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Drachinifel on Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King


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His Anglophobic tendencies are discussed, and somewhat debunked. He was an anglophobe, yes, but only with officers whose competence he thought as suspect, like Beatty.

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4 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

He was also an anglophobe who refused to listen to the British experience in convoying until it was nearly disastrous.

I think the take away from the video is that he was rather arrogant and that meant he gave short shrift to anyone he thought was less smart than he.

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3 minutes ago, RETAC21 said:

(...) anyone he thought was less smart than he.

I. e., almost everyone. The problem, in King's case, is that he was really, really smart, and he had experience applying those smarts, plus a good deal of energy, to reality, and obtaining results. Fortunately, he was smart enough to understand the cases where reality did not agree with his thinking. Case in point, the grey uniforms or the Arch admiral paygrade.

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He was quite overbearing when it suited him. USMC senior officers were shocked to learn that he thought he understood ground combat tactics because he had commanded a regiment as a midshipman at the Academy!

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21 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

He was also an anglophobe who refused to listen to the British experience in convoying until it was nearly disastrous.

The U.S. version of Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery ;) 

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On 4/2/2021 at 10:13 AM, Rick said:

The U.S. version of Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery ;) 

But Montgomery liked Americans. He may well have been an arrogant prick and politically inept at times, but he was quick to learn lessons, and really was actually pretty competent, despite A fondness of postwar historians to dump all problems in Normandy at his door.

King might have been competent, but that he was so arrogant as to throw away lessons from nearly 2 years of the second world war, AND throw away lessons from WW1 that the USN among others had pioneered, to my mind at least means he isnt in the same class. There was no need for that massacre to have occurred on the US Eastern Seaboard, because even a poorly escorted convoy was better than no convoy at all.

 

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1 hour ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

But Montgomery liked Americans. He may well have been an arrogant prick and politically inept at times, but he was quick to learn lessons, and really was actually pretty competent, despite A fondness of postwar historians to dump all problems in Normandy at his door.

King might have been competent, but that he was so arrogant as to throw away lessons from nearly 2 years of the second world war, AND throw away lessons from WW1 that the USN among others had pioneered, to my mind at least means he isnt in the same class. There was no need for that massacre to have occurred on the US Eastern Seaboard, because even a poorly escorted convoy was better than no convoy at all.

 

He was apparently wrong, or more accurately supported a subordinate who was apparently wrong, in his assessment of the value of unescorted convoys.  One probable wrong decision that affected one small theatre for a short time while getting nearly everything else right. 

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16 hours ago, Ken Estes said:

Monty may have been Britain's greatest soldier, whereas King was one of a dozen or so excellent sailors and commanders.

Oliver Cromwell, John Churchill, Arthur Wellesley, Douglas Haig, and William Slim might be candidates for that position over Montgomery.  He was certainly an excellent motivator and competent enough if not brilliant.

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On 4/1/2021 at 9:56 PM, Ken Estes said:

He was quite overbearing when it suited him. USMC senior officers were shocked to learn that he thought he understood ground combat tactics because he had commanded a regiment as a midshipman at the Academy!

 

That's scary. 

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Would be interested in specific reasons why Nimitz has such a stellar reputation (obviously historians vastly more knowledgeable than me have rated him as such, but he’s always come across as a Slim type to me — a great, inspirational person and a really good administrator but I’m not aware of any particular strategic genius). 

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13 hours ago, Angrybk said:

Would be interested in specific reasons why Nimitz has such a stellar reputation (obviously historians vastly more knowledgeable than me have rated him as such, but he’s always come across as a Slim type to me — a great, inspirational person and a really good administrator but I’m not aware of any particular strategic genius). 

He won, what more you want? :)

The Paciifc wasn't going to be a war of dazzling strategies, but one of slogging from island to island building bases for the next jump. It seems obvious in hindsight, but it hadn't been done before, much less with airpower being a factor, and the first days of the war had shown that the classic symbols of naval power, the battleships, were vulnerable to aircraft both at port and at sea. Nimitz took a number of decisions early on that would have significant impact, such as discarding the previous submarine doctrine of fleet cooperation and using the boats for strategic warfare.

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2 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

The Paciifc wasn't going to be a war of dazzling strategies, but one of slogging from island to island building bases for the next jump. It seems obvious in hindsight, but it hadn't been done before, much less with airpower being a factor, and the first days of the war had shown that the classic symbols of naval power, the battleships, were vulnerable to aircraft both at port and at sea. Nimitz took a number of decisions early on that would have significant impact, such as discarding the previous submarine doctrine of fleet cooperation and using the boats for strategic warfare.

 

The Japanese didn't believe in a 'War of Attrition' but one of 'Win the Decisive Battle'. They believed this ever since the 1905 war, where the Japanese Navy fought a pitched naval battle and won against the Russian Empire. When WW2 happened, the Japanese again fought a decisive battle in Pearl Harbour and won. They then attempted this at Midway and lost. All this time, the modern mobile elements, including the two Yamato class battleships were kept in the reserve to await the 'Decisive Battle' not realising that the war had become one of a 'Battle of Attrition'. The USN instead, deployed several 'State of the Art' Battleships against the JN in the battles of Guadalcanal. The JN should of released there modern Battleships for this campaign, but they were kept in reserve awaiting 'The Decisive Battle' and so they lost. The rest is history.

Note that the Japanese lost the 'War of Production' but that's a different story.

 

Edited by TrustMe
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6 hours ago, TrustMe said:

 

The Japanese didn't believe in a 'War of Attrition' but one of 'Win the Decisive Battle'. They believed this ever since the 1905 war, where the Japanese Navy fought a pitched naval battle and won against the Russian Empire. When WW2 happened, the Japanese again fought a decisive battle in Pearl Harbour and won. They then attempted this at Midway and lost. All this time, the modern mobile elements, including the two Yamato class battleships were kept in the reserve to await the 'Decisive Battle' not realising that the war had become one of a 'Battle of Attrition'. The USN instead, deployed several 'State of the Art' Battleships against the JN in the battles of Guadalcanal. The JN should of released there modern Battleships for this campaign, but they were kept in reserve awaiting 'The Decisive Battle' and so they lost. The rest is history.

Note that the Japanese lost the 'War of Production' but that's a different story.

 

The IJN didn't have the fuel to deploy the Yamatos in the Solomons which is why they sent a couple of much smaller Kongos instead.

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1 hour ago, R011 said:

The IJN didn't have the fuel to deploy the Yamatos in the Solomons which is why they sent a couple of much smaller Kongos instead.

I don't know enough about JN battleships range. According to wikipedia the Kongo's have only a 900nm extra range compared to the Yamato class. Could the IJN replenish at sea? or dock at say the Philipines for fuel? 

Edited by TrustMe
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