1942 1943 1944 1945 Associated articles Operation Paravane was a British air raid of World War II that inflicted heavy damage on the German battleship Tirpitz, at anchor in Kaafjord in the far north of German-occupied Norway.

The attack on 15 September followed a series of raids conducted against Tirpitz with limited success by Royal Navy carrier aircraft between April and August 1944, seeking to sink or disable the battleship at her anchorage, so that she no longer posed a threat to Allied convoys travelling to and from the Soviet Union.

[2] The Allies needed to keep a powerful force of warships with the British Home Fleet to counter the threat she posed and capital ships accompanied most convoys part of the way to the Soviet Union.

[3][4] Royal Air Force (RAF) heavy bombers conducted a series of abortive raids on Tirpitz shortly after the battleship arrived in Norway from Germany in January 1942.

[11] Two squadrons of RAF Coastal Command Handley Page Hampden torpedo bombers operated from Vaenga in northern Russia during mid-September 1942 to counter Tirpitz or any other German warships which attempted to attack Allied convoys but these aircraft did not make contact with the ship.

During 1942 and 1943 British inventor Barnes Wallis tried to develop a version of his "bouncing bomb" for use against Tirpitz alongside the larger weapons that were used to attack several German dams during Operation Chastise on 16/17 May 1943.

618 Squadron was formed in April 1943 and equipped with de Havilland Mosquitos for this attack but trials of the "Highball" bouncing bombs during the year were unsuccessful and the plan was abandoned in September.

[16] This anchorage was well protected, with the defences including equipment capable of rapidly generating an artificial smokescreen as well as many anti-aircraft guns located in shore batteries and warships.

Such a mission was judged to be impractical by the RAF as it was expected that German fighter aircraft would attack the bombers and Kaafjord would be covered by a smokescreen by the time they arrived over the target area.

[18] The only attack made against Tirpitz at Kaafjord by land-based aircraft prior to September 1944 was a small raid conducted by 15 Soviet bombers on the night of 10/11 February 1944, but it did not inflict any damage on the battleship.

On 23 September 1943, the crews of two British midget submarines penetrated the defences around the battleship during Operation Source, and placed explosive charges in the water beneath her.

[20] Further midget submarine attacks were not considered feasible and an air raid designated Operation Tungsten was conducted by Royal Navy aircraft carriers on 3 April 1944 as repairs to the battleship neared completion.

[24] Senior Royal Navy officers attributed the failure of the raids conducted between April and August 1944 to shortcomings with the Fleet Air Arm's main attack aircraft, the Fairey Barracuda.

[32] The group's staff officers judged that it was essential for the raid to surprise Kaafjord's defenders so that the battleship was not covered in smoke by the time the Lancasters arrived.

[33] Due to the difficulty of damaging the heavily armoured battleship, the main weapon selected for this operation was the Tallboy bomb, the largest then in service with the RAF and capable of penetrating well-protected targets.

[34] Some of the bombers were to be armed with "Johnnie Walker" (commonly called "JW") mines, which were designed to be dropped from aircraft and move through the water by rapidly diving and surfacing until they struck their target.

Instead, it was decided that the attack force should fly over northern Sweden and Finland after raiding Kaafjord and refuel at Yagodnik airstrip, which was on an island near Arkhangelsk.

511 Squadron Consolidated B-24 Liberator transport aircraft were assigned to carry maintenance personnel and supplies from the United Kingdom to Yagodnik, and a Mosquito fitted for photo reconnaissance tasks from No.

The first attempt at re-establishing a presence near Tirpitz occurred in August 1944, when a Norwegian Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) agent was dispatched to the nearby village of Alta.

[Note 2] The agent infiltrated with a radio transmitter codenamed "Sinding" from neutral Sweden, but only managed to begin transmissions to the United Kingdom on 22 September, too late for the preparation stage for the operation.

[48][49] As well as reporting on the weather, Moe and Arild radioed assessments of the damage Tirpitz had suffered in the air attacks prior to Operation Paravane.

5 Group and British military liaison officers in the USSR continued to work with the relevant Soviet headquarters to finalise the arrangements for Force A's flight from Norway to Yagodnik.

[42] The remaining aircraft passed over neutral Sweden where the aircrew, most of whom had only conducted night flying over countries observing blackouts, were pleased to see towns lit up.

[64] By the morning of 14 September, 26 Lancasters from the attack forces and the Film Unit aircraft were ready; 20 of the bombers were armed with Tallboys and the remainder with JW mines.

The Lancasters were to take off together, and fly at low altitude until they reached the border between Finland and the USSR to avoid detection by German radar stations located around Kirkenes.

When the main body reached a position around 60 miles (97 km) from the fjord, at which point the British expected that the Germans would have detected the bombers, the Lancasters would move into attack formations and commence their bombing run.

[71] Kaafjord's defenders detected the Lancasters approximately ten minutes before they arrived, and the protective smokescreen was beginning to form when the attack commenced at 10:55 am GMT.

As Soviet forces were also rapidly advancing towards northern Norway, Dönitz judged that it was not feasible to either return the ship to ocean-going service or retain her at Kaafjord.

[82][92] The commander of the German Navy's task force in northern Norway, Konteradmiral Rudolf Peters, was accordingly directed to anchor Tirpitz at a location near Tromsø where the water was shallow enough to prevent the battleship from sinking completely if she suffered further damage.

During the subsequent attack conducted on 12 November, Operation Catechism, Tirpitz was struck by several Tallboy bombs and capsized with heavy loss of life among her crew.