Word: royale
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Assuming that Royal Oak was patrolling the North Sea (where some critics said a ship of its type had no business to be), its course was made known to the Germans either by espionage or by radio communication between reconnaissance airplanes or submarines. The German submarine then stationed itself along Royal Oak's path, turned off its engines to avoid detection, rested on the bottom, waited till the battleship came by, discharged a shoal of torpedoes. One could not have sunk Royal Oak, protected by "blisters" and by a compartmentized hull. Big German U-boats carry twelve...
...torpedoes can be further directed by means of gyroscopes in their tails. The target's course and position can be calculated from, hydrophones. But warships have hydrophones too, and the British claim they can detect a submarine's position even when her motors are not running. Why Royal Oak or her escort failed to do so was another question. Evidently somebody blundered...
Britain's sea power was far from broken by the loss of Royal Oak. Together the Allies have 22 capital ships; Britain has nine more abuilding, and France has four. Germany has two, as well as three pocket battleships. But when British movie-goers last spring watched a Herbert Wilcox (Nurse Edith Cavell) film called Torpedoed-in which by models and studio shots Royal Oak is sunk by a U-boat (see cuts)-they little realized the melodrama's terrible impending reality...
...Admiralty announced that three U-boats had been sunk in a single day, two of them of large ocean-going type. This news preceded by only a few hours and helped to soften-perhaps designedly -the disclosure of the loss of Royal Oak. Paris announced that allied attacks so far had sunk at least 17 submarines, perhaps several more...
...confused with the aircraft carrier Ark Royal, which the Germans claim to have "destroyed" (TIME, Oct. 9) and which the British say is safe...