SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - ASW Aircraft Apr-May43

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Would the 4gb patch or the GWX 16km atmosphere have anything to do with the lack of ASW aircraft ?

No.

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Originally Posted by gi_dan2987 (Post 2156500)

Now you understand my suspicions. Do you know what the Indianapolis's cargo was? The atomic bomb that hit Hiroshima! You don't think those guys might have known too much? Have you ever heard of the "Let it happen on purpose" theory? Know it's going to happen, let it, then play dumb and point the finger at the other guy? The Captain took the fall, and surprisingly offed himself with a pistol. How convenient. All loose ends tied up..... :shifty:

Oh, well - I think you are over-reacting a little on this one. The captain was eventually (many years later) exonerated for negligence of duty as, according to intelligence received by him, no enemy U-boat activity was expected in the area he was passing through. The point of the Japanese U-boat captain, in his testimony, was that it would not have mattered much if he had zig-zagged because he had sunk him anyway.

If it was a cover-up it was probably more because Indianapolis received an inaccurate intelligence evaluation and the time it took to discover its loss and come to the assistance of its crew. This incidence, to my knowledge, was the only one where the USN captain was court-martialled for losing his ship in the Pacific. Some brass may not have liked this incidence to happen when things were going so "well" - the nuke and everything. That said, nobody would have blamed him for zig-zagging. Captain's decision.

Incidentally, less emotional later investigations have shown that only a few of the crew members were actually killed by sharks. Nothing like what was pictured by Robert Shaw in "Jaws".

Fred

It's pretty hard to tell if somebody is over-reacting through an email. I was just making an observation.

One of the issues of Slapton Sands was that several killed officers were 'bigoted' individuals with actual knowledge of the D-day operations-day and date. It was not known if they had been captured by the German Schnellboots or not. All of the bodies of the bigoted officers were recovered and no alterations to D-day planning were necessary. Additionally, when a crossword puzzle with "overlord, sword, bigot and Omaha innocently later appeared in a London newspaper, allied SHAEF headquarters and British intelligence had heart attacks.:o

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Originally Posted by gi_dan2987 (Post 2156500)

I'm quite aware that the Indianapolis carried the bomb. No one aboard knew what the cargo was, but if the brass was worried that they would blab a secret, the crew and officers easily could have been sequestered in a R&R area in the Marianas and a valuable ship saved. There was only a week between the Indianapolis' sailing and the dropping of the bomb. Trusting that a Japanese submarine would stumble on it and that it would sink it before a signal could get off is kind of a lousy way to ensure security. Especially when you consider that the ship was also unescorted during the long voyage to Tinian from San Francisco carrying it's unique cargo as well. Apparently, they weren't worried about a submarine sinking the atomic bomb during that longer voyage although in retrospect, they probably should have.

What you have is complacency perhaps mixed with contempt for a beaten navy, from the brass being covered up. Not a conspiracy to silence a crew.

It is worth noting that the big troops carrying liners routinely sailed unescorted. At the end of 1942 Queen Mary made an Atlantic crossing with 16.000 troops onboard, had an u-boat got lucky...

That was because of the high speeds they could maintain for long periods, speeds which would render an escort as innefective in an ASW escort role.

Not forgetting that even when uses as an AA escort, manouvering at such speeds run an increased risk of collisions:

http://ww2today.com/2nd-october-1942...ks-hms-curacoa