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Originally Posted by CCIP
Right. And many a sub were attacked by friendly aircraft in the Pac - a notorious problem there. The USS Seawolf (SS-197) is generally thought to have been sunk by a friendly plane, for example.
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The Seawolf was sunk by friendly surface forces, this was confirmed postwar. Pretty sad story too, local forces had been informed of her presence and she was within a supposedly safe corridor, but the task force commander refused to believe she was friendly and kept attacking until she sank with all hands. Fortunately, this is the only known case in WW2.
From 1941 to 1945, US subs were routinely attacked by allied airplanes who could not tell the difference between a US sub or a japanese one.
In short, if you command a sub, you have no friends.
Identification was a problem the other way also. In the game, it is infinitely easier to identify a ship than in ww2 . Because of sea or weather conditions, you often could not get a good look at a ship and when you did, many merchant ships were not in recognition manuals or flying national flags. It was less of an issue in the Pacific where most ships could be presumed to be japanese, but there were still mistaken sinkings of neutral ships.