Subs vs loaded carrier question

Indeed, there were many such radars installed and used but they were in their infancy during early WW2.  A submersible can only be seen by radar when it is on the surface, and the flat sheets and angular uncoated metal constructions of the time (covered in surface protrusions) were probably much easier to detect than any modern type of submarine or warship built with radar profile in mind, even though modern ships would be much larger and higher above the water than a sub deck and tower.  The surface of the sea is hardly flat, if it were, it would probably be incredibly easy to detect a WW2 sub with a very simple modern radar…

However, the sub had to be on the surface.  Early in the war, subs often attacked on the surface, to save power for the defensive and cruise, to use their deck gun instead of valuable torpedoes, to provoke surrender (by making their ominous presence obvious), and to maintain full situational awareness.  This tactic would have been suicidal in the presence of fast escorts or airplanes.  Early in the war, the Allies simply (esp US) did not internalize the devastating lessons of WW1 unrestricted sub warfare by having a plan in place to defend the US coast, much less slow ships travelling in the open sea.

One of the early problems was how to even deploy aircraft in the open Atlantic where land based planes could not reach (in the era before cheap drop tanks and aerial refueling).  While there were substantial developments in Fleet Carriers, these large ships are too powerful and expensive to be used to escort merchant shipping.  They even had to mount 1 time use spitfires without floats onto regular ships with an explosive catapult.  The pilot would attempt to intercept the sub or raider then ditch in the sea near his ship to be recovered.  Most ships smaller than a cruiser would not have dedicated float planes.

As the war progressed, escort carriers and seaplanes, and radar equipped land based bombers began to cover the gap.

Also, while radar would allow you to know precisely where  a sub was on the attack, more sweeping methods were needed to determine where the subs were, in general.  These included intercepting and triangulating radio transmissions from the subs;  once the german subs were equipped with airborne detection radars, the active signals from these radars could be tracked with complementary allied equipment.  Also, once the enigma code and naval codes were well known, very early in the war, the german spy network was completely compromised by the allies (especially the very sloppy methods of the Abwehr (german fleet intel), the Allies came to know when and where the Germans would attack, permitting them to anticipate where the subs would be and where they would be heading.

They also came to understand, I think, Hitler’s disdain for sea power.  This meant that the Kriegsmarine wasted their powerful surface ships in pyrrhic engagements, failed to attain any strategic sea power, and instead began to rely entirely on the subs as a method of suppressing the allies economically (as opposed to bombing or blockading them).  Because so much reliance was placed on this strategy, defeating it was simple;  kill all the subs.

So yes, by the end of the war, there were abundant resources and methods for finding subs on or below the surface, and instead of allowing them to crash dive and escape,  many of them were hunted by coordinated teams until their power ran out and they were forced to surface or surrender.  Very few of the German subs that entered the Med through the Gibraltar current made the return journey.  The effectiveness of submersibles as a weapon went from 10 kills per sub lost in 1941 to 2 subs lost for every kill at the end of the war.

I saw a documentary which reckoned at one point they were engaging escorted convoys on the surface at night and didn’t know they could be detected by ship board radar.

@GiddyXray:

Just changing the subject a bit: i know the rules are the rules, but IMHO the rule is wrong that planes can not shoot at subs! Historically the biggest treat for subs were planes at that time! Remember that at that time they were submercibles. They would dive when sighting an enemy. It was easy for planes to spot a sub. Plus, they were quicker to attack, then the sub to submerge. A more fitting rule would be that planes would have one shot at a sub. But this would make game rules more complex…

@simon33:

That was the rule in classic. I also think that the rule is not a valid reflection on history.

A single combat round assault was OP when a few planes were available to fight Subs.
OOB now, Subs gets more hope of survival.
I still house play Subs and planes differently and it satisfy both needs for simplicity and historical depiction of planes as Subs killers.

@ShadowHAwk:

First of all rules are the Rules.
But they have a pretty good historical basis, sure there was airborne radar but that was not available till 1944 before that most planes where merely spotters.
Only specific planes could engage subs, and only when armed with depth charges. Most of the time planes doing CAP would be fighters and well a fighter VS a submerged sub is useless.
Also subs would attack at night making fighters useless as night takeoffs and landings where not something done during WW2, it was already tricky on fixed airfields and it was a no go for carriers. Also it would be silly to asume that damage to the carrier would leave the planes intact. Violent explosions, shaken up, slided atop of eachother to 1 side. all these things make planes a lot less flyable afterwards.

The game should be playable, for every rule we can find a reason why it is silly. Cruisers VS a carrier would also leave the planes out of the fight because the attacker would attack at night. And why would the planes attack a sub when there is a carrier there as well? Why can a single destroyer stop a whole battlefleet from moving through, surely the destroyer would be gone when it spotted the fleet. Besides 1 destroyer in the vast ocean ( even a flotilla ) would not be able to spot a battlefleet let alone stop it.

Just accept that a lot of rules are there to make the game playable and fun not to make it a simulation.

A strange fact about U-boat casualties in WWII: 264 were sunk by warships while 250 were sunk by airplanes by themselves. Also, 37 U-boats were sunk due to team work between land-base aircrafts and warships.

From my POV, it is a factual evidence that planes were efficient Anti-Sub weapons.
Usually, Fighters (mostly F4F-Wildcat) and TBF Avengers worked together to get many kills in ATO 27 u-boats by F4F paired with TBF/ 8 subs were credited to TBF alone.

PBY Catalinas were good too: they sunk 30 U-boats all alone, and 8 others in team work.
Near 60 u-boats were sunk by B-24 Liberator all alone.

Of course, during years 1943, 1944 and 1945, they were more active and efficient.
1942 was the turning point.

Source: u-boat.net

Here is an interesting plane, able to do a lot by itself during 1942 and 1943 (near 20 u-boats sunk):
Lockheed Hudson Patrol Bomber

Hudsons began to receive ASV radar in early 1940, and were assigned specifically to antisubmarine duty beginning in August of 1940 from Aldergrove, Northern Ireland. In March, 1941 No. 269 Squadron began operations from Iceland. One of the Hudson’s first successes against U-boats was on August 27, 1941, when an Iceland-based Hudson bombed and damaged U-570 and, after repeated strafing passes, observed the U-boat crew to surrender. The Hudson circled the U-boat and called additional aircraft and ships to the scene. U-570 was indeed captured intact, although the crew had thrown the Enigma machine and codebooks overboard. Hudsons went on to achieve two dozen additional successes against U-boats. An Africa-based RAF Hudson of No. 608 Squadron was the first aircraft to sink a U-boat with rockets.

The Hudson was also used by the RAF as a bomber, some 35 taking part in the RAF’s second “thousand bomber” raid. Hudsons flown by the RAF, RCAF, RAAF, and RNZAF fought in virtually every maritime theater of the war, including the Mediterranean, South Pacific, Indian Ocean, North Atlantic, Caribbean, and even the East Coast of the United States in support of US forces. Hudsons of No. 161 Squadron were used in clandestine operations, landing in open fields of occupied Europe at night to deliver or retrieve agents or to provide weapons or information to partisans. Many nations used the Hudson to train the crews of bombers and patrol aircraft. Many also served as transport aircraft.

The first two U-boat sinkings achieved by American forces were both achieved by US Navy Hudsons, and the first sinking by the USAAF was also by a Hudson. The first submarine sinkings by Brazilian and RNZAF forces were also by Hudsons (the former assisted by a PBY Catalina).

http://uboat.net/allies/aircraft/hudson.htm

Thanks Baron for looking up the facts. This supports the suggestion that planes should have an opening shot at subs.
At the same time this would change the dynamics of the game a lot. But after all this was not a discussion about changing the rulebook!

@GiddyXray:

Thanks Baron for looking up the facts. This supports the suggestion that planes should have an opening shot at subs.
At the same time this would change the dynamics of the game a lot. But after all this was not a discussion about changing the rulebook!

I still don’t think it is a good a idea to return to classic rule for planes vs Sub.

@ShadowHAwk:

First of all rules are the Rules.

Just accept that a lot of rules are there to make the game playable and fun not to make it a simulation.

I don’t share this perspective. Such way of thinking would not have given Destroyer, Cruiser, Artillery, MechInf, TcBs, AAA units. A&A would  have stayed in Classic format.
I much rather prefer OOB second edition rules.
And usually, simplicity and better historical depiction are two major criterias which drive improvement in such war game.

Still waiting for the 8.8 Flak (AAA) to get at least 1 defence against all attackers additional to their air capabilities ;-)

Mr. Baron,

My assertion was only that planes, by themselves, are not effective weapons against submarines.  Nor is any other one thing I listed, by itself.

Does the Fighter unit in AxA represent a Brewster Buffalo or a Black Widow?  Answer;  Both and neither, and all of the other planes used in the war as well, but none specifically.  If it represented a PBY, why cant it just land on the water?  Why not add that?

The answer is, well you could.  That’s how wargames evolve;  people have pointed out all sorts of fairly easy things to integrate into the game that wouldn’t require major tweaks to be made to how the game operates.  But AxA is already at the point where the units added in the most recent iteration are very slight variations on what came before.  Cruisers are 1.5 destroyers.  Tac Bombers are reversed fighters…mechs are infantry that move 2…  You can add in SPGs and ATGs (reversed tank 2/3 for 5) but again, they aren’t going to add a whole lot to the game because its a d6 based game, and it has 4X (economy, diplomacy, building and battle) in just the right proportions.

Economy is robust, but simple.  Unit choice is rich, but not confusing.  Diplomacy is a thorny tack on, but it creates new choices for the Axis.  There are a ton of teams, but they’re all different.

If you mess with any of these things or increase their complexity/rules, you risk bogging the game down when it is already 8-12 hours long…

Try Twilight Imperium holy crap Axa + MOOrion in space…

@ShadowHAwk:

@Baron:

@GiddyXray:

Thanks Baron for looking up the facts. This supports the suggestion that planes should have an opening shot at subs.
At the same time this would change the dynamics of the game a lot. But after all this was not a discussion about changing the rulebook!

I still don’t think it is a good a idea to return to classic rule for planes vs Sub.

@ShadowHAwk:

First of all rules are the Rules.

Just accept that a lot of rules are there to make the game playable and fun not to make it a simulation.

I don’t share this perspective. Such way of thinking would not have given Destroyer, Cruiser, Artillery, MechInf, TcBs, AAA units. A&A would  have stayed in Classic format.
I much rather prefer OOB second edition rules.
And usually, simplicity and better historical depiction are two major criterias which drive improvement in such war game.

If you are going to change all the rules and unit profiles sure go ahead but that requires a lot of play testing as well.

There are plenty of rules in this game that have no base in history or even contradict history.
There are plenty of units that have weird quirks that are completly ignoring history.
If you are going to make things better then revise the whole game and all of the unit profiles not just because you want to attack subs with planes change this 1 rule.

Some things that are worst then the submarine rule.
Aircraft range ( really a plane attacking from WUS in SZ91 ), could be why subs are immume to them :)

That point bothers me too.
I will post something in the house rule thread discussing this topic.
I believe calculating 1 MP per SZ in NCM phase while 2 MPs per SZ during CM phase for all aircrafts can works without adding too much complexity.
This may better simulate how difficult to spot enemy in open Sea and makes planes units less ominous weapons. That way, warships gets a better projection of power at sea compared to planes, specifically strategic bombers.

Aircraft are trumping units in this game;  they are better than their cost, more flexible than any other unit (since they can be on land or sea).  They prevent the game from being like Risk; where only numbers matter and all the units are the same.

This is just like the sub rule, its to represent the overpowering advantage aircraft had and have over all other types of unit during that era.  Not sure what objection that raises, except that they are OverPowered.  Which is true in real life also, airpower is OP compared to its costs and that’s why they keep using it.