| Battleships: | 8 totalling 187,000 tons |
| Heavy Cruisers: | 5 totalling 50,000 tons |
| Light Cruisers: | 10 totalling 66,000 tons |
| Aircraft Carriers: | 3 totalling 45,000 tons |
| Destroyers: | 38 totalling 52,000 tons |
| Submarines: | 44 totalling 18,100 tons.14 |
The allowance for submarines, ignoring the fact that Germany had already started building them, was 45 per cent of the British fleet, which could be extended to parity, provided due notification was given with appropriate opportunity for discussion. The higher ratio for submarines was based on the Royal Navy having relatively few, around fifty-five, at the time. That they were offensive weapons had not been forgotten, but it appears that the British negotiators considered the number of submarines in question small in absolute numbers and manageable with the technology at hand.
‘The happiest day of my life,’ Hitler rejoiced when the message came through that the treaty had been ratified in London.15 His understanding of naval strategy was limited and he did not at all see that the limited resourses intended for the Kriegsmarine had now been locked in a manner that suited the Royal Navy. It appears that Hitler saw the treaty as a political agreement, ensuring that there would be no war with Britain in the short term, rather than as a technical agreement on weapons systems and tonnage.
Raeder saw the treaty as the end of the dishonour inflicted on Germany at Versailles. In his mind, it was proof of Hitler’s sincerity when he claimed that he had nothing but peaceful intentions towards Britain. Some years later he wrote: ‘The Führer hoped until the last moment to be able to put off the threatening conflict with England until 1944–45. At that time, the navy would have had available a fleet with a strong submarine superiority, and a much more favourable ratio in most other types of ships, particularly those designed for warfare on the High Seas.’ In his memoirs after the war, he modified this to state that up until the outbreak of the war, ‘the Naval Treaty [with Britain] in 1935 made the basis for all efforts and deliberations within the Kriegsmarine. An armed conflict with England was not taken into consideration.’ Trying to achieve too much too fast once the shackles were off, however, made research, testing and development suffer. This would backfire on the Kriegsmarine when the war started and several of the ships and their advanced tackle were continually plagued by inherent technical problems and flawed construction.16
The Kriegsmarine – Built for War
Deutschland was commissioned on 1 April 1933, less than three months into Hitler’s chancellery. She was classified by the Kriegsmarine as a Panzerschiff or ‘armoured cruiser’ and easily recognisable with her compact, low silhouette. Officially within the 10,000-ton limit, Deutschland was actually close to 15,000 tons when loaded. It was intended she should outgun all faster ships and outrun all with larger guns, but a maximum speed of only 28 knots would make the latter somewhat of a challenge, even if few Allied capital ships in commission at the time could actually catch her. The British Admiralty looked at Deutschland with concern, but she was far from the fierce warship she was conceived to be. Fast but not really fast enough, with unreliable engines and poor performance in heavy seas, she and her sisters never achieved what was expected in the Atlantic. Up to seven similar ships were originally planned, and the future Admiral Scheer, which had been approved by the Reichstag in May 1931, was launched on the day of Deutschland’s commissioning. The third ship, Admiral Graf Spee, had been laid down six months earlier and construction was well under way at Wilhelmshaven. Otherwise similar to Deutschland, the two ‘Admirals’ had some differences in superstructure design, carried more armour and were somewhat heavier.17
The diesel engine room of Graf Spee. (Author’s collection)
Rather than building further Deutschlands, Raeder decided proper capital ships were needed and sent the engineers of the Design Office back to the drawing board. Redesign took time, though, and only in May and June of 1935 were the keels of battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst laid down at Deutsche Werft in Kiel and Kriegsmarine-Werft in Wilhelmshaven, respectively.18 Their 35-cm gun-turrets could not be completed in time and, to avoid delays, it was decided to mount three upgraded triple 28-cm turrets as a temporary solution. Both turret types had the same base diameter and neither draught nor stability of the ships would be adversely affected through a later upgrade. After the start of the war, there was never an opportunity to take the ships out of service for refit, and they were destined to spend their careers with 28-cm turrets – over-armoured and under-gunned.19
Twelve 15-cm guns and fourteen 10.5-cm multi-purpose guns in twin mountings constituted the secondary armament. Sixteen 37-mm guns in twin mountings and ten 20-mm single mounted guns made up the light A/A armament. The 28- and 15-cm guns were directed by an advanced fire-control system with stereoscopic rangefinders in armoured cupolas, while a sophisticated new high-angle (HA) system with stabilised directors controlled the 10.5-cm heavy flak guns. The light flak operated individually. Diesel engines of sufficient power for the displacement in question were not available, and high-pressure steam turbines were chosen for propulsion. This would confine them to the North Atlantic without extensive tanker-support, but a range of 6,000–7,000 miles at 19 knots was still considerable.
Battleship Gneisenau. Her intended 35-cm guns could not be completed in time and, with her sister Scharnhorst, she was destined to spend the war with 28-cm turrets, over-armoured and under-gunned. (Author’s collection)
Gneisenau was commissioned in May 1938, while Scharnhorst would take until January of the following year to be completed. During the winter of 1938–39, both were equipped with an ‘Atlantic’ clipper-bow after initial trials of Gneisenau showed the forecastle to be very wet even in moderate seas. Other than adding a superbly graceful line to both ships, this did little for the wetness of the forecastle, which continued to be a problem. Further testing of Gneisenau also resulted in improvements to Scharnhorst’s propulsion system, giving a full knot in speed advantage for the latter – 31.65 versus 30.7 knots on trials. At this stage, the ships displaced some 38,700 tons fully loaded. Both had radar installed in early 1939.20
Germany’s first aircraft carrier, Graf Zeppelin, was launched in late 1938, but the work was suspended in 1940 and Raeder was never to have a carrier.21
The torpedo boats commissioned in the late 1920s were inadequate for support of the growing number of capital ships and Deutsche Werke in Kiel received the contract for four destroyers in April 1934. A further twelve were contracted at other yards during the following year. These Zerstörer, known as Type 34 or Maass-class, were large, powerful ships, 2,200 tons standard and 3,150 tons fully loaded. The first two, Z1 Leberecht Maass and Z2 Georg Thiele, were launched on 18 August 1935. Completion took time, though, and Z1 was not commissioned until January 1937.
Questions were soon raised over the sea-keeping qualities