I’m not really convinced by any of these “not a naval battle” claims, so I’ll just throw in 2pts where I think they’re deserved:
2pts —Battle of Hampton Roads. Notable for being indecisive.
OK, fair point, but it was not decisive as a naval battle, as such. It was important in that it preserved a large part of the British Army and conveyed it back home, where it was available to repel the German invasion which never came, and later to participate in military operations elsewhere. But as a naval battle? Not so decisive. (See the recent movie Atonement for a great scene on the beaches of Dunkirk, incidentally).
Midway? Why Midway?
I’m more leaning towards the view that Operation Dynamo was decisive - naval operations are often critical where they influence the delivery or extraction of land forces. Dynamo was not a classic battle in the sense of an engagement between opposing fleets, but what are the fleets for if not to either protect or prevent the transports trying to get from one shore to the other?
Had Operation Dynamo gone the other way, with the German forces preventing the extraction of 338,000 British and French troops, the lost manpower may have spelled the end of British willpower to resist, and some sort of peace treaty with Germany may have been signed in 1940 (of course, we can’t really know for sure what would have happened.)
According to the criteria in Mathus’ well-thought out post, Operation Dynamo is a candidate for #2 and 3, although not #1. Dynamo prevented the Battle of France from being decisive to the western European front of World War II. Britain has a long and honorable tradition of depending on naval action to give her a second chance after land battles that would have decisively ended a war for European countries on the continent.
ETA: Good point about Atonement - that was an awesome scene.
In some ways, Operation Dynamo was the flip side of the Second Battle of Syracuse (naval portion) - the Spartans didn’t sink the Athenian Navy, they just kept them from getting out of the harbor; and lacking a means to escape, the Athenian army was basically wiped out.
Leyte Gulf was a decisive battle in the sense that it was *the *Decisive Battle, according to the Japanese Kantai Kessen, or Decisive Battle Doctrine. The fact that they didn’t actually win it - or that even if they had, they still probably would have lost the war - doesn’t change the fact that it was basically the culmination of their entire Pacific strategy.
Sinking of Lusitania - 2, not a battle, just commerce raiding.
Hampton Roads - 2, notable battle for the first ironclad vs. ironclad match, but as a fight resulted in a draw.
Kamikaze - 1, a storm doth not a battle make.
I disagree with the conventional wisdom that the battle of the Monitor and the Virginia at Hampton Roads in March 1862 was a draw. True, neither ship was sunk. But the Virginia’s orders were to break the blockade; she failed. The Monitor’s orders were to stop the rebel ironclad after the carnage of the day before, and to protect the rest of the U.S. blockading fleet; she succeeded. The Virginia was then bottled up for the next few months and scuttled by her own crew to prevent capture in May. The battle was, in fact, a Union victory.
Kamizake, “divine winds” – 2. An important event, but not really a battle.
Sinking of the Lusitania – 2. Not even that important in WW1 history. The US remained neutral until Germany decided to resume unrestricted submarine warfare and Zimmerman sent that telegram.
Sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse – 1. This did demonstrate that big ships needed air cover, but I think the Allies would have realized this after other Pacific battles and it wasn’t as important in the Southeast Asia/Indonesia theatres as Percival’s cowardice at Singapore and the resulting Japanese victory.
What Exit? At Midway, Japan lost four carriers to one for the USA. After that battle, the Japanese were nearly always on the defensive in the Pacific. I was one of the Dopers who nominated this battle and in that nomination, I pointed out that Midway, along with El Alamein and Stalingrad, was one of the three battles that turned the tide in WW2.
KamIkazE (Good Lord…) - 2
Sinking of the Lusitania - 2
Operation Dynamo - 1
Great post, but I’m going to have to question this criteria. It really seems to shift the question from “What was the most decisive naval battle?” to “What was the most significant naval battle?”
I don’t think the significance of a war has any bearing on the decisiveness of a battle.
(I’d also argue that the Russo-Japanese War actually was of world-class importance, but I’ll wait until Tsushima is up on the block to get to that)
Never mind.
I kind of like the ambiguity of the criteria - it’ll add to the discussions I think.
My votes:
Kamikaze - 2 votes. - not a battle.
**Sinking of the Lusitania - 2 votes **- not a battle and the US didn’t enter the war for another 2 years.
Coral Sea - 1 vote. As someone pointed out above there are just too many Pacific War battles in the list. Using Malthus’ criteria I’d argue that this is lacking in classes 1&2 compared to Midway and Leyte Gulf.
But at Jutland, the German Navy’s goal was to take the British fleet by surprise and inflict heavy losses upon them. Unbeknownst to them, the British had intercepted the German signals and knew what was coming, so came out to meet them. In that respect, the battle was a failure for the Germans.
Fair enough.
2 votes Lusitania
2 Votes Dynamo
1 vote Eliat
I think What Exit? was asking silenus why he has apparently voted to eliminate Midway, not why it should be nominated as a decisive battle. But thanks for the info - I am nowhere near knowledgable enough to vote on the outcome of the thread, but I will be following it as it is a very interesting history lesson. As such, I would like to hear silenus’s justification, too :).
Midway: 2
- See below
Sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse: 2 - The loss of two battleships was a blow and taught the allies not to sail into enemy air-power unescorted. But in the end mattered very little both to the campaigns of early '42.
Hampton Roads: 1 - The very definition of indecisive.
The thing is even if the Americans had lost badly at Midway, the course of the war would have changed little, except perhaps to be extended (maybe up to a year depending on how badly they lost). And the Japanese were going to go to the defensive around that time no matter what. Fuel issues would have forced it even if nothing else would have. And in gaining Midway, the Japanese were going to gain a base that would be worse than useless. It was a useless supply base for the navy, and the Japanese bombers didn’t have the range to bomb Pearl. But vice versa the Americans could bomb Midway.
Even the sinking of American of all the American carriers wouldn’t have been more than a temporary disadvantage. 18 months later the Americans would still have a 2-1 advantage in carriers and planes.
I just can’t see this as “Decisive.”
I was replying to **Silenus **voting to remove it. I would vote for it as one of the final 5.
This thinking on Midway could extend to all the other Pacific battles. And, in fact, to almost every battle where one side had an advantage – they only won because they had an advantage. And the battles where the weaker side won were just luck. Pretty soon there are no nominees on the list at all.
Speaking just for myself, I don’t think that really works as a criterion. I mean, what would the US have done with that later 2:1 advantage in carriers, except fight a battle which you would also say changed the course of the war very little. Ultimately there must be the “cash transaction” of battle to translate purported advantages into actual results.
Also, I will argue for the sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse that the sinkings were instrumental in Percival’s defeatism, giving him a big “excuse” as it were. And the eventual collapse of British imperialism in Asia is always attributed to the British defeats in the war showing everyone they were as vulnerable as anyone else. PoW and Repulse were the first of those defeats, and in some ways the most shocking; their loss heavily influenced Singapore’s fall, which was the largest of those defeats. Those are the ones that were in the minds of colonial subjects when they threw off the British. That’s the connection I draw between those sinkings and the redrawing of the world map.
I’m thinking that Hampton Roads won’t be on the list long – although I guess it depends on what you consider to be included in the battle. The decisive part of that battle was the day before the Monitor showed up – when Virginia sank every wooden ship she could reach (quite literally). If you’re including that in “Hampton Roads” then maybe I need to revisit my previous assertion that it was a classic draw, which I based only on the ironclad vs ironclad encounter.
I’m inclined to move Flamborough head off the list early, despite my fondness for the battle. IMHO tactically it was more a case of dogged persistence squeaking out a win rather than decisive annihilation, and strategically it’s kind of obscure; I don’t get the sense that it determined the course of the war. But not this round, Jones! tips cap
So for now I will confine myself to voting against the Kamikaze storm. Important for east Asian history, life-and-death for Japan, a naval event of record-setting size…but not a battle per se. If anything, the brief land battle where the Japanese samurai turned back the first landing attempt should get credit for the troops still being embarked at sea when the typhoon struck.
Kamikaze vs the Khan - 2
That’s why I left it so vague. Vague makes for debate I hope…especially toward the end 
I will go with
Lusitania - 2
Kamikaze - 2
Hampton Roads - 1