Eager to get back into the good graces of the Führer after the stunning loss of the fleet flagship Hindenburg in the Med, Admiral Raeder immediately ordered Operation Regenbogen, or Rainbow, hoping to find a pot of gold. He had the older pocket battleship Deutschland up north near the cape, (which had not been renamed Lutzow in this history), and the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper was also there. Both ships were ordered out to look for the British convoy, escorted by six destroyers under Vice Admiral Oskar Kummetz.
They would find their quarry in that murky Arctic night, and a confused and scattered action resulted which saw all the British heavy forces too far off to intervene. The two German raiders thought they would make a quick end of things, but the gallant defense put up by those six escorting destroyers kept them at bay. The Hipper took damage, though the Germans sunk the minesweeper Bramble and Destroyer Achates, and battered the escort leader Onslow with five hits, one of which seriously wounded her Captain Sherbrooke.
Yet none of the 14 merchantmen were sunk, and when the British cruiser force arrived on the scene, the wary Admiral Kummetz, having orders not to risk his heavy ships, quickly retired. As sea battles went, it was a small affair, with gallantry on the British side, particularly from Captain Sherbrooke. Yet it was to have far reaching consequences, for Hitler had been informed about it, and he had been waiting on the outcome, eager for news of the raid.
Admiral Raeder had refused to directly contact the German ships to gain their report, as the standing order was for radio silence until they reached safe waters. This twelve hour delay saw Hitler become increasingly irate and impatient for news, and when he finally learned that the British had reported the safe arrival of the convoy, he was outraged. To make matters worse, when the report from the German side finally came in, Hitler learned that his fleet had lost the destroyer Eckholdt.
In a comedy of errors, the German destroyer saw a ship they believed to be the Admiral Hipper, and moved to form up with her—but it was the British cruiser Sheffield, which blasted the Eckholdt so badly that the destroyer broke in two.
“Look!” Hitler shouted, throwing the report at Admiral Raeder, whom he had summoned to account for the debacle. “Our Kapitans cannot even tell the difference between our ships and the enemy! This is the same blatant incompetence that undoubtedly led to the loss of the Hindenburg. Why do I invest all these resources, countless hours, steel and sweat, to build you this naval facility at Nordstern? What has the surface fleet ever done of note in this war? All you have done is waste fuel, ammunition, and resources. You could not hold the Canary Islands or prevent the Allied landings at Casablanca. You could not even keep the Straits of Gibraltar closed! I should immediately decommission all these useless ships, and turn the entire navy over to Döenitz and his U-boats. They are the only ships sinking enemy tonnage these days.”
Admiral Raeder endured the insults, saying nothing back, for he knew it would only prompt Hitler to continue with a litany of further complaints and accusations. He also knew that the very existence of his surface fleet had been in grave jeopardy ever since the loss of the Hindenburg, a moral blow that was heavier than any other he had sustained in the war, even worse than the sinking of the Graz Zeppelin and Gneisenau.
He said nothing of the fact that five British battleships had been sunk, with another lying wrecked at anchor in Alexandria. That was yesterday in Hitler’s mind, and he took many of those sinkings for granted, saying they were nothing more than obsolete ships from the last war, except for the Prince of Wales.
Hindenburg’s loss had imposed a quiet timidity on the entire German Surface fleet, and the ignominious fate of the Tirpitz in its last big engagement with PQ-17, losing propulsion and towed from the scene by the Scharnhorst, was an embarrassment Raeder had spent long months trying to live down. Only the strange sortie made by Captain Heinrich aboard Kaiser Wilhelm had given him one sweet moment of victory. The prize it delivered had delighted Hitler, a prize more dangerous than anyone first realized for a good many months after that incident.
Enduring the storm tide of Hitler’s tirade, Raeder waited like a stolid seawall, biding his time. When the other man had finished, Raeder said one thing: “My Führer, in war there will always be losses, and any engagement like this can produce them. This was but a single old destroyer, and it was the weather and darkness that really saved that convoy, not the British fleet. The Kriegsmarine has fought gallantly in every engagement, even in the face of these new enemy weapons. And there is one thing you should not forget in all of this—we have put a weapon of great power into your hands….”
Hitler had been standing with his back to Raeder, but now he slowly turned. “Yes Raeder, that little surprise delivered by the Kaiser Wilhelm will count for something. I will grant you that much. Yet you have been busy in the shipyards, or so Goring tells me all too often, but to what end?”
Goring… He had been a thorn in Raeder’s side for years, jealous of the fuel and resources that the navy was consuming, and becoming more and more of a problem as his Luftwaffe sustained heavier losses. The two men had recently quarreled over orders issued to the navy by Goring on the revised supply protocols for Tunisia. Raeder had intervened, rescinding those orders and telling Goring to mind his own business, but the Air Marshall had taken the quarrel to Hitler. As always, he again complained that Raeder was also undertaking unauthorized ship conversions, using the lion’s share of steel and oil, and presented a host of other complaints.
“We are completing the new series of fast ocean going destroyers to escort our new fleet carriers,” the Admiral explained.
“Did I not tell you to cease production on the Oldenburg?” Hitler eyed him reproachfully.
“That order was obeyed. I gave orders to halt the buildout of that ship as a Hindenburg class battleship, but there was that beautiful hull, just sitting there, and it would have been a waste to simply scrap it at that time. Do you know what the Japanese have been doing in the Pacific? They are taking all their unfinished battlecruiser hulls, and even cruiser hulls, and they are converting them to aircraft carriers. They know that is the real future where surface fleets are concerned—carriers, not these lumbering battleships that you complain about. So I ordered Oldenburg to be converted the same way. It cost us very little to build out that hull as an aircraft carrier, and in just a very few months, it will be recommissioned as the Brandenburg. What better way to celebrate this new operation you have launched, led by that very same division?”
“You have built me another aircraft carrier?” Hitler shook his head. “Now I will have to persuade Goring to build you enough planes to use on the damn thing. What have the others done? They sit around in the harbors, just like all the battleships, because if they do go to sea, all it will take is one of these new rocket weapons to destroy them. My new Zeppelins have done more than all your carriers combined!”