OT Debate: If you were karl Donitz ....
 

If you were Karl Donitz how would you have won the Battle of the Atlantic and thus defeated Britain.

Here's how I would have done it.

1. Concentrate on cutting off the British Supply lines by sending U-boats to only the Western Appraoches of Britain. Forget the Med, Indian Ocean, and even the US Atlantic Coast they were side shows and not the main theatre. The main aim of a u-boat is to place an enemy nation under blockade not to just sink tonnage.
This is exactly how the British won WW1. They blockaded Germany until into 1919 and starved them into submission.

2. Tankers were to be number 1 Priority targets. Britian produced no oil in 1939 - 45 and was totally reliant on Tankers bringing it in.

3. Demand Kriegsmarine sorties and feint attacks into the Atlantic. Thus pulling many British Destroyers and search aircraft away from ASW duty.

4. Demand Luftwaffe concentrate on bombing British Ports and Docks rather than City bombing. British Dockers were notorous for taking weeks to unload ships even when the country had introduced rationing. They even went on strike (Damn Commies I bet) many times. A few well placed bombs and they wouldn't have shown up for work at all.

5. Demand Luftwaffe air sorties over convoy routes. Forgot the Condors attacking Convoys they were mostly useless at it.

6. Send special raiding U-boats to attack coastal Oil refineries in Curacoa and then US Coast when the US entered the war. Shell those Oil tanks and blow see em burn.

7. Attack Destroyers and Escorts when possible. Dont just assume that they are the hound and the u-boats are the fox.

8. The most brutal of all would be to sink the Rescue ships in convoys when possible. I know it would be horrendous but to break morale of the merchant seaman it is a must. They would be terrified to come out of port. I would have been hung at Nurnberg for this.

Hindsight is a great thing isn't it.

I like many of your viewpoints. I think the better question is... what would you do if you were Hitler? Doenitz wanted 300 U-boats. He said if he had 300 submarines he could defeat England. Hitler got him his 300... but not until the "happy times" were well over. If Germany could have some how had 300 or more submarines available at the outset of the war.... if the Kriegsmarine could have some how developed the type XXI and XXIII a little sooner... perhaps if Hitler hadn't started the war in 1939, but instead waited until 1942, 44 or 46 when Germany's Z-plan would've been further along and the Kriegsmarine could've benefitted from the addition of the Graf Zepplin class CV's and Hindenburg BB's... they may have won. It's tough to say... but Germany DEFINITELY COULD'VE won the Battle of the Atlantic, in my opinion. This, ofcourse, depends on things being done differently, which they weren't. And like my esteemed historian colleague above said, hindsight is always 20/20.

I've always thought that attacking Russia was the turning point in the war. From then onwards Hitler was fighting too many fronts IMO.

I like your reply. Hitler could not have waited longer to go to war.
The whole reason Hitler and the Nazi's invaded Poland etc in 1939 was they were on a tight schedule. They owed many Eastern European nations huge amounts of money and couldn't pay it back. Do you think Germany's recovery in 1933 was down to superior German economics?
The most pressing reason for early war was the Ruskies were mobilising for a Bolshevik/Nazi showdown and Hitler knew it. Russians had began a five year plan that was no less than mobilization of their war indistries.
As for the so called Z-Plan. No way would it ever have started. Britain and France would have attacked when the 3rd Battleship went down the slipway. The British were slow to produce a pwerful army but threaten its Naval supremacy and you woudl have had a war on your hands.

Well, first things first. Donitz should have had Goering assasinated.

I'd like to think I would have gone to England and surrendered myself.

But in the spirit of the question, I would have tried to do what the Americans did with their tanks. Not try to make the biggest and baddest sub, but rather the one that could be mass produced the easiest.

And concentrated research to upgrading those sub's performance rather toward new subs.

It's difficult to say. I've always been a fan of the U-boats... and many U-boatmen weren't Nazis. Unfortunately, with the "regular" Germans came the Nazis... so as a submarine fan, I've always pulled for the Kriegsmarine and hoped it may have done better... but I certainly wouldn't like to see a world run by the Nazis... so I am glad history worked out the way it did.
I was under the impression that Plan-Z was already started in the late 1930's when Bismarck and Tirpitz were laid down? Graf Zepplin was laid down, but never really finished. Those ships were supposed to be a part of it, right?
Anyway, yes... I agree... find the "choke points" and stack up your U-boats there. That's a great tactic... as far as your so called "brutality" of attacking rescue ships and other types of ships... sink 'em all! If the world has been notified of a submarine blockade and neutral ships are still sailing in THAT zone, they do so at their own peril. You HAVE TO be aggressive and go right for your enemy's jugular, so to speak, in order to win the war... otherwise, you're just wasting your time... again... this is just my opinion.
In regards to the Med... Hitler had pressure from Mussolini to send subs to the Med to help out. Otherwise, he probably would'nt have done it. In my opinion, Germany did well with the VII and IX... the perfect mix of size and range... depending who you want to attack. With slightly stronger pressure hulls, snorkels and perhaps some other goodies earlier in the war, the VII and IX U-boats may well have won the day and not needed the "Electro boats." Nice chatting with you folks, but I'm off to bed. Hopefully by tomorrow evening, some other people will have weighed in w/ their opinions... quite an interesting question posed here!

I am confused. I think the mass production idea conflicts with the sub performance idea.
I don't want to slam the American tanks with respect to the job they did but to explain but in this case I have to. The Sherman tanks were quite inferior to the panzer tanks. The tiger tanks could kick a Sherman @ss easy as well. So Im just thinking mass producing a sub in the quality of the Sherman would have backfired - unless German war production had the raw materials to do such a thing. And even if they did it would have gone to the Eastern front most likely not to the Kreigsmarine.
Now, just for a moment what I wonder would have been the turn of events IF - the production system they used for the electroboats was put into use 2 years prior. Even if the raw materials, technology do do this was available it probably means the type IX sonar magnet would have been shelved.
HA! try to sell that one :arrgh!:

Hmm interesting. First thing i would have done would be to concentrate attacks on convoys heading to england.
Second thing would to bomb British ports.
Third thing would be to build/ collect all landing crafts for the invasion of England.
4th thing would be to establish German forward supply bases on the Azores and Ally with South American Countries, like they tried to do in WW1

All interesting points (from everyone), but we're only looking at one side.

Sounds good, but you do realize, you send your subs close to the enemy's shores in a predictable manner. This would allow Britain to recall all her destroyers and just patrol the shores up and down in ASW sorties. Convoys wouldn't even need escorts for the crossing - the "escorts" would be busy near the arrival area depth charging away. Denser sub concentrations would also mean they'd be easier to spot. A u-boot blockade during WWI is one thing, totally different in WWII :)

I am sure all merchants were hit when spotted. How would you actively go after tankers?

Ha! Good luck! The Kriegsmarine lurked in port for fear of being sunk. Fear not of the men obviously, but their illustrious leader. Even after the Deutschland was renamed, big ships hardly ever left the harbors. Not to mention the KM would not be a match to the British navy eventually - better ships, but outnumbered, hopelessly so.

Yea, good one. Talk to Herrn Mueller about that :rotfl:

Again, the former WWI ace would object. Still, the Luftwaffe could not even escort bombers over the channel, how far would their bombers get over the Atlantic? Not to mention that sending fully loaded bombers out to look for convoys is a waste of fuel. Now, if you mean send out spotters first, then alert the bombers... perhaps. Still, Battle of Britain! The Luftwaffe kept air superiority and ground support roles, forsaking any others. Ok, night bomb runs perhaps.

I thought all the u-booten should stay around Britain. If you mean 2, 3, 5 boats then ok. Still, they would have not made a dent really. Best to use them all in their conventional roles.

A bold move - and one that would have resulted in disaster. How many DDs would a u-boot sink? A convoy is moving in, with 3 escorts. Sink all of them? How many torpedoes would that leave for the convoy? Sink one? What good is that? The other two will depth charge you for hours anyway.

Yes, you would have been :p Still, terrified or not, the convoys would continue. Not to mention - how easy would it have been to consistently target and sink the rescue vessels? When you have one or two torpedo runs before having to make your escape, why waste one on the rescue ship? Sure, there would be some morale hit, but the juicy transports would just get away.


In the end I think Doenitz did what he could with the resources he had. It was a war of industries in the end and while german technical superiority and labor (not to mention some slave labor) took them far, it was not enough - especially after the U.S. entered the war. Yes, the Russian front was all an ill advised move, yes Mussolini was more detrimental than helpful. Yes Hitler made mistakes and thank god he did ;)

Good thread for some debate and thought!

Doenitz had an impossible job. He had to achieve total victory with paltry resources and no influence over the inner circle until after it was feasible to win the war.

Had he had the support of the Luftwaffe, the industrial support of Germany, had Hitler waited a bit longer to start the war, had they not invested in the irrelavent battleships and poured that into U-boats, and had Hitler not chickened out on Sealion and had avoided confrontation with Russia then... well then maybe we're talking about a different war.:hmm:

I don't think that Doenitz had the power, position, or luck to be able to influence the victory over England that Hitler wanted, not with the way things were in the Nazi regime.

Maybe, just maybe he could have swayed Hitler to his favour earlier in the 30s if he'd had the mind to do it, but then the Kriegsmarine had a plan that said that there wouldn't be war until 1945 and also Raeder was in charge so Doenitz didn't have the influence then either.

Me, I don't think I could have won as Doenitz. Not unless Hitler was my biggest fan and Goering chocked on a piece of Braughtwurst before Poland and died leaving a more adequate successor in charge that didn't want all the glory.

the topic brought me into this another what if

If you were Hitler's parent what would you do to change Hitler's character to avert world war II and the holocaust.:rotfl:

Used a Condom:doh:

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Move to New York, convert to Judaiism, start a jewelery shop, and name him Ira.

:hmm: