Hi Vic,

I am curious as to the origin of "flank speed".
,,
I have never heard of it before and though Wikipedia defines it, there is no reference to the origin o the tem.

Cheers
Peter

On 28/09/2013 9:15 AM, wrote:
Hi Vic,

I am curious as to the origin of "flank speed".
,,
I have never heard of it before and though Wikipedia defines it, there is no reference to the origin o the tem.

Cheers
Peter


It's a USN term afaik. If you are protecting a convoy and
they turn to avoid a sub, you, the destroyer or frigate, needs to
make up considerable ground to get between them, the targets, and
the bad guys. You needed to maintain a flank position between
the two.

I think your sub guys used it in WW2 to move as fast as they could
to get to their target positions. Although, in those days, almost
anything could outrun a sub. But they sure were hard to find

On Sat, 28 Sep 2013 12:31:30 +0300, injipoint
wrote:

On 28/09/2013 9:15 AM, wrote:
Hi Vic,

I am curious as to the origin of "flank speed".
,,
I have never heard of it before and though Wikipedia defines it, there is no reference to the origin o the tem.

Cheers
Peter


It's a USN term afaik. If you are protecting a convoy and
they turn to avoid a sub, you, the destroyer or frigate, needs to
make up considerable ground to get between them, the targets, and
the bad guys. You needed to maintain a flank position between
the two.

I think your sub guys used it in WW2 to move as fast as they could
to get to their target positions. Although, in those days, almost
anything could outrun a sub. But they sure were hard to find


Sounds right. I can only say for my DDG it wasn't an "emergency"
speed as suggested by a Wiki I read.
More "tactical." And when sea conditions allowed, all my skippers
would use it sometimes for hours on end while in transit, say from the
Med back to the U.S.
Sure, fuel efficiency suffers, but if you have enough and some to
spare to make it to port, or an oiler to rendezvous with, it didn't
matter. Warship skippers - at least in the days of cheap oil - were
probably no different than the typical power boater in that regard.
"Let's get this baby moving!"

On Fri, 27 Sep 2013 23:15:23 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

Hi Vic,

I am curious as to the origin of "flank speed".
,,
I have never heard of it before and though Wikipedia defines it, there is no reference to the origin o the tem.

Cheers
Peter

From www.history.navy.mil

Flank Speed
One quarter more than standard speed except for cruisers, destroyers,
light mine layers and fast aircraft carriers. In cruisers, destroyers,
light mine layers and fast aircraft carriers it is ten knots more than
standard speed.

This is certainly a U.S. term but I don't know whether the royal navy
uses the term or not.... so you have an excuse :-)
--
Cheers,

Bruce in Bangkok

Thanks gentlemen; very much appreciated.

I had recently bought and watched the DVD "Convoy, War for the Atlantic", a serious lengthy documentary series produced in England. I'd reccommend it t anyobe both the archive film footage an the information.

Although not mentioned in this documentary, a little known fact is that Malaysia's Penang Island was home to a fleet of long range German submarines that preyed upon Allied shipping during WWII. They shared a Japanese submarine base. Apparently the submariners of both countries despsed each other, inly due to the Germans' arrogance and sense of racial superiority. A private outfit has cleared the overgrown jungle that has hidden most of the site and it is now open to visitore.
Ciao
Peter

On 28/09/2013 3:41 PM, wrote:
Thanks gentlemen; very much appreciated.

I had recently bought and watched the DVD "Convoy, War for the Atlantic", a serious lengthy documentary series produced in England. I'd reccommend it t anyobe both the archive film footage an the information.

Although not mentioned in this documentary, a little known fact is that Malaysia's Penang Island was home to a fleet of long range German submarines that preyed upon Allied shipping during WWII. They shared a Japanese submarine base. Apparently the submariners of both countries despsed each other, inly due to the Germans' arrogance and sense of racial superiority. A private outfit has cleared the overgrown jungle that has hidden most of the site and it is now open to visitore.
Ciao
Peter

Like the Japanese and the Russians nowadays.

I have a Russian submarine Commander's cap (brass, too,
not a 2&1/2).

A relative was in a bar in the Kurils. He was USN.
Some Russians from a sub were in there. Some Jap fishermen
arrived. They began a small to-do with the Russkis.
The Russkis wanted to engage so they took off their greatcoats
and caps and handed them to the US guys (neutral observers?)

They then proceeded to beat the **** out of each other until
the Japanese coppers arrived and collared everyone.

Seeing as the Russians were not reachable for the foreseeable,
my relative (distant) ended up with the coat and cap.

I ended up with the cap.

i actually put it on one day on my base and walked along a
Los Angeles class with the usual Marine on guard. He didn't even
notice. People see whole images, detail gets lost until you
need to go back and examine it. He just saw a normal RAN Officer and
not the Russian high-peak cap with the Hammer and Sickle on it.
I took it off pretty quick after we did that - impersonating a senior
officer etc. Not sure what **** I could have got in.

On Sat, 28 Sep 2013 05:41:17 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

Thanks gentlemen; very much appreciated.

I had recently bought and watched the DVD "Convoy, War for the Atlantic", a serious lengthy documentary series produced in England. I'd reccommend it t anyobe both the archive film footage an the information.

Although not mentioned in this documentary, a little known fact is that Malaysia's Penang Island was home to a fleet of long range German submarines that preyed upon Allied shipping during WWII. They shared a Japanese submarine base. Apparently the submariners of both countries despsed each other, inly due to the Germans' arrogance and sense of racial superiority. A private outfit has cleared the overgrown jungle that has hidden most of the site and it is now open to visitore.
Ciao
Peter

When I worked for Petromer Trend in Irian Jaya there was a landing
craft captain - German guy - that had originally come out here to join
a team that were salvaging a German sub sunk somewhere off the West
coast of Malaysia. The boat was supposed to have been carrying mercury
from Japan, or one of their holdings, back to Germany and was sunk - I
don't; know by what.

Apparently they did salvage several tons of mercury and the story he
told was that one of the partners stored his share in a local
warehouse while the other partner moved his to some unknown location.

Some how the newspapers got hold of the "Treasure Hunt" and published
an article about it which resulted, the German said, in hoards of
police, customs, and I don't know who else, descending on the group
and their warehouse and seizing the "treasure" and putting some of the
crew in jail while they sorted things out. The German, being a lowly
diver got told to LEAVE! and so went to Singapore and got a job as
Master of a small trading ship trading between Bangladesh and
Singapore.

Apparently one partner and most of the diving crew ended up with
nothing and the other partner sort of vanished, together with his
share of the mercury :-)
--
Cheers,

Bruce in Bangkok

On Saturday, September 28, 2013 8:41:17 PM UTC+8, wrote:
Thanks gentlemen; very much appreciated.

Although not mentioned in this documentary, a little known fact is that Malaysia's Penang Island was home to a fleet of long range German submarines that preyed upon Allied shipping during WWII. They shared a Japanese submarine base. Apparently the submariners of both countries despsed each other, inly due to the Germans' arrogance and sense of racial superiority. A private outfit has cleared the overgrown jungle that has hidden most of the site and it is now open to visitore.

Hmm ... German subs used a few parts of Penang for ports. The main port was a few pens on Pulau Jerejak (aka Pulau Jerjak). Those pens were subsequently converted into a shipyard. And the shipyard still exists, owned and operated I think now by Boustead, a government-linked company that among other things does contract work for the Malaysian navy.

The other areas were Sweetenham Pier (the main port) and a couple of temporary pens on the northern coast.

The U-boots involved were the Monson Gruppe [Monsoon group] working the Indian Ocean and, occasionally, the Pacific. Wikipedia has a page about the Monson Gruppe.

Just N of Penang, one of the Monson Gruppe was sunk in 1945 as she was carrying a load of mercury to Penang, to deliver the mercury to the Japanese. The U-boot went down in 13 m of water. Twenty of the crew got out alive. One wrote a book about it (look for U-858 by Baudzus). Most of the mercury was retrieved in 1972 (a small legal suit was run: Malaysia recognised that Federal Germany owned the mercury). The wreck is still there and is marked on charts (and surrounded, when I last sailed past it by a dozen bamboo stakes driven into the seabed so trawlers don't snag their nets).

So ... (1) the facts are not little known. They're well documented including on the internet and books; (2) the pretense that the so-called Penang War Museum at Batu Maung ("a private outfit has now cleared the overgrown jungle") is just that - a pretense for commercial reasons to suck in the gulls)..

Bil
Penang

Thanks Bill for the info,

I only recently heard about the German subs from a Japanese friend, an old flatmate from university days. His uncle was based in Penang for a while during the war.

When I get back home to Penang, I'll check it all out. On my short trips home by plane, I get little time for myself and am usually busy with my kids, work and friends.

Are you living there or just passing through?
Cao
Peter

On Saturday, September 28, 2013 2:15:23 PM UTC+8, wrote:
Hi Vic,



I am curious as to the origin of "flank speed".

The concept of 'flank' in that usage dates back to the US Civil War and is recorded as an 'Americanism' or 'US slang' from 1872.

During the Civil War, journalists, civilians and soldiers all picked up the use of flank with its strategic meanings to outflank and attack the flanks, and to defend the flanks. As not used by the generals, 'flank' gained the additional meaning in US English of 'to dodge, to slip by'. Hence the usage recorded in 1872 of: "When the men wished to escape the attention of pickets and guards by slipping past them, they said they flanked them; drill and detail and every irksome duty was flanked, when it could be avoided by some cunning trick. Soon‥the poor farmer was flanked out of his pig and his poultry." (from Schele de Vere, Americanisms.)

And 'flank speed' became a defined USN term - which Bruce nailed correctly - as one quarter more than standard speed or +10 knots. The speed necessary to protect the flanks of a convoy, the speed necessary to outflank a convoy, etc.

Bil