Talk:Exercise Tiger

Blunders

I changed the into which said "through a series of blunders...lost their lives.". Reading the article it seems that the exercise was actually attacked by the enemy instead. DJ Clayworth 14:56, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

not so. that the german eboats could get close enough to attack was of course the result of a monumental cockup and actually i believe that most soldiers died as a result of other blunders eg drowning due to wearing heavy packs on the backs and a float on their front, which meant they flipped onto their backs with their heads under the water. Mujinga 19:45, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

having read the book The Forgotten Dead, i have added some more info Mujinga 22:39, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

• Did HMS Scimitar sustain enough structural damage to justify scurrrying back to Plymouth? Hugo999 (talk) 03:47, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

  If she was ordered to return, it was because there was a reason to do so. The likelihood of enemy activity in the area clearly wasn't considered to be especially high or else a slightly reinforced escort would have been present, but of course this in itself would have raised suspicions to enemy sigint observers.

  Frankly, this whole issue of 'it happened because of an Allied cock-up' takes no account of the fact that, even had the escort remained at full strength, it was totally inadequate to fend off the assault of a dozen S-boats at night. Much is made of the weakness of Azalea, but Scimitar was hardly any more powerful - it was not their four-inch guns which would have been of any value in such a close-in defence role, but their automatic weapons, and here the little Azalea was hardly less well-equipped than the much older Scimitar. In fact, each of the LSTs carried far greater firepower (although with far larger bind spots against low-lying targets) than did either of the convoy escorts, who were of far greater use against submarines and whose main role in reality was as guardships at each end of the line to raise the alarm.

  Bottom line: It was the enterprising Germans who caused this tragedy; the notion that the old Scimitar at the tail end of a three-mile-long convoy would have been sufficient to deter an S-boat attack under perfect conditions is nonsensical.

  This was not down to a blunder; it may have been somewhat exacerbated by them, that's all. 2A00:23C7:3119:AD01:C4C8:B971:C64:7300 (talk) 00:47, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Tank

Is it certain the Tank on the memorial is a Sherman DD? It looks to me like a regular Sherman. If you look at the picture on the Sherman DD article, you'll see the tank has toothed wheels at the front and back of the tracks. The front one is connected to the engine and drives the tracks, the rear one takes power from the tracks and turns the propellors. Regular Shermans, of course, didn't have this. They just had a non-toothed wheel at the back. That's what the tank in the picture looks like. Catsmeat 16:44, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• Guest-house keeper Ken Small, who salvaged the tank, took off its propellor and kept it in his living-room. I saw it there. So yes, it does appear to have been a DD Sherman. What is more doubtful is that it was a Sherman of the 70th Tank Battalion Nigel S. Lewis (talk) 15:47, 8 June 2019 (UTC).

• U.S. Sherman tank that lay beneath the waters a mile offshore, a tank lost not in Exercise Tiger but in another rehearsal a year earlier. At considerable personal expense, Mr. Small managed to salvage the tank and place it on the plinth just behind the beach as a memorial to those Americans who had died. The memorial was dedicated in a ceremony on the 40th anniversary of D-Day.--Mrg3105 07:54, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Mention in literature

The incident is also mentioned in "Hell has no heroes" by Wayne Robinson, Paperback Library, 1966 (original title "Barbara", 1962) It gives 11 DD tanks being sunk, and 23 crewmen casualties drowned.--Mrg3105 07:55, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Admiral Moon

This article is a good start - but fails to mention the command of Admiral Don P. Moon, who later took his own life (presumably) as a result of the casualties taken during Exercise (or Operation) Tiger. The fact that he doesn't have his own article is also something I will attempt to fix soon.

If someone with better knowledge about the event than myself could do a little touch up to include this information, that'd be much appriciated. Otherwise, I'll make my own best attempts.

Letoofdune 21:08, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Casualty figures

There appears to be a problem in this article with the casualty figures. Most sources referenced by the article cite a figure of 749 killed or missing as a result of the attack on Exercise Tiger. One source using this figure puts the eventual toll of the exercise overall (ie including blue-on-blue casualties etc) at 946 in total. 193.130.130.105 (talk) 16:30, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

The U.S. Navy lists even lower casualty figures: This brief action resulted in 198 Navy dead and missing and 441 Army dead and missing according to the naval action reports. Later Army reports gave 551 as the total number of dead and missing soldiers. http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq20-1.htm 68.183.91.149 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 04:14, 6 March 2012 (UTC).

There are still issues with casualty figures not matching. Can anyone please help clarify which figures are correct? Thanks, DPdH (talk) 15:37, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Author Richard Bass in the 2012 documentary film claims there may be as many as 1405 killed. Even 70 years after the event he encountered much resistance with military sources to determine correct figures. This documentary by Matt Richards was shown on the German TV channel ZDF Info on June 6 2014. Ontologix (talk) 13:45, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Is there a list of army casualties by units divisions platoons individuals and or persons participating but not injured or killed ?? My father may have been involved in this horrible accident and I am looking for any links he just said he had taken a booth of secrecy that he kept his entire life the loyalty of these people is beyond question I would just like to know more thank you  Jessmischke (talk) 17:15, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Recent investigations by historians have failed to substantiate the claim that 700 - 900 soldiers died in the series of exercises. It may be a myth. It seems improbable that hundreds of soldiers were killed by shellfire on the beach - they could surely have taken cover. Also, talk of mass graves being dug in the fields above the beach have been proven to be untrue. The truth is surely that the army did not keep careful records of the dates of death of individuals. Thousands of men were killed in the summer of 1944, but there was no effort to inform bereaved relatives exactly where or when the deaths occurred. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.16.90.22 (talk) 15:12, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

Maybe this is not the correct form for asking these types of questions but I wanted to start with authorities with the most possible sources of information thank you please advise if this is not appropriate Jessmischke (talk) 17:16, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Map

The map looks a little odd to me - it appears to show England surrounded by blue sea. What's happened to Wales and Scotland? Wouldn't a map of the southern part of the complete island of Great Britain be better? TheOneOnTheLeft (talk) 11:49, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Two articles?

According to the lead, "Exercise Tiger" was the name of two completely separate exercises. Shouldn't these, then, be separate articles? I suggest that the the '1942' information be put into a new article "Exercise Tiger (1942)" and that we also use of the existing Operation Tiger (disambiguation) for a 'seealso' tag at the top of both articles. Feline Hymnic (talk) 18:32, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Is 1942 Exercise Tiger notable enough for its own article, though? I can see having the section here, or I could see having it in a "List of Allied Training Exercises in WWII" article, but seems a bit thin to stand on its own as it stands. 69.204.255.197 (talk) 07:52, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The 1942 exercise can always be a stub article. In Wikipedia, when two different items share a common name, the convention is to keep them separate and use cross links ("hatlinks" such as for..., see also..., main article... etc.), resisting the temptation to push them into a single article. I don't mind how we separate them, but they ought, basically, to be separate (and cross referenced) not conflated together. Ideas? Thoughts? Feline Hymnic (talk) 23:59, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I have made the split. Hope that's OK. Feline Hymnic (talk) 22:37, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Death toll / friendly fire

Two things. The lead lists a casualty figure of 749 dead as a consequence of the attack at sea, but the article then goes on to give a figure 638 dead, specifically during the attack. The two figures could theoretically be reconciled; the wording of the article does not rule out the possibility that the missing 111 died in the aftermath of the attack, in the water, or that they died during the course of the exercise in incidents unrelated to the attack, and it is also possible that the true figure is not known. Perhaps the article could be rewritten to state that "several sources list a total casualty figure of 749, (source) (source) (source) although figures as low as N and as high as N have also been given. (source) (source) The official report lists a figure of N. (source)".

Secondly, the article goes on to cover a friendly fire incident. "When the remaining LSTs landed on Slapton Beach, the blunders continued and a further 308 men died from friendly fire." I don't have access to the given source, so I can't check this, but the article gives the impression that the wet, cold, injured survivors of the channel attack were then dumped on the beach and forced to run into an artillery barrage, which seems instinctively wrong. I assume that the unscatched portions of the LST flotilla were ordered to continue with the exercise - perhaps they were entirely unaware of the disaster that had taken place behind them - with tragic results, but this needs to be more clear.

In conclusion, is the death toll 749, 749+308=1057, or 638+308=946, or simply not known for sure? -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 13:45, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Again, the death toll is still inconsistent across the article. Can anyone please help? Regards, DPdH (talk) 15:39, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Memorials and books list the casualty figure at 946. Not sure where the 749 comes from. Big discrepancy. Kaci Lee (talk) 18:21, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Navy casualties 197 or 198 but Army goes from 441 or 442 to 551 or +110, and total from 639 to 749. No mention now in the article of 946 (and 749+197 = 946 so was the Navy total added to 749, though it included 198 for the Navy anyway?). And even if the LST logs were missing, the US Army must have written to the families of all the missing men. Hugo999 (talk) 04:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Dubious tag/friendly fire section

This is confusing; the Friendly fire section says at the outset the incident occurred after the engagement in Lyme Bay (“When [they] landed, … the blunders continued”) while the note at the end says it was the day before. Which is it? There’s a reference of sorts for the “day before” statement (and, having seen the programme that makes more sense) while there’s nothing for the “blunders continued” statement.
Also, the Revealed programme was vague about the number of casualties for the bombardment; it mentioned a letter by someone who was there who referred to “about 200 bodies” but the official documents had no numbers at all. Can we have a source for the 308 figure? Xyl 54 (talk) 12:38, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I've re-arranged the article to reflect the sources we have on the sequence of events. It still needs work on the casualties, particularly for the friendly fire incident. If there is no source for the 308 figure forthcoming, I propose to delete it and re-write that bit. Xyl 54 (talk) 16:36, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

Need to resolve an apparent contradiction

We have "The first practice assault took place on the morning of 27 April but was marred by an incident in which 308 men died from friendly fire." and "The first practice assaults took place on the morning of 27 April. These proceeded successfully, ..."

I assume it is the second of these that is wrong, but I lack expertise and sources to be sure. Anyone care to change whichever section is wrong? Rjm at sleepers (talk) 10:59, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

I have reworded the start of the battle of Lyme Bay section. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 18:38, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

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E-boats

This article uses the now outdated term 'E-boat' to refer to the schnellboote of the German Navy, which given the context is fine. This is about the American experience and no doubt all involved would refer to the shadowy torpedo boats as "E-boats". In fact, almost none of the servicemen involved would even know what an S-boot actually looked like, never even seeing one clearly before, during or after the attack.

But, while the use of 'E-boat' in this context is completely acceptable, the use of "German E-boat" seems to me to be somewhat redundant. The 'E' in 'E-boat' already stood for 'Enemy' - and the Germans did not ever refer to their own craft as E-boats - so, why the need for such a tag? We can simply put 'E-boat' and be done with it. Or we can put 'German S-boot' or 'German torpedo-boat/MTB' instead (obviously, the term 'MTB' has been used in the same paragraph to refer to the RN's vessels, so perhaps avoid using it - or maybe not?). But 'German E-boat' seems very awkward. 2A00:23C7:3119:AD01:D8C3:8F66:3B45:1F4D (talk) 20:56, 4 October 2022 (UTC)