"August 28th, 1941 - Bad day for Russian Navy" Topic
11 Posts
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Virtualscratchbuilder | 21 Mar 2010 8:27 p.m. PST |
I'm thumbing through an old Doubleday book on the Russian Navy and I notice a pattern
August 28th, 1941 over and over again. Two flotilla leaders mined and damaged, six destroyers, two torpedo boats and one submarine mined and sunk, all between Moon Sound and Kronstadt. Anyone know what was up then and there? |
Klebert L Hall | 22 Mar 2010 4:13 a.m. PST |
WW2 in the Baltic revolved around Germany, the USSR, and Finland laying giant mine barrages the try to contain each others' forces. These events happened during the evacuation of Revel, as the Germans attacked – there were apparently as many as 200 Soviet naval vessels operating in the Baltic during that period. Obviously, most of these were pretty small. OTOH, how many good days has the Russian navy had in the last century or so? Neutral seems about all they can hope for, post Age-of-Sail. -Kle. |
David Manley | 22 Mar 2010 4:50 a.m. PST |
They seemed to have some pretty good days chadsing the Germans down the Baltic in 1945, plus their coastal forces were particularly active and sucecssful throughout the war. |
Klebert L Hall | 23 Mar 2010 4:58 a.m. PST |
Yeah, that's pretty much my point – chasing beaten land powers at sea and the exploits of motorboats as high points do not a grand tradition of naval triumph make. -Kle. |
ptdockyard | 23 Mar 2010 6:51 p.m. PST |
Their coastal forces were like the Keystone Cops of MTBs. Their boats were basically a WW1 design, could not conduct a stealthy attack ( G-5s had to launch at 20+kts) and could not even reverse. There were several instances of them hitting EACH OTHER while attacking and sinking a boat or two before the Germans even had a chance to help them. Big events were torpedoing a mini-sub at dock (Black Sea 1942) and sinking a Finnish minelayer. The US Built boats they had sank a few trawlers off Norway but for the most part they lost when engaging German, Finn or Italian small craft. In the target rich environment of the 1945 Baltic evacuation they hit next to nothing while the "beaten" Kreigsmarine evacuated 1 million people. Dave G The PT Dockyard ptdockyard.com |
Aloysius the Gaul | 23 Mar 2010 7:05 p.m. PST |
In the target rich environment of the Baltic in 1945 they still ahd to navigate out of hte Gulf of Finland and it's minefields – they were still clearing those in the 1950's! It is easy to laugh at them, but remember that the Baltic fleet sent a lot of sailors to fight on land, and simply couldn't sail out of Leningrad/Kriondstadt until the minefields had been swept – which was mostly done by the Fins in 1944 and 45! They had almost no ability to do any training, no ability to construct new ships, and no cadre of experienced sailors to do much with. It is one of the rason they are still utterly paranoid about retaining Kaliningrad (formerly Konigsberg) as an ice-free exclave |
Chouan | 24 Mar 2010 2:56 a.m. PST |
Indeed, minefields were still being cleared into the 1970's. With Admiralty Notices relevant to this still being issued in the 1980's. |
Martin Rapier | 26 Mar 2010 1:50 a.m. PST |
"Anyone know what was up then and there?" Had a dig around and found some strength info. On June 22nd 1941 total strength of the Soviet fleet was: 3 x BB 7 x CA 59 x DD 269 x Torpedo Boats 218 x Subs The Red Banner Fleet in the Baltic had two elderly battleships, two cruisers, forty destroyers, one hundred and six torpedo boats, nintey three subs and approx sixty minesweepers (in 1942 they had 57, so 60 is a guess). All from Albert Seatons 'Russo-German War 1941-45'. |
Barin1 | 26 Mar 2010 5:58 a.m. PST |
I have similar figures: By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, cadre ships of the USSR Navy numbered 3 battleships, 7 cruisers, 59 flotilla leaders and destroyers, 218 submarines, 269 torpedo-boats, 22 guard-ships, 88 mine-sweepers, 77 submarine-chasers and several other ships and boats as well as auxiliary vessels. 219 ships including 3 battleships, 2 heavy and 7 light cruisers, 45 destroyers and 91 submarines were under construction as for overall results for Soviet Navy:
"During the Great Patriotic War, the Navy sank 708 warships and auxiliary vessels of Germany and its allies as well as 791 transport vessels of total tonnage of 1, 84 million tons. The validity and adequacy of these data can be proved by different sources. Almost half of the ships and vessels sank was the direct result of the Air Forces attacks. Submarines accounted for 5% of the enemy warships and 20% of transports and supply ships. The destruction of 15% of the German ships and vessels was owing to mine weaponry. The USSR Navy surface ships sank 53 warships and auxiliary vessels as well as 24 enemy transports" Taken from here: rusnavy.com/history/io7.htm unfortunately most of the military-related sites are in Russian
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Barin1 | 26 Mar 2010 6:06 a.m. PST |
and to answer the original question: An emergency re-deployment operation of the Baltic Fleet ships from Tallinn to Kronshtadt carried out between 28 and 30 of August was extremely difficult and dangerous. During this transfer, in conditions of complete enemy dominance on the both shores of the Gulf of Finland, one third out of 153 units of war ships, transport vessels and floating vessels was destroyed by mines and enemy aviation. And, yet, main cadre ships made it safely to Kronshtadt. |
Tango01 | 16 Apr 2021 9:37 p.m. PST |
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