bombard Sevastopol and Novoriossiisk in the Black Sea. The Goeben was then "sold" to Turkey but remained under German command and operated by German sailors. It was then renamed the Yavuz.

Meanwhile on the other side of Constantinople, the British fleet is pacing back and forth and chomping at the bit to get at Goeben. Frustrated, they start bombarding the Turkish forts protecting the entrance into the Dardenelles with a couple Battlecruisers and two French Dreadnoughts. This merely encouraged the strengthening of the Turkish Forts and the escalation of the Allies repeated unsuccessful and expensive attempts to force the strait.

Late in April 1915, the Goeben came out again to attack allied transports off Gallipoli but on sighting the suberb Battleship Queen Elizabeth, thought better of it and high-tailed it back to Constantinople. Deciding the Russians would a easier, Souchan began a moderately successful harassement of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, and was damaged by Russian mines in 1914.

Goeben finally sailed back into the Aegean in 1917 under command of Admiral Rebeur Paschwitz. In January 1918 they sortied again to bombard an allied base. Goeben is slightly damaged by a allied mine at the entrance to the strait. Continuing on, they surprise the British monitors Raglan and M28, sinking them both. An hour later Breslau strikes a mine and while maneuvering to take her in tow Goeben hits another. The powerless Breslau drifts deeper into the minefield, detonating four more and sinks. Goeben returns back to the strait only to strike another mine. Listing heavily she runs aground but was towed back to Constantinople. Goeben was so severely damaged that she was repaired only just before the end of hostilities. Two of the British mine holes were not repaired until 1926-1930.

She was laid up in 1948 and decommissioned in 1960. Her only crew being a single petty officer and his cat and serving as a museum. She was offered for sale to Germany sometime in the 1960s but the sale was rejected. In 1972 she went up for sale in the New York Times for 2 million dollars. She was finally sold and tragically scrapped in 1976. The last example of a WWI Battlecruiser. Of that period only the Battleship Texas remains, in her post refit WWII configuration.

[Chris SI]

The Turks kept her operational for a long time, for such an old design.

[Just plain old Punisher]

Battlecruisers were an abortion of a concept. At the time it was believed that their high speed would compensate for a lack of heavy armour protection.

[Brush Wolf]

Battlecruisers were an abortion of a concept. At the time it was believed that their high speed would compensate for a lack of heavy armour protection.

The most real problem with the battlecruisers was the fact that they should never have been in the line of battle. The first British BC's were laid down as counters to the fast French armored cruisers and were never ment to meet anything heaver than that. The American Alaska class were more true to the ideal being designed to combat the heavy Japanese cruisers and being armed with 9" guns was not considered to be a unit for the battle line.

[Harlax]

Goeben's political impact was far greater than her military impact.  The British contributed to the fiasco at the start of the war by confiscating two warships just completing contruction that had been purchased by Turkey.  As Barbarba Tuchman put it "the Ottoman Empire was so lightly regarded that two warships were considered more valuable..."