A little later, the battleship was discovered by the British submarine Ansheikn. By this time it became known that the convoy had already been disbanded and the Tirpitz had turned back. Convoy PQ-17, disbanded and left unguarded due to the Tirpitz threat, suffered greatly from air and submarine attacks.

Operation Sizilien

For the successful conduct of the operation, the captains of the mini-submarines X6 and X7 were awarded Victoria Crosses - the highest military awards of the British Empire.

Operation Tungsten

Wreckage of the Tirpitz

After the war, the wreckage of the Tirpitz was sold and broken up on site by a Norwegian company. Almost the entire ship was cut up and taken away. However, much of the Tirpitz's bow remains where it sank in 1944. In addition, the ship's power generators were used as a temporary power station, supplying electricity to the fishing industry around the town of Honningsvåg (Norwegian: Honningsvåg).

Not far from the site of the sinking of the Tirpitz, there are artificial lakes that appeared in the craters from the explosions of Tallboy bombs (weighing more than 5 tons) that hit the Tirpitz. Currently, some parts of the battleship are used by the Norwegian Road Department (Vegvesenet) as temporary road surfaces during repair work. Some parts of the battleship were melted down to make brooches and other jewelry. In addition, a significant part of the armored plating is stored at the Royal Naval Museum "Explosion!" ("Bang!") in Gosport, Hampshire.

Command staff

• Construction instructions: Captain zur See Friedrich Karl Topp (German) Friedrich Carl Topp), January 15 - February 25
• captain zur see Friedrich Karl Topp, February 25 - February 24
• Captain zur see Hans Karl Meyer (German) Hans Karl Meyer), February 24 - May 1
• Captain zur See Wolf Junge (German) Wolf Junge), May 1 - November 4
• Captain zur See Robert Weber (German) Robert Weber), November 4 – November 12 (killed in action)

• One of the missions in the game Hidden & Dangerous 2 is connected with the Tirpitz, where a group of English intelligence officers carry out a mission, which is clearly based on a real operation. In the game, the mission was successful, not only the Tirpitz itself was mined, but also the minesweeper Olaf, and the Enigma encryption machine was stolen from the latter.
• "Tirpitz" was also mentioned in the Call of Duty game in the British missions, where two scouts carry out sabotage on a battleship - mining the boilers and destroying the electronic components of the radar system.
• "Tirpitz" was also mentioned in the game Wolfenstein in the opening video, where Agent Blazkovich, the main character, carried out sabotage on the ship and sent it to the bottom.

Notes

Literature

• Taras A.E. Second World War at sea. - Mn.: Harvest, 2003. - 640 p. - (Military History Library). - ISBN 985-13-1707-1
• David Woodward"Tirpitz". Battleship operations in 1942-1944 = Dawid Woodward THE TIRPITZ and the Battle for the North Atlantic. - M.: ZAO Publishing House Tsentrpoligraf, 2005. - 255 p. - ISBN 5-9524-1636-5
• Tkachev A.V. Hunt for Tirpitz. M.: St. Andrew's flag, 1993.

see also

• Battleship Bismarck is the first ship of the Bismarck class.

Germany has good engineering and industry. Together they created many useful and efficient machines and equipment. In the event of war, their symbiosis was dangerous for a potential enemy - the USSR felt this firsthand during the Great Patriotic War. But there were some “punctures”.

Some monsters of the German military industry were scary on paper and to the eye, but the practical result of their use tended to zero. Among these “scarecrows” is the battleship Tirpitz. The British feared him not because he caused them significant damage, but because he simply existed.

What will you name the yacht... It is clear that the German sailors did not know this song by Captain Vrungel. Otherwise they would have chosen a different name for the super battleship. And so the history of the ship was quite consistent with the history of the man whose name it received.

Father of the German Navy

Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz enjoyed a good reputation among German sailors. He was extolled for a specific biographical fact: he did not lose a single battle. There is a good reason for this - he did not participate in any of them.

But the admiral had merit. Before the First World War, he actively advocated the development and strengthening of the German fleet. The goal was to end English dominance at sea. Tirpitz liked large ships with thick armor - he believed that these floating tanks would defeat the British.

The result turned out to be so-so - the British were more experienced in maritime affairs, and for every German ship they built 2 of their own.

Submarine warfare, of which Tirpitz was a fan, also did not succeed. It only made the United States, outraged by the underwater attack on the Lusitania, become Germany’s opponents (this passenger liner sank after being torpedoed by the U-20 submarine. 1,198 people died).

But in the minds of the German military, Tirpitz remained the “father of the fleet” and a symbol of the impending victory over England on the water. So his name was used to title the new ship.

Chancellor and Admiral

In 1935, the military ordered two battleships for construction. Hitler, having come to power, immediately began to ignore the conditions of the Treaty of Versailles, which limited the German military potential, and this turned out to be an issue on which the Germans were really at one with him (the conditions set by the victors were too humiliating).

It was decided to build ships in the country capable of replacing the British dreadnoughts. One of them was named “Bismarck”, and the second was given the honor of becoming “Tirpitz”.

There was something wrong with them from the beginning. went on the only voyage in his life, and the British sank him (not without damage to themselves, but still).

Tirpitz survived until 1944, but its combat effectiveness turned out to be insignificant. The main occupation of the battleship was... playing hide and seek with the British military. The ship repeated the fate of the admiral - he did not have the chance to take part in a single notable battle.

Giant Transport Hunter

It is known that Hitler was characterized by gigantomania when it came to weapons. He was fascinated by large and scary-looking devices. In fact, the giants did not justify the resources spent on their construction (for example, the giant Dora cannon, which was never able to properly fire at the 30th Sevastopol battery).

The same thing happened with Bismarck and Tirpitz. But the characteristics of the ships commanded respect. The battleships with the best performance (the same Japanese Yamato) took part in the war, but the German ships were also a considerable force.

Postscript system in German

It (the system) accompanied the ship already at the design stage. But it was the opposite of what was used by Soviet bureaucrats.

To please the requirements of the Treaty of Versailles, which limited German military potential, the data on ships was not overestimated, but underestimated.

Thus, the officially declared displacement of the Tirpitz was supposed to be 35 thousand tons. But already in the project “for internal use” the figure of 45.5 thousand tons appeared. Further, the battleship's displacement was further increased during reconstruction (up to 53 thousand tons), but no one hid this anymore - the war had begun.

A similar miracle happened with the Tirpitz’s armament - officially the main caliber was supposed to be 350 mm, but for some reason in reality it turned out to be 380 mm.

Technologically advanced scarecrow

The Tirpitz was launched in 1939, and immediately completed its first task - the British were scared. They had the habit of keeping 2 of their own in reserve of a similar class against each German ship (in war there is no time for a dueling code). Battleships were needed against a battleship. But the British lacked confidence that they had such a reserve against Tirpitz and Bismarck.

The battleships of the “King George” series were not the best, but then the Germans presented a really powerful battleship. The German battleship Tirpitz was not perfect, but its power was impressive.

The tactical and technical characteristics (linear, armor, running, fire) of the Tirpitz were not record-breaking, but good. Here you can simply refer to the numbers.

1. Dimensions - 253.6 m total length, 15 m total height (from the keel), 36 meters wide.
2. The thickness of the armor is from 145 to 320 mm, on the main caliber turrets and wheelhouse - 360 mm.
3. Maximum speed is more than 30 knots.
4. Main caliber – 380 mm (8 guns); plus another 12 150 mm cannons and 116 anti-aircraft guns of various calibers.
5. Autonomous cruising range is up to 16,500 km.
6. Deck-based aviation – Arado aircraft 4 pcs.

The ship was propelled by 12 boilers and 3 turbines. It had a radar station and, in addition to artillery, carried torpedo tubes. During its operation it was modernized several times; in particular, the number of anti-aircraft installations increased.

But at the same time, the Tirpitz was initially planned to be used not for battles with an equal enemy, but for hunting transport ships. The Nazis' focus was on English maritime trade, and they wanted to stop it. The ship was to be used not as a battleship, but as a cruiser.

So they sent him to the North Sea - it was safer, and the spoils were at hand (transport convoys carrying equipment, weapons and materials under Lend-Lease to the northern ports of the USSR).

The clear superiority of the British in the west and the fate of the Bismarck forced the Nazi command to save the second naval miracle.

The battleship was prepared for a pleasant sinecure - to chatter with Arctic convoys. The command was afraid that something unexpected would happen to the Fuhrer’s favorite naval toy. And put her out of harm's way.

Captains and maritime law

It remains to be mentioned about the people who were supposed to set the floating miracle in motion. The battleship's crew in its best days consisted of 2,608 people, including 108 officers.

There were several commanders on the Tirpitz during the ship’s existence, but all of them were at the rank of captain zur see (according to the Russian system, captains of the 1st rank). F.K. Topp was the first to receive the battleship in February 1941 (before that he had managed the construction and testing of the ship).

The fate of the last commander deserves attention. Robert Weber knew the unwritten law of the sea well. He did not leave his ship, and together with the Tirpitz went to the bottom. 1,700 crew members died with him; part of the crew managed to escape.

Symbolic thunderstorm of Arctic convoys

Since January 1942, the Tirpitz served in the North Sea. In the Norwegian fjords one could find a convenient anchorage for a battleship, hardly noticeable to the enemy. The German command wanted to protect the only remaining newfangled ship and hoped that its very existence would reduce the courage of the British.

In addition, the Nazis expected the imminent fall of Leningrad and for some reason decided that in this case the USSR Baltic Fleet would be guaranteed to flee to Sweden.

Leningrad held out, the Baltic Fleet did not escape anywhere, even Arctic convoys mainly suffered from aircraft and other ships, but not from the Tirpitz.

He basically tried the "snap and tick" tactic - appearing for a moment, and back to base.

But still, the battleship had a chance to take part in several real operations. Their scale is such that it allows us to believe that the Tirpitz was taken out of the parking lot only so that the Fuhrer would not have any questions about what he was doing.

Timber truck racing

Among his exploits was an attempt to intercept two convoys at once in March 1942. The first of them, PQ-12, was coming from Iceland to Murmansk, the second (QP-8) was heading towards it, from Murmansk.

The German squadron, which included the formidable Tirpitz, managed to slip right in front of the bow of one and behind the stern of the second convoy. Then everyone made excuses, citing the weather - they say, fog, zero visibility, and aerial reconnaissance was wrong.

The only victim of the hunt for the convoys was the Izhora, a Soviet timber carrier that accidentally fell behind its own in the fog. The commander of the Tirpitz had enough sense not to waste expensive charges on it - one of the destroyers of the squadron caught up with and sank the unfortunate vessel. And yet, “Izhora,” practically unarmed, held out against a sea wolf armed to the teeth for an hour and a half! Having managed to warn others about the attack.

Vain knight move

Another anti-convoy operation (codenamed “Knight’s Move”) was carried out in July of the same year. For convoy PQ-17, things ended badly - more than half of the ships sank. But Tirpitz did not touch them.

He simply went to sea, and this was enough to cause panic in the British Admiralty.

Having received intelligence data about the performance of the German “scarecrow”, the convoy was ordered to disperse and the escort vessels to fall behind. It turned out that the British command deliberately sacrificed transports to save the cruisers.

The convoy carried out the order. There was no loot for the battleship. The command decided that small German ships would cope with the task of catching the convoy ships one at a time. And so it happened. And the Tirpitz went back to the parking lot - away from British aircraft and submarines. It was a brilliant victory - the battleship didn’t even have to uncover its guns in order to win it.

From guns through mines

The Tirpitz also had a chance to take part in shooting along the coast. In September 1943, he moved to the shores of Spitsbergen. The buildings of the mining town remained there (before the war, coal was mined by the USSR and Norway) and German meteorologists worked for some time. They were fired upon by the British, who were pursuing their own goals when landing on Spitsbergen.

Revenge for the “dastardly attack” (of which as many as 1 person was the victim) was the visit of “Tirpitz”. The operation was beautifully called “Citronella” (aka “Sicily”).
The huge battleship brought with it several hundred marines and tested its main caliber in real combat, firing at the miners' barracks. It looked scary, but the practical result would have been greater when shooting sparrows.

The combat biography of the battleship is exhausted by these three operations. The rest of the time she stood at anchor, repaired and spoiled the nerves of the British.

The fate of a tempting target

England did not see the Tirpitz in action, but was afraid of it - apparently due to a lack of confidence that at the right moment it would not have 2 or more battleships at hand against one “German”.

The British military went out of their way to try to destroy the German battleship.

Bombs of all calibers (including super-powerful Tallboys), conventional and guided torpedoes were used. But for almost 3 years the battleship seemed under a spell.

Simple methods of invulnerability spell

In fact, everything was simple. The battleship was invulnerable because of its own merits, the characteristics of the northern nature, but even more so because of the mistakes of the British.

1. Visibility in Norway is poor. The battleship changed colors in June 1942 - the coloring acquired northern camouflage. So the British bombed at random.
2. The Tirpitz's air defense was good - a rare raid did not cost the British several aircraft.
3. The battleship's crew also achieved excellent results in installing smoke screens.
4. British pilots were taught to bomb areas. This was done in Dresden, but the area of ​​the battleship is much smaller. So the bombs basically reduced the fish stocks of the North Sea.
5. Several guided torpedoes inexplicably... got lost along the way.
6. One of the armor-piercing bombs that damaged the Tirpitz, according to the results of the test (it was carried out by the Germans), contained half the explosives required by the standard.

It is clear that it is not easy to fight such “conspiracies”. But some strikes reached their target - before the final sinking, the Tirpitz received damage several times that precluded independent progress (in September 1943 and April 1944).

Some bombing and mining by mini-submarines yielded results. As a result, this destroyed the battleship - it was unable to fully defend itself from the last attack.

Captain Lunin and the attack on the Tirpitz

The question of who sank the Tirpitz is closed. This was done by British bombers on November 12, 1944. But the USSR also claims credit for the hunt for the battleship.
The captain of the K-21 submarine, N.A. Lunin, during the counteraction to the “Knight's Move,” fired torpedoes at the Tirpitz and the destroyer accompanying it. Then in his report he reported hearing explosions and suggested that he had damaged the Tirpitz and sank the second ship.

But such losses were not recorded among the Germans.

Almost certainly Lunin's torpedoes missed and exploded as they fell to the bottom. Data on his course indicate that his chances of getting into the battleship were minimal. This does not discredit the captain's integrity - he at least tried, and did not claim that he observed a hit. But Tirpitz is not his prey.

Posthumous fame

During the implementation of Operation Catechism on November 12, 1944, the British dropped several Tallboys onto the Tirpitz. One reached the goal; the hit caused a fire and detonation of the ammunition. The battleship capsized and sank.

There was no need to look for the place of death on the map - the hull of the battleship was visible in Hockeybotn Bay above the surface. There he waited for the end of the war.

After peace was concluded, Norway cut up the Tirpitz until 1957. A significant part of the metal... was sold to Germany. Many of the fragments decorate museums, and souvenir jewelry was made from some of them. Several pieces of the battleship were used to repair roads. The bow part is still lying on the bottom.

Not far from the final resting place of the Tirpitz there is a monument to the dead crew members. The monument is dubious, but you can’t fight with the dead...

The fate of the battleship also affected the surrounding nature.

After the war, new lakes appeared in the Hockeybotn Bay area. They were formed when the craters from the Tallboys filled with water - the well-aimed British managed to miss the ship by kilometers.

After the death of the battleship, a new, glorious biography was invented for him. The British were proud of its destruction as if the Tirpitz had personally sent half of their fleet to the bottom. In modern computer games, “destroying the Tirpitz” is a common task for a superhero.

Well, at least he will fight on the screen. In reality, the Tirpitz did not recoup even a tenth of the funds invested in it, and what the British were afraid of was their shortcoming, and not the advantage of the ship. Let him work it out now.

Video

Tirpitz

Tirpitz (German: Tirpitz) was the second Bismarck-class battleship that was part of the Kriegsmarine. He practically did not participate in hostilities, but with his presence in Norway he threatened Arctic convoys in the USSR and tied down significant forces of the British fleet. For its passive role in the war, the Norwegians nicknamed the battleship “The Lonely Queen of the North” (Norwegian: Den ensomme Nordens Dronning). Attempts to destroy the Tirpitz continued for several years, but were crowned with success only in November 1944 after an air attack with super-heavy Tallboy bombs. Details of the battleship are still in military museums around the world.

History of application

The ship was launched on April 1, 1939. It received its name in honor of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the founder of the modern German fleet. It was originally intended that the Tirpitz would act as a raider, attacking Allied trade caravans in the North Atlantic. However, the fate of the battleship Bismarck made Hitler disillusioned with the surface fleet, and therefore the Tirpitz was used extremely rarely.

In January 1942, Tirpitz was sent to Norwegian waters to hunt Arctic convoys to Russia and counter the Archery operation of British commandos on the island of Vågsøy. There, in the fjords, it stood for almost the entire Second World War. However, even the mere presence of the Tirpitz tied up significant forces of the Royal Navy, although during its entire stay in Norway it carried out only three offensive operations. Despite this, the British fleet took into account the potential danger of the battleship and did not stop efforts to destroy it. After repeated attacks from the air and sea, the Tirpitz was sunk while docked in Tromsø on November 12, 1944, as a result of an air raid using super-heavy five-ton Tollboy bombs.

Operation Tirpitz

Operation Sportpalast

In early March 1942, there was an attempt to intercept convoys PQ-12 and QP-8. PQ-12 left a port in Iceland on March 1, 1942, and QP-8 left Murmansk at about the same time. On March 5, the Tirpitz, accompanied by three destroyers, left the base and headed across the Arctic Ocean to Bear Island. Due to bad weather, it was not possible to find the convoy; only one of the destroyers discovered and sank the timber carrier Izhora, which lagged behind QP-8. On March 9, the Tirpitz was spotted by an aircraft from the aircraft carrier HMS Victorious, and Admiral Otto Ciliax decided to abort the cruise and return to base.

Operation Rösselsprung

In July 1942, the German command planned to use the Tirpitz and the heavy cruisers Admiral Scheer and Admiral Hipper to attack the PQ-17 convoy (Plan Rösselsprung - “Knight's Move”). Due to delays in permission to begin the operation (it was given personally by Hitler), the sea went out only on July 5. On the same day, the battleship was attacked by the Soviet submarine K-21 under the command of N. A. Lunin. The boat fired a salvo of four stern torpedo tubes. The crew of the boat did not directly observe the result of the attack, but heard 2 strong explosions and a series of weaker explosions. Lunin in his report suggested that the explosions were explained by torpedoes hitting the battleship, while at the same time admitting the possibility that the torpedoes hit one of the escort destroyers; at the headquarters of the submarine brigade, his report was interpreted as a report about the sinking of the destroyer and damage to the battleship. In Soviet and Russian memoirs, popular and journalistic literature, statements about the damage to the Tirpitz during the K-21 attack are repeatedly encountered, but these statements do not have documentary evidence. The German ships avoided being hit (and did not even note the fact of the attack); The explosions heard by modern researchers are explained by the detonation of torpedoes when they hit the ground or distant explosions of depth charges dropped by convoy ships. Some Russian mass media still publish arguments in favor of the version that K-21 torpedoes (or torpedoes) hit the Tirpitz.

A little later, the battleship was discovered by the British submarine Ansheikn. By this time it became known that the convoy had already been disbanded and the Tirpitz turned back. Convoy PQ-17, disbanded and left unguarded due to the Tirpitz threat, suffered greatly from air and submarine attacks.

Operation Sizilien

In September 1943, Operation Sizilien (“Sicily”) was carried out - a raid on Spitsbergen. German troops landed on the island with artillery support from the battleships Tirpitz and Scharnhorst and nine destroyers. The Germans occupied the island from September 6 to September 9, 1943. Operation Sizilien was the only operation in which the Tirpitz fired its guns at the enemy (however, it never fired a single shot at enemy ships).

Operations against Tirpitz

The British began attacks on the Tirpitz even during construction and did not stop until they sank the battleship.

Operation Title

October 30-31, 1942. An attempt to destroy the Tirpitz using guided underwater vehicles codenamed Chariot, which were human-controlled torpedoes. The vehicles were to be delivered to the Tirpitz anchorage by covert towing in an underwater position using the fishing boat "Arthur" (captain - Leif Larsen).

On October 30, a boat with torpedoes in tow managed to enter Trondheimsfjord. When there were no more than 15 miles (24 km) left to the Tirpitz anchorage, a strong headwind and a wave arose. On October 31, at 22:00, a loud grinding noise was heard astern. "Arthur" entered the nearest harbor, where a diver discovered the loss of both torpedoes. At this point, Tirpitz was less than 10 miles away. The boat was flooded and the team left on foot to the Swedish border.

The Germans later discovered the sunken boat and, after examination, came to the conclusion that it was intended for a special operation.

Operation Source

September 1943: first successful operation against Tirpitz. Ex-class mini-submarines were used for the attack. For most of the journey, the mini-boats were towed by conventional submarines. Of the six midget submarines, three were to attack the Tirpitz: X5 (Lt. Henty-Creer), X6 (Lt. Donald Cameron) and X7 (Lt. Basil Place). The X5 boat was discovered and sunk, but X6 and X7 dropped four 2-ton mines filled with ammotol under the battleship. After this, the boats were also discovered, and their crews were captured. Despite the detected danger, the Tirpitz was unable to leave the parking lot before the mines exploded. The explosion caused serious damage to the battleship: the frames in the bow were damaged and one of the turbines was torn off the frame. Tower C, weighing about 2,000 tons, was thrown upward and jammed the ball ring when it fell. It was impossible to fix the tower outside the dock. In addition, all rangefinders and fire control devices were out of order. As a result of the damage received, the battleship was out of action for six months and its maximum speed was significantly reduced.

For the successful conduct of the operation, the captains of the mini-submarines X6 and X7 were awarded Victoria Crosses - the highest military awards of the British Empire.

Operation Tungsten

By April 1944, the Tirpitz had been repaired and could again pose a danger. In response to this threat, the British Navy launched Operation Tungsten. The attack involved a significant fleet force, including: two battleships, two attack aircraft carriers, two escort aircraft carriers, two cruisers and sixteen destroyers. The attack began on April 3, on the eve of the Tirpitz entering sea trials after repairs.

The raid consisted of two waves of Fairey Barracuda torpedo bombers accompanied by fighter escorts. The attacking planes, however, carried not torpedoes, but bombs of various types: armor-piercing, depth, high-explosive and fragmentation. The first wave struck at 05:30. By 08:00 the attack was completed: three aircraft had been lost. Tirpitz lost 123 people killed and 300 wounded. The armored hull was not damaged, but the superstructure suffered noticeable damage, requiring three months to repair.

Operations Planet, Brawn, Tiger Claw and Mascot

Tirpitz remained a threat, so the British Admiralty continued to plan operations against it. However, due to bad weather in April-May 1944, three raids had to be canceled: Operations Planet, Brawn and Tiger Claw.

The next attack using aircraft carriers (Operation Mascot) took place in July 1944. However, by this time the Germans had organized an air defense, especially a smoke screen system, as a result of which the attack ended in failure: the attacking aircraft scored no hits.

Operations Goodwood I, II, III and IV

In August 1944, the Tirpitz finally passed sea trials. Shortly afterwards, the British carried out further raids (Operations Goodwood I and Goodwood II), which ended in vain due to bad weather.

Operations Paravane, Obviate and Catechism

Operation Paravane was launched by the British Royal Air Force on September 15 from the Yagodnik base near Arkhangelsk. Avro Lancaster aircraft were armed with 5-ton Tallboy bombs and experimental 500-pound (230 kg) underwater "walking" mines. Despite the smoke screen set up to protect Tirpitz, one of the bombs still hit the bow of the ship, rendering it unseaworthy. The Germans had practically no opportunity to drydock Tirpitz for repairs, so in October the battleship was transferred to Tromsø as a floating artillery battery in case of the expected Allied invasion of Norway. The ship's new location was already within range of the air fleet from Scotland, and the British continued to attack it, unaware of the German decision not to restore the ship.

On October 28, another raid on Tirpitz was launched from the Lossiemouth base in Scotland, called Operation Obviate - but at the last moment the ship was hidden by clouds, and only one Tallboy bomb, exploding not far from the ship, bent the propeller shaft.

But the next time, on November 12, 1944, during Operation Catechism (English catechism; interrogation), there was no smoke screen or clouds over Tirpitz. The ship was hit by 3 Tallboy bombs: one bounced off the turret armor, but two others penetrated the armor and made a 200-foot (61 m) hole in her port side and caused a fire and explosion in the powder magazine, which blew off the "C" turret. As a result, the Tirpitz sank west of Tromsø, in Håkøybotn Bay, a few minutes after the attack, taking with it 1,000 of its crew of 1,700.

For reasons that are not entirely clear, the Luftwaffe was unable to prevent the bombing. German air defense only managed to damage the engine of one of the planes participating in the raid, but its crew escaped with a “hard” landing in Sweden. As a result of this failure, the commander of the Luftwaffe in Norway, Major Heinrich Erler, was accused of neglect of duty and sentenced to death, commuted to three years in prison and sent to the front.

The destruction of Tirpitz eliminated the last serious threat to the Allies on the surface of the North Atlantic. This made it possible to transfer the main forces - battleships and aircraft carriers - from the European region, where they were kept as deterrent forces, to the Indian and Pacific oceans, where they took part in hostilities against Japan.

After the war

After the war, the wreckage of Tirpitz was sold and broken up on site by a Norwegian company. Almost the entire ship was cut up and taken away. However, much of the Tirpitz's bow remains where it sank in 1944. In addition, the ship's power generators were used as a temporary power station, supplying electricity to the fishing industry around the town of Honningsvåg.

Not far from the site of the flooding of Tirpitz, there are artificial lakes that appeared in craters from the explosions of Tallboy bombs (weighing more than 5 tons), which did not hit the target. Currently, some parts of the battleship are used by the Norwegian Road Department (Vegvesenet) as temporary road surfaces during repair work. Some parts of the battleship were melted down to make brooches and other jewelry. In addition, a significant part of the armored plating is stored at the Royal Naval Museum "Explosion!" ("Bang!") in Gosport, Hampshire.

Tirpitz - the second Bismarck-class battleship that was part of the Kriegsmarine

1939 was the pinnacle of sea power Germany, it was this year that Bismarck’s sister ship, a battleship of the same class, type and equipment, Tirpitz, was launched from the stocks of the Hamburg shipyard “Wilhelmshaven”.

According to the Fuhrer's plan "Tirpitz", which had a length of at least 251 meters, a width of 36 meters, a height from the bottom to the upper edge of the side - 15 meters, a draft of more than 10 meters and a displacement of over 53 thousand tons, was supposed to bring the entire navy of the world to its knees , including English. The power that 12 steam boilers and three powerful turbines gave the battleship exceeded 163 thousand horsepower, allowing it to achieve a maximum speed of up to 31 knots per hour.

On board the battleship there were more than 2,600 cabins, capable of accommodating 108 members of the officer corps and more than 2.5 thousand lower naval ranks. As for weapons, the Tirpitz was armed to the teeth; on board there were more than 36 guns of various calibers, torpedo and anti-aircraft installations, as well as 4 modern aircraft for that period. Without entering the port, the battleship could make a voyage of 8 thousand nautical miles.

German battleship Tirpitz

Being in action battleship The super-class Tirpitz was actually considered more by both the command and the crew as a battleship, evidence of which was the steel armor of the ship, which covered the conning tower, side and bow of the ship to a depth of several tens of centimeters. The thickness of the armor was even more than 36 centimeters in some places, which made the ship extremely heavy and at the same time stable, as well as safe from small-caliber shells hitting its hull.

After the news of the tragic death of the invincible Bismarck reached Germany, all hopes of transforming Germany into a maritime power and its conquest of most sea routes were placed on waging unrestricted submarine warfare using submarines, while Tirpitz was included in Hitler’s new strategic plans very little space was allocated.

The battleship, for the sake of its own safety and security, as a valuable and effective means of intimidation, was sent to the shores of Norway, where for a long time it did not take an active part in hostilities, nevertheless, threatening the passage of ships along the northern sea route and unnerving the British government, forced because of him alone to maintain an entire squadron flotilla in the Northern Seas.

So in 1942, the Tirpitz tried to attack the sea convoys PQ-12 and QP-8 coming from the Soviet Union and Iceland, but it did not manage to cause any damage or even detect the ships traveling as part of the convoys; it itself was attacked by the British by plane and therefore tried to get away from the convoy's route.

In the summer of the same year, the German command ordered the Tirpitz to go to sea and attack the PQ-17 convoy. But the telegram with the order was delayed, therefore, having gone out in search of the convoy, the battleship did not find anyone and was forced to turn back, not even suspecting that the very news of its presence prompted the command to disband the convoy and thereby doom it to inevitable death.

Arctic convoy PQ-17

It should be noted that the Tirpitz was considered invincible only by the British and Americans, while the Soviet sailors were not only not afraid, but, on the contrary, were looking for a meeting with it. So, on the day of the unsuccessful attack on the convoy, the battleship itself was attacked by the Soviet submarine K-21, whose commander was N.A. Lunin. subsequently claimed that he hit the Tirpitz with two torpedoes and heard the explosions characteristic of a hit. However, many years later it was proven that there were no hits, since the Tirpitz armor was fully protected from Soviet torpedoes.

In 1943, with fire support from Tirpitz, a German landing on Spitsbergen was organized. The operation under the loud name “Sicily” was carried out in just three days from September 6 to 9, but its success for the Germans was short-lived.

Bearing in mind how successful the sinking of the first German battleship was, the British decided to finally put an end to the Tirpitz, as in previous times, by organizing a real sea and air hunt for it, in which several hundred aircraft and dozens of submarines took part at once. boats, cruisers and ships of other classes. In total, more than 13 more or less successful naval operations of the English fleet were undertaken to capture and destroy the Tirpitz, but only the last operation, which in Russian translation was called “Interrogation,” was successful.

At its height on November 12, 1944, the Tirpitz was pinned down and fired upon by more than 120 aircraft. As a result of more than a thousand direct hits, the battleship began to collapse on the left side, and its holds began to fill with water, after which a flame appeared in the area of ​​the powder magazine, followed by a powerful explosion, due to which the ship turned upside down in an instant. Most of the battleship's crew of more than 1,000 people died, only a few managed to escape.

The sunken German battleship Tirpitz

In the post-war period, individual parts of the ship were raised to the surface and sent to various military museums around the world. For each of the wrecks of the battleship, the Norwegian company that received the right to sell it received a lot of money. Electric generators, which by pure chance remained undamaged, are still used today as a power station in one of the small Norwegian towns.

Despite the enormous material collected over the past since graduation Second World War years, to find out what was the reason why the German aviation forces based nearby were unable to prevent the destruction of the Tirpitz. What is known is that after the successful sinking of the battleship by the British, the chief of the German bombers was sentenced to death and executed.

Evidence of the death of the ship, in addition to the wreckage and museum exhibits, are also the huge lakes that formed near the site of the sinking of the Tirpitz, the cause of which was aerial bombs that did not reach or flew beyond the battleship.

In 1944, in late autumn, citizens of the USSR learned good news from messages from the Sovinformburo. British bombers sank the German battleship Tirpitz in a little-known Norwegian fjord near the port of Tromso. The history of the battle was not described in detail, but it was clear that this did not happen on the first attempt; the hunt for the ship lasted a long time and was finally crowned with success. The death of the Kriegsmarine combat unit that was annoying the Allies brought the hour of common victory closer and freed up the Royal Navy for operations in other naval theaters of war.

Sea giant

Germany has never built anything like this - neither before nor later. The battleship Tirpitz was not the largest ship in the world, but it is difficult to call it small either. The declared displacement was 35 thousand tons, but in reality it exceeded 50,000. Three propellers rotated by a power plant with a capacity of over 138 thousand liters. s., pushed this colossus. It was a raider, that is, a ship designed to hunt individual ships and convoys within a radius of 10 thousand miles. The speed exceeded 30 knots. A dozen boiler-turbine units loaded the turbo-gear units, one per propeller. The length of the ship is 251 meters, the width at the maximum section is 36 m with a draft of 10.6 m. The crew is almost 2,100 sailors and officers. The giant battleship Tirpitz personified the doctrine of Admiral Raeder, according to which success in the naval theater of operations was determined by the power of the surface fleet. Chancellor Adolf Hitler, hypnotized by the enormity of the dreadnought, held the same opinion at the time. Later it turned out that the Fuhrer was mistaken, but it was too late.

About the name

The ship was named after Alfred von Tirpitz, an outstanding figure in German politics and a prominent naval leader. The future rear admiral received the title of nobility in 1900, at the age of 50, as a reward for his many works for the benefit of his native state. He proved himself to be a prominent theorist and geopolitician by developing a plan for the reconstruction of the German Navy, which, however, did not involve its excessive expansion. At the outbreak of the First World War, the Kriegsmarine forces, in addition to other ships, had seven dreadnoughts, twenty-five cruisers, twenty battleships and four dozen submarines (about 2.5 times less than the British Navy, but enough to actively resist it) . It was on the submarines that the author of the plan had special hopes, but he was unable to convince the then German leadership that he was right. Ironically, the battleship Tirpitz also did not correspond to the late rear admiral's vision of the future of naval forces and the nature of the coming battles. It should also be noted that this extraordinary figure in every sense died in 1930, before the National Socialists came to power. Despite his militaristic beliefs (quite natural for a military man), von Tirpitz was not a fascist.

How did Tirpitz come about?

In fact, if Germany, led by Hitler, had adhered to the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, it would not have built ships of this class. The country did not have the right to launch military vessels heavier than 10 thousand tons. Typically, cruisers, usually armed with 203 mm caliber guns, corresponded to this displacement. It was this inaccuracy, carelessly written into the treaty, that allowed the Germans to build completely atypical combat units that turned the tide. The class of “pocket battleships” was characterized by a small displacement (just over 10 thousand) and heavy-duty weapons (6 guns of 280 mm caliber). There were three of them: “Admiral Graf Spee”, “Admiral Scheer” and “Deutschland”, they were laid down in 1934, and even then it became clear that Hitler was not going to comply with the conditions of Versailles, since the ships’ displacement exceeded the established limit of 10 thousand tons , although still insignificant. In the spring of 1939, the battleship Tirpitz entered service. And the battleship Bismarck too. These were ships of the same type, they were preparing for the war that would start soon.

Tirpitz shell

Like a real Teutonic deity, the ship was clad in a strong shell. Its hull was surrounded by armor that protected the cellars of the towers for more than two-thirds of its total height with a thickness of 170 to 350 mm. There were also two armored decks (50 and 80 mm). The extremities were also covered (bow 50 mm, stern 80 mm). Barbets (tower protection) with a thickness of 340 mm ensured the invulnerability of the crews during the battle. The medium caliber also had armor, including sloped armor, up to 20 mm. At 5 m 40 cm, the steel sheets went below the waterline to reduce the risk of possible torpedo attacks. In general, the newest and largest German battleship Tirpitz had rational and powerful protection against all possible types of anti-ship weapons of its time. Looking ahead, we can state that this did not affect his sad fate in any way.

Weapon

In terms of firepower, the battleship was significantly superior to most of its world counterparts. Main caliber guns (380 mm) were mounted in pairs on four turrets located at the bow and stern. In addition to them, the artillery was represented by auxiliary firing points: six 150 mm guns, eight 105 mm guns, and the same number of anti-aircraft guns (37 mm). The armament was changed several times, this was facilitated by a significant degree of unification of mounting dimensions.

The battleship Tirpitz also had an air wing, represented by six seaplanes launched from a twin ejection platform. The planes carried out maritime reconnaissance, searched for enemy submarines, and, if necessary, could attack them with depth charges and heavy machine guns (if the submarine was on the surface).

In terms of its armament, the ship could compete with any ship of the anti-Hitler coalition. But the fate of the battleship Tirpitz was such that it had very little opportunity to fire from its main caliber and only at coastal targets.

Situation in the Atlantic

In the spring of 1941, the German command made great efforts (not without success) to the naval blockade of the British Isles. The 24th of May became a dark date in the history of the Royal Navy. The battleship Bismarck, with well-aimed fire (perhaps by accident), managed to destroy the cruiser Hood, the pride of the English fleet. In the battle, the German raider received damage that worsened its performance characteristics, as a result of which it was overtaken by a British squadron, fired upon, attacked by torpedoes and sunk. Success accompanied the British, but after realizing the danger that German battleships posed, they began to treat them cautiously, avoiding direct clashes, but constantly trying to destroy them.

The Germans, having lost the Bismarck, also experienced a certain stupor. For fear of losing the last dreadnought, they protected the battleship Tirpitz, hiding it in the Norwegian fjords. But weapons were created for war, and the end inevitably had to come, sooner or later.

Annoying Battleship

After an unsuccessful and practically useless campaign against Spitsbergen (September 1942), during which the coastal part of the island and coal mines were subjected to artillery bombardment, the raider stood almost idle in Nazi-occupied Norway. The British knew about this and were preparing a secret mission, which was tasked with sinking the battleship Tirpitz. The ship also annoyed Soviet sailors: it made forays that impeded the passage of convoys carrying military cargo from the United States to Arkhangelsk and Murmansk. During these raids, the German ship was attacked by British aircraft and Allied submarines, but without success.

The essence of the operation planned by the British Admiralty was to sink the battleship with special submarines of the X-6 and X-7 types of very small tonnage.

Operation Title

Actually, this was not the first plan; attempts had been made before. For example, at the very end of October 1942, Operation Title entered its final phase, during which two submarine-controlled torpedoes were supposed to hit an enemy ship. A tug disguised as a trawler delivered these shells to a minimum distance, and then they followed to the target, led by special pilots who risked their lives no less than the Japanese kaiten suicide bombers.

The boat was able to penetrate into the Trondheims fjord, but the operation was unsuccessful - bad weather prevented it. A strong wave tore the torpedoes from the cable at a distance of only ten miles from the battleship. The tug had to be scuttled, the Germans discovered it a little later and understood, if not the whole plan, then at least that something was being planned against the Tirpitz.

"Source"

In September 1943, an operation called Source was much more successful. Three mini-submarines, which had "X" codes from 5 to 7, were towed by conventional submarines to the Tirpitz home base (Alten Fjord). The Germans managed to discover and sink the first of them, the other two completed the task: they fired mines weighing 2 tons at the very bottom of the battleship. The results of the explosions were disastrous for the ship; it received numerous damages. The third tower, having received a colossal impulse, lost the ability to rotate, one turbine fell off its frame, and the frames were bent. Many important fire control and navigation devices stopped working. After the inspection, the practical irreparability of the ship became obvious. German technical services spent a lot of effort and resources trying to restore the battleship Tirpitz. The characteristics could no longer be the same. The British did not know about this.

Other attempts

Attempts to finish off the largest German ship continued in 1944. During Operation Tungsten, naval forces were involved. The air strike coordinated with them led to additional damage and the death of part of the crew (123 people), but did not achieve the final goal. Several other promotions with scary names (“Tiger Claws”, “Talisman” and others) turned out to be even less effective. The Goodwood plan was generally unsuccessful due to poor visibility in the operational area. The use of the Yagodnik airbase (Arkhangelsk region), as well as the use of special five-ton “Tallboy” bombs, increased the capabilities of British aviation. At that time, the Tirpitz was actually already a stationary floating artillery battery, occupying an insignificant position near the Norwegian city of Tromsø. The ship was bombed frequently, and was eventually finished off on November 12th. The last battle of the battleship Tirpitz took place in Hockeybotn Bay, where it sank. Of the 1,700 crew members, seven hundred were saved, the rest sank to the bottom.

Lunin version

The events that took place near the island of Rolvsø on July 5, 1942 are interpreted ambiguously today. The Soviet submarine K-21, under the command of captain third rank N.A. Lunin, attempted to destroy a large sea surface target with four torpedoes. The conditions of the attack were difficult; the crew could not verify the effectiveness of the launches. Acoustics detected two explosions, but whether they occurred as a result of hitting an enemy ship, or whether the torpedoes detonated from a collision with a rocky bottom is not known for certain. Documents that became the property of the Allied powers after the collapse of Hitlerism do not confirm the damage caused to German ships by the K-21 submarine. These are the bare facts.

Fiction is another matter. The famous writer Valentin Pikul wrote about how Lunin attacked the battleship Tirpitz. According to his version, it was the actions of the Soviet submariners that became the decisive factor in the death of the Kriegsmarine flagship.

The job of historians is to analyze documents. This work seems boring to many, but it is precisely this work that provides answers to most questions regarding the past. For example, when asked who sank the Tirpitz. The battleship sank to the bottom after an air raid by British aircraft, this fact is undeniable. Our heroic submariners do not need other people's glory; their own is enough for them.