A view through the windshield of a U. S. Army HMMWV traveling in a convoy in Baghdad, Iraq (April 2005). This article refers to the Military HMMWV not the civilian Hummer sold by General Motors The M998 High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Baghdad (بغداد) is the Capital of Iraq and of Baghdad Governorate, with which it is also coterminous

A convoy is a group of vehicles (of any type, but usually motor vehicles or ships) traveling together for mutual support. Vehicles, derived from the Latin word vehiculum, are non-living Means of transport. Often, a convoy is organized with armed defensive support, though it may also be used in a non-military sense, for example when driving through remote areas. If one vehicle breaks down or gets stuck, the other vehicles can assist with repairs or attempt to free the bogged-down vehicle. If repairs are not possible, the people from the broken-down vehicle can transfer to others.

Naval convoys

Age of Sail

By the French Revolutionary Wars of the late 18th century, effective naval convoy tactics had been developed to ward off pirates and privateers. The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of major conflicts from 1792 until 1802 fought between the French Revolutionary government and several European states The 18th century lasted from 1701 to 1800 in the Gregorian calendar, in accordance with the Anno Domini / Common Era numbering system Naval warfare is Combat in and on Seas Oceans or any other major bodies of water such as large Lakes and wide Rivers History Naval tactics is the collective name for methods of engaging and defeating an enemy Ship or fleet in Battle at Sea during Naval warfare Piracy is Robbery committed at sea or sometimes on shore without a commission from a sovereign Nation (as distinct from Privateering A privateer was a private Warship authorized by a country's Government by Letters of marque to attack foreign shipping Some convoys contained several hundred merchant ships. The most enduring system of convoys were the Spanish treasure fleets, that sailed from the 1520s until 1790. Beginning in the 16th century the Spanish treasure fleets (or simply West Indies Fleet from Spanish Flota de Indias) transported various metal resources and agricultural

When merchant ships sailed independently, a privateer could cruise a shipping lane and capture ships as they passed. Ships sailing in convoy presented a much smaller target: a convoy was no more likely to be found than a single ship. Even if the privateer found a convoy and the wind was favourable for an attack, it could hope to capture only a handful of ships before the rest managed to escape, and a small escort of warships could easily thwart it.

Many naval battles in the age of sail were fought around convoys, including:

• The Battle of Portland (1653)
• The Battle of Ushant (1781)
• The Battle of Dogger Bank (1781)
• The Glorious First of June (1794)

World War I

In the early 20th century, the dreadnought changed the balance of power in convoy battles. A naval battle is a Battle fought using Ships or other waterborne vessels The Age of Sail was the period in which International trade and Naval warfare were dominated by Sailing Ships lasting from the 16th to the mid The naval Battle of Portland, or Three Days' Battle took place during 28 February - 2 March, 1653 ( Old style) during the Year 1781 ( MDCCLXXXI) was a Common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common Year 1781 ( MDCCLXXXI) was a Common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common The Glorious First of June (also known as the Third Battle of Ushant, and in France as the fr ''Bataille du 13 prairial an 2'' or fr ''Combat de Prairial'' Year 1794 ( MDCCXCIV) was a Common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a The twentieth century of the Common Era began on Genesis Battleships of the era typically carried four large guns mounted fore and aft in twin turrets with a number of smaller-calibre guns ranged along the sides of the Steaming faster than merchant ships and firing at long ranges, a single battleship could destroy many ships in a convoy before the others could scatter over the horizon. A battleship is a large heavily armored Warship with a main battery consisting of the largest Calibre of Guns Battleships were To protect a convoy against a capital ship required providing it with an escort of another capital ship; a very high cost.

Battleships were the main reason that the British Admiralty did not adopt convoy tactics at the start of the first Battle of the Atlantic in World War I. The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the United Kingdom responsible for the command of the Royal Navy. The First Battle of the Atlantic ( 1914 &ndash 1918) was a naval campaign of World War I, largely fought in the seas around the British World War I (abbreviated WWI; also known as the First World War, the Great War, and the War to End All But by the end of 1914, German capital ships had largely been cleared from the oceans and the main threat to shipping came from U-boats. Year 1914 ( MCMXIV) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year U-boat is the anglicized version of the German word, itself an abbreviation of Unterseeboot ( undersea boat) and refers From a tactical point of view, World War I-era submarines were similar to privateers in the age of sail: only a little faster than the merchant ships they were attacking, and capable of sinking only a small number of vessels in a convoy because of their limited supply of torpedoes and shells. A submarine is a Watercraft that can operate independently below water as distinct from a Submersible that has only limited underwater capability The Admiralty took a long time to respond to this change in the tactical position, and only in 1917, at the urging of the British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, did they institute a convoy system. Year 1917 ( MCMXVII) was a Common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the political leader of the United Kingdom David Lloyd George 1st Earl Lloyd George of Dwyfor OM, PC (17 January 1863 &ndash 26 March 1945 was a British Statesman and the only Losses to U-boats dropped to a small fraction of their former level.

Other arguments against convoy were raised. The primary issue was the loss of productivity, as merchant shipping in convoy has to travel at the speed of the slowest vessel in the convoy and spent a considerable amount of time in ports waiting for the next convoy to depart. Further, large convoys were thought to overload port resources.

Actual analysis of shipping losses in World War I disproved all these arguments, at least so far as they applied to transatlantic and other long-distance traffic. Ships sailing in convoys were far less likely to be sunk, even when not provided with any escort at all. The loss of productivity due to convoy delays was small compared with the loss of productivity due to ships being sunk. Ports could deal more easily with convoys because they tended to arrive on schedule and so loading and unloading could be planned.

In his book On the Psychology of Military Incompetence, Norman Dixon suggested that the hostility towards convoys in the naval establishment were in part caused by a (sub-conscious) perception of convoys as effeminating, due to warships having to care for civilian merchant ships. Military incompetence refers to incompetencies and failures of military organisations whether through incompetent individuals or through a flawed institutional culture ^[1] Also, it should be noted that convoy duty exposes the escorting warships to the uncomfortable and sometimes outright hazardous conditions of the North Atlantic, but with only extremely rare occurrences of visible achievement (i. e. fending of a submarine assault).

World War II

The British adopted a convoy system, initially voluntary and later compulsory for almost all merchant ships, the moment that World War II was declared. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including Canadian, and later American, supplies were vital for Britain to continue its war effort. The course of the second Battle of the Atlantic was a long struggle as the Germans developed anti-convoy tactics and the British developed counter-tactics to thwart the Germans. The Battle of the Atlantic was the longest continuous Military campaign of World War II, (though some say it was a series of naval Military campaigns

The power of a battleship against a convoy was dramatically illustrated by the fate of Convoy HX-84. HX-84 was a North Atlantic Convoy of the HX series during the battle of the Atlantic in World War II. On November 5, 1940, the German pocket battleship Admiral Scheer encountered the convoy. Events 1499 - Publication of the Catholicon in Treguier ( Brittany) Year 1940 ( MCMXL) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full 1940 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. History During World War II Admiral Scheer, under Captain Theodor Krancke, was by far the most successful capital ship Commerce raider of the war Maiden, Trewellard, Kenbame Head, Beaverford, and Fresno were quickly sunk, and other ships were damaged. Only the sacrifice of the Armed Merchant Cruiser HMS Jervis Bay and failing light allowed the rest of the convoy to escape. Armed Merchantmen has come to mean merchant ships equipped with guns usually for defensive purposes either by design or after the fact See also List of shipwrecks in 1940

The power of a battleship in protecting a convoy was also dramatically illustrated when the German warships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau came upon an eastbound British convoy of 41 ships, HX-106 in the North Atlantic on February 8th, 1941. For the German armoured cruiser commissioned in 1907 see SMS Scharnhorst The sisters - Scharnhorst and Gneisenau The Construction She was laid down in February 1934 at Deutsche Werke Kiel. Convoy HX-106 consisted of some 41 ships eastbound from Halifax Nova Scotia to Liverpool, England When they noticed the presence in the escort of the old battleship, HMS Ramillies, they fled the scene, rather than risk damage from her 15" guns. Construction and launch Ramillies was built by William Beardmore and Company at Dailmuir in Scotland.

The enormous number of vessels involved and the frequency of engagements meant that statistical techniques could be applied to evaluate tactics: an early use of operational research in war. Operations Research (OR in North America South Africa and Australia and Operational Research in Europe is an interdisciplinary branch of applied Mathematics and

On the entry of the U. S. into World War II, the U. S. Navy decided not to instigate convoys on eastern seaboard of the U. S. Fleet Admiral Ernest King ignored advice on this subject from the British as he had formed a poor opinion of the Royal Navy early in his career. Fleet Admiral Ernest Joseph King GCB ( November 23, 1878 &ndash June 25, 1956) was Commander in Chief United States The result was what the U-boat crews called their second happy time, which did not end until convoys were introduced. The Second Happy Time was the informal name for a phase in the Second Battle of the Atlantic during which Axis Submarines attacked Merchant shipping This was, unfortunately for the Allies, as near to a laboratory test as is ever seen in war time and it proved conclusively that convoys worked.

The German anti-convoy tactics included:

• long-range surveillance aircraft to find convoys;
• strings of U-boats (wolf packs) that could be directed onto a convoy by radio;
• breaking the British naval codes;
• improved anti-ship weapons, including magnetic detonators and sonic homing torpedoes. The development of the steam Ironclad firing explosive shells in the mid 19th century rendered sailing tactics obsolete

The Allied responses included:

• air raids on the U-boat bases at Brest and La Rochelle;
• converted merchant ships, eg, Merchant aircraft carriers, Catapult Aircraft Merchantman and armed merchant cruisers
• more convoy escorts, including cheaply produced corvettes, frigates, and escort carriers;
• improved anti-submarine weapons such as the hedgehog;
• long-range aircraft patrols to find U-boats;
• larger convoys, allowing more escorts per convoy as well as the extraction of enough escorts to form support groups that operated in defence of convoys that faced an above-average risk of attack
• allocating vessels to convoys according to speed, so that faster ships were less exposed. Strategic bombing is a Military strategy used in a Total war with the goal of defeating an enemy nation-state by destroying its economic ability to wage war rather Brest (bʁɛst in French, in Breton) is a city in the Finistère department in Bretagne in northwestern France. La Rochelle is a city in western France, and a Seaport on the Bay of Biscay, a part of the Atlantic Ocean. Merchant aircraft carriers (MAC were minimal Aircraft carriers used during World War II by Britain and the Netherlands as an emergency measure A CAM ship was a World War II -era British Merchant ship used in Convoys as a quick emergency solution to the shortage of escort carriers Armed Merchantmen has come to mean merchant ships equipped with guns usually for defensive purposes either by design or after the fact A corvette is a small maneuverable lightly armed Warship, originally smaller than a Frigate and larger than a coastal patrol craft, although many For the bird see Frigatebird. A frigate /ˈfrɪgɪt/ is a warship The escort aircraft carrier or escort carrier (popularly known as the jeep carrier) was a small Aircraft carrier utilized by the Royal Navy For the area denial weapon see Czech hedgehog. The Hedgehog was an Anti-submarine weapon developed by the Royal Navy

They were also aided by

• improved sonar (ASDIC) allowing escort vessels to better track U-boats;
• breaking the German naval cipher;
• improved radar and radio direction finding allowing planes to find and destroy U-boats;

During World War II, Japanese vessels rarely traveled in convoys (see also USS Grayback and USS Thresher). Sonar (which started as an Acronym for sound navigation and ranging) is a technique that uses Sound propagation (usually underwater to navigate Sonar (which started as an Acronym for sound navigation and ranging) is a technique that uses Sound propagation (usually underwater to navigate The Enigma machine is any one of a family of related electro-mechanical Rotor machines used to generate Ciphers for the Encryption and decryption of Radar is a system that uses electromagnetic waves to identify the range altitude direction or speed of both moving and fixed objects such as Aircraft, ships Direction finding (DF refers to the establishment of the direction from which a received signal was transmitted For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. First patrol Grayback ’s first war patrol from 15 February to 10 April took her along the coast of Saipan and Guam. Sea trials Following training and sea trials Thresher got underway from New London Connecticut on 25 October 1940 for engineering Their merchant fleet was largely destroyed by Allied submarines.

Many naval battles of World War II were fought around convoys, including:

• Convoy PQ-16, May 1942
• Convoy PQ-17, June-July 1942
• Operation Pedestal, August 1942
• The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, November 1942
• The Battle of the Barents Sea, December 1942
• The Battle of the Bismarck Sea, March 1943

The convoy prefix indicates the route of the convoy. Arctic Convoy PQ16 supported the Allied war effort of World War II In the winter and spring of 1942 U PQ-17 was a World War II Convoy carrying war Matériel from Britain, Canada and the USA to the USSR. Operation Pedestal was a British operation to get desperately needed supplies to the island of Malta in August 1942 during the Second World War. The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, sometimes referred to as the Third and Fourth Battles of Savo Island, the Battle of the Solomons or in Japanese sources as The Battle of the Barents Sea took place on December 31, 1942 between British ships escorting Convoy JW  51B to Kola The Battle of the Bismarck Sea was a battle in the South West Pacific Area (SWPA during World War II, in which planes of the United States Fifth For example, 'PQ' would be Iceland to Northern Russia and 'QP' the return route.

Analysis

The success of convoys as an anti-submarine tactic during the world wars can be ascribed to several reasons related to u-boat capabilities, the size of the ocean and convoy escorts.

In practice, Type VII and Type IX u-boats were limited in their capabilities. Type VIIA The Type VIIA boats were designed in 1933 until 1934 as the first of a new generation of attack U-boats Most were built at Deschimag AG Weser in Bremen with U33-36 Type IXA Type IXB Type IXC Type IXC/40 Type IXD Submerged speed and endurance was limited and not suited for overhauling many ships. Even a surfaced u-boat could take several hours to gain an attack position. Torpedo capacity was also restricted to around fourteen (Type VII) or 24 (Type IX), thus limiting the number of attacks that could be made, particularly when multiple firings were necessary for a single target. There was a real problem for the u-boats and their adversaries in finding each other; with a tiny proportion of the ocean in sight, without intelligence or radar, warships and even aircraft would be fortunate in coming across a submarine. The Royal Navy and later the United States Navy each took time to learn this lesson. Conversely, a u-boat's radius of vision was even smaller and had to be supplemented by regular long-range reconnaissance flights.

For both major allied navies, it had been difficult to grasp that, however large a convoy, its " footprint" (the area within which it could be spotted) was far smaller than if the individual ships had travelled independently. In other words, a submarine had less chance of finding a single convoy than if it were scattered as single ships. Moreover, once an attack had been made, the submarine would need to regain an attack position on the convoy. If, however, an attack were thwarted by escorts, even if the submarine had escaped damage, it would have to remain submerged for its own safety and might only recover its position after many hours' hard work. U-boats patrolling areas with constant and predictable flows of sea traffic, such as the United States Atlantic coast in early 1942, could dismiss a missed opportunity in the certain knowledge that another would soon present itself.

The destruction of submarines required their discovery, an improbable occurrence on aggressive patrols, by chance alone. Convoys, however, presented irresistible targets and could not be ignored. For this reason, the u-boats presented themselves as targets to the escorts with increasing possibility of destruction. In this way, the Ubootwaffe suffered severe losses, for little gain, when pressing pack attacks on well-defended convoys.

Post-WWII

The largest convoy effort since World War II was Operation Earnest Will, the U.S. Navy's 1987–88 escort of reflagged Kuwaiti tankers in the Persian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq War. Operation Earnest Will ( 24 July 1987 - 26 September 1988) was the U Year 1987 ( MCMLXXXVII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link displays 1987 Gregorian calendar) Year 1988 ( MCMLXXXVIII) was a Leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar) The State of Kuwait ( دولة الكويت IPA [dawlatt̪ alkuwajt̪]) is a sovereign Arab Emirate on the coast of the Persian Gulf, enclosed The Persian Gulf, in the Southwest Asian region is an extension of the

It seems that satellite surveillance, aircraft carriers, cruise missiles and modern submarines have turned the tactical advantage decidedly in favour of the attacker. This article is about artificial satellites For natural satellites also known as moons see Natural satellite. An aircraft carrier is a Warship designed with A cruise missile is a guided Missile that carries an explosive payload and uses a lifting wing and a propulsion system usually a Jet engine, to allow See the modern naval tactics article for an idea of the problems facing the defender. The term modern naval tactics refers to tactical doctrines developed after World War II following the final obsolescence of the Battleship and the development of long-range

Humanitarian aid convoys

The word, "convoy" is also associated with groups of road vehicles being driven, mostly by volunteers, to deliver humanitarian aid, supplies, and – a stated objective in some cases – "solidarity". Humanitarian aid (also called succour) is material or logistical assistance provided for humanitarian purposes typically in response to humanitarian crises ^[2]

In the 1990s these convoys became common travelling from Western Europe to countries of the former Yugoslavia, in particular Bosnia and Kosovo, to deal with the aftermath of the wars there. Western Europe at its most general meaning means 'all the countries in the West of Europe ' See also Kingdom of Yugoslavia, Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Yugoslavia ( Serbo-Croatian Bosnia and Herzegovina ( Latin script: Bosna i Hercegovina, Cyrillic script: Босна и Херцеговина is a country on the Balkan They also travel to countries where standards of care in institutions such as orphanages are considered low by Western European standards, such as Romania; and where other disasters have led to problems, such as around the Chernobyl disaster in Belarus and Ukraine. Romania ( dated: Rumania, Roumania The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear reactor accident in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in the Soviet Union. Belarus ( Belarusian Беларусь / Biełaruś is a Landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered by Russia to the north and east Ukraine (Україна Ukrayina, /ukrɑˈjinɑ/ is a country in Eastern Europe.

The convoys are made possible partly by the relatively small geographic distances between the stable and affluent countries of Western Europe, and the areas of need in Eastern Europe and, in a few cases, North Africa and even Iraq. Eastern Europe is a general term that refers to the Geopolitical region encompassing the easternmost part of the European continent. North Africa or Northern Africa is the Northernmost Region of the African Continent, separated by the Sahara from Sub-Saharan For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Iraq topics. They are often justified because although less directly cost-effective than mass freight transport, they emphasise the support of large numbers of small groups, and are quite distinct from multinational organisations such as United Nations humanitarian efforts. The United Nations ( UN) is an International organization whose stated aims are to facilitate cooperation in International law, International security

Truckers convoys

The film, Convoy immortalises comradeship between truck drivers, where the culture of the CB radio encourages truck drivers to travel in convoys. Convoy is a 1978 Action film directed by Sam Peckinpah and starred Kris Kristofferson, Ali MacGraw, Ernest Borgnine Citizens' Band radio ( CB) is in many countries a system of short-distance simplex radio communications between individuals on a selection of 40 channels within

Trucker convoys were created as a byproduct of the 55mph speed limit and 18-wheelers becoming the prime targets of speed traps. Most truckers had difficult schedules to keep and as a result had to maintain a rate of speed above the posted speed limit in order to reach their destinations on time. Convoys were started so that multiple trucks could run together at a high rate of speed with the thinking being that if they passed a speed trap the police would only be able to pull over one of the trucks in the convoy.

See also

• Camel train

Military convoys

• List of convoy codes and the similar List of World War II convoys
• Arctic convoys of World War II
• convoy commodore
• Malta Convoys
• The 1940 massacre of convoy SC-7
• Q-ship
• Anti-submarine warfare

Humanitarian convoys

• Aid Convoy
• Workers' Aid for Bosnia

References

• Convoy, The Defense of Sea Trade 1890-1990, John Winton 1983. ISBN 0 7181 21635

External links

• Lists of convoy prefixes for both World Wars
• Convoy web – a comprehensive analysis of certain naval convoy routes
• Aid Convoy – a humanitarian aid charity running convoys