World's Worst Warships?

HansMustermann said:
I don't think any armed ship can be flat out useless against a sub. But really old destroyers could be rather ineffective if they lacked the agility. The old destroyers that the UK got from the USA, for example, were regarded by the admiralty as not particularly suited for ASW duty. They were fast but had a very high turning radius, by WW2 destroyer standards, which made a sub's task of getting out of the way a lot easier.

Well, I suppose the whole IJN was utterly useless against subs in the beginning of WW2. Though not through a fault of the ships themselves, but rather because the Japanese thought nobody can dive too far and set the depth charges to explode at a rather shallow depth. So the explosion tended to be nowhere NEAR the US sub they were hunting. Come to think of it, I'm not sure why they had that misconception, since their own subs could dive deeper than what they set their depth charges for.
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Japan also had poor sonar and not all their ships were fitted.
'One of Our Submarines' by Edward Young has a good account of submarine warfare in the Far East. It's Young's war memoire and the best first hand account of sub warfare I have read.
 
HansMustermann said:
I don't think any armed ship can be flat out useless against a sub. But really old destroyers could be rather ineffective if they lacked the agility. The old destroyers that the UK got from the USA, for example, were regarded by the admiralty as not particularly suited for ASW duty. They were fast but had a very high turning radius, by WW2 destroyer standards, which made a sub's task of getting out of the way a lot easier.

Well, I suppose the whole IJN was utterly useless against subs in the beginning of WW2. Though not through a fault of the ships themselves, but rather because the Japanese thought nobody can dive too far and set the depth charges to explode at a rather shallow depth. So the explosion tended to be nowhere NEAR the US sub they were hunting. Come to think of it, I'm not sure why they had that misconception, since their own subs could dive deeper than what they set their depth charges for.
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And then a US Congressman set them straight!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_J._May

Loose lips really did sink ships, err boats technically.
 
Here is a talk by the excellent Lindybeige on the very same subject

 
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Lindy always somehow seems a tad to excitable to me, but I'll certainly be watching the video.

This discussion reminds me that I have fairly recently re-read C.S. Forester's The Good Shepherd, centered on the captain of an escorting destroyer. Don't know how accurate it is, but I enjoyed it.
 
My most watched Youtube channels are Lindy, Ian McCollum on Forgotten Weapons and Othais on C&Rsenal for his Small Arms of WW1 'primers'
 
I forgot the excellent British Muzzle Loaders. It's title is misleading as it covers up to WW2 Lee Enfields.
Very entertaining as well as educational.
 
Trebuchet said:
Lindy always somehow seems a tad to excitable to me, but I'll certainly be watching the video.

This discussion reminds me that I have fairly recently re-read C.S. Forester's The Good Shepherd, centered on the captain of an escorting destroyer. Don't know how accurate it is, but I enjoyed it.
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Book has apparently been made into a movie by Tom Hanks, supposed to be released in June.
I should download and read a couple of the other books mentioned by Lindy in the video.
 
Trebuchet said:
Lindy always somehow seems a tad to excitable to me, but I'll certainly be watching the video.

This discussion reminds me that I have fairly recently re-read C.S. Forester's The Good Shepherd, centered on the captain of an escorting destroyer. Don't know how accurate it is, but I enjoyed it.
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I read that ages ago, when I was in middle school. I think my mom picked it up at a garage sale. I took it along on a church retreat, mainly as a joke, because the name of our church is "Good Shepherd United Methodist." :D That was years before I started reading Horatio Hornblower.

As I recall, it seemed fairly realistic to me, but my knowledge of WWII naval affairs wasn't nearly as extensive back then as it is now, so I can't be sure my impression was accurate.
 
Trebuchet said:
Book has apparently been made into a movie by Tom Hanks, supposed to be released in June.
I should download and read a couple of the other books mentioned by Lindy in the video.
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I see that I'll have to reread the book before June; it's a shame we won't be able to see the movie in theaters. :( I am annoyed to learn that they've changed the name of the movie to Greyhound, which sounds kind of cliched. Further, I don't like it when movie or TV adaptations get renamed for no good reason (my definition of "good reason"). The worst offender of all time in that regard, though, is Gettysburg, which should have been called The Killer Angels. :mad:
 
It'll be interesting to see if they retain the captain's deep religiosity in the film. I suspect they won't. It makes an interesting variation on Forester's usual characters.
I started reading Hornblower in college, more than 50 years ago. I only started reading some of Forester's other stuff in the past year.
 
Trebuchet said:
It'll be interesting to see if they retain the captain's deep religiosity in the film. I suspect they won't. It makes an interesting variation on Forester's usual characters.
I started reading Hornblower in college, more than 50 years ago. I only started reading some of Forester's other stuff in the past year.
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Hank's character mentions god several times in the trailer I saw.
 
I just watched the trailers and looked a few websites. It seems fairly promising, but there are a few things that concern me. Some of the U-boat tactics appear to be unrealistic, such as the boats' being too close together during an attack, and their attacking on the surface during daylight.

There's also the unfortunate fact that a lot of the filming was done aboard the USS Isaac C. Kidd, (Fletcher class), which has far too many and too modern AA guns for 1942, including radar-directed quad 40mms. :eek:

Finally, if what I've read is accurate, the name of the ship (which bears the hull number of a canceled and unnamed Fletcher) is the USS Greyhound, which, if true, is absolutely unforgivable. I get that they wanted to have a cool-sounding name, but they could have done that by choosing something that could also be the name of a fictitious and distinguished sailor, such as USS Hawke, or USS Wolfe.
 
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It's Hollywood, of course. Greyhound sounds far more like a name you'd find on an RN destroyer. US ones are named almost exclusively for USN heroes.

ETA: Just watched a trailer. Not liking it.
 
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SpitfireIX said:
Finally, if what I've read is accurate, the name of the ship (which bears the hull number of a canceled and unnamed Fletcher) is the USS Greyhound, which, if true, is absolutely unforgivable. I get that they wanted to have a cool-sounding name, but they could have done that by choosing something that could also be the name of a fictitious and distinguished sailor, such as USS Hawke, or USS Wolfe.
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Perhaps a compromise on USS Greyhounde?
 
Trebuchet said:
It's Hollywood, of course. Greyhound sounds far more like a name you'd find on an RN destroyer. US ones are named almost exclusively for USN heroes.
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There actually was a G-class destroyer named HMS Greyhound during WWII, but she was sunk before the US entered the war.

Trebuchet said:
ETA: Just watched a trailer. Not liking it.
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I'm willing to give it a chance, and hope that it has some good parts. Kind of like Sully is a really great movie, right up until the point where Sullenberger and Skiles start talking to the NTSB investigators. :(
 
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