Four Drh LC/34 turrets, three of which were originally intended to re-arm the Gneisenau and one completed to the Soviet order, modified for land service, were planned to be emplaced at Paimpol, Brittany and on the Cap de la Hague on the Cotentin Peninsula, but construction never actually began.
Gneisenau hit one mine off Terschelling, but suffered little damage; the magnetic mine exploded some metres off the ship, making a small hole on the starboard side and temporarily knocking one of her turbines out of action.
The British guns fired on the German battleships Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Prinz Eugen during their 1942 Channel Dash, but were unable to stop them.
On 2 October 1936 he was appointed watch officer on the Aviso Grille, Adolf Hitler's state yacht, and on 30 March 1938 transferred to the battleship Gneisenau.
But on 6 April, Flying Officer Kenneth Campbell succeeded in torpedoing Gneisenau and putting her out of action for several months, and Tirpitz was not yet completed.
His task was to work on radar anti-jamming methods; for a year German jamming of Allied radar had been a problem and the escape of two German warships (Scharnhorst and Gneisenau) through the English Channel, aided by enemy radar jamming from the French Coast, had highlighted the problem.
On 12 February 1942 the unit took part in operations over the English Channel during the German Operation Cerberus, when the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau made a high–speed dash from Brest to reach safety in German ports.
The Imperial Japanese Navy submarine Japanese Kaidai class submarine I-181 was beached upon Gneisenau Point in Kelanoa Harbour, after it was attacked in Vitiaz Strait by a United States Navy destroyer and a PT boat on 16 January 1944 and lost with all (89) hands.
In February 1942 Ibel acted as liaison officer with the Kriegsmarine during the famous "Channel Dash" when the Luftwaffe provided effective air cover over the battle cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau passage through the Channel.
On 12 February it took part in the unsuccessful attempts to intercept the German battleships Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen when they sailed through the Channel, escorting bombers searching for the German squadron.
On 24 July 1941, 4 Group dropped 2,000 lb bombs on the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and helped to keep these battle-cruisers locked in Brest until 12 February 1942.
This meant that, at the end of the war, the Germans left a fully armed, defended airfield with docks, infrastructure and a cannon taken from the battleship Gneisenau.
For a long time, under the influence of Leopold von Ranke, the era of reforms was presented first and foremost as a story of the deeds and destinies of "great men", as shown by the large number of biographies written about the reformers - Hans Delbrück wrote about Gneisenau and Meinecke about Boyen, for example.
Their best-known action came a few months later, on 12 February 1942, when the light battleships Gneisenau, Scharnhorst and the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen attempted the Channel Dash from Brest back to Germany.