Friendly fire and a disturbing moral dilemma

[Platapus]

Just had my first encounter with friendly fire. There is nothing friendly about friendly fire. :nope:

I was returning to Pearl. Came across an American TF. Decided to give it a wide berth but evidently not wide enough. I was running TC pretty high and before I could stop it, I was dead. Oh well it was only late 41 so a career restart is not that big of a deal.

As this was my first FF death, it started me thinkin.

If you have an American destroyer trying to kill you and you can't evade, would you sink an American ship to save your own?

This being a game, the answer is truly academic. But I wonder what I would do in real life?

In real life, would there be a way for a submarine to "communicate" with a surface craft? Would hammering morse code on the hull be understood?

Would I kill an American destroyer and its crew to save my submarine and crew?

Honestly, I would probably continue to evade in a desperate attempt to escape.

An interesting moral dilemma that I would rather not have to think about.

[Munchausen]

In real life, would there be a way for a submarine to "communicate" with a surface craft?

:03: I think that would depend on the color of your sub and whether or not you had nurses aboard. Especially those with a double-D cup size.

[Torplexed]

If I was an American sub skipper in the Pacific being attacked by an American destroyer, the first thing I'd do is pop to the surface and get as many men overboard as I could. Why? Because it's about the most un-Japanese maneuver possible. Unlike the U-Boats, the Japanese sub skippers almost never came up to scuttle. It was escape or die with them. Hopefully that would raise a few questions in the destroyer captain's head. There's always a small chance the familiar silhouette of an American sub would be recognized once on the surface too. Plus, my chances underwater against the state of the art Allied ASW are almost nil.

[Stealhead]

Well that is why i like to call "Friendly fire" fraticide(killing ones brother) it is a much more accurate way to name such a thing. The navy used the signal lights to send codes to suspect ships or aircraft to know friend from foe also there was IFF(identify friend or foe) once we had radar common and this gave out some form of siganl that another allied radar would "see" that way they would know they where seeing a friend. for a an allied sub being under the water when near an unaware friendly unit was near would be the most dangerous thing to do as while submerged they had no way to know who you where. I guess you could surface if they began attacking you but that is still risky if you are too far away your "buddy" might still send some kind regards at your sub before they realize your a friend.At the same time even in modern times mistakes are made it is just part of the fog of war I suppose. In SH4 when I know I am getting close to an allied TF I stay on the surface and keep an eye to be sure I dont sail into the line of travel of thier ships lest they run me over but doing this i have never been fired on. Attacking your own allied unit even if he thinks you are the bad guy is really dumb the primary reason for this as soon as they see that you are firing torpedos at them they will no doubt belive you to be a Jap and they will call in everyone else to kill your ass.The only opiton in real life in any form of fraticide situation would be to attempt to signal to whom ever that you are on the same team one clear way to do this would be not to return fire.For an Navy sub the best bet would be to surface and get someone on the signal light ASAP and fire a signal flare off as well having several men suddenly show up topside may appear that one is getting ready to man the guns not a good impression to make.In odern times there are things(what i wont say) that do attempt to make it clear who the good guys are to aircraft and such and most of the time aircraft are only to attack when called to do so by another unit this is a good way to avoid mistakes.

[Kron161]

On 3 october 1944, japanese submarine RO-41 sunk USS Shelton (DE407). In preparation for antisub sweeps, All US submarines in the area were ordered to report their location. USS Seawolf (SS197) failed to do so.


Later that day, an US airplane marked with dye the position of a submarine that had just submerged. USS Rowell (DE403) arrived to the site shortly afterwards and located a submarine in his sonar. The submarine acted in a extrange way and between depth charges explosions, the submarine could be heard sending long morse dashes and dots which USS Rowell did not recognize as a valid code or recognition signal. Then after a hedghog attack, a large air bubble, oil and debris appeared on the surface. The next day, 4th October, Seawolf was again directed to report. She did not respond and was later declared lost with all hands.


RO-41 arrived Japan unmolested and in his log, no depth charge attack was recorded.


Could Seawolf had attacked the US destroyer that sunk them?. Possibly. But obviously, that is not what they did choose to do.

[Fincuan]

Here (http://www.jmlavelle.com/gunnel/patrol1.htm) is a story of USS Gunnel's first patrol in the Atlantic, the highlights of which contain a short recap on their encounter with an Allied convoy and its escorts(about midway down the page). They were also attacked by a US P-40 during the same patrol, and on top of that all their main engines failed during the patrol because of a mechanical fault.

Here's the short story: The Gunnel spotted masts in the horizon and submerged. It was unable to identify the escorts until a British flag was spotted, at which point the escorts had also aquired the sub on their sonar. The Gunnel fired a red smoke(a submarine emergency signal in allied navies) and was told to surface via Morse code over the sonar. The sub trained its rear tubes towards the nearest escort and complied, and was recognised as friendly upon surfacing.

[breadcatcher101]

Never had any friendly fire running stock, are you guys using mods?

[Platapus]

I am running RFB

[theluckyone17]

I'd sooner think the original poster simply ran into an escort. I've done the same thing a few times myself. High TC can be a pain in the arse, sometimes.

I just had a close call with a Jap merchant this afternoon. I had my boat on course to Midway, after patrolling just off the Jap home islands. Out in the middle of nowhere (I thought, but then realized it was a direct route towards Iwo Jima), SH4 kicked me out of 2048 TC and the lookouts called out a ship. The target was at 160 degrees, medium range. I called battlestations, snapped off two fish. Poor luck, and SH4 would've dropped me out of TC as the target was ramming me instead.

I've done the same going into port... left high TC running, and T-boned a destroyer or stationary merchant.

Come to think of it, I've had a couple instances with enemy forces, too. A Jap task force caught me with my pants down in bad weather, high TC. Another incident involved shore guns. Both times, by the time I switched to the bridge view to figure out what was going on, I had shell holes in the boat. Not good.

[Loud_Silence]

If i was in that situation, i would just SURFACE. Hopefuly somebody aboard the destroyer will notice that my sub isnt japanses or german (WTF ARE YOU DOING WITH A BALAO OFFSHORE PORTSMOUTH???)

[Armistead]

Never had it happen, played stock, RFB and TMO, but only one RFB career.

Is this a RFB thing...if so, fairly cool idea.

I take that back, I once got attack by a merchant, wasn't US, but an allied merchant.

[Sensekhmet]

When ORP Jastrzab was attacked by the Brits it popped to the surface immediately and started signalling 'friendly'. Still, a few men were killed on the bridge by small caliber artillery fire before the Brits figured out it wasn't a u-boat. :( The rest of the crew was picked up and the boat scuttled on the spot IIRC.
There was also a story of one of Polish submarines pretending it was a friendly fire situation to avoid a German plane. I think it was either the Sep or Orzel, big ocean boats that perhaps looked a bit like u-boats to the crew of the plane. For some reason the submarine's crew couldn't dive fast enough so they signalled, waved and fired signal flares, all the while turning away from the plane because the conning tower had a huge letter (in this case either S or O I think) painted on one side that would be a dead giveaway. In the end the submarine dived and the plane didn't attack.

[tomoose]

I don't think RFB or TMO have "friendly fire" built in. I'm guessing the TC caused a collision which still gives the same result......one sunk sub. I have seen "accidental" collisions etc but nothing I would say was "friendly fire" in the true sense of the expression.

If RFB or TMO has this aspect I've not seen it yet. I was under the impression that friendly ships simply did not fire on other friendlies as "recognition" was automatic so to speak.

Curious.:hmmm:

[Platapus]

The only collision was the collision between my Sub and the Naval Artillery shells (ouch!) It did not hurt long. But no, there was no sub to ship collision.

There WAS a Sub to Ocean Bottom collision but I was dead by then. :D

Getting back to one of my original questions, could a sub communicate with a surface ship by banging morse code with a hammer?

[Folducker]

I had one that left me scratching my head; I was stalking a large convoy. Had them on radar at about 15 miles. All of a sudden, an escort peels off and charges out at an angle nowhere near me. A gray "sunken ship" marker appears on the map, the destroyer rejoins the convoy. Apparently, the Jap destroyer attacked another sub?

[Stealhead]

Someone already gave the answer to the morse code question it did not work the DE kept attacking. There was no "normal" way to contact anything on the surface in a sub. Pretty much you had to be very careful in a sub to not be mistaken by your own surface forces as not friendly. If you did get mistaken say by air your only hope would be to signal them and hope they see before they do any or too much damage if you are under and being attacked this is even worse as you could surface but there is a very good chance that seeing as that they think you are a foe they will start pumping various forms of lead at your sub as soon as it starts to surface and being under is just as bad in that situation only god can help you. But taking your chances below seem better than anything else. i have seen some old film of allied ships attacking a german U-boat and they where pumping 20mm and 40mm and what all else at the thing before it was really even at the surface odds of surfacing near a ship that belives you to be axis and survie nill. Chances of making it by staying under low but better than nil.Basicly a sub just had to be very careful when near his own unware friendly units beyond that sometimes **** happens.It did work in the one story but this time the sub was able to send a signalthat was seen and the allied ship saw it and acted of course you have to rely on everyone doing the correct action and that does not always happen also even when something follows protocall it could always be a ruse.

[Dr. Evil]

The periscope works both ways. In low light, I'd point it at the attacker, stick a flashlight in the eyepiece, and do a Bart Mancuso. :D

Otherwise, in daylight, just pull the sheets off my bed, surface the boat, and wave for everything I'm worth...

[Armistead]

Also with the Rowell they were in a no shoot sub zone. They knew US subs were in the region. The Seawolf made no attempt to escape. Obvious the Captain was more in a rage for revenge.

They even painted a sub kill marker on the bridge. Imagine how they felt when they had to paint over it. No doubt the Rowell took out the Seawolf.

Imagine how they must have felt...being killed by your own....had to be terrible.