SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - View Single Post - How effective were U-boats during WWII?

blueparrott · 08-10-05, 10:43 AM

In Clay Blair's "Hitler's U-boat war - The hunted 1942-1945" the there is a statistic mentioned. It deals with the period Sept -42 till May -45 and so does not include either of the so called "happy times", but still.

He claims that during this period 953 convoys comprising 43 526 ships sailed on the North and Mid Atlantic runs. 272 of these were sunk!! by u-boats (that is 0.6%)

He further claims that during the entire war there was 2919 ships sunk by u-boats. I havent been able to find any figure of total sailings, single or in convoy but the 1% sunk does not seem that unrealistic.

I know numbers cannot tell the entire story, but I still think the numbers are interesting and thought provoking.

08-10-05, 10:43 AM	#7
blueparrott Swabbie Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 11 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	In Clay Blair's "Hitler's U-boat war - The hunted 1942-1945" the there is a statistic mentioned. It deals with the period Sept -42 till May -45 and so does not include either of the so called "happy times", but still. He claims that during this period 953 convoys comprising 43 526 ships sailed on the North and Mid Atlantic runs. 272 of these were sunk!! by u-boats (that is 0.6%) He further claims that during the entire war there was 2919 ships sunk by u-boats. I havent been able to find any figure of total sailings, single or in convoy but the 1% sunk does not seem that unrealistic. I know numbers cannot tell the entire story, but I still think the numbers are interesting and thought provoking.