16-in Guns vs Hard Targets : A Reality Check

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944

Battleship Warspite by V.E. Tarrant :

During August 1944, the Americans were investing a powerful force of 40,000 German troops which wa cut off and squeezed up in the tip of the Brest peninsula.

The lynch-pin of their defenses was a girdle of old French forts dating from the time of Louis XIV (1774-93) and casemates armed with heavy guns.

In the confined space of the peninsula, the Americans could not take these fortifications, which commanded all land approaches, except at a heavy cost in casualties.

Warspite, therefore, was called upon to silence them with her 15-inch guns.
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Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Targets

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Targets

Battleship Warspite by V.E. Tarrant :

The control station ashore gave five targets to be engaged; fifty rounds to be fired on each in thirty minutes. Firing to be completed in 2.5 hours, before the assault by the attacking troops commenced.

Target #1 : Keringar 11-inch gun battery (called Graf Spee by the Germans). Target was found with four ranging salvoes. Spotting aircraft reported near misses on all gun turrets. Fifty-seven rounds expended.

Target #2 : Les Rospects 6-inch gun battery in casemates. Range 29,000 yards. Eight salvoes were fired before firing for effect. All salvoes after the fifth were in the target area. Twenty-two salvoes were fired - 47 rounds expended.

Target #3 : Toulbroch Fort, including two batteries running 1,000 yards to the west. Range 32,000 yards. Target was found with two salvoes. Eleven salvoes were fired - 32 rounds expended.

Target #4 : Minou Fort. Range 31,000 yards. Target was found in three salvoes. Several salvoes were not seen owing to smoke and dust over target area. Eighteen salvos were fired - 51 rounds expended.

Target #5 : Montbarey Fort. Range 32,000 yards. Target was found in four salvoes - 26 rounds expended.
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Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Keringar

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Keringar

Keringar Battery (aka MKB Graf Spee of 5/MAA 262) in Lochrist near Brest was armed with 11-inch SK L/40 naval guns.

Originally built for the Braunschweig and Deutschland pre-dreadnoughts, the SK L/40 used as coast defense gun fired a 626-lb projectile to a maximum range of 30,250 yards.

Three of the four guns were in open pits, and only one in a large casemate shown in the pics below :
 
Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Targets

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Targets

Top to Bottom :

1. & 2. : Les Rospects

3., 4. & 5. : Toulbroch
 
Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Results

Bombardment of Brest, 24 August 1944 - Results

Battleship Warspite by V.E. Tarrant :

It was while Warspite was engaging Montbarey Fort, that the control station ashore made the signal at 17:45 : "Afraid your time is up, cease fire".

Simultaneously with the receipt of this signal, came the first reply by enemy. Huge fountains of sea-water rose near Warspite from 11-inch shells falling short, fired by the Keringar battery.

Ten salvoes were fired at Warspite, three of which fell so close on the starboard bow and beam, that splinters from the shells hit the funnel, motor-cutter and starboard HA director.

(...)

In total, Warspite had fired 213 high-explosive and armour-piercing shells. Results were disappointing. Although one of the forts and a few of the batteries were silenced, others survived practically intact, and were able to put up a stiff resistance to the attacking troops.
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vannor said:
Is, your hypothosis that Heavy gun bombbardment without H.E. is ineffective?
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Shipwreck said:
My hypothesis is that if they had used HC instead of AP against El Hank (and AP instead of HC at Mili Island), the results would have been the same as historically.
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During the bombardment of Brest, HMS Warspite used both AP and HE. Results were disappointing.

As noted earlier in the thread, *hard-targets* remain largely unaffected by near misses, even when using 14-inch, 15-inch or 16-inch guns against them.
 
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HMS Warspite vs Battery Goldbrunner, September 1944

HMS Warspite vs Battery Goldbrunner, September 1944

Battleship Warspite by V.E. Tarrant :

Early on the morning of 10 September 1944, Warspite, in company with the destroyer Ulysses and HM tug Growler, sailed from Portsmouth bound for a bombarding position thirteen miles west of Cap Le Havre, which she reached at 09:45. The object of the bombardment was to assist the British Fleet Corps's assault on Le Havre by silencing enemy gun batteries. Spotting was by aircraft.

Four our of five allotted targets, and two others indicated by aircraft, were engaged at the extreme range of 32,000 yards. In all Warspite expended 304 x 15-inch shells.

The first of these targets, engaged at 10:05, consisted of three 170mm (6.7-inch) guns in casements [see Battery Goldbrunner at Clos-des-Ronces]. Despite two direct hits and a third in the mouth of one of the emplacements, two of these guns were still firing at Warspite when the ship withdrew; 183 rounds were expended at this target.
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It takes two to tango.... The facts are true, but I think you guys are still being pretty unfair to the poor ole Warspite. The guns and shells of Warspite were designed to poke great big holes in warships with up to approximately 12 (guessing the thickness her shells could penetrate) inches of face hardened steel. Those bunkers she was firing at were composed of highly reinforced concrete two to three dozen feet thick DESIGNED to repel battleship HE and AP rounds. What I am trying to say that it is unfair to blame the guns for their inablity to knock out the gun emplacments but rather the failure of the type of ammunition to penetrate the bunkers.

That is my two cents worth, and here are two cents more...

In modern warfare, if trying to neutralize gun emplacments such as those present at Normandy, I think that the "bunker buster" bomb would be the most efficient method of dealing with emplacments. If the use of naval guns were desired for such an action then a new type of round would need to be designed to deal with highly reinforced concrete.

Unfortunatly planners back in WW2 didn't have the toys we do today, so had to make the most of what they had.
 
maximusslade said:
That is my two cents worth, and here are two cents more...

In modern warfare, if trying to neutralize gun emplacments such as those present at Normandy, I think that the "bunker buster" bomb would be the most efficient method of dealing with emplacments. If the use of naval guns were desired for such an action then a new type of round would need to be designed to deal with highly reinforced concrete.

Unfortunatly planners back in WW2 didn't have the toys we do today, so had to make the most of what they had.
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Tallboy, grand-slam?
 
Yes, near misses from the Tallboy did send the Tirpitz to the bottom. Without actual data, I would have to assume that a near miss of a Tallboy against one of those gun bunkers would make life extremely unpleasant *sarcasm* for the gun crews inside, but I doubt that it would take the gun itself out of action. Secondly, using the Tirpitz as an example, direct hits with any high altitude bomb was extremely difficult, if memory serves me correctly, not a single Tallboy hit the Tirpitz. If you can't hit a big target like the Tirpitz, it would take a lot of luck to hit a much smaller in size bunker.

As for the 2000lb concrete bomb. I dont think it would do any better than a 2700lb AP shell. Again, my personal thoughts.
 
maximusslade said:
Secondly, using the Tirpitz as an example, direct hits with any high altitude bomb was extremely difficult, if memory serves me correctly, not a single Tallboy hit the Tirpitz.
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At least 3 direct hits were achieved with the Tallboys on Tirpitz : 1 on 15 September 1944 (Operation Paravane) and 2 on 12 November 1944 (Operation Catechism).
 
maximusslade said:
Yes, near misses from the Tallboy did send the Tirpitz to the bottom. Without actual data, I would have to assume that a near miss of a Tallboy against one of those gun bunkers would make life extremely unpleasant *sarcasm* for the gun crews inside, but I doubt that it would take the gun itself out of action. Secondly, using the Tirpitz as an example, direct hits with any high altitude bomb was extremely difficult, if memory serves me correctly, not a single Tallboy hit the Tirpitz. If you can't hit a big target like the Tirpitz, it would take a lot of luck to hit a much smaller in size bunker.

As for the 2000lb concrete bomb. I dont think it would do any better than a 2700lb AP shell. Again, my personal thoughts.
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Yes but it should not be outwith technical possiblity to fit a modern guidance
head to a tallboy. One would probably have to change the tailfin to remove
the spin that Wallace designed into it. Then since the scrapping of
the V-bombers there is nothing adapted to carry one.
 
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