Landships II

Long Tom · Brigadier

German Naval Forces

28juni14 · Hero

Long Tom,

You might want to search for MarineKorpsFlandern to discover the Imperial Naval efforts on land.�� They raised 3 divisions of Naval personel who fought with distinction in Flanders.�� Good luck.

mad zeppelin · Commander in Chief

And they had a makeshift armoured car in Flanders in 1914.

James H · Legend

There's a less than flattering description here:�

http://www.avalanchepress.com/GermanNavalInf.php

I had always assumed they were tough nuts, but acc to this they weren't at all.

philthydirtyanimal · Commander in Chief

Perhaps, Long Tom, you could write�a brief�article�we could post it on Landships2.

28juni14 · Hero

... to gain an objective quality�appraisal of the MarineKorpsFlandern battle performance you need to review only two prominant actions;�� of course the Zeebrugge raid,� and more importantly "Operation Strandfest" from the previous summer.�� The former has been grossly tainted by partisan historians, �while the later has been all but ignored.

James H · Legend

Hi, Jack. I was surprised to see�unfavourable description of the Marinekorps as the one I've linked to above. Do you have more info?

There is a book on the Korps in WWI, but it's a discouraging $85, so I shan't bother. Some of it can be read online, but�it breaks off just as Strandfest begins:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=4feIJouYEZEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=marinekorps
+flandern&source=bl&ots=v6_JxCHBM7&sig=u480sw8I7IQotw-R7NW4_xrSfBw&hl=en&ei=Q5beS5j6B5asmwPsytjpBw&sa=X&oi
=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CCgQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

As you say, Strandfest is little known but it was a very sophisticated action, arguably the first to use combined ops of the type for which Amiens usually gets the credit. (To�codename it Beach Party always strikes me as being more of a British type of humour than German, if I�might be forgiven for saying so)

It would be nice to get to the bottom of how good or otherwise the Marinekorps was. There are some excellent uniform pics here

�http://www.sacktrick.com/igu/germancolonialuniforms/militaria/naval%20greatcoat.htm

and lots of other Marinekorps stuff on this splendid site.

28juni14 · Hero

James,

Yes,� "Wielding the Dagger"� is a bit expensive,�� and unless you're a committed enthusiast for the subject material it may not be a practical investment.�� However, I've added it to my library and found it to be an excellent study.

The Zeebrugge action is still shrouded in misinformation even after all these years.�� ( The result of the finest propaganda specialists of any belligerent then or since. )

There are a�host of inaccuracies that have been accepted simply because they appeared in Key's report�.

a) �He suggested the Mole was defended by 1000 Germans,� when actual numbers were only 70.
b)� The submarine/viaduct explosion obliterated a company of cyclists.�

c) The raid inflicted some 2000 casualties on the defenders according to Keys.� Actual German casualties were less than 40,� while inflicting some 700 on the raiders.

The VCs were waiting when Key's men returned to Dover;� only participant votes remained to identify who was going to get them.

It seems the only officer in the Royal Navy who saw through all of it was the� Bacon;� Key's hapless predecessor.��

Rectalgia · Legend

Fascinating stuff. An account of Operation Strandfest by Johan R. Ryheul, using primary sources, is given at http://www.armchairgeneral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=41082.

Ryheul credits Admiral Ludwig von Schr�der with the first tactical use of close air support in that action. John Monash, with some justification regarded as one of the most innovative and effective generals of the western front, was still not coordinating his 'airpower' for that purpose a year later at Hamel (though he did use it for forward re-supply which was novel, he had tanks, it was a rapid advance, it was all over quite quickly, etc, etc.) http://www.ww1westernfront.gov.au/le-hamel/battle-of-hamel.html. But clearly von Schr�der was a master of his forces and used them to great tactical effect. One can't help but agree he (and his men) deserved far greater recognition.

As for the Zeebrugge Raid, Naval Minister Alfred von Tirpitz's official report at http://www.firstworldwar.com/source/zeebrugge_tirpitz.htm stands in stark contrast to the British Admiralty Statement on the Zeebrugge and Ostend Raids in http://www.firstworldwar.com/source/zeebrugge_admiralty1.htm both in volume of verbiage and interpretation of effect.

A handfull of Australians participated in that action (well, a handfull if you're a Taswegian, there were eleven of them) and the Naval Historical Review account of their part in the action is given in http://www.navyhistory.org.au/australians-at-zeebrugge/. The conclusion, in partThe achievements of the raid on Zeebrugge were small, the objective not being fully achieved. However, the raid has entered history as one of the boldest undertaken by the British Navy. Never before, nor since, have so many decorations for valour in action been awarded to British fighting men engaged in a single operation.It seems on cooler analysis that the objectives were not met at all ... and perhaps awards serve a public need at least as much as they recognise the valiant. There's no shortage of unheralded heroism in battle - as almost every VC winner has said, in one form or another, "Others were more worthy than I."

28juni14 · Hero

..excellent summation, Rectalgia.�� It is interesting to note that Keys later quietly resumed Bacon's bombardment plans of the Zeebrugge locks,� which the�former had stubornly declared was the best way to neutralize the Brugge threat.��
Isn't it strange how poor Bacon was allowed to slip into obscurity while Keys remains basking in glory even to this day.