Few sinkings

[Laufen zum Ziel]

Originally Posted by Dread Knot

One of the consequences of Doenitz's desire to create a larger U-Boat fleet was that increasingly inexperienced officers and crew were being thrown into the fight against the enemy in machines that weren't keeping with the other side's technology. The elite force he started with war with was pretty much diluted or dead by 1942. Then you add the fact that improved British codebreaking meant more and more convoys were simply routed out of the paths of waiting U-Boats giving them no chance to attack. Thirdly, Allied aircraft carrier-based and land-based kept U-Boats surpressed and submerged where their chances of even sighting a target, let alone attacking it were almost nil.

KM's system simply didn't keep up the times and the Allies overwhelming material advantages. Hardly surprising since the German Navy came third behind the Wehrmacht and the Luftwaffe in the Reich's order of things.

Well said.

[Brer Rabbit]

In addition to the excellent sources in uboatnet are the uboat by uboat histories including the interrogation reports and enigma intercepts, that also bear out this fact. This site is to me one of the most interesting sites there is. I try to read a uboat history every couple days a week. I not only get good histories about the uboats and the crews, but the tactical, mechanical, and allied efforts against the boats.

That said I have been playing sh3 for almost three years and I am only now getting reasonably effective. I have not reached 1942 in all of my careers, but hter have been several patrols where I have sighted few ships and other patrols where I returned with no torps left, but no sinkings to report.

GWX rules