[Hitman]

Different boats for different purposes.....

The US subs had to travel thousands of miles before they arrived to their patrol zones in the vast Pacific Ocean, so they are more to be compared with a german long range Type IX/D2 than to any other U-Boot.

In a face to face comparison between a Balao and a IX/D2 (Both ships available appeared around 1943), you note that:

-Maximum diving depths is similar, with slight advantage for the IXD2 (Talking here about REAL crush depth, not factory specs)

-Slight speed advantage for the US sub (Surfaced & submerged)

-Armament advantage for the US sub (Both deck gun and 4 extra torpedo tubes)

-Huge electronics advantage for the US sub (Radar with PPI)

-Range advantage for the US sub

U-Boots are beautiful, and specially the Type VII was a masterpiece at the beginning of the war (Like its WW1 predecessor the UB-III), but let's face it: The US never attempted to do such a mid-size sub, so comparisons agains that one are not fair.

I would also like to remark that unlike the germans, the americans had little need for further development of their subs after the war started, because 1) They already had better electronics than the germans, and 2) Japanese ASW was not as good as the allied one. Note however that japanese convoys had less ships and much more escorts, so it still was a VERY challenging affair to engage them.