i don't understand what your saying. we are talking technical data, not who won the war. had the US subs had to fight the same as the u-boats, the fleet would have been wiped out in 6 months. the fact that the japanese were incompetent at protecting merchant shipping does not make the Gato/Balao superior to the German boats! we are purely talking technicalities here, we not saying the US subs must have been better because they won the war.

Again another apples and oranges debate......So I will wage in with my apples to your oranges......You speak about the US subforce being wiped out in 6 months....I think it would be a safe bet that if the US were the ones waging the war against the UK in that time frame it would have been the UK wiped out in 6 months.

Now....How retarded does this sound...About as retarded as the rest of this thread!......How ya like dem apples.

Your comparison of the things go the wrong way..."who won the war" but you don´t name the main reason for the fact that so much german boats were sunk...."THE TECHNICS OF THE OPPONENTS"

A comparison that way is impossible because of the different technics the allied used and the japanese used. If the japanese would have had used (if it would have been available for them) the same technics of ASW like the allied have had in WWII...then your comparsion would make sense....but I doubt that if the japanese would have had the same technics that so many US subs would have had survived the war.

Ouch!! :o

But I kinda agree w/ you, what is the point of this thread really? The Gato and Type VIIC were so different as to render any attempt at comparison meaningless. And don't even get me started on the difference bewtween the Atlantic and the Pacific and the Allies and IJN ASW efforts.

Barkhorn.

Since we are comparing the Gato to the Type VIIC why not mention their names? I think "Gato" class sounds a lot more impressive than "Type VIIC" !

As ive said, the only fair comparision is the Gato vs IXD2. They were similar in many respects and even operated in similar areas. Infact, the areas they operated in were so similar, that a Gato (edit: in this case Balao) acutally saw one and got the drop on him:

http://www.uboat.net/boats/u183.htm

I'm not sure the Gato is the better boat because the US "won the war" is a valid or defensible argument. It may have been the better boat. That's for someone more familiar with the specs of both vessels to decide, not me. I'm just an armchair bubblehead.

But I do know something about economics. America's main strength was in the number of vessels she could put into a TO.

When you consider the Germans only had a handful (comparitively speaking) of operative u-boats at the beginning of the war they did a pretty good job in damn near starving Britain, or at least crashing her economy. (Something Clay Blair totally overlooks, he just counts beans: numbers of u-boats vs. merchants. He completely glosses over the impact this blockade had on the economy. You don't have to sink every merchant ship to crash Britain's economy, or the economy of any nation. Economics doesn't work that way. But enough about Blair.)

By the time the Germans started fielding big numbers of boats the Allies were ready to unleash their superiority in numbers: DDs, planes, radar sets, etc.

The Americans in the Pacific on the other hand, were already winning the war after Midway. It was just a question of "when" they would win the war after that battle, not "if". With the aircover and superiority of numbers re: vessels and other support craft, it's no wonder the subs were able to totally destroy Japan's merchant fleet. I mean, what did Japan have at the end of the war, a couple of junks and a sampan or two? Maybe a bamboo raft thrown in for good measure? C'mon.

And while I agree the comparison spec wise between the Gato and VIIC may not be fair, it does bear looking into because these two vessels have the most mystique.

one thing i notice is that the gato has twice the crew size. so the germans could field 2 type VIIc"s to the US's 1 gato while training the same amount of crew. just a thought but id rather have 2 VIIc's than 1 gato.:D

That's only the crew. Can you get two VIIcs for the price of one Gato? I doubt it.

Oh, and welcome aboard.

Ok. How about 2 IIDs and a motor launch.;)

I recently read that a Gato class went to 450M after being accidently attacked by American planes (What's with those flyboys?)and survived!

if you haven't got anything nice to say (retarded) or am unable to debate on a forum without accusing peoples conversations as "retarded" then don't say anything at all.

I'll see that and raise you one Schnellboot.

I'm firmly of the belief that American fleet boats could go just as deep as the Germans, but in the case of a story like this I'll say what I always say: documentation please. Actual names, numbers and confirmation of the story. "recently read" and "a Gato class" doesn't tell anything but a whale of a tale.

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

I fold!