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Originally Posted by Greyco
I had a simular problem today.
I went to raid Tobruk to help out Fieldmarshall Rommel.
For the ones who aren't that familiar with Tobruk:
There are 3 ships moored outside of the harbor. One of them is a C2 but is rather hard to sink because with the nets and destroyers nearby it's hard to get in a good position.
But the 2 others, one trooptransport and one LCT (? that ship with the tanks on top), are easier.
I got into position without any problems, decided to take on the trooptransport first because it's worth more renown. I thought I fired perfect, and it would be a oneshot kill. Well I hit it right in the middle but nothing would happen.
No worries, perhaps she would go down silently so I got in position for the LCT. Again I thought that I fired so perfect this would be easy. But except from a truck that dropped into sea nothing happened.
Scared of incoming Zerstörers and wasting more torpedoes I decided to withdraw back and wait it out.
When I check my periscope an hour later I saw that the LCT's bow was low in the water but was stable so I fired another fish at her rear and that did the job.
So now I switched my attention to the trooptransport and she was laying there quietly, a bit twisted over to port. Losing patience I fired a 2nd torp.
I retreated once more confident that the job was done. But after several hours which I used to reload my tube1 (quite risky doing this in the mids of destroyers) I still hadn't received the 'She's going down' message so I went back a third time and fired a third fish into her. Now she began banking heavily, decks awash and she would go down. At least that's what I thought. I kept waiting and waiting but this was one determined boat.
I wasn't going to waste any more torps on this one. I maneuvred my boat between the trooptransport and the coastline. Placing me out of fire from the deckguns of the trooptransport and hiding myself behind the trooptransport for the fire of the destroyers. I surfaced and began pounding her on the other side. In the meanwhile the destroyers where shooting back at me but their shells were plunging on the trooptransport or falling onto the coastline. By the way, the stationary destroyer didn't moved or anything in the whole proces, and the others seemed to be having problems with the subnets because they were acting weird aswell.
Anyway, the trooptransport sank, don't know whether it was by my doing or the friendly fire but I got credited and that's what count. I was able to sneak to safety without problems. (although one shell came awfully close)
And after 13hours (!) in that small harbor I finally got those 2 to the bottom.
Luckily I knew from earlier experiences that the water was deep enough to sink them, otherwise I wouldn't have been so determined.
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Yeah! What is up with those troop transports?!?
In casablanca, I sank 4 fish into one and 5 fish...5!!....into the one next to it and they werent even decks awash. Targeted bow to stern and at least another 5-10 feet worth of sinking space and they wouldnt go down.
Same thing in a convoy a few days later....1000 meter depths so no "harbor excuse". 2 fish, one slightly ahead of center and one slightly behind, 5 m down, a magnetic under the tail (only blew off one propeller and she kept steaming at 8 knots on a single prop) and one more near the front, 3 m down at perfect 90 degrees. Still floating!
They need to soften these troop transports up a bit. These things are over armored!