The Battle Of The Atlantic, 1939-1945 Why The U-boat Campaign Failed, Pt. Ⅰ Of Ⅲ

摘要

On 3 September 1939, Britain and France declared war on Germany in response to the German army's invasion of Poland. Late that same day, U-30 was on patrol at periscope depth south of Rockall, 120 miles west of Scotland. As night approached, the U-boat's captain, Kapitaenleutnant Fritz-Julius Lemp, was tracking a large ship that was blacked-out and was steering a zig-zag course at high speed, leading him to conclude that it was an armed merchant cruiser. Lemp fired two torpedoes, one of which hit, causing the vessel to stop and slowly begin to sink. He had torpedoed the 13,600 ton British liner ATHENIA carrying over 1100 passengers, of whom all were rescued save the 118 killed when the torpedo struck. What came to be known as the Battle of the Atlantic had begun. In view of the Imperial German Navy's extensive U-boat campaign in World War I, the German Navy in 1939 arguably possessed the most experienced submariners of any navy in the world. Their exploits in 1916-1917 had nearly brought Britain to its knees, yet their campaign ultimately had failed. The same fate awaited the U-boat force of World War II, despite the expertise gained in the previous war. This paper seeks to determine why the U-boats lost the Battle of the Atlantic.