Graf Zeppelin - The Forgotten German Aircraft Carrier

The colossus Graf Zeppelin was a German aircraft carrier armed with over 60 guns and room for over 1,700 people and 60 aircraft. It was widely regarded as the definitive German vehicle that could have turned the tide of the war.

Impressively enough, most world superpowers had plenty of aircraft carriers participating in the war, but the technologically-advanced Germany didn’t.
Hitler and his Admirals eventually envisioned four aircraft carriers that were going to be built and finished by 1947 as part of the naval expansion of the Kriegsmarine.

However, the early breakout of the war forced the Wehrmacht to focus on more pressing matters, leaving the project to the side.

Graf Zeppelin, the incomplete 33,000-ton lead ship in a class of two carriers, would remain stationed in Poland for almost two years. It wouldn’t be until the war raged on and aircraft carriers from other nations played a pivotal role in winning crucial battles that Hitler ordered the Kriegsmarine to carry on with the project.

It was now a race against time...