GWAS: Airships Preview
Part II: The Operational Scenarios
October 2013

Here’s a preview of the five operational scenarios in Great War at Sea: Airships.

Operational Scenario 1
AIRSHIP AMBUSH
3-6 July 1915
Rumors had reached the British Admiralty that the Germans were gathering transports behind Borkum and in the Ems estuary, presumably to form an invasion fleet. These rumors were not given too much credibility, but it was considered prudent to discredit them entirely. A scouting mission conducted by seaplanes was the chosen method.

It was assumed that the squadron sent to accomplish this task would itself be scouted by German airships. The airships had been making a nuisance of themselves whenever British light forces had approached the German Bight. A trap would be set. The Royal Naval Air Service had just taken delivery of a new seaplane fighter, a Sopwith model known as the Schneider because it was the military version of a plane that had won the Schneider Cup seaplane race. Three of the fighters would be with the task force, waiting to ambush the airship which would inevitably appear.

The High Seas Fleet was under the command of Admiral Hugo von Pohl, an officer who took seriously the Kaiser’s order not to hazard units of the fleet. When a U-boat reported a British squadron sailing toward German waters, airships were ordered to monitor the British force and attack it with bombs. No surface forces were committed.

Note: This scenario uses the map from Jutland and pieces from Zeppelins and Jutland.

Aftermath
The crews of the German Naval Airship Division congratulated themselves on a victory. They believed they had prevented the British from conducting a seaplane bombing raid similar to the Christmas Morning raid portrayed in Jutland Operational Scenario 19. They did not realize that their own airships were the target and that the British had failed mainly due to equipment failure: the Schneider seaplane fighters could not take off from the choppy sea. For their part, the British were unduly discouraged by their equipment problems and did not attempt another operation against the German coast until 1916.

Operational Scenario 2
CHASING THE METEOR
8-11 August 1915
SMS Meteor (2 x 8.8 cm guns) was an auxiliary minelayer. Formerly the SS Vienna, she was a British merchant ship seized by the Germans at Hamburg when the war broke out. On the morning of August 8, 1915, Meteor was mining the approaches to Cromarty when she was interrupted by H.M. Armed Boarding Steamer The Ramsay (2 x 12 pdr guns), which she promptly sank. But warning had been given and the chase was on. Admiral von Pohl was in command of the High Seas Fleet, so Meteor would get no help from that source. But the Admiral did order airships and submarines to assist the Meteor to reach home.

Note: This scenario uses the map from Jutland and pieces from Zeppelins and Jutland.

Aftermath
The weather was abysmal during this operation; ideal for surreptitiously laying mines in enemy waters but not so good for flying airships. SL3 was damaged in a thunder squall while attempting to land. The Meteor was scuttled when escape from the British cruisers appeared impossible. The crew reached Germany on a Swedish fishing boat.

Operational Scenario 3
THE WINDAU GAMBIT
JULY 1915
Things were not going well for Russia on the Baltic front in the summer of 1915. Libau had fallen to the Germans and Windau would soon follow. A bombardment of German forces outside Windau would directly assist the Russian Army. It might also provoke an intervention by the obsolete battleships to which the German Admiralty had delegated the task of controlling the Baltic; the German Army might insist upon it. If Russia’s squadron of four powerful dreadnoughts could catch a squadron of these old battleships at sea, Russia could gain a great propaganda victory.

The one thing Russia could not afford was an encounter between her dreadnoughts and the High Seas Fleet. Germany’s dreadnoughts were deployed against the British fleet, but the Kiel canal gave Germany the strategic flexibility to quickly redeploy the High Seas fleet into the Baltic. Fortunately, Russia’s new airship could scout ahead, to give ample warning of any such redeployment.

Note: This scenario uses the map from Jutland and pieces from Zeppelins and Jutland.

Scenario Notes
It is, of course, impossible to say whether a major operation of this kind by the Russian fleet could have achieved any success. Russia’s problem with the Germans was the same problem the Germans had with the British: they could hope to defeat a detachment of the enemy’s forces, but had no hope of winning a general engagement. Russia’s problem was more acute, in that Germany’s numerical advantage in dreadnoughts (5:1) was greater than Germany’s numerical inferiority to the British (a little less than 1:2 at Jutland).

The Russian airship Gigant was damaged on her test flight. The test flight took place near St. Petersburg, where the airship was built. The scenario supposes that the airship was repaired and the forward deployment to Revel supposes that a shed has been built for her at that naval base.

The scenario takes place within the first 14 days of July 1915. It was on July 14 that the German naval airship L5 was deployed to the east to replace PL19, which the Russians had shot down on January 25, 1915, and it was on July 18 that Windau fell to the Germans.

BC04 Seydlitz was heavily damaged as a consequence of being hit by 3 x 13.5-inch shells at the Battle of the Dogger Bank. BC05 Derfflinger was also hit by 3 x 13.5-inch shells, but little damage was done. So, Derfflinger is available as part of the reaction force but Seydlitz is not.

By 1915, most Russian cruisers had had rails installed for laying mines. They are not carrying mines in this scenario. Russian gunboats would not ordinarily have worked with a battleship squadron, but are included in the bombardment force on the theory they could provide some protection against German torpedo boats that might attack the nearly stationary bombarding battleships.

Operational Scenario 4
BARBARY COAST
November 1911
The Turkish navy did not have the firepower to oppose the Italian invasion of Libya in October 1911 — its two old battleships could not stand up to Italy’s eight pre-dreadnoughts. Had Turkey been able to purchase both of the dreadnoughts which Brazil put up for sale in 1910, the naval balance would have tipped firmly toward Turkey and prevented the invasion. But editorial opinion ran strongly in favor of grabbing Italy’s “share” of the decaying Ottoman Empire, so if Turkey had managed to purchase just one dreadnought, the Royal Italian Navy could not have gotten away with backing down in the face of just one enemy battleship.

The invasion would have gone forward, with the full Italian battleline escorting the initial invasion fleet. Turkey likely would have kept her dreadnought in port rather than risk an attack at 1-8 odds, but when the small Italian Expeditionary Corps was badly mauled by an Arab-Turkish army, Italy began sending a stream of troop reinforcements to Libya. This would have been a golden opportunity for Turkey’s dreadnought, because the destruction of Italian troop convoys fast on the heels of Italy’s near defeat on land could have disrupted Italy’s entire war effort. Italy’s best countermeasure against this was her two airships, which would have been pulled from ground-attack duty in Libya to patrol the seas east of the convoy lanes and spot any incoming dreadnought before it could surprise a troop convoy.

Note: This scenario uses the map and pieces from Mediterranean, and pieces from Dreadnoughts and Zeppelins.

Comments: In this scenario the Turkish player gets to use dummy counters plus give one fleet a Raid mission. This makes the two Italian airships crucial, as only they will be able to sweep large areas of sea quickly to distinguish dummy fleets from real ones and spot the Turkish dreadnought before it reaches the Italian convoy lanes.

Operational Scenario 5
MARE NOSTRUM
Summer 1923
Well aware that foreign wars do wonders for covering up political corruption at home, Benito Mussolini began flexing Italian military muscle around the Mediterranean in 1923. With the bombardment of Corfu that spring provoking zero reaction from the League of Nations, Il Duce’s dreams of a new Roman Empire could apparently flower unimpeded. In determining a target for Fascist Italy’s first expansionist move, Egypt would have been an intriguing choice. Britain had showed weakness the previous year by caving in to Egyptian nationalists and declaring Egyptian independence. It would fall to a strong leader to restore order in Egypt and unite the Mediterranean basin under one government for the good of all.

Note: This scenario uses the map and pieces from Mediterranean and pieces from Sea of Troubles, Jutland and Zeppelins.

Comments: Here the Italian battle fleet escorts an invasion force to try to capture Alexandria and the Suez Canal, and the outnumbered and outgunned British will need to rely on their four airships to make repeated bombing raids on the transports and spot for battleship gunnery as well.

That’s all 10 scenarios in GWAS: Airships. We hope you enjoy them!

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