The class was a pair of fast battleships built for Nazi Germany's shortly before the outbreak of World War II. The ships were the largest and most powerful warships built for the ; displacing more than normally, they were armed with a battery of eight guns and were capable of a top speed of . was laid down in July 1936 and completed in September 1940, while the keel of her sister ship, , was laid in October 1936 and work finished in February 1941. The ships were ordered in response to the French s, themselves laid down in response to the Italian s. The Bismarck class was designed with the traditional role of engaging enemy battleships in home waters in mind, though the Oberkommando der Marine (High Command of the Navy) envisioned employing the ships as long-range commerce raiders against British shipping in the Atlantic Ocean. As such, their design represented the strategic confusion that dominated German naval construction in the 1930s.
Both ships had short service careers. conducted only one operation, Operation Rheinübung, a sortie into the North Atlantic to raid supply convoys sent from North America to Great Britain. During the operation, she destroyed the British battlecruiser and damaged the new battleship in the Battle of the Denmark Strait. was defeated and sunk in a final engagement after a three-day chase by the Royal Navy. There is still debate as to the direct cause of s sinking, though the majority of experts conclude that scuttling hastened the inevitable foundering of the badly damaged battleship.
s career was less dramatic; she operated in the Baltic Sea briefly in 1941 before being sent to Norwegian waters in 1942, where she acted as a fleet in being, threatening the convoys from Britain to the Soviet Union. She was repeatedly attacked by the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force between 1942 and 1944, but she was not seriously damaged in most of these attacks. Operation Source, an attack by X-craft in late 1943, inflicted significant damage and neutralized the ship for six months. In 1944, Lancaster bombers hit the ship with two Tallboy bombs, which caused extensive internal damage and capsized the battleship. was broken up for scrap between 1948 and 1957.
Design A series of conceptual designs was begun by the (Navy of the Realm) in 1932 to determine the ideal characteristics of a battleship built to the limit of the Washington Naval Treaty. These early studies determined that the ship should be armed with eight guns, have a top speed of , and have strong armor protection. At the time, the German Navy was constrained by the terms of the Treaty of Versailles that had ended World War I, which restricted battleships to a maximum displacement of . The sketch design for what became the class was produced by the Construction Office in 1933 and the final design agreed 1936. Ministerial advisor Hermann Burckhardt was responsible for the project, and he later supervised the launching of . During this period, the naval leadership grappled with a variety of problems, including the strategic and operational use of such a ship and the preferred propulsion system. War games suggested that the new battleships could be used both to attack French shipping at long range and to fight in a traditional battle against the French and Polish navies, then seen as the most likely threats. Due to the numerical inferiority of the German fleet and the assumption that naval battles would take place at relatively close range in the North Sea, the design staff placed great emphasis on stability and armor protection. Very thick vertical belt armor was adopted, along with heavy upper-citadel armor plating and extensive splinter protection in the bow and stern of the ships.
The learned in June 1934 that Italy had decided to build a pair of 35,000-ton battleships armed with guns—the —which would surely provoke the construction of similar ships for the French fleet. The French response came in the form of two s ordered in 1935. To keep pace with their French rivals, the next two battleships built by Germany would need to be of a similar size and armament. At the same time, Germany was preparing to begin negotiations with Great Britain to secure a bilateral naval agreement that would effectively abrogate the naval restrictions of the Versailles treaty. In exchange, Germany would limit its fleet to a third the size of the Royal Navy. With the construction of at least two 35,000-ton battleships within reach, the German naval design staff began work in late October to lay out requirements for armament, armor, and speed. A preliminary design was completed in November, which resulted in a ship armed with eight 33 cm guns in four twin gun turrets, protected by an armored belt that was thick, and capable of a top speed of . The staff noted that such a ship would likely exceed the 35,000-ton limit, so triple or quadruple turrets should be considered to reduce the weight.
The design staff had decided that four twin turrets would provide the best solution to distribution of the main battery, as it would provide equal firepower forward and aft, as well as simplify fire control. This arrangement was similar to the last German battleships of the Imperial period, the . The similarity led to speculation that the s were essentially copies of the earlier ships, though the arrangement of the main battery along with a three-shaft propulsion system were the only shared traits. As design work continued into January 1935, (General Admiral) Erich Raeder, the commander of the , met with the various department and section leaders to refine the design requirements. The Naval Ordnance Department argued for an increase to 35 cm guns to keep parity with the expected Italian and French ships, which Raeder approved on 19 January. Another meeting in March saw the Ordnance Department raise the possibility of increasing the projected main battery again to , though Raeder initially rejected the idea owing to the significant increase in displacement. Nevertheless, though he formally approved the 35 cm version on 1 April, he allowed for the option to increase the main battery depending on foreign developments. Just a month later, Raeder decided to adopt the larger gun on 9 May, largely the result of Chancellor Adolf Hitler's preference for the 38 cm gun.
In June 1935, Germany signed the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, which allowed Germany to build battleships at a ratio of 35 percent to the total tonnage of the Royal Navy; this granted Germany effective parity with France, at least in terms of allotted tonnage. It also made Germany party to the international treaty system begun at the Washington Conference. By this time, the only significant issue to be settled was the propulsion system, which was largely dependent on strategic questions. Many senior officers in the navy envisioned using the class in the Atlantic Ocean, which would require a long cruising range. The naval constructors examined diesel engines, steam turbines, and turbo-electric drive engines; the last system was the preferred choice, as it had been extremely successful in the two American s and the French passenger ship . The design staff were also required to provide sufficient range to the new battleships; they would have to make long voyages from German ports to reach the Atlantic, and Germany had no overseas bases where the ships could refuel. Raeder ordered the turbo-electric engines for the new ships, but the contracting manufacturer, Siemens-Schuckert, could not meet the navy's requirements and removed itself from the project less than a month before construction on began, forcing the navy to revert to high-pressure steam turbines.
The displacement of and was ultimately limited by the capabilities of existing infrastructure in Kiel and Wilhelmshaven, and the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, rather than international agreements. On 11 February 1937, the Construction Office informed Raeder that the ships could not displace more than due to harbor constraints and canal depths. The office also expressed a preference for building a third vessel and remaining within the 35,000-ton treaty limit. Admiral Werner Fuchs, the head of the General Command Office of the Oberkommando der Marine, advised Raeder and Hitler that modifications would be necessary to reduce the displacement to ensure the new ships met the legal requirements of the Second London Naval Treaty. Japan refused to sign the new treaty, and so on 1 April 1937 an escalator clause permitting treaty signatories to build ships up to a limit of went into effect. The final design displacement of was well within this limit, so Fuchs's modifications were discarded.
Even though Raeder and other senior naval officers envisioned using and as commerce raiders against first French and later British shipping in the Atlantic, and in fact used them in that role during World War II, the ships were not designed for that mission. Their steam turbines did not afford the necessary cruising radius for such a role, and many of the decisions made for the ships' armament and armor layout reflect the expectation to fight a traditional naval battle at relatively close range in the North Sea. The disconnect between how and were designed and how they were ultimately used represents the strategic incoherence that dominated German naval construction in the 1930s.
General characteristics The -class battleships were long overall and long at the waterline. The ships had a beam of , and a designed draft of ; the draft at standard displacement was , and at a full load. The ships had a designed displacement of ; s standard displacement was , and when fully laden, the ship displaced . was heavier, displacing and , respectively. The ships had a double bottom for 83 percent of the length of the hull, and twenty-two watertight compartments. The ships were 90 percent welded construction. The stern was weakly constructed; this had significant consequences on s only combat mission. The building cost of was 196 million Reichsmarks, while was slightly cheaper at 191.6 million . Both ships had seven searchlights.
The ships were very stable, primarily because of their wide beam. The ships suffered from only slight pitching and rolling, even in the heavy seas of the North Atlantic. and were responsive to commands from the helm; they were capable of maneuvering with rudder deflections as small as 5°. With the rudder completely over, the ships heeled only 3°, but lost up to 65% of their speed. The ships handled poorly at low speeds or when traveling astern. As a result, tugs were necessary in confined areas to avoid collisions or grounding. The ships carried smaller boats, including three picket boats, four barges, one launch, two pinnaces, two cutters, two yawls, and two dinghies.
The ships had a standard crew of 103 officers and 1,962 enlisted sailors, although the crew of expanded to 108 officers and 2,500 men by 1943. The crew was divided into twelve divisions of between 180 and 220 men. The first six divisions were assigned to the ship's armament, divisions one to four for the main and secondary batteries, and five and six manning anti-aircraft guns. The seventh division consisted of specialists, including cooks and carpenters, and the eighth division consisted of ammunition handlers. The radio operators, signalmen, and quartermasters were assigned to the ninth division. The last three divisions were the engine room personnel. When Bismarck left port, fleet staff, prize crews, and war correspondents increased the crew complement to over 2,200 men.