The German aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin was the lead ship in a class of two carriers of the same name ordered by the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany. She was the only aircraft carrier launched by Germany and represented part of the Kriegsmarine's attempt to create a well-balanced oceangoing fleet, capable of projecting German naval power far beyond the narrow confines of the Baltic and North Seas. The carrier would have had a complement of 42 fighters and dive bombers.
Construction on Graf Zeppelin began on 28 December 1936, when her keel was laid down at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel. Named in honor of Graf (Count) Ferdinand von Zeppelin, the ship was launched on 8 December 1938, and was 85% complete by the outbreak of World War II in September 1939. Graf Zeppelin was not completed and was never operational due to shifting construction priorities necessitated by the war. She remained in the Baltic for the duration of the war; with Germany's defeat imminent, the ship's custodian crew scuttled her just outside Stettin in March 1945. The Soviet Union raised the ship in March 1946, and she was ultimately sunk in weapons tests north of Poland 17 months later. The wreck was discovered by a Polish survey ship in July 2006.
Projected recognition drawing of Graf Zeppelin had she been completed in September 1942
Graf Zeppelin was 262.5 meters (861ft)long overall; she had a beam of 36.2m (119ft) and a maximum draft of 8.5m (28ft). At full combat load, she would have displaced 33,550 long tons (34,090t). The ship's propulsion system consisted of four Brown, Boveri & Ciegeared turbines with sixteen oil-fired, ultra-high-pressure LaMont boilers. The power plant was rated at 200,000 shaft horsepower (150MW) and a top speed of 33.8 knots (62.6km/h; 38.9mph). Graf Zeppelin had a projected cruising radius of 8,000 nautical miles (15,000km; 9,200mi) at a speed of 19kn (35km/h; 22mph). She would have had a crew of 1760officers and enlisted men, plus flight crews.[2]
The ship's primary offensive power would have been its aircraft complement. Graf Zeppelin would have carried 42 aircraft as designed: 12 navalizedJunkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bombers, 10 Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters, and 20 Fieseler Fi 167torpedo bombers.[3] Later during the construction process, the aerial complement was reworked to consist of thirty Ju 87s and twelve Bf 109s, and the Fi 167s were removed altogether. As designed, Graf Zeppelin was to be fitted with eight 15 cm SK C/28 guns for defense against surface warships. This number was later increased to sixteen. Her anti-aircraft battery consisted of ten 10.5 cm SK C/33 guns—later increased to twelve—twenty-two 3.7 cm SK C/30 guns, and twenty-eight 2 cm guns. The ship's flight deck was protected with up to 45 millimeters (1.8in) of Wotan Weich steel armor.[lower-alpha 1] A 60mm-thick (2.4in) armored deck was located under the deck to protect the ship's vitals from aerial attacks. Graf Zeppelin had a waterline armor belt that was 100mm (3.9in) thick in the central area of the ship.[2]
Construction and cancellation
The keel for Graf Zeppelin in December 1936
On 16 November 1935, the contract for Flugzeugträger A (Aircraft carrier A)—later christened Graf Zeppelin—was awarded to the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel. Construction of the ship was delayed since Deutsche Werke was working at capacity, and the slipway needed for Graf Zeppelin was occupied by the new battleship Gneisenau, which was launched on 8 December 1936.[5] Work started on Graf Zeppelin on 28 December, when her keel was laid down. She was launched on 8 December 1938, the 24th anniversary of the Battle of the Falkland Islands,[6] and she was christened by Helene von Zeppelin, the daughter of the ship's namesake. At the launching ceremony, Hermann Göring gave a speech.[7] By the end of 1939, she was 85% complete, with a projected completion by the middle of 1940.[8] By September 1939, one carrier-borne wing, Trägergruppe 186, had been formed by the Luftwaffe at Kiel Holtenau, composed of three squadrons equipped with Bf 109s and Ju 87s.[9]
Meanwhile, the German conquest of Norway in April 1940 eroded any chance of completing Graf Zeppelin. Now responsible for defending Norway's long coastline and numerous port facilities, the Kriegsmarine urgently needed large numbers of coastal guns and anti-aircraft batteries. During a naval conference with Hitler on 28 April 1940, Admiral Erich Raeder proposed halting all work on Graf Zeppelin, arguing that even if she was commissioned by the end of 1940, final installation of her guns would need another ten months or more (her original fire-control system had been sold to the Soviet Union under an earlier trade agreement).[10] Hitler consented to the stop work order, allowing Raeder to have Graf Zeppelin's 15cm guns removed and transferred to Norway. The carrier's heavy flak armament of twelve 10.5cm guns had already been diverted elsewhere.[11]
In July 1940, Graf Zeppelin was towed from Kiel to Gotenhafen (Gdynia) and remained there for nearly a year. While there, she was used as a storage depot for Germany's hardwood supply.[12] Just before Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, the carrier was again moved, this time to Stettin, to safeguard her from Soviet air attacks. By November, the German army had pushed deep enough into Russian territory to remove any further threat of air attack and Graf Zeppelin was returned to Gotenhafen. There, she was used as a store ship for timber.[13]
Graf Zeppelin moored at Stettin in mid-1941Aerial view of Graf Zeppelin in Gotenhafen, February 6, 1942
By the time Raeder met with Hitler for a detailed discussion of naval strategy in April 1942, the usefulness of aircraft carriers in modern naval warfare had been amply demonstrated. British carriers had crippled the Italian fleet at Taranto in November 1940, critically damaged the German battleshipBismarck in May 1941 and prevented the battleship Tirpitz from attacking two convoys bound for Russia in March 1942. In addition, a Japanese carrier raid on Pearl Harbor had devastated the American battle fleet in December 1941. Raeder, anxious to secure air protection for the Kriegsmarine's heavier surface units, informed Hitler that Graf Zeppelin could be finished in about a year, with another six months required for sea trials and flight training. On 13 May 1942, with Hitler's authorization, the German Naval Supreme Command ordered work resumed on the carrier.[14]
But daunting technical problems remained. Raeder wanted newer planes, specifically designed for carrier use. Reichsmarshall Hermann Göring, head of the Luftwaffe, replied that the already overburdened German aircraft industry could not possibly complete the design, testing and mass production of such aircraft before 1946. Instead, he proposed converting existing aircraft (again the Junkers Ju 87 and Messerschmitt Bf 109) as a temporary solution until newer types could be developed. Training of carrier pilots at Travemünde would also resume.[14]
The converted carrier aircraft were heavier versions of their land-based predecessors and this required a host of changes to Graf Zeppelin's original design: the existing catapults needed modernization; stronger winches were necessary for the arresting gear; the flight deck, elevators and hangar floors also required reinforcement.[15] Changes in naval technology dictated other alterations as well: installation of air search radar sets and antennas; upgraded radio equipment; an armored fighter-director cabin mounted on the main mast (which in turn meant a heavier, sturdier mast to accommodate the cabin's added weight); extra armoring for the bridge and fire control center; a new curved funnel cap to shield the fighter-director cabin from smoke; replacing the single-mount 20mm AA guns with quadruple Flakvierling 38 guns (with a corresponding increase in ammunition supply) to improve overall AA defense; and additional bulges on either side of the hull to preserve the ship's stability under all this added weight.[16]
The German naval staff hoped all these changes could be accomplished by April 1943, with the carrier's first sea trials taking place in August that year. Towards that end, Chief Engineer Wilhelm Hadeler was reassigned to oversee Graf Zeppelin's completion. Hadeler planned on getting the two inner shafts and their respective propulsion systems operational first, giving the ship an initial speed of 25–26 knots, fast enough for sea trials to commence and for conducting air training exercises. By the winter of 1943–1944 she was expected to be combat-ready.[14]
On the night of 27–28 August 1942, while still moored at Gotenhafen, Graf Zeppelin was the target of the only Allied air attack aimed at her during the war. Three Royal Air ForceAvro Lancaster heavy bombers from 106 Squadron were dispatched against the German aircraft carrier, each one carrying a single "Capital Ship" bomb, a 5,600lb (2,540kg) device with a shaped chargewarhead intended for armored targets.[17] One pilot, who was unable to see the carrier due to haze, dropped his bomb instead on the estimated position of the Gneisenau. Another believed he had scored a direct hit on Graf Zeppelin, but there is no known record of the ship suffering any damage from a bomb strike that night.[18]
Graf Zeppelin in drydock in March 1943
On 5 December 1942, Graf Zeppelin was towed back to Kiel and placed in a floating drydock. It seemed she might well see completion after all, but by late January 1943 Hitler had become so disenchanted with the Kriegsmarine, especially with what he perceived as the poor performance of its surface fleet, that he ordered all of its larger ships taken out of service and scrapped. Raeder was relieved of command shortly thereafter and replaced with the Commander of Submarines Karl Dönitz. Though Dönitz eventually persuaded Hitler to void most of the order, work on all new surface ships and even those nearing completion, including Graf Zeppelin, was halted.[19][20] On 30 January 1943, all major work on the ship ceased, though some limited, temporary work continued until March.[12]
In April 1943 Graf Zeppelin was again towed eastward, first to Gotenhafen, then to the roadstead at Swinemünde and finally berthed at a back-water wharf in the Parnitz River, two miles (3km) from Stettin, where she had been briefly docked in 1941. There she languished for the next two years with only a 40-man custodial crew in attendance.[21] When Red Army forces neared the city in April 1945, the ship's Kingston valves were opened, flooding her lower spaces and settling her firmly into the mud in shallow water. A ten-man engineering squad then rigged the vessel's interior with demolition and depth charges in order to hole the hull and destroy vital machinery. At 6pm on 25 April 1945, just as the Soviets entered Stettin, commander Wolfgang Kähler radioed the squad to detonate the explosives. Smoke billowing from the carrier's funnel confirmed the charges had gone off, rendering the ship useless to her new owners for many months to come.[22]
Fate after the war
Graf Zeppelin in Soviet custody at Świnoujście, April 5, 1947.Bow view of a model of Graf Zeppelin, at the Aeronauticum.
The carrier's history and fate after Germany's surrender was unknown outside the Soviet Union for decades after the war. The Soviets could not repair the ship in the length of time specified by the terms of the Allied Tripartite Commission, so she was designated a "Category C" ship. This classification required that she would be destroyed or sunk in deep water by 15 August 1946.[23] Instead, the Soviets decided to salvage the damaged ship and it was refloated in March 1946. A number of speculations from Western historians about the ship's fate arose in the decades after the end of the war. According to German historian Erich Gröner, after the Soviets raised the scuttled ship, they towed her to Leningrad. While en route, she reportedly struck a mine off Finland during a storm. Gröner claimed that after Graf Zeppelin arrived in Leningrad, she was broken up for scrap in 1948–1949.[12] Naval historians Robert Gardiner and Roger Chesneau state that the ship was towed out of Stettin in September 1947, but she never arrived in Leningrad; they speculated that a mine sank the ship while she was under tow.[8]
According to Soviet records, on 19 March 1947, the Council of Ministers decreed the destruction of former German ships. The first ship to be sunk, Lützow, was sunk off Swinemunde on 22 July 1947. On 14 August Graf Zeppelin was towed into Swinemunde harbor, and two days later to its final position. It was subjected to five series of controlled explosions of 180mm (7.1in) shells and FAB series bombs. The first test imitated a FAB-1000 detonation in the exhaust funnel and lesser bombs below the flight deck. The second in the series was a single FAB-1000 explosion above the flight deck. The third, the fourth and the fifth series imitated penetration of FAB-100, FAB-250 and FAB-500 bombs at flight deck, hangar deck and gun battery deck levels. These bombs were placed in cutouts in their target decks to imitate the effects of dive bombing. Graf Zeppelin remained afloat, and Admiral Yury Rall ordered a torpedo strike. A torpedo fired from an Elco PT boat exploded in the anti-torpedo bulge but did not penetrate the belt armor. A torpedo fired by the destroyer Slavny penetrated the unprotected hull section below the bow elevator; Graf Zeppelin sank 25 minutes later.[24]
Discovery in 2006
The exact position of the wreck was unknown for decades. On 12 July 2006, the research vesselRVSt. Barbara, a ship belonging to the Polish oil company Petrobaltic, found a 265-meter-long (869ft) wreck 55km (34mi) north of Władysławowo, which they thought was most likely Graf Zeppelin. The wreck rests at a depth of more than 80m (260ft) below the surface. After the wreck was located, the Polish Navy began a two-day survey of the wreckage to confirm its identity. Using remote-controlled underwater robots, they concluded that they were "99% certain" it was Graf Zeppelin.[25][26]
↑ "Wotan Weich"—"Wotan soft"—was a type of steel armor developed by the German navy. It had a breaking strength of 65–75kilograms/square millimeters and expanded up to 25percent. "Wotan Hart"—"Wotan Hard"—was more rigid and had a breaking strength of 85–96kg/mm2 and expanded up to 20percent.[4]
Deutschland was the lead ship of her class of heavy cruisers which served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. Ordered by the Weimar government for the Reichsmarine, she was laid down at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel in February 1929 and completed by April 1933. Originally classified as an armored ship by the Reichsmarine, in February 1940 the Germans reclassified the remaining two ships of this class as heavy cruisers. In 1940, she was renamed Lützow, after the unfinished Admiral Hipper-class heavy cruiser Lützow was sold to the Soviet Union the previous year.
The Scharnhorst class was a class of German battleships built immediately prior to World War II. The first capital ships of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine, it comprised two vessels: Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Scharnhorst was launched first, and is considered to be the lead ship by some sources; they are also referred to as the Gneisenau class in some other sources, as Gneisenau was the first to be laid down and commissioned. They marked the beginning of German naval rearmament after the Treaty of Versailles. The ships were armed with nine 28 cm (11 in) SK C/34 guns in three triple turrets; plans to replace these with six 38 cm (15 in) SK C/34 guns in twin turrets were never realized.
Plan Z was the name given to the planned re-equipment and expansion of the Kriegsmarine ordered by Adolf Hitler in early 1939. The fleet was meant to challenge the naval power of the United Kingdom, and was to be completed by 1948. Development of the plan began in 1938, but it reflected the evolution of the strategic thinking of the Oberkommando der Marine over the two decades following World War I. The plan called for a fleet centered on ten battleships and four aircraft carriers which were intended to battle the Royal Navy. This force would be supplemented with numerous long-range cruisers that would attack British shipping. A relatively small force of U-boats was also stipulated.
Nürnberg was a German light cruiser of the Leipzig class built for the Kriegsmarine. She was named after the city of Nuremberg and had one sister ship, Leipzig. Nürnberg was laid down in 1934, launched in December of that year, and completed in November 1935. She was armed with a main battery of nine 15 cm (5.9 in) guns in three triple turrets and could steam at a speed of 32 knots. Nürnberg was the longest-serving major warship of the Kriegsmarine, and the only one to see active service after the end of World War II, though not in a German navy.
The Admiral Hipper class was a group of five heavy cruisers built by Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine beginning in the mid-1930s. The class comprised Admiral Hipper, the lead ship, Blücher, Prinz Eugen, Seydlitz, and Lützow. Only the first three ships of the class saw action with the German Navy during World War II. Work on Seydlitz stopped when she was approximately 95 percent complete; it was decided to convert her into an aircraft carrier, but this was not completed either. Lützow was sold incomplete to the Soviet Union in 1940.
The Deutschland class was a series of three Panzerschiffe, a form of heavily armed cruiser, built by the Reichsmarine officially in accordance with restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. The ships of the class, Deutschland, Admiral Scheer, and Admiral Graf Spee, were all stated to displace 10,000 long tons (10,160 t) in accordance with the Treaty, though they actually displaced 10,600 to 12,340 long tons at standard displacement. The design for the ships incorporated several radical innovations, including the first major use of welding in a warship and all-diesel propulsion. Due to their heavy armament of six 28 cm (11 in) guns and lighter weight, the British began referring to the vessels as "pocket battleships". The Deutschland-class ships were initially classified as Panzerschiffe, but the Kriegsmarine reclassified them as heavy cruisers in February 1940.
Seydlitz was a heavy cruiser of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine, fourth in the Admiral Hipper class, but was never completed. The ship was laid down in December 1936 and launched in January 1939, but the outbreak of World War II slowed her construction and fitting-out work was finally stopped in the summer of 1940 when she was approximately 95 percent complete. The unfinished ship remained pier-side in the shipyard until March 1942, when the Kriegsmarine decided to pursue aircraft carriers over surface combatants. Seydlitz was among the vessels chosen for conversion into auxiliary aircraft carriers.
The Leipzig class was a class of two light cruisers of the German Reichsmarine and later Kriegsmarine; the class comprised Leipzig, the lead ship, and Nürnberg, which was built to a slightly modified design. The ships were improvements over the preceding Königsberg-class cruisers, being slightly larger, with a more efficient arrangement of the main battery and improved armor protection. Leipzig was built between 1928 and 1931, and Nürnberg followed between 1934 and 1935.
The O class was a planned class of three battlecruisers for the Kriegsmarine before World War II. Prompted by a perceived lack in ship numbers when compared with the British Royal Navy, the O class' design was born with the suggestion of modifying the P-class cruiser design with 380 mm (15 in) guns instead of 283 mm (11.1 in).
The Graf Zeppelin-class aircraft carriers were four German Kriegsmarine aircraft carriers planned in the mid-1930s by Grand Admiral Erich Raeder as part of the Plan Z rearmament program after Germany and Great Britain signed the Anglo-German Naval Agreement. They were planned after a thorough study of Japanese carrier designs. German naval architects ran into difficulties due to lack of experience in building such vessels, the situational realities of carrier operations in the North Sea and the lack of overall clarity in the ships' mission objectives.
The German aircraft carrier I was a planned conversion of the transport ship Europa during World War II. The loss of the battleship Bismarck and near torpedoing of her sistership Tirpitz in May 1941 and March 1942, respectively, spurred the Kriegsmarine to acquire aircraft carriers. Europa was one of several vessels selected for conversion into auxiliary aircraft carriers. As designed, the ship would have had an air complement of 24 Bf 109T fighters and 18 Ju 87C Stuka dive-bombers.
The H class was a series of battleship designs for Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine, which were intended to fulfill the requirements of Plan Z in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The first variation, "H-39", called for six ships to be built, essentially as enlarged Bismarck-class battleships with 40.6 cm (16 in) guns and diesel propulsion. The "H-41" design improved the "H-39" ship with still larger main guns, eight 42 cm (16.5 in) weapons, and reinforced deck armor. The Construction Office of the Oberkommando der Marine (OKM) concluded their work with the "H-41" design, and were not involved in subsequent plans. Two of them, "H-42" and "H-43", increased the main battery yet again, with 48 cm (18.9 in) pieces, and the enormous "H-44" design ultimately resulted with 50.8 cm (20 in) guns. The ships ranged in size from the "H-39", which was 277.8 m long on a displacement of 56,444 t, to the "H-44", at 345 m on a displacement of 131,000 t. Most of the designs had a proposed top speed in excess of 30 knots (56 km/h).
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The Jade class comprised a pair of passenger ships intended to be converted into auxiliary aircraft carriers by Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. The two ships were launched as Gneisenau and Potsdam in 1935 and operated in peacetime by Norddeutscher Lloyd. After the outbreak of war, the ships were requisitioned by the Kriegsmarine as transports, and in May 1942, plans were drawn up to convert them into aircraft carriers. The ships were not identical, but were similar enough in size to allow identical outfitting.
Z34 was a Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer built for the Kriegsmarine during World War II. Completed in 1943, the ship spent all of 1944 in Norwegian waters, and was twice damaged by British aircraft attacking the battleship Tirpitz. She escorted troop convoys from northern Norway when the Germans began evacuating the area beginning in October. Z34 was transferred to the Baltic with two of her sister ships at the beginning of 1945 and participated in the action of 28 January 1945 when they were intercepted off the Norwegian coast by a pair of British light cruisers. The ship was only lightly damaged during the battle and all three destroyers were able to disengage.
Z38 was a Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer built for the Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down in 1941, and completed two years later. Her anti-aircraft armament was modified heavily under Project Barbara. She served with the 4th Destroyer Flotilla her entire time under German service, and spent much of her life escorting task forces, patrolling, laying mines, and bombarding land forces. She served in the Baltic briefly in 1943, before being reassigned to the Arctic area around Norway from 1943 to 1945, and then serving in the Baltic again in 1945.
The Z39 was a Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer built for Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down in August 1940 and completed three years later. Her anti-aircraft armament was increased extensively during the war. Z39 served with the 6th Destroyer Flotilla her entire German career, which she spent escorting transports in the Baltic Sea, laying mines, and bombarding land forces. The destroyer served the navies of a total of three different countries: from 1943 to 1945 with the Kriegsmarine as Z39, from 1945 to 1947 with the US Navy as DD-939, and from 1948 to 1964 with the French Navy as Q-128.
The German torpedo boat T3 was one of a dozen Type 35 torpedo boats built for the Kriegsmarine during the late 1930s. Completed during the Second World War in 1940, she was assigned to escort duties between Germany and Occupied Norway in August before beginning to escort minelayers in the North Sea the following month. The boat was sunk in France by British bombers in September and was refloated the following year. T3 was assigned to the Torpedo School when her repairs were completed in 1943. She returned to active duty a year later and escorted German ships as they bombarded Soviet positions. The boat sank a Soviet submarine in early 1944 and she struck a mine in March 1945 and sank with heavy loss of life.
References
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Breyer, Siegfried (1989). Graf Zeppelin: The German Aircraft Carrier. Atglen: Schiffer Publishing Ltd. ISBN0887402429.
Chesneau, Roger (1998). Aircraft Carriers of the World, 1914 to the Present An Illustrated Encyclopedia. London: Brockhampton Press. p.288. ISBN1-86019-875-9.
Gröner, Erich (1990). German Warships: 1815–1945. Vol.I: Major Surface Vessels. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN978-0-87021-790-6.
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Lake, Jon (2002). Lancaster Squadrons 1942-43. Oxford: Osprey. ISBN1-84176-313-6.
Marshall, Francis L. (1994). Sea Eagles: The Operational History of the Messerschmitt Bf 109T. Walton on Thames: Air Research Publications. ISBN1871187230.
Reynolds, Clark G. (January 1967). "Hitler's Flattop: The End of the Beginning". Proceedings. United States Naval Institute Proceedings. OCLC61522996.
Rohwer, Jürgen & Monakov, Mikhail S. (2001). Stalin's Ocean-going Fleet. London: Frank Cass. ISBN0714648957.
Schenk, Peter (2008). "German Aircraft Carrier Developments". Warship International. 45 (2). Toledo: International Naval Research Organization: 129–158. ISSN0043-0374. OCLC1647131.
Shirokorad, Alexander (2004). Флот, который уничтожил Хрущёв (Flot, kotoryi unichtozhil Khruschev (in Russian). Moscow: AST publishers. ISBN5-9602-0027-9.
Whitley, M.J. (July 1984). Warship 31: Graf Zeppelin, Part 1. Vol.VIII. Annapolis: United States Naval Institute Press. ISBN0-85177-354-0.
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Further reading
Willigenburg, Henk van (March–April 2001). "Graft Zeppelin Afloat". Air Enthusiast (92): 59–65. ISSN0143-5450.
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