Go Back   Kampfgruppe Forums > Military History > World War II > War in the Air

 
We are happy to announce open registration on the KG forums has begun! Welcome everyone!

Reply
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Unread 01-30-2011, 04:24 PM
KG_Jag's Avatar
KG_Jag KG_Jag is offline
Vice Kommandir
Generalfeldmarschall
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: New Braunfels, TX & Reno, NV
Posts: 3,762
Default Operation Chariot

From the recently released Shrapnel Games January 2011 newsletter:

On March 27th , 1942, Kriegsmarine Admiral Donitz was visiting the submarine pens at the French port of Saint Nazaire, when he asked the commander of the 7th submarine flotilla, Kapitänleutnant Herbert Sohler, what he would do if the British attacked his base. Sohler's reply was, "It would be out of the question for the English to enter the harbor". Unfortunately for Sohler within 24 hours he would have the British in the harbor.

The Raid on St. Nazaire, also known as "The Greatest Raid of All", was a daring special operations raid by over 600 British commandos to disable the Nazi controlled port of St. Nazaire. The reason for the raid was simple. Britain's lifeline was the shipping in the Atlantic and to cut that lifeline Germany used their submarine arm and surface raiders. In the opinion of the British high command U-boats could be dealt with fairly easily but surface raiders were a different beast. This way of thinking led to the intensive hunt for the Bismarck when it began to threaten the Atlantic, and its ultimate destruction. The Bismarck had a sister ship though, the Tirpitz, and the mere thought of it operating in the North Atlantic was such a nightmare that six battleships (four Royal Navy, two USN) were always kept ready to hunt her down if she did start to operate against the convoys.

The question of how to destroy the Tirpitz challenged the British. Engaging in battle was always a possibility, but how much damage could she do before they got to engage? Air raids were out of the question, as their wasn't much accuracy in bombing during the early years of the war. This was proven by the continual air raids carried out against Brest in an attempt to damage the German ships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. These air raids proved entirely ineffective, with only minor damage sustained by the vessels.

The Achilles' heel of the Tirpitz was that only one port in France could support it for Atlantic operations, that being the Normandie Dock built in 1932 for the ocean liner, Normandie. Located in St. Nazaire this dock, the largest dry dock in the world at the time, would be the only place Tirpitz could refit and repair if damaged. If the British could deny the use of the port Tirpitz would not be able to operate in the Atlantic, and so plans began to be drawn up for the attack on St. Nazaire.

A surface raid would prove to be too tough, and an air raid even tougher, especially given the enormous number of nearby civilians living around the port. A conventional landing force would be spotted from miles out, so that was out of the question. The only way possible lay in landing commandos. Planning began, and amazingly within seven weeks the plans were put in motion.

The raid, codenamed Operation Chariot, hit St. Nazaire on March 28th. The attack force consisted of sixteen small motor launches, one motor torpedo boat, one motor gun boat and one aging US destroyer, the USS Buchanan, that had been given to the Royal Navy as part of the lend-lease pact. Renamed the HMS Campbeltown she was heavily modified to look like a German Mowe class destroyer. The Campbeltown also received other modifications: everything that wasn't needed was stripped, armor was strategically placed to protect the commandos she would carry into battle, and finally over four tons of time-delayed explosives were placed aboard her. The Campbeltown's main job was to (a) deliver the commandos and (b) ram the docks.

The St. Nazaire port was located up the Loire estuary but due to an unusually high spring tide, shallow bottom vessels (such as the motor launches) and a light vessel (like the stripped Campbeltown, even with all those explosives) could easily avoid the main shipping channel to St. Nazaire and instead travel over the sand banks that would normally create havoc for any approaching ship.

The trip to St. Nazaire was surprisingly uneventful, except for one encounter with a German U-boat 160 miles from St. Nazaire. The attack group had been escorted by two destroyers, who went after the submarine. While not sinking it they managed to drive it away for the time being. The sub, U-593, later radioed a message about spotting the task force, but it was disregarded.
Shortly before the St. Nazaire raid was to go off the RAF bombed several nearby targets. The bombing was carried out as a diversion, but in the end failed as the bombing was not quite up to the usual level and the German garrison commander, Mecke, thought the raids were a ruse and put the harbor on alert.

As the attack group approached the port they were challenged by the German defenders and a few shots were fired off by the shore batteries. The British signaled to hold fire, which seemed to work. After all, in the darkness the Campbeltown did indeed look like a German destroyer. But at the same time it was showing up in an alerted port in a totally unexpected manner. Soon, the batteries opened up again but by then it was too late.
At 0134, the 28th of March 1942, the Campbeltown rammed the docks. The operation had been so precise that she was only four minutes past the scheduled time of ramming. The commandos disembarked and began their rampage of destruction.

While the port was mostly defended by German naval troops they put up a great fight. Aiding them were patrol boats, and lots of heavy guns. The fighting raged on during the night and in the end 169 commandos and Royal Navy personnel lay dead, 215 were captured, and 222 managed to make it back to England aboard the motor launches and another five made it back home via travelling overland all the way to Gibraltar.

At 1135 in the morning the explosives on the Campbeltown went off, killing 360 Germans who were examining the Campbeltown. More importantly, the explosives utterly destroyed the outer gate of the dry dock, rendering the port inoperable until well after the war, 1948 to be exact. The Tirpitz would never threaten the Atlantic. The Greatest Raid of All was a resounding success.

Operation Chariot netted its participants five Victoria Crosses, and eighty other awards for gallantry. The five Victoria Crosses were awarded to: Lt. Cdr. Sam Beattie (CO HMS Campbeltown), Lt. Col. Charles Newman (Military Commander), Cmdr. Robert Ryder (Naval Commander), AB William Savage (Gun Layer on the Pom-Pom Motor Gun Boat 314 -Posthumous), and Sgt. Tom Durrant (Lewis Gun operator on Motor Launch 306 - Posthumous).
__________________
“A government big enough to give you everything you need is strong enough to take everything you have.” Thomas Jefferson--the first Democrat President
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 07:13 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.3
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.