hitlers lost battleship

ann's Longstaff commander of the german pocket battleship half-speed at the beginning of world war ii he sinks British merchant ships at will Graf Spee becomes Britain's public enemy number one and Langsdorf a target for the most powerful Navy in the world Commodore Henry Harwood will be his opponent in the first great naval battles of World War two Langsdorf is wounded his ship severely damaged as she limps into a South American port her captain faces an impossible decision Hitler will accuse him of cowardice as he tries to save his ship his crew and the honor of the fatherland for 70 years Graf Spee has kept her secrets in the mouth of the River Plate today the strange truth of her downfall can be revealed the naval Harbor of Montevideo Uruguay on this foggy morning the crew of the minesweeper our deaths are preparing to go on Patrol their destinations just a few nautical miles east of the category the Uruguayan Navy are caretakers of a sunken memorial to a great sea battle that took place here 70 years ago as usual in the southern winter visibility this morning is less than 300 meters but there's an appointment these sailors must keep with the wreck of the Admiral Graf Spee at a safe distance the audace anchors and her divers prepare for their regular inspection they have to make sure the wreck is holding together no guns or turrets breaking off into the channel to endanger shipping in 2006 the Uruguayan Navy declared this a closed zone and their patrols have a second purpose to deter neo-nazi souvenir hunters it's tough work here the strong current can carry away inexperienced divers underwater you can see about 30 centimeters all too easy to lose your bearings now plankton carpets the battleship but computer reconstruction reveals what the coastal waters obscure the scale of this 186 meter Colossus she lies rusting eerily completely after more than 70 years in the silt in the mouth of the River Plate the result of a bitter decision taken on December the 17th 1939 the cafe was born out of a dilemma engineers of the Imperial German Naval Yard have to build new battleships for Germany battleships she's not allowed to have this is their solution the plans of the Admiral Graf Spee after losing the first world war Germany is forbidden any ships over 10,000 tons the result the pocket battleship the first three is soon being built with the firepower of a warship three times their displacement nothing like this has been tried in naval history with pocket battleships Germany will once again be a great power without breaking the rules set by the victors of World War one chief among them Britain naval historian yanma have it has studied the thinking behind the building of these ships this particular concept these were teacher concept behind the glass bay was this it must be faster than any ship that was more heavily armed and more heavily armed than any ship that was faster and this ship would be used to wage commerce warfare it was specifically designed to attack enemy merchant ships constable the concept was truly revolutionary a closer look will show what this ship was capable of identify her strengths and reveal her Achilles heel she was perfectly suited to her role as high seas pirate even her hull is innovative for the first time on a ship of this scale it's not riveted but welded a smoother surface means less water resistance and a great saving in weight but to keep the weight down the designers also sacrificed vital armor plating Graf Spee is powered by diesel engines not the usual steam turbines eight nine cylinder motors provide more than 55,000 horsepower giving the garage a high speed and enormous range an awesomely effective power plant but complicated and untested crash Bay is a thoroughbred a race horse of the Seas like a racehorse she will need constant care and attention this ship is a high-speed gun platform to turrets fore and aft 628 centimeter guns with a range of 22 kilometers smaller calibre guns and anti-aircraft guns complete the picture but the guns can only target one enemy at a time one flank will always be vulnerable combine that with her light almost non-existent on the plating and crafts we must be a Buccaneer that will hit and run the ship is two years in the building by the time she's finished the Nazis have seized power in Germany suddenly the pocket battleship has a new role to play she must be a showpiece for the regime and yet as storm clouds gather over Europe the job of commander of this great ship goes to an unexpected candidate the man who takes command in October 1938 his captain Hans Lang Stav a decorated veteran of World War one but no ardent Nazi Longstaff entered the Imperial Navy as an eighteen-year-old cadet after World War one married and with children he served in Berlin at the War Office by the mid 1930s he has a reputation as a brilliant administrator but he hadn't joined the Navy defying his parents in the process in order to end up behind a desk he saw himself as a sailor and as a warrior but one with the conscience according to family tradition he should have become a priest other disasters are under force won't stick so this other ambition to become a naval officer rather took the family by surprise Jesus but I think that growing up in a strictly Protestant household had a powerful influence on him and stayed with him his whole life the occasional decline deterred Lang staff has little sympathy with the Nazi government in Berlin he applies for an active service posting as far as possible from the capital he's given command of the most prestigious ship in the German Navy the Admiral Graf Spee it's like winning the jackpot the most modern ship of her times the chance to take her out onto the high seas and show what she can do Lance top on both camp and when captain Langsdorff came on board was rather a novelty to have such a young commander yeah he came to us with an impressive reputation we all had a picture of what he would be like but then there he was a good-looking young officer we greeted him with all due respect Ben soon held him in high regard because he was so loyal to us and he knew exactly how to deal with people like Norman so again Wooster from the start Longstaff treats officers and men with equal respect sweeping aside class distinctions he welds his crew of 1,100 into a single team Lang staff soon has a chance to test himself and his ship with Europe in the state of high-tension be is sent on a secret mission the crew have no idea where they're headed only long staff has that information and he starts the voyage with a deliberate feint lang staff set sail North Woods three days out in the middle of the North Atlantic he turns South Cafe is to disappear in the vastness of the ocean German military archives hold a document that helps throw light on Lange stoves controversial decisions in the coming weeks this is the captain's log of the Graf Spee the mug makes it clear that when the Goths pay left harbor on August the 21st 1939 Hitler already knew war would break out ten days later Germany's hidden mobilization has started the graph phase wartime mission is to attack British merchant ships in the Southern Oceans as an island Britain was dependent on the supply of food and raw materials from overseas that was her Achilles heel so of course it was Langsdorf aim to cut these supply routes to the size early weekend Britain oh damn it England and France especially with colonies on four continents half a world from the mother country Britain's trade is extremely vulnerable but there's a second part - Lang staffs role if Garvey forces the Royal Navy to send its warships to the South Atlantic they'll be weaker in the channel and the north sea just when the Germans plan to invade Britain so Graf Spee has orders to run a mock sinking as many British freighters as possible there's just one complication Britain and Germany are not yet at war so the ship must hide and lie in wait phalanx Dorf screw it feels more like an innocent holiday under the tropical Sun these are hardly men straining their sinews for war the ships band plays on deck every day the loud speakers blare out German hits many of these men are away from home for the first time blank stuff lets them enjoy this moment of peace he knows they'll be fighting soon enough on September the 1st 1939 Hitler makes a radio broadcast accusing Polish troops of attacking Germany that day German forces invade Poland the Second World War has begun land staff does nothing he's been told to remain hidden off the African coast Hitler is convinced Britain will not go to war over Poland it love are from Britain's declaration of war took Hitler completely by surprise his foreign minister Ribbentrop had promised him that Britain had not get involved when the British declaration of war landed on the cabinet apple in Berlin but Hitler turned to Ribbentrop and said what now the German High Command waits three more weeks on September the 26th they finally authorized commerce war against British merchant ships they will not have to wait long for action sailing west bisecting britain's traded with south america bay intercepts her first victim a shot across the bow brings her to a halt her crew fear for their lives but Langsdorf takes them prisoner before sinking their ship he follows the rules of war with every attack but not every British captain accepts the situation and honestech captain door for them off when he sank the Africa shell captain dove came onboard wearing his short trousers and what's it called a solar 2p and he came on board and said I was inside the three-mile limit no I've said the captain you weren't you were outside the three-mile limit otherwise he wouldn't have wasn't and they had a little argument and lungs so said coming to my cabin and he showed them the chart we were here and you were there you see the whole thing alright we'll sort it out after the war captains I've said it's after them they're kept indoors yet Langsdorff treats his English counterparts like a trusted friend does pasanda offer headedness meeting carpeting Duff he had a very special relationship with Captain dove I explained it was as if he had found a man after his own heart a man he could really talk to and conjure coughs be sunk the Africa shell in the Indian Ocean now she swings back into the South Atlantic danced off has sown more confusion as to the space location twice a day lansdorf sends up the onboard seaplane to seek out new targets the Machine AHA Tannen circle but seems four and the plane flew a triangular course it would wreck either route the ship would be taken in the course of that day and the target Argus who'd had the quantonium Crenn approach then it flew Batson signal to pay the coordinates of any enemy freighter at citation it's bearing and distance ship of heard so and so down thousands of elapsed oldish Bay had to do was follow those directions to the British time thus English on earth ship gazillion hadn't the Arado 196 is launched by catapult and winched back onto the ship after its Patrol this plane is only a prototype the engine needs constant repairs finally it packs up altogether but there are still enough targets out there for space torpedoes in the first week of hostilities space sinks 14,000 tons by the end of October that figure has doubled in London the Admiralty starts to get extremely concerned a month later without killing a single sailor or betraying his ships location Langsdorff has sunk nearly 50,000 tons but like his ship the captain has a weakness Longstaff was a very pleasant man clearly he got on very well with his British prisoners who had a lot of respect for him he was a good seaman he was very aggressive and that was his big problem he wrapped up inside him was that deep frustration that every German naval officer felt that individually they might be able to defeat the British but the British all would always had much greater strength Langsdorf instincts were to take risks and he took one risk too many the pocket battleship always manages to escape unseen hiding in the vastness of the ocean she moves so fast the British can't even work out if they're facing one enemy warship or two the old Admiralty in Whitehall London the nerve center of the Royal Navy this is where it all comes together the intelligence the sightings from friendly or neutral ships the wires are running hot - B must be found but there isn't even enough information to decide which area to search the Admiralty sends out eight hunting groups to find Karsch B German strategy is paying off twice the Royal Navy is being drawn away from home waters British warships are now looking for one pocket battleship the café's log confirms that Hans Longstaff is aware of the danger facing his ship yet on December the 6th 1939 he carries out a searchlight practice because his crew had made a mess of their previous attempt at a night attack cafes lights are visible for miles a dazzling display in the South Atlantic from a battleship that is supposed to stay invisible suddenly a lookout spots an unlit freighter on the horizon longstaff can't identify it as an enemy vessel he lets the freighter escape two serious mistakes in one night the Norwegian merchant ship signals the presence of the battleship to London the cafe is steaming towards South America the Admiralty diverts one heavy and two light cruisers to intersect glanced off scores the Exeter the Ajax and the Achilles under the command of a dangerous strategist Commodore Henry Hartley Commodore Harwood was the worst possible enemy for Lang store from the Grouch Bay he had studied how you dealt with pocket battleships before the war he even lectured on it at the Royal Naval War College at Greenwich he was the the British anti pocket battleship expert Langsdorf was really putting his head albeit unknowingly into the lion's mouth power Wood is prepared he knows that she is a floating fortress far superior to the ships in his own flotilla so instead of spreading his ships to seek the enemy he will keep them together he Gamble's that SH Bay will look for prey close to the mouth of the River Plate and the great ports of Montevideo and Buenos Aires he concentrates his flotilla there he plans a pincer movement Exeter will attack from one side Achilles and Ajax from the other he knows that she can only target a ship on one side and slang stuff is short of time Seamus returned to Germany for a refit but his logbook reveals that he wants one further success an attack on an armored convoy then he could sink enemy ships without warning in a real battle against express orders from Berlin and sailors will die Longstaff Langsdorf was a naval officer that means he was a soldier first and a seaman second as an officer and a soldier it was his aim to inflict as much damage on the enemy as possible his own humanity had to take certain pace immensely tides work when German intelligence reports a British convoy off the coast of South America longstaff sees his chance for the crowning act of his mission the morning of December the 13th 1939 perfect visibility calm sea battle weather 6:00 a.m. the watch reports smoke columns and mastheads on the horizon Langsdorf rings full ahead and directs his battleship towards what he believes is a British convoy the expected freighters turn out to be heavily armed British warships longstaff Bhavan longstaff was told there was one light cruiser and two destroyers in fact he was facing one heavy cruiser and two light cruisers Langston decided to attack what he thought was a weaker that's before they pursued him blank stove believes he has no choice if he tries to flee the faster enemy cruisers will cut him off within minutes 1,100 men are at battle stations by engaging the British Lang stove his flouting Berlin's direct orders but his next decision is the fatal one given the first two mistakes that Langsdorf made of looking for trouble and when he found British ships engaging them what perhaps he might have done what the British feared was he would standoff at long range and used the advantages of his big guns in the event he didn't he close to short range which gave the British cruisers a considerable advantage helped of course by the fact that at the crucial moment his forward turret stops firing so at the beginning of the action the crucial minutes he only has half his armament his gamble had really failed space guns have a range of 22 kilometers long store closes to well inside that distance suddenly Shmi is vulnerable the British fire salvo after salvo and launch torpedoes in an all-out attack on Spain blank stove tries desperately to zigzag - no they Longstaff in the 1920s Langsdorf had commanded a flotilla of torpedo that means he thought like a destroyer captain and that's exactly how he commanded the GlassFish like a destroyer defusing her mobility and her ability to change course quickly off to turn away from the enemy and evade their torpedoes in fact leaking for ID by doing that well he throw away his real advantage his heavy artillery far superior to anything the British wine bar the battle continues in the South Atlantic for over an hour the pocket battleship is attacked from both sides taking casualties this ship is not impregnable the missing armored plating takes its toll Indian fluckey shirts come and prefer a flash turret took a direct hit between its two barrels there was absolutely no trace left of the gunner inside we cleaned it up with a fire hose there was nothing left explosion had simply vaporized him explosion at their mental health gurus but SH B has hit home too via MIT then we concentrated on Exeter first until she was knocked out of the battle and broke off your file is hotter Exeter had more than 70 days she was on fire and then the commander turned to deal with the two other British grocers off T by an Englishman quite a linguist but by then Ajax and Achilles had been able to close on space that was when we took all the punishment by eight o'clock in the morning the battle is over the ships break off no one knows who was won the British don't know how severely Langsdorf ship has been damaged Avadh spay the captain sees only one option to make for the nearest deepwater port Montevideo Montevideo was the suggestion of Lang stoves navigation officer people always say he should have gone for Buenos Aires upriver in Argentina but the problem was the River Plate is full of marshland meat seafood that's it okay that's good have jammed the inner fakes of the water cooling system and ruin and then the ship wouldn't affect have been lost if factors fellow organism slow ahead thanks to off steers towards Harbor Ajax and Achilles shadow the limping giant at a distance of about sixteen nautical miles lang stuff is confident of getting help in Montevideo Uruguay is neutral according to the Hague Convention it mister now the Goff faith essential repairs Bay is anything but shipshape her complex diesel treatment plant is damaged she's holed above and below the waterline she needs all the time she can get for repairs to have any chance of making it home to Germany but Uruguay is neutral only in theory she's economically dependent on Britain Millington Drake happens to be British ambassador he once grafts be expelled German ambassador dr. otto lang man will do all he can to get permission for Graf Spee to stay as long as possible the odds are stacked against him Montevideo's small German community listening in on their own local radio station can't offer their compatriots any help the newspapers are full of speculation about British reinforcements and an ultimatum to quit the port the next day December the 14th bodies are brought ashore from cow fish pee hours later she pays British prisoners are given permission to land in Montevideo they are free men not a single prisoner has been killed in the battle while Langsdorff visits the German Embassy Millington Drake is negotiating with Uruguayan officials they will insist spade is ready to leave he was quite certain he couldn't sail out with the ship in that condition he wanted the government in Montevideo to give him a week for repairs done via then he would have been able to run at full speed and they would have provisions for the Atlantic crossing everything would have been ready so right in tactical reason the German ambassador receives the ultimatum cough famous depart by December the 17th just four days after her rival daddy oh why should like evil Shawn though England since the Uruguayan government was so heavily influenced by Britain and put under constant political pressure by Millington Drake with hindsight it was a political in his calculation to try to stay in the event you require loud be to stay just two more days that was completely inadequate as far as a fully in force on December the 15th the funeral is held for the German dead then Longstaff has to face his surviving crew that come on board or not done and he came on board and in told his officers and crew that there was no hope of getting safely out of the harbour without another battle again and we only had a hundred and sixty-eight shells left for the big guns damn it and they wouldn't last more than an hour off cabal well that's Benny and we wouldn't be able to cross the Atlantic get through the English Channel to Germany we all knew that up close another battle against the British can have only one outcome there's no hope the men write home across the city a young German immigrant describes the strange standoff now we hear that a whole British fleet is assembled at the mouth of the river waiting for the Goff should be to leave they're caught in a trap the news spreads Bay is leaving on December the 17th at 6 p.m. she glides out of the harbor Langsdorff has made his plans spays carrying a skeleton crew and Seibel is one of just 40 sailors on board as we left harbor i dismantled the warheads from 6 ohm to pH was about 1 meter 50 tall and contained 300 kilos of explosives kilo sprang stove blank stuff will not give the enemy their victory the stick abandon the captain wanted to stay onboard when this ship blew out by all the officers with him said no no come on sir we'll get in the boats and then things will sort themselves out see how they virtually stopped him staying on board he would have gone down with the ship the bar mitzva Swanson we'd moved away about 20 minutes when the explosion happened the commander sat on the port side of the boat with his head in his hand and you could see what was going on inside him for seeking an American newsreel crew films the burning battleship she blazes for three days before sinking but Langsdorff has cheated the enemy they did not sink his ship he has secretly transferred his crew onto tugs and from there to a German freighter it will take them upstream to the Argentinian capital Buenos Aires the staff common done was often at that moment we all realized that their captain had given us our lives back Clara worden understand we were all relieved we'd lost our ship we didn't know what was coming next Posse but we hope somehow we'd make it back to Germany but not that since I come the Hotel des immigrant is in Buenos Aires in peacetime the first stop for would-be immigrants to Argentina since the war began it has been empty the new home for grafts Bay's crew Longstaff has one further responsibility to his crew to ensure the authorities accept them as shipwrecked sailors the only way they will escape internment but in accordance with international law neutral Argentina must keep the sailors prisoner there one concession is to allow the men to live with German families and Buenos Aires but they have no prospect of making it home when lofty survivor and the captain addressed us and told us he was more than satisfied with a conduct of his crew and that we would manage from here Rosie today the wreck of the Graf Spee lies just beneath the surface British frogmen dived to the ship hoping to salvage vital military technology but the German demolition crews did a good job every sensitive piece of equipment had been destroyed by hand the Maritime Museum in Montevideo has relics salvaged from the GAVI this 15 centimeter cannon and an artillery range finder reminders of a time when the whole world was watching the city on the River Plate lang staff takes full responsibility for the loss of the shui but South American newspapers are calling him a coward on the evening of December the 19th he writes to his wife it must be clear to a commander with a strong sense of honor that in circumstances like these his own fate is inseparable from that of his ship I have put off carrying out my decision while I still had responsibility for the well-being and safety of my crew in his room in the hotel de immigrant ace Lange stuff lay down on should be his battle flag his last act as captain the exact words are important we shall show the world what German honor me at the time I didn't really understand what he meant of course the captain believed that and the next morning we heard the news of his death candy now freed from toward the Superman done Langsdorf suicide is global news early in the war it still has the power to shock he had taken the decision as soon as he realized that he couldn't sail his ship back out kaput mentioned if he did everything would be lost the ship and her crew that's the thing I can sink the ship fine so that it doesn't fall into enemy hands and save the crew would not and then according to the traditions at the service not and my own sense of Honor I can do nothing but follow my shoes my shoes it's affordable the captain of the Graf Spee was buried with full military honors thousands of mourners fill the streets his crew accompanied the coffin members of the German community ordinary Argentinians even a few Britons paid their respect there was seven cars with reeds it was amazing how the people of Buenos Aires were affected by the captain's death and from then on we felt a bit like Walden's hands Longstaff is buried in the German cemetery in Buenos Aires the Nazis used his funeral as a propaganda coup no one said land staff had anything to be ashamed of yet his widow was never granted a full pension Hitler later accused him of cowardice for not going down with his ship but the lives of his crew meant more to him than blind obedience and loyalty to the fatherland the Argentinean Navy helped most of his crew escaped from internment and returned to Germany to fight on an Ibis stayed on in Argentina still grateful to the captain who saved his life

Channel: WarhoundFlies

Views: 324,637

Rating: 4.79702 out of 5

Keywords: WW2, WWII, world war 2, battleship, graf spee

Id: usgsIIPtYXk

Length: 45min 9sec (2709 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 20 2012

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[u/turpajouhipukki]

I know beggars can't be choosers, but holy hell do I wish that there was even one documentary I want to watch on YouTube with a resolution over 10 by 10 pixels...