Reviews for German Naval Strategy 1856-1888: Forerunners to Tirpitz

The average rating for German Naval Strategy 1856-1888: Forerunners to Tirpitz based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2019-06-11 00:00:00 Pam Mcewin A speculative, conspiratorial work. This one sentence from John Craven's book fascinates the author: "there existed a possibility, small though it might be, that the skipper of this rogue submarine was attempting to launch or had actually launched a ballistic missile with a live warhead in the direction of Hawaii. He take this conditional conjecture, throws in a cabal of KGB big shots, and delivers an almost 300-page book. The central thesis behind his assertion of a rogue launch is his claim that the sub went down at 163º W Lon, 24º N Lat. This is critical since the K-129 was armed with three SS-N-5 Serb missiles with a range of approximately 760 nautical miles. Pearl Harbor is 327 nautical miles from the claimed sinking site, well within the range of the Serb missile. If the sub sank at the official claimed site of 180º Lon, 40º N Lat, it would be more than 800 nautical miles short of the presumed target. That aside, There's a bunch of inaccuracies in his description of the Hughes Glomar Explorer and the raising of the K-129. The essential facts are: The location of the recovery site was not restricted to "ranking members of the Glomar crew and the CIA managers" as Mr. Sewell claims. Certainly the seamen (ship drivers) were well aware of the recovery position, as was the recovery team. Contrary to his assertion, there were no restricted areas on the ship except the commo van and the rig floor during dangerous pipe handling conditions. Others would frequently visit the bridge where we could observe the Transit Nav Sat position being displayed on the navigation console. Besides, anyone with a boy scout's knowledge and protractor could observe the sun at local noon and determine the latitude to within a couple of degrees. The position of the K-129 recovery site was on the180º meridian, approximately 40º N Lat. The longitude was so spot on the International Date Line, that there was some discussion as to the date to use in the recovery log. Since the voyage originated east of the date line, we continued to use this date. Also, the book states that the one-megaton nuclear warheads carried on the K-129's missile have a yield equivalent to 1000 tons of TNT; in reality, one megaton is about one million tons TNT equivalent. Another simple, verifiable error is that the authors claim that the crews of USS Parche & USS (Richard B.) Russell received awards for their part in the K-129 recovery efforts in late 1968/early 1969. What?! These two subs weren't even built yet! Also, the authors repeatedly use presented hypotheses as facts later in the book - a cardinal flaw in any form of deductive reasoning. There's some space on nefarious Soviet rogues, but there's no record of them (a memorial later carries extra names, but the authors never follow up on them) - but if they had been there, he asserts, they could have been KGB "Oznaz" commandos who could have commandeered the ship, and would have had training in using nukes; the Americans determine the truth, but kept quiet for "political" reasons (for the authors, it's enough to say how tense the American political situation is and say that the considerations for the cover-up were indeed political without having to get into details). The authors lunge for every possible conclusion, and drop a few sensationalist hints that they never bother to follow up (links to convicted turncoat John Walker and the mysterious loss of the USS Scorpion being two examples; my guess is that Walker's role is overblown here - there's no explanation for how he had access to sensitive diplomatic documents). The authors' proof is also selectively analyzed. Extra crewmen are "established" to have been on K-129, even though there's no record of their being aboard, and any record, the authors say, could have been falsified by the high-ranking plotters. The authors never consider that evidence establishing that these men ever existed may have been a simple clerical error (if the plotters were highly placed, couldn't they have simply substituted the desired crewmen?). The authors discount a voluntary role played by the actual executive staff because their high rank made them loyal - but then implicate higher ranking members of Soviet leadership; the extra crew accidentally destroy the ship trying to bypass safeguards on the ship's warheads, but it's never explained why loyal agents of such highly authorized sources lacked access to the weapons that obviated a bypass; the authors determine that a missile explosion destroyed the ship - but make the leap to an explosion caused by an attempted launch, and ignore any other hardware failure like the one that caused the Nedelin tragedy, or the one involved in the loss of Submarine K-219 in 1986 (K-219 rates nary a mention in "Rogue"). The authors posit conspirators trained on nuclear-weapons, but not trained adequately. Lastly, the Americans go out of their way to recover K-129 intact because they can use it as proof of the Soviets' plot as leverage against them - even though the sub itself (according to "Rogue") is likely cut up for scrap by those same Americans almost as soon as it's brought back to California. Though claiming the attack was meant to frame the Chinese, the authors utterly fail to present evidence pointing to China: K-129 was an advanced member of a class of subs found only in Soviet service, crewed by uniformed Soviet sailors and armed with Soviet missiles. The authors utterly fail to provide information that Americans in 1968 would have needed to link the attack to China, or explain how the Soviets could have refuted suspicions that the attack was their own. It's as if the authors spent most of the book hyping some horrible plot - then neglecting to include the plot as well. The author's spend most of the book "debunking" the nearly-official story of K-129 & her recovery, dismissing some claims as ludicrous - but still relying on many such sources for corroboration. Why the accepted story is the wrong story, but sufficient for their purposes will remain a mystery the authors are not likely to reveal in the near future. The book gets goofier and goofier as you go along: he describes a "cold launch" system to fire the missiles FROM A SURFACED POSITION - in essence this system uses compressed air to blow the missile free from its launch tube AS THE SUBMARINE IS SUBMERGED. The predecessor to the submarine, the Golf I class HAD to fire while surfaced, and used an elevator platform to lift the missile clear of the launch tube, of which there were three located in the sail. The Golf II was specifically created to be able to utilize the R-21 missile, which GAVE IT AN UNDERWATER LAUNCH CAPABILITY. If the author had even bothered to actually read Pavel Podvig's book, Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces WHICH HE CITES, he would know that the K-129 would not have fired from the surface, but submerged. But well, that would conflict with the story.... So the permissive action lock triggered the missile's warhead to self destruct? What? How? The PAL prevents the missile from firing, or the warhead from detonating, but it does NOT pop the explosives. It would render it inert, assuming the R021 had such a system. Not to mention that such an explosion would have opened up the missile's fuel tanks (it was a liquid-fuelled missile after all) and most likely would have blown open the missile hatches covering the other two birds in their tubes. Then you have two more missiles blowing their fuel tanks, and in the end, there wouldn't be enough of that sub left to fit in a sardine can. Elsewhere young sailor found wearing a senior officer's sheepskin coat is cited as evidence of a mutiny. The authors say anonymous sources reported twelve mysterious men were added to the crew, but they do not have a list of the crewmembers. The authors say such a list would be faked anyway. Huh? This was actually my first book on K-129, unfortunately.

Review # 2 was written on 2009-08-13 00:00:00 Partha Ghosh I thought this book was a good editor away from being a five star book, but there are a number of reasons why I like it. First of all, assuming that this book is completely true and full of facts, it's a scary reality, and it's certainly plausible. Did this happen? Was all of society nearly snuffed out? Is this worth reading again with Pakistan's shaky society and North Korea's nuclear ambitions? In short, simply the prospect of what could have been is scary enough for me, and I found this part to be gripping. Additionally, did Tom Clancy get the idea for The Hunt for Red October from this story? The similarities are there, but since I'm someone that enjoys an occasional Clancy novel or three, if you want something as well-written as possible, you take Clancy and the Red October. Lastly, though, I was engrossed with the inclusion of the Glomar Explorer. As a young boy, I remember reading Janes and all sorts of good military history, and I always wondered what that ship was for...until I read this book. Some things I've always wondered about fit into place, and with that, we get a four star book. If only the writing was stronger...