Deutschland class
General Characteristics
Displacement:	12,100 t standard; 16,200 t full load
Length:	610 ft (186 m)
Beam:	71 ft (21.6 m)
Draft (max.):	24 ft (7.4 m)
Armament:	6 × 280 mm (11 inch) 8 × 150 mm (5.9 inch) 6 × 105 mm (4.1 inch) 8 × 37 mm 10 × 20 mm 8 × 533 mm (21 inch) Torpedo Tubes
Armor:	turret face: (160 mm) belt: (80 mm) deck: 40 mm)
Aircraft:	one catapult with Arado 196 seaplane(s)
Radar:	From 1937, 60 cm Seetakt FuMO
Propulsion:	Eight MAN diesels driving two screws,
Power	52,050 hp (40 MW)
Speed:	28.5 knots (53 km/h)
Range:	8,900 nautical miles at 20 knots (16,500 km at 37 km/h)
Crew:	1,150

The Deutschland class was a series of three Panzerschiffe ("armoured ships"), a form of heavily armed cruiser, built by the German Reichsmarine in accordance with restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. The class is named after the first ship of this class to be completed (the Deutschland). All three ships were launched between 1931 and 1934, and served with Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. Public domain. ... Image File history File links War_Ensign_of_Germany_1938-1945. ... Corbelled corner turrets at Newark Castle, Port Glasgow. ... The Ar 196 was a shipboard reconnaissance aircraft built by Arado starting in 1936. ... USS Port Royal (CG-73), a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser (really an uprated guided missile destroyer), launched in 1992. ... Reichsmarine Jack The Reichsmarine was the name of the German Navy during the Weimar Republic. ... The Treaty of Versailles (1919) was the peace treaty which officially ended World War I between the Allied and Associated Powers and Germany. ... The Deutschland (later re-named Lützow), was the lead ship of a heavy cruiser class that served in the German Kriegsmarine before and during World War II. The ship was originally classified as an armored ship (Panzerschiff) by Germany, and referred to as a pocket battleship by the British. ... Year 1931 (MCMXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1931 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1934 (MCMXXXIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display full 1934 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Kriegsmarine (or War Navy) was the name of the German Navy between 1935 and 1945, during the Nazi regime, superseding the Reichsmarine. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

The British began referring to the vessels as pocket battleships, in reference to the heavy firepower contained in the relatively small vessels; they were considerably smaller than battleships and battlecruisers, and although their displacement was that of a heavy cruiser, they were armed with guns larger than the heavy cruisers of other nations. Deutschland class ships continue to be called pocket battleships in some circles. The ships were actually two feet longer than the American Pennsylvania class battleships, though considerably narrower and much less heavily armored. The firepower of a battleship demonstrated by USS Iowa A battleship is a large, heavily-armored warship with a main battery consisting of the largest caliber of guns. ... HMS Invincible, one of Britains first battlecruisers Battlecruisers were large warships of the early 20th century. ... The term heavy cruiser is used to refer to large cruisers, a form of warship. ... The Pennsylvania-class battleships, of the United States Navy, were an enlargement of the Nevada class; having two additional 14 in (356 mm) 45 caliber main battery guns, greater length and displacement, four propellers and slightly higher speed. ...

Deutschland class ships were initially classified as panzerschiffe, but the Kriegsmarine reclassified them as heavy cruisers in February 1940. The Kriegsmarine (or War Navy) was the name of the German Navy between 1935 and 1945, during the Nazi regime, superseding the Reichsmarine. ...

Description

German capital ships were restricted by the Treaty of Versailles to a displacement of 10,000 tons for "armoured ships" (Panzerships). The idea was to limit Germany to nothing more than Coastal defence ships - effectively pre-dreadnought types - which could not challenge the major naval powers of Britain, France and the United States. A number of technical innovations were used by Germany to build a formidable warship within this restricted weight; among them were the large-scale use of welding to join hull components together (as opposed to the then-standard rivets), triple-gun main armament turrets (which had first been used by the Austro-Hungarian Navy in battleships in the Tegetthoff class of 1912), and the use of diesel engines for propulsion. Even so, all members of the class were well over that weight limit (first constructed as 10,600 tons, later enlarged to 12,100 tons), although for political reasons their announced displacement was always misrepresented as the 10,000 tons of the Treaty limit. Panzership Hertog Hendrik A panzership (from German Panzerschiff, or armored ship) can be described as a coastal defence battleship with limited blue-water capacity. ... Dutch coastal defence ship Hertog Hendrik Coastal defence ships (sometimes called coast-defence battleships) were warships built for the purpose of coastal defence, mostly in the period 1860-1920. ... USS Massachusetts, a pre-dreadnought battleship launched in 1893 The term pre-dreadnought refers to the last type of battleship before the British Royal Navys HMS Dreadnought (1906). ... Welding is a fabrication process that joins materials, usually metals or thermoplastics, by causing coalescence. ... A rivetted buffer beam on a steam locomotive A rivet is a mechanical fastener consisting of a smooth cylindrical shaft with heads on either end, the second one formed in position. ... Corbelled corner turrets at Newark Castle, Port Glasgow. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Though the Deutschlands had much more in common with heavy cruisers than battleships/battlecruisers, they were nonetheless considered capital ships. They also superficially resembled contemporary battleships due to their unsually high conning tower/bridge and the masts of the Admiral Scheer and Admiral Graf Spee. A heavy cruiser is a type of large warship which originated with the British Hawkins class during World War I. They entered service after the war. ... The capital ships of a navy are its important warships; the ones with the heaviest firepower and armor. ...

The principal feature of the Deutschland design was that it had guns of large enough calibre -- i.e., 280 mm (11 inches) -- to out-gun almost any enemy cruiser fast enough to catch it, while being fast enough to outrun most any enemy powerful enough to sink it. The Royal Navy had three modernized battlecruisers that could be effective in pursuing the Deutschlands; the HMS Renown, HMS Repulse, and HMS Hood were equal to the Deutschland ships in speed and were better protected and better armed. Some World War I-era Japanese battlecruisers could do the same. The German naval staff also knew that new ships would be built that were both faster and more powerful than the Deutschland class ships - the announced intention to build six of the Deutschland ships led the French, for example, to draw up their own small "fast battleship" (the Dunkerque class) - but they hoped for a temporary advantage. The advantage did not last long: Deutschland ships had a maximum speed of 28.5 knots, which would already be considered to be too slow at the beginning of the Second World War, only eight years after the first ship was launched. The ships had a range of about 30,000 km (18,650 miles). USS Port Royal (CG-73), a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser (really an uprated guided missile destroyer), launched in 1992. ... HMS Renown was the lead ship of the three 26,500-ton Renown class battlecruisers of the Royal Navy; the other two were HMS Repulse and the cancelled HMS Resistance. ... HMS Repulse was a Renown-class battlecruiser, the second to last battlecruiser built for the Royal Navy. ... For other ships of this name see HMS Hood (disambiguation). ... “The Great War ” redirects here. ... HMS Hood (left) and the battleship HMS Barham (right), in Malta, 1937. ... The Dunkerque was the first of a new type of warship of the French Navy, labeled as fast battleship. Not quite the size of a full battleship, they were designed to counter the threat of the German pocket battleships of the Deutschland class. ...

The Kriegsmarine, which superseded the Reichsmarine and thus inherited the ships, was much more cognizant of the ships' limitations, and during the war they intended to use the Deutschland ships purely as commerce raiders on the high seas. In the early years of the conflict, before the Allies closed the air gap over the North Atlantic, developed better Huff-Duff (radio triangulation equipment) and airborne centimetric radar, and provided escort carrier protection to the merchant ship convoys, the Deutschland ships' speed and heavy armament made them very difficult to bring to task, as they could generally avoid any fight they did not like; indeed, they were ordered not to fight enemy ships unless they were much stronger than them. The Kriegsmarine (or War Navy) was the name of the German Navy between 1935 and 1945, during the Nazi regime, superseding the Reichsmarine. ... Reichsmarine Jack The Reichsmarine was the name of the German Navy during the Weimar Republic. ... Commerce raiding or guerre de course is a naval strategy of attacking an opponents commercial shipping rather than contending for control of the seas with its naval forces. ... Look up ally in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Atlantic (disambiguation) The Atlantic Ocean is Earths second-largest ocean, covering approximately one-fifth of its surface. ... High Frequency Direction Finder is usually known by its acronym HF/DF, pronounced Huff-Duff. ... A cavity magnetron is a high-powered vacuum tube that generates coherent microwaves. ... The escort aircraft carrier or escort carrier, was a small aircraft carrier developed by the Royal Navy in the early part of World War II to deal with the U-boat crisis of the Battle of the Atlantic. ...

Ships in class

Admiral Scheer in Gibraltar, c. 1936, with Spanish Civil War neutrality markings (the black, white and red stripes) painted on her forward gun turret.

Though all ships were technically of the same class, there were some considerable differences between the members, with the Admiral Graf Spee being the most improved, as well as being the heaviest. Public domain. ... Public domain. ... Combatants Spanish Republic With the support of: Soviet Union[1] Nationalist Spain With the support of: Italy Germany Commanders Manuel Azaña Francisco Largo Caballero Juan Negrín Francisco Franco Gonzalo Queipo de Llano Emilio Mola José Sanjurjo Casualties 500,000[2] The Spanish Civil War was a major conflict...

Deutschland / Lützow

The lead ship of the class, Deutschland was renamed Lützow upon the outbreak of World War II due to fears of the political liability of having a ship named Deutschland (Germany) sunk. She generally remained close to home through the war, doing service in the Baltic in support of German troops. Deutschland survived until the last weeks of the war. The Deutschland (later re-named Lützow), was the lead ship of a heavy cruiser class that served in the German Kriegsmarine before and during World War II. The ship was originally classified as an armored ship (Panzerschiff) by Germany, and referred to as a pocket battleship by the British. ... The Baltic Sea is located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. ...

Admiral Scheer

The most successful commerce raider of the class, Admiral Scheer made several raids into the North Atlantic and operated as far as the Indian Ocean during her raiding. On one occasion she sank the armed merchant cruiser HMS Jervis Bay and several cargo ships after catching convoy HX84. In 1945 she was bombed by the RAF while docked in Kiel, causing her to capsize and sink. Admiral Scheer was a Deutschland class heavy cruiser (often termed a pocket battleship) which served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. The vessel was named after Admiral Reinhard Scheer. ... The Atlantic Ocean is Earths second-largest ocean, covering approximately one_fifth of its surface. ... Auxiliary cruisers were merchant ships taken over for conversion into a vessel armed with cruiser-size guns, and employed either for convoy protection against true cruisers, or for commerce-raiding missions, where its appearance was used to trick merchant ships into approaching. ... HMS Jervis Bay was a British liner later converted into an Armed Merchant Cruiser, pennant F40. ... The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the air force branch of the British Armed Forces. ... Kiel ( ) is a city in northern Germany and the capital of the Bundesland Schleswig-Holstein. ...

Admiral Graf Spee

Admiral Graf Spee destroyed nine British merchant ships (totalling 50,089 tons) before being cornered by three British cruisers in December 1939. In the ensuing battle of the River Plate she damaged the heavy cruiser HMS Exeter so severely that it had to break off the action. However, the German ship suffered significant topside damage (though the British 6-inch shells could not penetrate her armour), and after spending several days trapped at Montevideo, she was deliberately scuttled on 17 December 1939, rather than risk a battle with the blockading heavy cruiser HMS Cumberland, the light cruisers HMS Ajax and HMNZS Achilles, and a superior Royal Navy force assumed to be approaching. Her captain, Hans Langsdorff, committed suicide three days later. Admiral Graf Spee was a Deutschland class heavy cruiser which served with the Kriegsmarine of Germany during World War II. Originally classified as an armored ship (Panzerschiff), she was later reclassified as a heavy cruiser, and was referred to as a pocket battleship by the British. ... Year 1939 (MCMXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Combatants Germany United Kingdom New Zealand Commanders Hans Langsdorff Henry Harwood Strength 1 heavy cruiser 1 heavy cruiser 2 light cruisers Casualties 1 heavy cruiser damaged 36 dead 60 wounded 1 heavy cruiser heavily damaged 2 light cruisers damaged 72 dead 28 wounded For other uses, see The Battle of... The fourth and best known of the Exeters, HMS Exeter (68), was a York class heavy cruiser of the Royal Navy that served in World War II. She was laid down on 1 August 1928 at the Devonport Dockyard, Plymouth, Devon. ... Department Montevideo Department Altitude 43 m Coordinates 34º 53S 56º 10W Founded 1726 Founder Bruno Mauricio de Zabala Population 1,325,968 (2004) (1st) Demonym Montevideano Phone Code +02 Postal Code 10000 Montevideo (IPA: ) is the capital, largest city, and chief port of Uruguay. ... December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... HMS Cumberland, the fifteenth ship of that name was a County class heavy cruiser of the Royal Navy that saw action during the Second World War. ... HMS Ajax was a Leander-class light cruiser. ... HMS Achilles (from 1941 HMNZS Achilles) was a Leander class cruiser of 7,200 tons built in Birkenhead, England and launched on 1 September 1932. ... Kapitän zur See Hans Wilhelm Langsdorff (March 20, 1894 – December 19, 1939) was a German naval officer, most famous for his command of the Panzerschiff (pocket battleship) Admiral Graf Spee during the Battle of the River Plate. ...

See also

• List of naval ships of Germany
• List of Kriegsmarine ships
• List of World War II ships
• Washington Naval Treaty
• Alaska class cruiser

The list of naval ships of Germany includes all naval ships which have been in service of the German Navy or its predecessors. ... The list of Kriegsmarine ships includes all ships commissioned into the Kriegsmarine, the German navy of the Third Reich period, during its existance from 1935 to the conclusion of World War II in 1945. ... The List of ships of World War II is an alphabetical list of major military ships of World War II. Only warships with a displacement of 1000 tons or greater are listed. ... The Washington Naval Treaty limited the naval armaments of its five signatories: the United States, the British Empire, the Empire of Japan, the French Third Republic, and Italy. ... Class Lead ship USS Alaska (CB-1) Builders New York Shipbuilding Corporation Number of ships 6 ordered, 3 laid down, 2 completed General characteristics Complement 2,251 officers and enlisted Armament Nine 12 inch (305 mm), twelve 5 inch (127 mm), 56 x 40 mm, 34 x 20 mm guns...

Further reading

• Siegfried Breyer, Gerhard Koop, (translated Edward Force), The German Navy At War 1939–1945: Volume 1 - The Battleships (Schiffer, West Chester, 1989)
• Bernard Ireland, Tony Gibbons, Jane's Battleships of the 20th Century (HarperCollins, New York, 1996) pp. 42-43
• Dudley Pope, Graf Spee: The Life and Death of a Raider (J.B. Lippincott Co., 1956)

External links

• More about pocket battleships
• Battle of the River Plate