248: The Attack

Description

Two waves of Swordfish launched from HMS Illustrious flew through heavy anti-aircraft fire and searchlights to drop torpedoes on the Italian battleships anchored at Taranto. By dawn, the Littorio, Conti di Cavour, and Duilio had all been torpedoed — at the cost of just two aircraft and four aircrew casualties.

The Cavour never returned to service, and the attack temporarily shifted the balance of Mediterranean naval power toward Britain. Churchill announced it to Parliament as a decisive blow, though historians would later debate how fully the British exploited the window it created before German involvement in the theater closed it.

Listen

Transcript

Hello everyone and welcome to History of the Second World War episode 248 - Taranto Pt. 2 - The Attack. This week a big thank you goes out to all of our members for supporting the podcast. Members get access to ad-free versions of all of the podcast’s episode plus special member only episodes roughly once a month. Head on over to historyofthesecondworldwar.com/members to find out more. At 6PM on November 11, 1940 the HMS Illustrious would detach itself from a larger Royal Navy force and begin making its way northeast towards its target. The Illustrious was one of the most advanced aircraft carriers in the world, the first to be fitted with air search radar, and was just at the beginning of a storied career. As she pulled away with a small group of escorts and moved towards the launching point for Operation Judgement, Admiral Cunningham, the commander of the Royal Navy’s Mediterranean fleet would signal: “Good luck then, to your lads in their enterprise. Their success may well have a most important bearing on the course of the war in the Mediterranean.” The goal for the night was to make a daring attack on the Italian naval base at Taranto, where multiple Italian battleships and cruisers were known to be at anchor. And while the Illustrious was one of, if not the most advanced ship in service with the Royal Navy, the Swordfish torpedo bombers that would execute the attack were precisely the opposite. The Swordfish was not necessarily obsolete, but it was far from the technological marvel that newer aircraft were at this point in the war, but the mission had been built around its unique capabilities. Yes, it was slow, and it was vulnerable, but it could also fly night operations which was somewhat exceptional among the carrier borne aircraft during the early war period. That night flying capability would be put to use over Taranto, with the goal of surprising the Italians while also limiting the performance of their anti-aircraft guns. The first wave would be in the air just after 8:30PM, and they would then be on their way to their date with destiny.

While Operation Judgement and the attack on Taranto was the primary goal for the fleet operations during the first 10 days of November 1940 there were several other operations happening all around the Mediterranean at the same time. These operations were designed to flood the zone so to speak, preventing the Italians from focusing on just one of the fleet and convoys that were moving. This included several supply convoys as well as a strike force built around another British carrier the Ark Royal which would attack the Italian air base at Cagliari. This attack would be launched on November 9th, and they would be able to do some damage to facilities and to some reconnaissance aircraft on the base. Several of these forces would also come under Italian air attack, but Force A, the one with Illustrious and the one moving towards Taranto would be able to dodge the Italian aircraft. The radar that Illustrious carried would prove its worth very quickly when, on November 7th it was able to track an Italian aircraft out to a range of about 25 miles. Just knowing that the aircraft was there, and being able to know through radio interception gear that it had sent no radio messages, was incredibly valuable. No naval force wanted to be spotted by land based aircraft, but the only thing worse than being spotted was not knowing that they had been spotted. However, on November 8 more forceful measures were required, with British Sea Gladiators being sent against Italian seaplanes that got too close. One of the Italian aircraft would be shot down. Then later in the day Italian bombers would be detected by Illustrious’ radar, with two fighters sent against them. Only one of the 15 aircraft was shot down, but more importantly the rest were forced to drop their bomb loads to escape. Forcing an attack to abort in this way was just as good as shooting them down, at least in the short term. Other forces around the Mediterranean would have similar experiences throughout the days between November 5 and 8, with the effect that the Italians knew there was a major Royal Navy operation underway, but they did not have any real idea on what its purpose was. This is one of those situations that is much easier for us to interpret and understand with our information about British intentions, but for the Italians all they had were the positions and vague movements of a variety of different surface groups without even the benefit of perfect information about the size and contents of each of the groups. All they could was keep up on the reconnaissance flights and hope that more information would help.

On the eve of the attack, things were going relatively well for Force A, with the only major issue being the fact that 3 Swordfish had been lost during the previous day’s operations. This was critical because the raid on Taranto had originally been planned for two British carriers to work together, the Illustrious and the Eagle, but the Eagle had been left behind due to engine issues. A few of its Swordfish had been transferred over to the Illustrious, but even that meant that there were only 24 Swordfish available at the start of the operation. And now there were only 21. Even with this reduced force, the decision was made to go ahead with the operation, and at 6PM on the 11th the final stage of the plan started with the Illustrious, along with 4 cruisers and 4 destroyers separating from the rest of Force A to begin their high speed run into their attack position. They were armed with the knowledge that their targets were ready for them, with RAF reconnaissance flights being made over Taranto early on the 11th to confirm that the battleships were present. This report would then be confirmed just before dusk by another reconnaissance flight, with the RAF really coming in clutch during the day with their flights. Their launch point was 170 miles from Taranto. The organization of the attack was for the first wave of Swordfish to be in the air at around 8:30PM, with 12 in the first wave. Six of the aircraft would be carrying the torpedos, the weapons that would do the most damage, while 4 were outfitted with bombs, but the most important were the two that carried both bombs and incendiary flares. These flares would be used to provide illumination of the targets, with the goal of dropping them on the eastern side of the anchorage while the torpedo attacks would come from the west. While the torpedoes were focused on the battleships, the bombs would be dropped on the dock and oil facilities ashore. The second wave would include 9 Swordfish, although it was also supposed to be 12 before the 3 were lost, and there would be 2 of them equipped with bombs and flares, 2 with just bombs, and 5 with torpedos. For the second wave the torpedo aircraft would approach from a different direction, and the bombs would search for targets in the smaller anchorage where it was expected Italian cruisers would be found.

As the first wave of attack aircraft began their journey to Taranto, which would take them over 2 hours of flight time, they quickly ran into a problem. The altitude that they planned on keeping during their cruising time was 6,000 feet, but they ran into some thick clouds. There was a plan for this, and the aircraft began to climb so that they could get above the clouds, but even though they were all trying to do roughly the same thing the clouds immediately broke up the formation. While this disorganized the attack it did not prevent the attack from going forward, as all of the pilots had been properly briefed and prepared to carry out their part of the attack without any additional input or guidance from the rest of the strike. It would have an impact though, as the plan called for coordinated attack happening in a specific order, and that was not going to happen after the clouds. As the first groups of Swordfish began to approach the target, they realized that the anti-aircraft guns around the harbor were already ready firing. To quote Charles Lamb, one of the pilots, “For the last 15 minutes of our passage across the Ionian Sea Scarlett had no navigational problems, for Taranto could be seen from a distance of 50 miles or more, because of the welcome awaiting us. The sky over the harbour looked as it sometimes does over Mount Etna, in Sicily, when the great volcano erupts. The darkness was being torn apart by a firework display which spat flame into the night to a height of nearly 5,000 feet.” The exact cause for this is unknown, because they had started firing much earlier than they should have if they were reacting to the First Wave of British aircraft. During this point in the war, especially at night, anti-aircraft fire was often not aimed at specific aircraft but instead just fired into the sky to try and fill the area with fire, with each gun and battery responsible for a different area. However, when the first British aircraft arrived, and the two flare aircraft dropped their flares there was suddenly a very clear target to aim at. And the anti-aircraft guns would do so, blazing away at the flares with the hope of extinguishing them or hitting aircraft that were around them. None of the British aircraft were around them though, and in fact the flares were set up to drop around 1,000 feet before they ignited. The increased rate of anti-aircraft fire did provide much better illumination for the other Swordfish though, which was very welcome.

While the flares were dropping the first attack began with three of the torpedo armed Swordfish moving in. They moved in at just 30 feet above the water, after having cut their engines during their dive down from 5,000 feet. The lead aircraft, with the designation L4A, dropped its torpedo which hit the battleship Cavour, the same ship that the other two dropped their torpedoes on. They missed though, and the attack would result in L4A being shot down, ending up in the water. Both of its aircrew would survive to become Italian prisoners. Lieutenant Scarlett, the observer from L4A, would later recall: “We put a wing-tip in the water. I couldn’t tell. I just fell out of the back into the sea. We were only about 20 feet up. It wasn’t very far to drop. I never tie myself in on these occasions. Then old Williamson came up a bit later on and we hung about by the aircraft which still had its tail sticking out of the water. Chaps ashore were shooting at it. The water was boiling so I swam off to a floating dock and climbed on board that. We didn’t know we’d done any good with our torpedoes. Thought we might have, because they all looked a bit long in the face.” The second set of attacks were far less organized, with two Swordfish hitting the battleship Littorio in a completely uncoordinated attack. One other Swordfish would drop on the Littorio, but it would miss and instead would not explode after hitting mud at the bottom of the harbor. During all of these attacks, with Swordfish flying every which way around the harbor, they were under fire by Italian guns, with the guns of the Italian cruisers being particularly noted in first hand accounts. As would so often happen during the war, the Swordfish were probably saved by a simple miscalculation on the part of the Italian gunners, with the vast majority of their fire going above the attacking aircraft. The bomb equipped Swordfish would drop their bombs on various targets with many of the bombs hitting good targets, but importantly none of the bombers finding the primary targets, the Italian cruisers. After each Swordfish executed their attack they turned back out to sea and began to flight back to the Illustrious, the second wave was already in the air.

As the second wave was getting ready to take off just before 9:30PM one of the waiting Swordfish slid into another, causing damage that meant that the damaged aircraft, L5F, had to be repaired, delaying its take off. The other would take off on time, but would then have to turn back during the flight due to fuel issues. The end result is that only 8 of the expected 9 aircraft would actually be able to execute the attack, with the repaired Swordfish catching up with the other just in time. After the new set of flares was dropped the five torpedo aircraft began their attack just after midnight. For the second time that night the torpedo armed Swordfish tried to find the correct ships to attack in the darkness, with some success. Two dropped on Littorio with one hit, while another was shot down with both crewmen lost. Another hit the battleship Duilio, while the fifth barely escaped fire from the Vittorio Veneto, missing the battleship only to then have the torpedo hit the Cavour. For the bombing aircraft of the second wave, only one would actually make it to the harbor, with the other having to turn back as mentioned earlier. The solo bomber would drop its bombs on the Italian heavy cruisers hitting the Trento, rupturing a fuel tank. By 12:35 all of the surviving aircraft were back on their way to the Illustrious.

As the first planes of the first wave began to near the point where they were supposed to meet the carrier they would pick up the Illustrious’ transponder signal. This could be detected 50 miles from the carrier, and used a radio signal to give the returning Swordfish the carrier’s location so that they could move in to land. The landing went very smoothly, with the only issue being one Swordfish running into another while it was taxiing. Which is pretty impressive given the fact that the pilots had been flying for over 6 hours, and it was a night landing at around 1AM. 18 of the Swordfish that had arrived over Taranto had returned, and the crews were just as joyous as you might expect. To quote Lieutenant M.R. Maund from the Swordfish E4F: “My God, I am hungry! I feel as though we had not eaten, drunk or slept for days. We circle once before the raised deck-lights go on. The three bright lights ahead are the deck landing-control officer telling us ‘steady approach’— the flying-deck is suddenly underneath us. Back throttle stick— a pause— the gentle brush of wheels on the deck, and the wires have got us.” Damage reports began to be collected and analyzed, and while the exact situation was unclear it was clear that some of the Italian ships had been hit. The hope was that firm information would arrive from RAF reconnaissance aircraft based out of Malta. The information they provided was not perfect, but what was clear was that 3 Italian battleships had been damaged to some extent. This left Admiral Lyster with a decision to make. While the first night of attacks had not been as costly as was feared, he still decided to cancel the planned second night of attacks. Because Illustrious would have to stay in the region for another night, and because it was feared that the Italians would be more prepared for a second attack, it was felt to be simply too much of a risk. And so the Illustrious turned and began to move towards its rendezvous with the rest of Force A.

While the British would only learn of the exact damage that the attack had done over time, for the Italians on the spot the situation was clear quite quickly. The immediate impact of the attack was that on November 12th there were 3 Italian battleships that were damaged in some way: the Littorio, Conti di Cavour, and the Duilio. Of these the Littorio was both the most important and appeared to be the most heavily damaged. It was the newest and largest of the three Battleships, being the lead ship of the Littorio class which had been constructed in the late 1930s. Three torpedos had hit it, with two hitting the bow and one the stern. The stern torpedo essentially destroyed the Littorio’s steering, while the two in the bow caused so much flooding that the ship sank where it was. In deeper water it probably would have sunk completely, but in the shallow port the bow settled into the sea bottom while the stern was able to stay above water. An important delay on trying to repair the ship would be the presence of a British torpedo in the mud below the ship. It had not exploded during the attack, and was also very difficult to move because of the danger of it exploding if handled incorrectly. This would delay the movement of the ship into a dry dock until mid December a month after the attack, and given the other damage that the ship suffered might have had a greater impact on its return to service than it may have had if it had impacted the ship as expected. The Littorio would be repaired and would return to service in May 1941, with it being given the greatest focus during the repair. The Duilio would take longer to bring back into service. It had been hit by a single torpedo that impacted in between A and B turrets and while water would quickly rush in, there was still time to move the ship so that it could be beached with the help of some tugs that were available. The movement of the ship into water that was just 40 feet deep would make it easier to refloat the ship and by January the work had been done. At that point it was able to make its way to Genoa where actual repairs would occur. It would be back in the fleet by May 1941. The Conti di Cavour was a different story, even though it had also only been hit by 1 torpedo. That torpedo had hit below A turret, creating a hole large enough to span two watertight compartments, which when flooded rapidly caused the forward area to begin filling with water. Tugs were brought in to tow the ship into shallower water, but by dawn it was fully on the bottom in 50 feet of water which brought the water over the surface deck. The efforts to re-float the ship took time as all of the guns and large amounts of its armor had to be removed. With so much work having been done there was a tremendous amount of work that needed to be done to put it back together. And that work would never be completed during the war.

When it became clear that 3 Italian battleships, along with the damage to the cruiser Trento, had been damaged it did shift the balance of power in the Mediterranean. Given all of the other threats faced by the Royal Navy around the world, the older battleships Malaya and Ramillies were sent out of the Mediterranean to other theaters. The news of the attack would be known around the world very quickly, with Churchill announcing it to Parliament “The Italian communiqué of 12th November, in admitting that one warship had been severely damaged, claimed that six of our aircraft had been shot down and three more probably. In fact, only two of our aircraft are missing, and it is noted that the enemy claimed that part of the crews had been taken prisoner. I felt it my duty to bring this glorious episode to the immediate notice of the House. As the result of a determined and highly successful attack, which reflects the greatest honour on the Fleet Air Arm, only three Italian battleships now remain effective. This result, while it affects decisively the balance of naval power in the Mediterranean, also carries with it reactions upon the naval situation in every quarter of the globe.” Obviously Churchill was more than ready to talk up anything that could be spun as anything even close to success during late 1940 when there was so little that seemed to be going well for the British. But in this case he was not lying, the British attack had been incredibly successful, at very low cost, nobody liked to lose aircraft but trading just 2 dead aircrew, with two captured, for heavily damaging 3 capital ships was better than anybody could have hoped for.

However, when looking at the general course of the war in the theater, things did not necessarily change that much. Just because the Italians had a few battleships out of action, did not mean that the Royal Navy could just go anywhere, there was still the Italian Air Force, the Regia Aeronautica to worry about. Of the 5 books I read specifically on Taranto, all of them spent the last part of the book criticizing Cunningham and the British in the aftermath of Taranto. The general evaluation of those historians is that whatever advantage Taranto provided was simply wasted by the British in the months that followed. There were no major attacks to try and cripple the Italian Navy further, there were no major actions to try and change the war in the Mediterranean in a more permanent way. Things just kind of continued as normal. What the commanders at the time could not know was that their window for operations was closing, and in 1941 first with the invasion of Greece and then with the increased German presence around the Mediterranean, operations would become much more difficult. I am a bit more hesitant to criticize the British leaders too much here, and I think what actually happened after Taranto is that the world just had a perfect example of how removing a few capital ships from a fleet did not decisively change any situation during the Second World War. There were simply too many other threats and too many other sources of power that the Italians had access to. And the British were not in a position to really take advantage of any major weakness, they did not have the men or even the naval power to decisively shift the course of the campaign. This means that the raid at Taranto was always going to be, at best, an operation that would damage the ability of the Italians to use their fleet, and make them hopefully more cautious in its use. But that did not mean it was not a major victory, one that made for amazing propaganda if nothing else. The victory was like a pressure relief valve for the Royal Navy at a time when pressure was continuing to build in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. And that pressure would only get worse when the events in Greece demanded a major British response.