Battle of Jutland C4

[Ithoriel]

Far better view of Jutland on BBC Radio 4 at the moment. Admiral West narrating.

[Zippee]

I haven't seen it, but the comments from wargamers are always the same after a documentary.  You do realise it wasn't for the kind of person who has read a number of books about it.

I do, which is why I don't have an issue with them glossing over the magazine problems and revealing them as 'new truths', or of setting it up as some form of personality clash or scapegoating exercise - that's TV. Nothing they presented was particularly wrong, nothing was particularly shocking, nothing was really new (bar the confirmation on Indefatigable).

However they set out with an agenda - to vindicate Jellicoe. To this end, nothing they did, presented or unearthed had any bearing on Jellicoe's performance. Some of it had a passing bearing on Beatty's performance. So what I have a problem with is a journalistic TV programme failing to follow its own agenda or attempt to answer its own question. That's bad programming, bad journalism, bad presentation and bad writing. All of which could have been easily edited to fit the footage and outcome they ended up with. . .

And even then I don't have a major problem as I wasn't expecting much but they opened with the promise that these "new charts" will vindicate Jellicoe's decision - it was disappointing that this turned out to be not entirely truthful and [as a result?] the 'new charts' were basically never mentioned again  

[Leon]

Thanks for the YouTube link d_guy, as someone with almost no knowledge of it at all, that was an interesting video.

[cameronian]

I've had a preview of Angus Konstam's new book on Jutland and its bloody good, really excellent, out next month and highly recommended.

Yes the C4 thing was overhyped crap, shock horror, flash doors left open, whoda thunk it.

[d_Guy]

I've had a preview of Angus Konstam's new book on Jutland and its bloody good, really excellent, out next month and highly recommended.

Yes the C4 thing was overhyped crap, shock horror, flash doors left open, whoda thunk it.

I've been waiting for its release and as of now it is available on Kindle - just downloaded - two bucks more than print but what the hey.
Incidentally does anyone have any idea when N A M Rodgers may be getting his 3rd volume out? I was rather hoping before the Jutland centenary.

[d_Guy]

@ Pierre and Paul - well, lots of pictures guys. Controversy aside, maybe Beatty will start firing sooner? 

@ Zippee - Scheer at the Portsmouth game - well, no pressure there mate! 

@ Fenton - thanks for starting a Jutland topic. I wondered when it was going to happen. 

[paulr]

Indeed and I get the thrill of being Scheer for the day

Best of luck

[Fenton]

Best of luck

Sounds like scheer hell

[Ithoriel]

The BBC Radio proggie is available here:

Jutland: The Battle that Won the War

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07bt7n7

Auntie Beeb's blurb says:

"Lord West explains why Jutland was the most important battle of the First World War on land or sea, a dramatic strategic victory and an inflection point which directly paved the way for allied victory.

He argues that the major British contribution to winning the war came at sea, and that it was the ancient British tactic of blockading and starving out a continental foe which eventually won the day, and shows how central the naval war, and the Battle of Jutland in particular, was to bringing America into the First World War on the allied side.

Lord West visits the German naval base in Wilhelmshaven, former home of the German Imperial navy and the place from which German naval commanders looked out on a North Sea which they could not safely navigate and from which they could not escape. He travels on a boat close to the site of the battle itself to imagine the scene when the sea was filled with giant 'castles of steel', firing huge shells and belching out coal smoke. And after meeting British and German historians, he travels to a new memorial in Jutland to weigh the human cost that day."

Dan Snow is "doing" Jutland next Sunday on TV.  (Sun 29 May 2016 21:00)

Beeb's blurb for that is:

"The Navy's Bloodiest Day on BBC Two will bring the 12 hour naval battle at Jutland to life. On May 31 1916, the Royal Navy precipitated an apocalyptic head-to-head battle with the German Imperial fleet. 151 British warships, many the most modern in Britain's Grand Fleet, confronted 99 German ships. This was supposed to be a walkover - Britain's second Trafalgar. But it didn't work out that way. Instead, the Battle of Jutland was the bloodiest day in the history of the Royal Navy. During 12 chaotic hours, 14 British warships sank to the bottom of the North Sea with the loss of more than 6,000 Allied lives. For a century it's been considered one of the greatest disasters of WWI.

Presented by Dan Snow, engineer Shini Somara and naval historian Nick Hewitt, The Navy's Bloodiest Day will go to the heart of the 12-hour battle at Jutland. With brand-new scientific experiments, they will probe the reasons why so many men died. Through the powerful words of eyewitnesses, read by current Royal Navy personnel; through emotional meetings with relatives of those who died; and on board the only surviving Dreadnought from the era, they come to understand what it was like to fight that day. And as the Royal Navy prepares to commemorate the centenary, they join the first official survey of the battlefield, searching to pinpoint the wrecks of the five giant British warships in which the vast majority of the Allied dead now lie entombed.

The programme also features brand new documentary evidence that helps a reassessment of the significance of the battle. Was Jutland a disaster, or in fact the forgotten battle where the First World War was won, and lost? The programme provides amazing visceral and visual detail helping to uncover what went wrong and why the battle unfolded the way it did."

[pierre the shy]

I'll keep an eye out for those programmes on nz tv (in between all the "reality" tv shows I don't watch)....but don't know if they'll be on here or not.

AAR with what went wrong with whose ships and pics after the game next Saturday.

[Techno]

Could you  watch it on Channel 4's 'Catch up' facility on 'tinternet', Peter ?

It seems to be listed this morning, with 28 days to watch.

Cheers - Phil

[pierre the shy]

Could you  watch it on Channel 4's 'Catch up' facility on 'tinternet', Peter ?

It seems to be listed this morning, with 28 days to watch.

Cheers - Phil

Nope Techno I can find the programme but not get it to run - probably have to be in the UK for it to work. Can't find any mention of Jutland programmes coming up on any of the networks here 

its not on "vutube" either, but did find and watch a couple of older C4 documentaries (from 2003) where they dive several the wrecks from Jutland - conclusion is that in order to fire rapidly the RN ships stacked unshielded cordite in handling rooms and also carried 50% more RPG and cordite than magazines were designed for so this lead to the problems. The lack of flash protection is hardly a revolutionary conclusion, but footage from wrecks certainly seems to support that as being the cause.

Seen Dan Snow in one episode of Dig WW2 - Amazingly they got a Browning .303 from a crashed fighter to fire again after being buried in a Irish bog for 60+ years. 

     

[Zippee]

For a century it's been considered one of the greatest disasters of WWI.

Really? And here was I thinking it had merely been damned as one of the greatest missed opportunities. 

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

its not on "vutube" either, but did find and watch a couple of older C4 documentaries (from 2003) where they dive several the wrecks from Jutland - conclusion is that in order to fire rapidly the RN ships stacked unshielded cordite in handling rooms and also carried 50% more RPG and cordite than magazines were designed for so this lead to the problems. The lack of flash protection is hardly a revolutionary conclusion, but footage from wrecks certainly seems to support that as being the cause.

That's the one I saw.

[fsn]

Really? And here was I thinking it had merely been damned as one of the greatest missed opportunities. 

Only because the dastardly Hun cut and run before we could give him the trouncing he so richly deserved!