What are you reading right now?

[Sepp von Ch.]

Today delivered J. J. Baart´s book "Schnellboote". Really good and comprehensive story of the Schnellbootwaffe with the base in Germany, France and Holland.

[Sepp von Ch.]

Gentlemen, is this book Under the Jolly Roger. British Submariners at War 1939-1945 good? This book contains photos, color profiles or only text?

http://www.amazon.com/Under-Roger-Br...er+submariners

[Jimbuna]

http://www.abebooks.co.uk/Under-Joll...5/848475400/bd

[Sepp von Ch.]

Thanks jimbuna!

[Jimbuna]

Your welcome

[Sepp von Ch.]

Harald F o c k´s Die deutschen Schnellboote 1914-1945 (technically oriented book) and thereto Korvettenkapitän Werner Töniges (history of the E-Boats deployment and curriculum vitae of this german ace). Really super books.

[Red Brow]

I wish more Japanese WWII ship captains would have written books about their war exploits, but I was gratified to read the war account of Capt. Tameichi Hara who was a well celebrated Japanese destroyer captain through most of the war. He was the designer of Japan's revised doctrine for torpedo aiming calculations which made Japan's ship fired torpedoes much more accurate. This was very important since Japan's new torpedoes could do a range of 40,000 meters at 36 knots! At the time the US fish could only do 8,000 meters at 32 knots, and the British could do 10,000 meters at 30 knots.
Not only did the Japanese torpedoes have great range; their oxygen-fueled torpedoes did not leave bubble trails.

The Japanese kept their torpedo stats totally secret during the war and as a result sometimes the Allies would blame Japanese subs for torpedoes that were actually coming from Japanese destroyers that seemed too far off to be a torpedo danger.

This captain was in a line of ships where the lead one hit and ran over PT-109 commanded by JFK.

This Captain also mentions an American routine with bombs in one Pacific battle area where allied bombers would skip bombs into the sides of Japanese ships just like the 617 Squadron, RAF, "The Dambusters" did to German defended dams. Apparently when this US tactic was used Japanese ship captains had no choice but to kiss their ars good bye. But Tameichi Hara, who was known as a problem solver, was asked to set his mind to figure out how to survive such an attack. Turns out he never did UNTIL his own ship was so attacked and in the few moments of on coming terror he solved the mystery and his ship survived. Necessity is the mother of invention!

His last sea mission was on the light cruiser Yahagi that went out with the Yamato on the suicide mission "Operation Ten-Go".

One funny trick he played - earlier in the war - was when his destroyer was set upon by a large force of American planes. Few Japanese destroyers at that time could survive such attacks. It was very cloudy so he tried a last second trick - he yelled for his engine room to ignore standard safety procedure and to pour on the fuel above what was considered safe. He produced a huge backfire that sent a huge fireball up through the stack. The ship shuddered and slowed to a stop. To the circling American planes it appeared like they had scored a death hit on the ship and so they flew off. The cloud cover obscured the fact that the ship didn't sink.

This captain was very inventive compared to your average ship captain. I felt like he was the equivalent in inventive tricks as for example Colonel Robert Scott, who with one P-40 convinced the Japanese in his Asian zone that they were up against many planes since he had his plane repainted over and over again for multiple missions. Or the equal to Panzer (Kurt) Meyer a Waffen SS officer who never failed to come up with wild on-the- spot ideas to defeat his enemies.

Believe me, you want to read this book.

[Sailor Steve]

I still have the copy I bought when it was released in 1961.

[nikimcbee]

I need to finish reading this. It's a pretty interesting book.

[Jimbuna]

Japanese Destroyer Captain

I'll put that on my Christmas list.

[tmccarthy]

I'm also reading Japanese Destroyer Captain by Capt. Tameichi Hara

Very interesting first hand account.

Just finished. Red Mutiny: Eleven Fateful Days on the Battleship Potemkin by Neal Bascomb.

Not a bad retelling of the famous mutiny and 1905 revolution. Quite readable, well sourced and footnoted.

Up next. R.J. Overy's The Road to War about the start of WW2 in Europe.

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

Japanese Destroyer Captain

I'll put that on my Christmas list.

Should be good,

[Sailor Steve]

Still reading the Medieval book, and very slowly due to time spent working on games, but my latest reference arrived just a few minutes ago: Norman Friedman's British Cruisers of the Victorian Era, and it's a good one! Lots of text, lots of pictures, lots of details.

[Herr-Berbunch]

The Middle East: Abraham to Arafat (although it does predate Abraham), but I'm expecting a library book to be ready soon and I'll put out down for that.