Did the Germans lose the U-Boat war in World war II because of a shortage of quality, rather than quantity?

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Accepted answer

Commander Michel Thomas Poirier, USN wrote a paper/study in October 1999 called Results of the German and American Submarine Campaigns of World War 2.

In it he details many factors of both campaigns; it's well worth a read in its entirety if you are interested in the subject. However, most relevantly to this topic is Appendix 1. In it, the author details the expenditure of both sides in the Battle of the Atlantic on fighting the submarine war. The allies invested $26.4 Billion compared to the $2.86 Billion invested in U-Boats by the Germans.

As a result of this, and considering the other answers, it seems likely to me that the Germans lost the U-Boat war due to a mixture of lack of quantity and quality. Ultimately, the effect of high quality U-Boats would have been severely limited by the amount of escorts and aircraft the allies could put into fighting the battle.

APPENDIX 1: CALCULATION OF BATTLE OF THE ATLANTIC COSTS

Allies:

A. Merchant Ships:

  1. Cost of merchant ships lost to sub attack: 14,687,231 tons lost at $420 a ton.(97)

  2. It is assumed that 50% of destroyed ships had cargoes and I have estimated the value of each cargo as equivalent to the price of the ship.(98)

  3. American Maritime Commission constructed 5,777 ships of 39,920,000 tons during the war that cost $14.2 billion.(99) It is estimated that only 2/3 were used in the Atlantic (this accords well with 61% reported in Leighton's Global Logistics 1940-43 (p.662) which was prior to the increase in lift necessary to handle Overlord).

  4. The English and Canadians produced 11.9 million tons during the war.(100) It is assumed their cost of production was as low as in the U.S.(101)

  5. The English started the war with 17,430,000 tons. The Americans started with 8.5 million tons (again only assumed 2/3 used in Atlantic). Additionally the Allies seized 3 million tons of shipping from nations occupied by the Axis.(102)

  6. It is assumed that 33% of the total merchant fleet was lost due to inefficiency of convoying. That is 11.36 million tons at $420/ton.(103)

  7. Repair costs from U-boat attacks were not included.

  8. Total: $14.65 billion.

B. Warships:

  1. The Americans had 140 destroyers stationed in the Atlantic. Each cost approximately $10 million. Additionally, they had 56 frigates assigned to the Coast Guard. I've estimated their cost as similar to a new frigate ($2.3 million).(104)
  2. During the war, the U.S. produced 520 destroyer escorts (DDE) and 96 frigates (FF) for convoy protection. A DDE cost $5.5 million and a FF cost $2.3 million apiece.(105)
  3. The Allies built 61 escort carriers that participated in the campaign at a cost of $12 million a piece.(106)
  4. The English and Canadians built or seized 169 DDEs. I've estimated their costs as equivalent to a Hunt class DDE ($6.4 million).(107)
    They also built 156 frigates, 63 sloops (estimated to cost $4 million), 306 Corvettes, 27 other ASW vessels, and 15 armed merchant cruisers (all estimated at $3 million).(108)
  5. The English employed about 302 fleet destroyers during the war.(109) I've estimated that only 50% of their missions were related to ASW and that they cost the equivalent of an U.S. destroyer (a probable underestimation).(110)
  6. The cost of coastal defense craft and minesweepers used for ASW missions was not estimated.
  7. The cost of major warships sank by submarines was not used in the estimate.
  8. Total: $10.15 billion.

C. Aircraft:

  1. 2828 U.S. patrol aircraft were used in the Atlantic.(111) I've used either exact prices as given by Holley, or the cost of similar aircraft.(112)
  2. The U.S. used 4719 tactical aircraft in the Atlantic fleet. I've assumed that 50% of their missions were related to ASW.(113)
  3. No costs of the U.S. Army Air Corps or of the Civil Air Patrol (both limited participants in the campaign) were included.
  4. I've used the number of English and Canadian squadrons and CVEs (i.e. 24 aircraft per CVE) to estimate total numbers of aircraft.(114) I doubled the numbers to account for losses etc. The total was 740 patrol aircraft and 850 tactical aircraft. This is probably an underestimation when one considers U.S. aircraft numbers.
  5. The Allies lost at least 200 heavy bombers in attacks on against U-boat bases or production facilities.
  6. To the extent that air operations tend to be expensive relative to the cost of operating ships, allied costs are probably significantly underestimated.
  7. Total: $1.6 billion.

The Germans:

  1. German data was used to determine the cost of submarines.(115) Where cost data on specific types of submarines could not be found (Type XIV, XXIII, Walther), I estimated the price based upon German submarines of similar displacement, accounting for differences in construction man-hours. The exchange rate was based upon wartime U.S. estimates (I used $.50 per mark, the 1942 estimate).(116) Of note, the cost of a U.S. submarine in 1943 was about $3 million.(117) The figures for German submarines are reasonable when compared to U.S. costs and man-hours required for construction.(118)
  2. Type II- 52 boats at $1.03 million.
  3. Type VII- 705 boats at $2.25 million.
  4. Type IX- 194 boats at $ 3.2 million.
  5. Type XB- 8 boats at $ 3.175 million.
  6. Type XIV- 10 boats at $ 3.51 million.
  7. Type XXI- 123 boats at $ 2.875 million.
  8. Type XXIII- 59 boats at $1.03 million.
  9. Walther- 7 boats at $2.13 million.
  10. Only the costs of the 1,158 submarines completely constructed were calculated.
  11. Total: $2.76 Billion

Conclusion: The Allies total investment was $26.4 billion compared to the German investment of $2.76 billion. The Allies spent at least 9.6 times the German investment.

Upvote:3

The type XXI U-boat manufactured during 1944, but not ready until too late was qualitatively far superior to any submarines anywhere.

Even older type VII and Type IX U-boats adopted advanced technologies with schnorkel, acoustic torpedoes, NAXOS, TUNIS and SAMOS radar warning receivers. By mid 1944 two dozen U-boats had FMU-200 Hohenweil radar sets.

It was not the lack of quality, but rather the rapid acceleration of anti submarine warfare techniques, coupled with effective code breaking which destroyed the U-boat's chances.

During Black May in 1943 the u-boat arm was crippled by the loss of 43 U-boats due to the coupling of ULTRA intelligence against U-boats to predict their movements and stalk them with radar equipped patrol aircraft.

The Germans could not understand why the Allies were so successful and withdrew from the Atlantic conflict for a few months to reassess tactics but never regained their previous supremacy after this.

Thus it was not the inadequacy of U-boats but rather radar technology coupled with effective code-breaking which destroyed the U-boat arm.

Upvote:4

The reasons the Germans lost the Battle of Atlantic:

  • ULTRA: The reason number one, cracking the Enigma. By cracking the encryption the German U-Boats were playing with open cards. The British were devilishly careful to contain the secret, they resisted to attack U-Boats if it was too clear that they must have known the position and preferred to route convoys apart from known U-Boat positions. The lack of British ships could always be explained by bad luck.

  • Missing reconnaissance: Göring was an incompetent leader of the Luftwaffe and he was not able to set up long-range recon high altitude aircraft. A submarine had a viewing range of approximately 20km, an aircraft could see objects over 200 km away.

  • Torpedo crisis: During the first and most important years German U-Boats had the G7a torpedo with failure rates of over 30%. Finally they found out that the increased pressure in the submarines disturbed the depth detection, running the torpedo in the ground or that the magnet detonators weren't working. German commanders said that during the Norwegian war they would have been able to incur catastrophic losses to the British Navy during the retreat.

  • Missing number of U-Boats: General Raeder was not incompetent, but he still wanted a "normal" navy with battleships and cruisers. Those battleships were a strategic threat, but effectively they were hopelessly useless in relation to their cost and allocated resources.

  • Missing insight about the advantages of U-Boats. Until very late the Germans (and also the Allies) were putting bulky cannons on deck. Those could only be used at very moderate swell, needed much care during the operation and were more and more useless when freighters and decoy ships (looking like harmless freighters) were armed. The U-Boat could not use the cannon anymore without risking imminent destruction, but the resistance of the cannon and the necessary deck slowed down the U-Boat to 7 knots underwater and then it was loud as hell. That meant they could not escape easily, especially hunter-killer groups. Torpedo loading was far too slow. Only once the U-Boats were silent and streamlined, they were a real threat, but it was far too late.

  • Convoy protection: The British perfected the convoy system. Inside were the most valuable targets, outside frigates and destroyers were patrolling. Before the convoy were sweepers (also frigates/destroyers) who were very careful that an enemy U-Boat does not hide himself in direction of the convoy. From time to time the convoy were changing the course (zig-zag) to prevent that long-range torpedoes could be fired from far away. Once an U-Boat was detected, the destroyer was responsible to hold the U-Boat under water until the convoy was out of reach (As said, under water the U-Boat was simply too slow). Many German aces like Prien were killed while they tried to attack a convoy.

  • Allied aircraft and hunter-killer groups: Once the position of an U-Boat was found, the Allies send aircraft equipped with radar (The Germans first thought it was not possible to build bulky radars in planes). During night the U-Boats felt safe to run over water because they were visually invisible. The plane homed in and at the last moment bathed the U-Boat in floodlight and sent two bombs as present. This was frighteningly effective. Another invention was the hunter-killer group: A group of warships with aircraft which homed in after an U-Boat was sighted. The plane forced the U-Boat to dive so it could not escape with their low velocity. Then the warships came and did not let the submarine out of their claws (Sooner or later an U-Boat must emerge, due to lack of battery power or oxygen).

Upvote:7

Not mentioned so far is the Allies' progressively better use of radar. Diesel submarines spent a lot of time on the surface, at least until the Germans developed snorkels. If they could be seen on radar, they were easy pickings. They could also be located by radio triangulation, so toward the end of the war they had to maintain radio silence. In such circumstances the quality of a commander wouldn't help much - U Boats were sitting ducks.

Upvote:13

If you look at ace sinking by year you'll find that aces could only develop their sink counts during "happy times," when a technical and doctrinal superiority favoured mass sinkings. These times often involved unimpeded surface running, surface attacks on individual ships, an absence of convoy systems and loosely protected convoys.

While it may be defensible that certain commanders were more successfully aggressive, the conditions in which their aggression had strategic effect (large tonnage ratios), were ones where they were technically and doctrinally superior to their opposition.

For most of the war, a large body of submarines were necessary to achieve any tonnage.

Secondly, selection on the basis of aptitude could only be accomplished at sea, and it is uncertain whom the selection pool contained.

Thirdly, aces displayed severe fatigue and this fatigue meant that a system dependent on them could not operate successfully.

The key benefits to the German submarine campaign would be in order:

  • Not having to do it. It was a fool's errand to go to war.
  • Cryptosecurity
  • 300 ocean going boats at the start of the war (this would cause the war to fail in other ways, in the speculative opinion of most counter-factual commentators)
  • Better supply of long range boats for very long range "cruiser" patrols earlier
  • Simply giving up in 1943

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