The first duty of the commerce raider is to survive to kill more commerce.
But is it the first duty of the commander tasked with protecting the sea lanes to do damage to the commerce raider at all costs, or should he also preserve himself rather than leave the sea lanes completely unprotected?
Examples would include the decision by many WWII escort commanders to ram a U-boat, sacrificing their vessel for the sake of removing a submarine which could go on to sink many more. But this depletes the usually scarce number of escorts for the remaining convoy.
Or we can look back to the Battle of Coronel, in which Cradock's destruction and the loss of two locally important cruisers nevertheless set in motion the events which led to Spee's destruction.
The problem with Coronel is that Spee's destruction was by no means certain and even if his ammunition was depleted, had he been able to elude further pursuit, he could still have sunk more ships and attacked shore-based installations and generally been a nuisance. So unless Cradock was clairvoyant, was he justified in taking this risk?
You could extend this thinking to other examples. Was Jellicoe justified in declining to pursue and deliver the killing blow to the High Seas Fleet because of his fears over losing battleships to torpedo attack? The submarines of the day were not as effective as their sales brochures claimed and had he pressed this attack, for the damage or loss of a handful of units he might have ended the war - but he didn't know that.
But is it the first duty of the commander tasked with protecting the sea lanes to do damage to the commerce raider at all costs, or should he also preserve himself rather than leave the sea lanes completely unprotected?
Examples would include the decision by many WWII escort commanders to ram a U-boat, sacrificing their vessel for the sake of removing a submarine which could go on to sink many more. But this depletes the usually scarce number of escorts for the remaining convoy.
Or we can look back to the Battle of Coronel, in which Cradock's destruction and the loss of two locally important cruisers nevertheless set in motion the events which led to Spee's destruction.
The official explanation of the defeat as presented to the House of Commons by Winston Churchill stated: feeling he could not bring the enemy immediately to action as long as he kept with Canopus, he decided to attack them with his fast ships alone, in the belief that even if he himself were detroyed... he would inflict damage on them which ...would lead to their certain subsequent destruction.
The problem with Coronel is that Spee's destruction was by no means certain and even if his ammunition was depleted, had he been able to elude further pursuit, he could still have sunk more ships and attacked shore-based installations and generally been a nuisance. So unless Cradock was clairvoyant, was he justified in taking this risk?
You could extend this thinking to other examples. Was Jellicoe justified in declining to pursue and deliver the killing blow to the High Seas Fleet because of his fears over losing battleships to torpedo attack? The submarines of the day were not as effective as their sales brochures claimed and had he pressed this attack, for the damage or loss of a handful of units he might have ended the war - but he didn't know that.
