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Originally Posted by IrischKapitan
Yes the XXI was built in sections, but most of them by slave labour. Therefore they were badly manufactured, ill-fitting and when they got to port they were often missing equipment, which added to the lenght of time for them to become operational.
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So did VII's nad IX's. and Panthers and Tigers. You didnt think all war machines were produced solely by germans do you? and all subs were produced in sections.
Oh by the way, failure in production often resulted death penalty to slave workers and dont you underestimate the work of a labor threatened by his life.
For the topic,
Yes XXI was a revolution, and it was a way too late revolution. Just like Me262, V2 and HX homing bombs. Could have they changed the course of the war? Definitely.
For upgrading existing boats, it was a no go. Why? Because XXI was a completely new design, truly a new concept. The boat was designed and given better stats for "underwater" performance raher than previous designs which were usually surfaced and temporarily submerged.. They were actually submersible ships rather than submarines.
So Aerodynamix (or should i say Aquadynamics) of XXI were all designed for submerged conditions. We are talking about the hull. And a hull of a sub is 60% of its structure. How were you going to upgrade a VII's 60%? is it feasible? No.
Besides you have to recall your existing force in atlantic to do that. And If you do, allied forces will begin to transfer vast amounts of airforces to assist land forces which were busy to search the entire atlantic for U-boats. When Hitler saw that technologically overwhelmed U-boats were hunted all over seas, he didnt put an end to atlantic operations, on the contrary he ordered Doenitz to keep sending them to keep allied airforces busy. You would have given freedom for all naval vessels as well and that would give allies to perform an amphibious operation wherever, whenever they want.
For bleeding Britain dry by U-boats, that was a true strategy, of course not to make them starve to death but for huge amounts of ammunition, weaponry and manpower supply from U.S. All of us know that how hard Britian was keeping up with the Battle of Britain, and using Britain as a steppingstone, U.S. forces have managed to deploy enough forces (over millions of people) to perform D-DAY eventually made Germany to surrender.
Now think about it, XXI was ready and entered service in late 42 or at the beginning of 43. Allied navy has recently using ASDICs in their DDs and XXI has schnorkel, anti sonar coats as well as sonar decoys, automated torpedo loading systems, most importantly, 17-18 knots submerged speed. Official max. depth is 285m. (Note that this is (225 - 247m for VIIs and they can often go beyond that) and 285 nm submerged range (Note: 80nm for VIIs) britain would be completely isolated and USA will not be able to participate effectively in Europe.
Only one XXI was performed active duty in the last days of war and even it was detected by a pack of latest technology DDs, it survived the war, as DDs were looking for a sub making 3kts, XXI got away with 9 knots in silent speed.
Let me remind that, XXI were all design templates for US and Soviet navies after the war. during cold war, All tango class, victor class, Los angles class nuclear subs are derived from its design concepts.
XXI could definitely changed the war, at least for sure with Britain and USA.