HT_Wolfpack_Moorhouse === [00:00:00] Introduction --- Al: Welcome to Historically Thinking, a podcast about history and how to think about history. For more on this episode, go to historically thinking.org, where you can find links and readings related to today's podcast. Comment on the conversation and sign up for our newsletter, and consider becoming a member of the Historically Thinking Common Room, a community of Patreon supporters. Al: Hello. During the second World War Germany's submarines San over 3000 allied ships, that figure amounting to nearly three quarters allied shipping losses in all theaters of the Second World War, what would become a war within a war began the very first days after September 1st, 1939. This war, particularly the contest which has become known as the Battle of the Atlantic, has been the focus of numerous studies and arguments. But until now, little has been said about the undersea war from the perspective of the German submariners. Roger Morehouse has now remedied that with his new book, Wolfpack Inside [00:01:00] Hitler's U-Boat War. It is not simply a story of the undersea war, but a history of those who fought it, who endured the miserable conditions within a German U-boat, had only a 25% chance of survival, and when they did survive, were often psychologically scarred for the remainder of their lives. Roger Morehouse is a historian of the Second World War, the author of numerous books. His most recent was the Forgers, the Forgotten Story of the Holocaust Most Audacious Rescue Operation, which he and I discussed in a conversation of November six, two, 2000, ~uh, ~2023. You'll find the link to it in our show notes on Substack. Roger Morehouse. Welcome back to Historically Thinking. Roger: Thanks Al. Thanks very much for having me. The State of U-Boat Development in the 1920s --- Al: So you talked about this, ~uh, ~book when we last talked, which was probably two years ago, and I was very excited, ~um, ~because it struck me as a, ~um, ~second World war, ~uh, ~amateur. That battle The Atlantic is' probably not a very good name for it. It's like a whole separate war within the war. ~Um, ~[00:02:00] but I I, we want to go back before that and we're probably going to deemphasize, hedgehogs and cryptography and ki you know, hunter killer groups and all that, that stuff. And want, want to talk about the sort of the, the social history of the undersea boat, arm of the creeks marine, which I swear to God listeners is much more interesting than I just, it sounds Roger: Yeah. Al: There is a history here, ~uh, ~that there is a, a history of success, I think in the First World War in in the Great War, ~um, ~the Creek's Marine, in many ways, the U-Boat War led to the entry of the United, well, actually in most ways, the U-Boat War led to the entry of the United States into the, into the First World War, and yet does the Creeks Marine, what's the state of the, of the pursuit of the U-boat development? Um, is it [00:03:00] based on the success in the First World War? Is it based on a new conception of what U-boats can be, ~um, ~what's going on in the twenties Roger: ~Uh, ~yeah, it's a very good question. Um, what what's interesting here, I suppose, is that the Germans, contrary to our assumptions at the time, crucially, ~um, ~essentially continued their efforts at developing, ~um, ~u-boats in the interwar period. There, of course, treat under the Treaty of Versailles, they were banned from, from manufacturing or, or, or, or keeping U-boats submarines. Um. But they continued to build them, ~uh, ~very through various sort of shell companies, ~um, ~established in, in Holland. And they, they had shipyards in Holland that were, that were still building u-boats submarines in the, in the interwar period, ~um, ~as a commercial enterprise. So, ~you know, ~selling them to whoever would buy, ~um, ~the Turks and the Fins were quite good customers of German submarines in the 1920s. So the Germans actually had a sort of continuity to a large [00:04:00] extent, ~I mean, ~not perfect, but a continuity of personnel, a continuity of technology, and a continuity, continuity of manufacture. ~Um, ~and crucially, I think the allies kind of took their eyes off the ball at the same time. So we, we, obviously that was all clandestinely done. The, the British and the French and others, ~um, ~didn't have oversight of it at all. So in a sense, we kind of, ~you know, uh, uh, ~congratulated ourselves on having eliminated the threat of the Ubo war and essentially stopped thinking too much about it. ~Um, ~so when you picking it up again in the 1930s, so when they're then after 19 35, 36 when the, when the Germans are then permitted to, to, ~uh, ~start building limited numbers of U-boats, ~uh, ~by the various treaties that, that were signed at the time, ~um, ~not at least the Anglo German Naval Agreement, ~um, you know, ~they're, they're coming at it, ~you know, ~pretty much hitting the ground, running, ~you know, ~they're coming out pretty, pretty fresh. They've got. You know, good continuity of personnel, technology and everything else. And when they start building, for example, the Type Sevens, which is the [00:05:00] mainstay of the German submarine fleet in World War ii, it draws on a lot of the technology that was there in the U-boats that had at the end of the first World War. The, ~um, ~like type UB three was the most advanced at the end of the First World War. ~Uh, ~and that's, you know, a lot of its DNA reemerges in the type seven. So there is continuity there. ~Um, ~what is kind of novel in, in the German vision of all of this is the idea of the Wolf Pack. And that's now, that's sort of technologically dependent because the wolf packs themselves. It might be sort of five or six, maybe more, ~um, ~submarines working together in unison to attack, ~um, ~a convoy. ~Um, ~is, you know, what they require is, is communication. So they needed radio communication and that obviously is an interwar technology, so they didn't have that at the end of the first World War. So that was a, that was a key component of those tactics. Composition and Recruitment of the U-Boat Force --- Al: So we can make a connection there between what's going on in the Acht and the lfa, where, ~um, ~the experimentation with close air support is dependent upon [00:06:00] and with what we call Blitz Creek is really dependent upon miniaturization and pushing out of radios into lower and lower echelons. ~Um, ~likewise, I mean, ironically enough, this creation of this crypto cryptographic machine, the enigma, ~uh, ~allows then communications with U-boats in a way that had, was impossible 20 years Roger: Yeah, exactly. So they're, they are enabled to not only communicate with their home base, but they can communicate between new boats as well. So that means they can coordinate, ~uh, ~and obviously, you know, ~um, ~Wolfpack tactics in Mid-Atlantic or impossible without communication. So that was, that was a key of innovation of the interwar period. ~Um, ~but the other, the other aspect that I think is significant to talk about is, ~I suppose ~the idea, the, the idea that the, that having a u-boat force is a, is a sort of strategic need at all. And that's something that, that Deitz as the head of the Uber arm kind of had to fight for. ~Um, ~he's [00:07:00] competing with. Every other arm of German service in this time, ~you know, ~Germany's re-arming quickly. As we know, there's a almost an unspoken assumption, certainly amongst, ~you know, ~many of those in the military that war is coming. They dunno when, but it's coming. ~Um, ~and there's this really ferocious competition for resources, for men, for, ~you know, for, um, you know, ~space to sort of produce your materials, whatever it might be, whether it's, you know, tanks, aircraft or submarines. ~Um, ~and the u-boats are, they sort of suffer in that, excuse me, the U-boats kinda suffer in that, in that competition. So donuts, although he has, he can see, you know, his vision is absolutely clear. He sees this as, you know, potentially a war winning weapon. ~Um, ~he always argues for, for a, ~um, ~a ubo force of about 300, a minimum of 300 vessels. ~Um, ~and that meant that he could keep a hundred of them at sea minimum at any one time. ~Um, ~and he reckoned that was the sort of, that was the minimum that would be necessary to achieve what he wants to achieve, which is to, you [00:08:00] know, attack Britain, supply lines, str, essentially strangle Britain, if not out of the war, then at least to, ~uh, ~negotiation. ~Um, ~but he doesn't really manage to, to proselytize with that vision, with that, that strategic vision amongst his superiors. Al: He doesn't sell that. So who's, he's not the commander of the fleet. Who's the commander of the Roger: uh, r Al: right. And he's a much more, I mean, at least as I recall, he's a much more conventional sort of bl blue water sailor. ~Uh, ~he has, and, and, and conventional navy man, I mean, so his energies, ~um, ~they're building an aircraft carrier. ~Um, ~those, those, the, the funds of the Navy are gonna be pushed into other things other than that 300 U-boat Roger: so primarily surface ships. So Hitler loves a surface ship. I think that, you know, donuts made this complaint of Hitler where he talked about him having a continental obsession, right? Obsessed with the continent, with the land war, with Libs around and Eastern Europe, all of that stuff. And that, and that's the stuff we know about, right? That's the [00:09:00] headline stuff. ~Um, ~where the, the exception to that continental obsession for Hitler is that he loved a naval bobble, should we put it that way. He loved a Bismarck or a, ~you know, ~a, a Shan horse, you know, one of those big naval vessels that was a demonstration of German power, a demonstration that Germany was back and German Honor had been restored and all of that stuff. And they were gonna compete with the Royal Navy. All of that stuff was to Hitler's very important. ~Um, ~but the costs of that are vast and that, that, that. Rebuilding of the, of what was actually a relatively small surface fleet of the creeks Marina is done a huge cost, enormous cost, but it's a it's a tiny Al: combined, it's a tiny fleet compared to the Royal Navy or the Royal Navy plus the United States Roger: But it's done at, at huge cost. So ~I, I ~did the maths on this recently, you know, to, to, to, to build a, a Bismarck, the cost of building a Bismarck. You could have bought, you could have, ~um, ~built 40 type [00:10:00] seven new boats, four zero. Right. Which would, which would've made a huge, huge difference. Right? Al: you just think the amount of steel involved just in the armor of a Bismarck alone, that Roger: exactly. So that's a, ~I think ~that's a really telling statistic. So, you know. Duritz really struggles to sell his vision of, of the U-boat war, ~um, ~particularly in that interwar period. And ~you know, ~consequently he wants 300 U-boats. He doesn't get them by the time he actually goes to war in September, 1939. ~Um, ~he's got 27 ocean going combat U-boats only 27. ~Um, ~which is barely enough to ~sort of, ~you know, make, make a sort of a string between West Africa and Iceland, you know, across the Western approaches. So, Al: If, if they're all out at Roger: yeah, exactly. And, and they can't Al: if things, things breaking, they can't be. 'cause things break down things that people, yeah. Roger: to come back to resupply and all the rest of it so that, that you, you never get the full total out, out at sea at any one time anyway. So, you know, this is a puny force [00:11:00] compared certainly to what, what donuts have wanted. Dönitz and the Strategic Vision for U-Boats --- Al: So the U-boats and what you're answering a question of mine U-boats. Prior to the beginning of the war. Prior to some of the initial successes, U-boats are unimportant to the Hitler regime. Roger: ~Uh, ~essentially yes, that has to be said. Now they do come round. So by late 41 Hitler comes round to at least some understanding of the, ~you know, ~the potential of, of the ubo strategic potential. ~Um, ~and, ~you know, ~makes lots of public pronouncements about how he's gonna put lots of money into it and they're gonna invest more and so on. But arguably, by, by that point, it's too late, know the, the, the window of opportunity that they had had, had in the opening, say two years of the war, has pretty much closed by, by the end of 41. So it's too little, too late. Al: So Donuts, a former sub, ~uh, ~submariner from the, the first war. ~Um, ~he's running a little fiefdom within the CREs Marine because it would, my, my suspicion would be if that, that [00:12:00] Raider other people, the surface guys don't really care what happens amongst the U-boats. This is kind of Donuts, his toy, right? This is his thing. Roger: Yeah. Yeah. That's fair. Fair Al: So he. And so he is able to then control the composition of the U-boat force to a, a high degree. It's interesting how this happens again and again throughout military history, isn't it? It's a little bit like Rick Hyman Rick over and the nuclear submarine force. It's like that, that's becomes his thing in the US Navy and it lasts for like decades. ~Um, ~no, no one has ever compared someone named Hyman Rickover and Carl Donuts before, but we'll, we'll get into that. ~Um, ~but there are these, these fiefdoms where if other people don't care about it, you get to run it. ~Um, ~yeah. So who is he bringing into the U-Boat force? ~Um, ~what's the composition of the force, ~um, ~are and how are they different than other sailors in the Roger: that's a, that's a very good question. One, one or a couple of thing, couple of points to make there. One thing is that he liked, he kind of had a liking for Mavericks and there's a few, excuse me. There's a few mavericks in already [00:13:00] in the Kres Marina. ~Um, ~you know, people like Joachim, Shep, people like, ~I mean, ~tpr to some example, to some, to some extent. These are people who are already in the Kres Marina as, as, ~uh, um, as, uh, ~sailors, you know, very experienced in many cases. I mean, someone like gun pri and had already served in the Merchant Marine, ~uh, ~in the late 1920s, early thirties, and then had, ~uh, ~transferred to the Kress Marine, you know, during the, during the economic crisis, ~um, ~and later to the Yuba arm. But, so there were a few people there who could sort of fallen foul of, ~um, you know, ~the sort of strict discipline perhaps, or the strict conformity of the, of naval service, conventional naval service. ~Um, ~and Dunt evidently saw something in them that he quite liked. ~Um. ~They, the officers generally tend to be, and ubo officers tend to be obviously, you know, middle and upper, middle class. Not necessarily aristocracy, but middle and upper, middle class, ~um, ~with a, with a bit more, ~um, you know, ~longer in education, for example and so on. So, you know, in that sense, kind of [00:14:00] a standard profile for, for officers. What's interesting about the, the crew themselves is that they tend, because of the necessity to have people who have practical skills, right? You want. You don't want peasants, basically you don't want peasant boys. ~Um, ~you want mechanics, plumbers, ~um, ~electricians, right? That sort of thing. People with practical skills. 'cause when the, you know, the proverbial hits the fan, you need someone, obviously, first of all, who's not gonna panic, which, you know, who's a tough call anyway. But you need someone who's got practical skills to, you know, deal with the problem when you're in a hundred feet under beneath the sea and, and you're springing a leak. So they, they tend to be so working class boys, you know? So the, so the profile is, is slightly different. I, Al: you quote one guy, ~uh, ~one commander who says, if in civilian life they were locksmith's, plumbers, electricians, mechanics, or professional, professional sailors, okay, professional sailor we get, but locksmith's, plumber, electrician, mechanic. I looked on them as [00:15:00] valuable recruits. Another said, if by chance the man played football, he would probably develop a feeling for teamwork and fit in. And if in addition someone could produce a bit of music on the squeeze box or mouth organ, he was my man. So you Roger: a lovely quote. Al: Al, it's a Roger: Yeah. But ~it, it shows, ~it shows you, ~you need, ~you need those skills, practical skills amongst the men. You need teamwork. ~You need, ~you need people that are gonna fit in. Um, 'cause ~it, ~it's more vital, I would argue, because of the enclosed nature of a submarine, because of ~the, ~the claustrophobia of it. There's nowhere to hide, right? So if you've got someone who's being a pain in the backside who doesn't fit in ~that sort of, ~has personal squabbles with everyone that he comes across, you don't want him in there. You don't want him as one of your 50 crews. So you get rid of him. Right. So you need people that work together and fit in. And as he said, ~you know, if you, ~if you can play the mouth organ, who can play a squeeze box even better, because everyone can have a sing song at the end of the day and it improves morale so ~that it's, ~it's interesting how ~they sort of, you know, ~they put together and that quote tells it beautifully that the commanders. Of course this is a con [00:16:00] conscription force, but the commanders are able to ~sort of ~select, to some extent, select their own crews, uh, and ~sort of ~curate their own crews, you know, as they see fit. Training and Selection of U-Boat Crews --- Al: It. It's interesting you've, and described these. Commanders as Mavericks. Um, but at the same time, when you think about basic, like even the diving procedure for those of us who've watched run Silent and run deep far too many times or ~any, ~any submarine movie, just diving alone to do that right and not kill yourself and everyone on board, you have to be a type A check the box control freak. So ~you're, ~you're really looking for someone really unusual who's a maverick, who's a, but also likes checklists. Roger: good at delegating. I mean, ~a lot of, ~a lot of what the commanders are doing is saying Right. You know, and shouting out commands, do this, do that, do that. And then ~some ~relying on other people ~to, ~to do your bidding, whatever it might be. So yeah, ~it is, ~it is a peculiar mixture and ~that, ~that early [00:17:00] generation ~and ~of, um, of Ubo commanders, they are remarkable men, you know, the likes of gun ~and, ~and Shep Ko and ~uh, uh, uh, ~Otter Kretchma for example. You know, ~they, ~they're some remarkable breed of men there, and they're tremendously successful in that opening phase of the war. Al: Mm-hmm. What, ~what, um, ~what else is training like for enlisted? You? There's one thing you describe, um, gosh, where is that? On page 24, Rolf Hilla talks about a tank. They get locked into a tank. Roger: Yeah, Al: Um, they shut the lid and you stay in there for two minutes. They wouldn't open it. Roger: yeah. Al: You learn to hold your breath, and if you panic, that was your lookout. You won't die in two minutes. Uh, they'd open it after two minutes. If you're lying on the bottom, they'd fish you out. But they wouldn't open it. You'd learn it. It was up to you. I mean, this, I, I said before we started, it reminds me of ~like ~paratrooper training. ~I mean, ~it's kind of the same kind of people, mavericks, but also you have to be, make certain that your parachute is properly packed, and that's up to you. So you're, you have to have that both in submarines and in airborne and all these new types [00:18:00] of modern warfare formations. You have to have a little bit of both. You have to have, even in the, in the U-boats, you're going through the sort of endurance training. Roger: Yeah. And it's, and it's as much as anything, it's kind of conquering your own fears. Um, it's not being scared of the water, obviously. I mean, that's ~a ~absolutely a given in this scenario. But yeah, so that's, that bit you read about, you know, locking them in this sort of water-filled, um, tank. You just have to hold your breath. If you can't do it, ~like ~he says, you're not gonna drown in two minutes, but you'll, you'll suffer and they'd be able to fish you out and revive you and say, okay, well maybe the ubit arm's not for you chap. Uh, ~you know, ~but then, you know, the, the other thing was the, um, the dive tower that they had to, ~you know, ~the escape tower, um, where they had this sort of facsimile of a, of a, ~you know, ~conning tower of a U-boat, the bottom, which, and the whole thing could be the whole tower was flooded, and then the, the bottom could be separately flooded. So that was all watertight. And you had to, and they all had to do this procedure many, many times. You had to essentially practice your escape [00:19:00] from a sunken submarine, which means. Allowing the water in to flood the, the chamber that you're in. So you have to equalize the pressure, first of all, and then getting out with your rebreather apparatus and all of that and swimming to the surface. ~Um, and ~these, it's quite a high tower. It's something like, ~you know, um, ~40 feet or something like that. It's quite, quite a high thing. So the pressure down there is quite serious. ~Um, and ~that could induce panic ~in, in, ~in those recruits. They all had to do it and they had to do it many times. And there are numerous mishaps as well. They mean numerous, ~uh, ~people that sort of get it wrong. And, ~um, you know, ~it, it goes wrong. You have to, you have to master that technique. ~Um. ~They had this, this sort of faith that they had in this rebreather apparatus, which is like a Mae West, but had, ~um, ~a sort of cassette, a sort of charcoal cassette, which would pull the carbon dioxide out of your breath so that you could sort of reb breathe your own breath effectively over and over again. So it enabled you to, to, to last much longer on a single breath. ~Um, ~it was known as the dragger lung and, ~um, you know, ~using that as well, ~I think, you know, ~that was a, a really [00:20:00] important piece of training. So you had to master that thing and again, overcome the sort of, the, the, perhaps the urge to panic while doing so. And that's a weird one because I, I make the point in the book that I think that was to some extent a sort of, ~uh, ~a psychological comfort blanket for the men. ~Um, ~because the actual instances of. U-boat crews actually escaping from a sunken submarine are, you know, vanishingly small. There are, there are so few that it's, it's, it's terrifying. So I think in a sense, the whole process with the drag along, when they use the drag along all the time when they're submerged, if they're submerged, ~you know, ~for longer than their, kind of was normal, they would use the Drager lung just to preserve their own oxygen anyway. ~Um, so ~just, ~you know, ~with, not in extremists as it were, but in terms of actual escapes from, ~um, ~sub submarines, ~you know, ~hardly ever happens. They, or, or even when it does, they don't survive. Al: But it's a, it is a way of weeding out people who are terrified of have claustrophobia. ~I mean, ~the last person that you wanna be on a U-boat with is someone who [00:21:00] discovers 30 days into a tour that their, their claustrophobia and, and water is above them is just too much. ~I mean, ~those of us with good imagine, those of us with good imaginations probably would've died during the, ~uh, during, ~during that procedure of trying to escape in that escape tank. ~Um, so ~you've me touched on this already, but the type seven is the type seven operational by September 1st, 1939, or is it still an earlier? It is. So, ~um, ~it's important that listeners realize how awful a u-boat was as a, a place to live for two months. ~Um, ~because as the penance among us would point out, they're not really under sea boats. ~Um, ~it takes a really, a nuclear power plant to be a, a good under sea boat. ~Um. ~They are semi-submersibles, so they are, they provide the worst of all experiences at sea, both above and below. Life Aboard a Type VII U-Boat --- Roger: Yeah, that's absolutely right. ~I, I mean, ~this is, ~uh, ~it is a submersible. It's designed to spend, you know, maybe 95% of its time on the surface. ~Um, ~it's designed to do most of its [00:22:00] traveling on the surface. ~Um, ~it, it can dive of course as we know it can dive within. A good crew can dive within about 30 seconds. ~Uh, ~it will dive to attack or it will dive to evade counter attack. ~Um, ~it can stay down for it, it, it varies, but probably up, up to about 24 hours is a, probably a good bet. ~Um, ~pretty uncomfortable after, after 24 hours, as you can imagine. As I said, they start using their rebreather operators just, just to be able to breathe at all. ~Um, ~but in terms of space, ~I mean, ~the type seven is, is 67 meters long. ~Um. ~That is, I always say, describe it as being equivalent to, in terms of the habitable space inside, ~um, ~is kind of equivalent to two, ~uh, you know, ~subway carriages like London underground carriages, if you imagine that. And of course that's got, you know, two massive, ~uh, ~diesel engines, 300 liter engines, which are vast, they're huge things. ~Um, ~the electrical motors, you know, any number ~of, ~of gauges, hand wheels and everything else, [00:23:00] all of the control surfaces, ~which are, ~which are, you know, take up a lot of space. And then of course, ~uh, ~up to 14 torpedoes. ~Uh, ~and then the men in between. And a type seven has a crew of about 50. So if you imagine that sort of space, two subway carriages with all of that stuff inside it, so much so actually that even without any men, if you, if you went into that, there's only one place which is underneath the con conning tower, what they call the centra, where two men could actually pass each other without doing an embarrassed shuffle. Right? And yet you've got 50 men working, sleeping, on duty, off duty, fighting in that space. So it's incredibly cramped. There's no, absolutely no privacy whatsoever. That's an abstract concept. ~Um, ~and then you've got, you know, sweat, ~you know, ~there's no room for your, for your own, your own stuff. You, you're basically wearing the same clothes for two months. You are allowed one ch one change of underwear for two months. So they're filthy, you know, they stink. ~Um. And, uh, ~and, and they're [00:24:00] all hot bunking. Of course, ~the, you know, the, ~the, the officers, you might have say six officers, they will have their own bunks, but the, the men themselves are all hot bunking either in hammocks or on dropdown bunks. So very quickly, if someone has like scabies or a skin infection, everyone gets it, right? Because that's just the nature of the beast. So it's a pretty bloody horrible, bloody horrible environment to be in. Al: And, ~um, ~well, the other thing that takes up a lot of space, I hadn't realized this was of course stor storing thing. If you're going off for a two month cruise, if you're going to the Caribbean, you're not gonna get resupplied. ~Um, ~well we can talk about that. That's, they, they might get resupplied, but they still, they load every space that's not occupied by diesel engines with food, ~um, ~you know, to, in order to stay out there. And then what do they do for like fresh water? I mean, they are in the middle of a salt Roger: yeah. Exactly. Al: so where do you get, where do you get your Roger: Yeah, I mean, if they take, take, there's a, there's a fresh water tank there, there is a, ~uh, um, uh, ~installation which can do ~sort of ~small, small volume [00:25:00] conversion. So, ~you know, ~remove the saline, desalinate and so on. So they can do that. But, but fresh water is very strictly rationed as a result. You can't have, ~you know, ~everyone ~sort of, you know, ~imagine showering for example. So if you want to wash, you generally do it either in a little bowl with, with the, the water that you've been given rationed for the day. You can use that to, to wash with if you want to splash your face and so on. If you want to, you know, have a proper splash, then you, you. Ideally you go up on deck and you can do it up there. ~Um, ~but you, you're doing it with, with seawater. And, and a lot of them didn't like using seawater. They had this really curious soap, which, ~um, ~was designed to, to, to lava in seawater because normal soap generally doesn't. So, ~um, ~they had that, but it smelt really bad. So the, the sailors didn't like using it. So consequently they're just, you know, on top of everything else, they just generally didn't wash. ~Um, ~and we have this ~sort of ~curious, ~uh, ~romantic image, you know, from watching dust B and stuff, ~you know, ~from back in the day of this, of the, of the bearded [00:26:00] U boatman, ~you know, um, ~the reality is that they, they, they didn't, they didn't wash, so they didn't shave. ~Um, ~and, and then the beard came with a, came with a, a, you know, side order of stink. Al: Yeah. Yeah. So, and, and, ~uh, ~not to mention the, ~um, ~the toilet, ~uh, ~facilities are not up to the standard of the normal cruise line. Roger: No, absolutely not. So, you know, type seven had two toilets. ~Um, ~you mentioned about the supply. So, you know, one of those toilets or heads as they're known to, to naval folk, ~um, ~would be used as a lader, you know, essentially for probably three of the, three or four maybe of the, ~um, uh, ~of the two months or three or four weeks of the, of the eight weeks in total. ~Um, and ~yeah, there had, so there was a sort of a hand pump. So if you, ~you know, ~if you are, ~uh, ~Moy on the surface, for example, you could use this sort of hand pump and it would, and it would push whatever effluent there was out. ~Um, ~didn't really work at depth. So if, if you're submerged for any length of time, they're basically sort of collected up effluent in the bowls. Probably the same bowls that you're washing with in the morning. They'd collect them up and then when they [00:27:00] surface next, then you would. Sip it out of the, out of the conning tower. So you know, that stuff, ~you know, ~for sur if you are submerged for any length of time, then that's lying around as well, right? So, ~uh, ~adding to the smell and the general discomfort of your surroundings. So it's a, it's a pretty grim environment. Al: And that's all that, and there's still the chance of violent and sudden death, which we haven't yet, we haven't yet factored in. So there's only, so there's only 27 of, of this, of this force, of 300 that donuts imagines. ~Um, ~one thing I need to ask before we get any farther is what's Donut's relationship to the regime Now he's, he is Hitler's successor. Roger: Mm-hmm. Al: ~Um. ~He becomes a member of the party, surprisingly late. ~Um, ~and yet my impression is that he was always really a Nazi, ~um, ~from, from, from the beginning of, of Hitler, even before Hitler came to power. So, ~um, ~[00:28:00] and yet at first, Hitler doesn't care much about the U-boat, so it's not quite the, ~um, ~it's not the propaganda card that the Lofa is. And if we compare things, I mean, recent research, I believe has shown the Lofa was much, much, much more Nazi than, ~um, ~the whole Knights of the air nonsense that people used to subscribe to. ~Um, ~is the U-boat arm like the lfa or is it unlike the lfa, what's the ideological fervor amongst both officers and crew? Ideology and Nazi Indoctrination in the U-Boat Arm --- Roger: a very good question. ~Um, ~and it's one that I do try and address as far as possible with the material that I had. ~Um, ~I think the first thing to say, ~uh, ~two points. The first one is that, you know, any. Conscript force like that is, is essentially a cross section of German society. So you've got, at one extreme, you've got the Nazi party members, which were at the peak. Only 10% of of German German population was were Nazi party members. That's not to say that only 10% [00:29:00] supported the regime. 'cause there's a vast suave in the middle that don't become party members for various reasons, but still can be very fervent supporters. ~Uh, ~some of them just kind of go with the flow and when it's going well, they, they're supportive. And when it's not, they're less. But ~you know, ~that's, that's, that's the nature of, of human society. So all the way from Nazi party members, believers, all the way up to anti-Nazi as well. I mean, there are a couple of examples I give of anti-Nazi commanders, particularly who fall foul of the regime because they're, they're kind of denounced and so on. ~Um, ~and the broad mass in the middle who go along with it. When it's going well, maybe less so when it's not. ~Um, ~so that's the sort of first point to make. There's no preference necessarily given to party members in recruitment. ~Uh, uh, ~certainly of the, of ordinary crews, certainly not. ~Um, ~arguably a little, ~you know, ~it would count in your favor if you're a party member, if, if you are, if you are a, want to be a commander. ~Um, ~but even then it's probably down the list. They're probably more practical, ~um, ~and, and sort of [00:30:00] career, ~uh, uh, uh, um, ~criteria that, that would be applied before that. So it's down the list of, of, of necessary requirements. I would say. ~Um, ~during it, interestingly say about during, 'cause he is, he is a really interesting character. He is, as you say, a fervent believer in the Nazi program. He believes in Hitler, he believes in Nazism. And I think in that he comes at it from. The perspective of many milit, many of the German military in this period is that he saw the Third Reich under Hitler as a restoration of German, German military honor Germany's position in the world. And for that reason, he saw that his, ~you know, ~his support for the regime and for Hitler personally, ~um, ~was, was a given. Right. Where we have to sort of part ways with that, that, ~um, ~model that you gave, I think correctly of the Luft as being quite a Nazi fied branch of the, of the, ~uh, ~German military is that, ~you know, ~first of all you have in the Navy, [00:31:00] it's, ~uh, ~it, it doesn't have the sort of the novelty power, the novelty appeal that, ~um, ~that the luer had. The luer was, ~you know, ~reformed in the, in the interwar period, not formed I suppose. I mean obviously they had air forces in the first war as well, but ~you know. ~It, it's, it, it's a new force. It's one that's one whose fate is very much, ~you know, ~closely tied to the Nazi regime. It's seen and it's very existence and it's very, um, operation is is novelty. It's a new thing. Right. So, so it has that, that restless novelty about it. So you can see how it would be, ~you know, ~if you were absolute believer in the regime and you thought this was the future. And in a way, I know we'd say a lot about Nazi Germany being kind of, in many ways backward looking, but it's also, it's also kind of radically forward looking as well. This is a revolutionary program, right? Al: the lo wafa is the instantiation of the revolutionary Nazi program, um, from be from before the Hitler becomes [00:32:00] chancellor. There are glider clubs, Nazi glider clubs. I mean, this is all part of the, this is part of their forward looking. ~I mean, ~this is Hitler's campaigning in an airplane going back and forth. This is all part of the drive revolutionary for, uh, direction that the party will, that and the furor will take Germany. Um, and the U-boats don't Roger: no, they don't have that. And, and actually in a sense it's, ~you know, ~the tradition is older is, is of, is of naval warfare going back into the 19th century and beyond. Um, the sort of folk memory, if you like in naval services is a very different one from the, the folk memory, if we can call it that in the, so there's a, there's a real difference of tradition there on one point. And then the other point is that, um, done, its weirdly and I sort of came across a couple of articles which I used in the book. 'cause you have to ~sort of ~rationalize, ~you know, ~once you can see that there's no overt indoctrination of u-boat crews. Right. Um, then you have to ~sort of ~[00:33:00] ask yourself why that would be the case. ~Um, and the, ~the way that I've explained it or that has been explained that I, I sort of, ~um, uh. ~Repeating the book is that essentially, ~you know, ~DNIS is not oppositional. We know that because he is on side with the regime. So why would he allow, ~you know, ~these sort of indoctrination units to set up in the, in the UBO basis themselves, but not allow them to ever ride along on the, on a ubo to actually do, ~you know, ~essentially do their job of indoctrination. ~Um, ~first of all, there's no space, right? There's no room for passengers in a U-boat, right? They didn't even take doctors on board 'cause there was no space for, for, for passengers. So that's 0.1. And then the second one, I think, and this point was made very, very clearly to me and one of these articles that, ~um, ~essentially he sees that as not only as an imposition from, you know, central government on the senior service, right? We look after ourselves. We don't need this sort of political imposition, even though he says, we're completely on board, we're completely on side, but we don't need this. This is an [00:34:00] an, an irrelevance and imposition. And then he says that his. His perception of his boys, and he was unbelievably loyal to his boys. His his submariners, ~um, ~is that, you know, they're all by definition patriots, they're all onside with the regime. ~You know, ~they don't need lessons from anyone in political loyalty to, to the Third Reich and, and by extension to Germany. So I think that combination of factors explains why a fervent Nazi like Deitz actually effectively blocks the further indoctrination of his own men in World War ii. But that has a knock on effect, of course, in terms of, ~you know, ~how they behave at sea is one strand of, of trying to explain why there are so few, ~um, uh, ~atrocities committed. Al: So tease that out because I, ~I think ~our idea, ~um, ~dunno what it's based on, but our idea of, ~uh, ~a HU boat would be that it torpedoes a ship and surfaces to a machine gun to [00:35:00] survivors. ~Um, ~I know, I know, I know some US Navy submarines did that. Roger: Yeah, absolutely. Al: in the Pacific War. ~Um, ~but, and I'm sure that some one UBO probably did it, but you make the case that this is not, this is not standard. This is not standard operating Roger: no, it's not. Al: And this, this takes us back to an earlier conversation, I think with Catal Nolan about his book, ~uh, ~Cal Nolan, about his book Mercy, where he's highlighting the fact that a lot of Ubo commanders show Mercy, ~um, ~to the people that they've just Roger: Yeah. Al: Um, because there are other rules at play here other than Nazi ideolog. Prize Rules and Treatment of Enemy Crews --- Al: So could you tease Roger: Yeah. So there's the, there is, um, in the interwar period, first, I mean, there are many strands to this. One of them is what I just mentioned, that there is this sort of notable, I wouldn't say there's absence, but there's, there's a, to some degree, a lack, a surprising lack ~of sort ~of ideological indoctrination. Ideological fervor, we could say, ~uh, ~amongst, ~uh, ~Ebo crews, ~I mean, ~they're all patriotic as we know. They're all fighting for Germany. We know all of [00:36:00] that. ~Um, ~they're not oppositional in that sense, but there's a, there's a lack of overt indoctrination. Um, so that's one strand. The other, another strand is that, you know, in the 1930s you had various international treaties, which essentially tried to, you couldn't make, um, naval warfare illegal in that sense, like we probably would now. Um, but they tried to make naval warfare, submarine warfare, legally unviable. So this is a, the sort of upgrading of the so-called prize rules in the 1930s. So essentially the, the prize rules as they were reimagined in the 1930s meant that, ~you know, ~if a submarine was to engage an, an enemy merchant ship, it had to first surface stop the ship, ~um, ~you know, interrogate the, the, the master of the ship and say, what are, who are you, where are you going? What are you carrying? So they could properly ascertain whether it was an enemy, you know, fair target at all, an enemy vessel. ~Um, ~and then they had to give the crew, [00:37:00] um. Sufficient time to, to disembark in good order, and then they could torpedo the vessel and sink it, right? And then of course, the, the kicker of all of this is that you as the captain of the U-boat that has just sunk the vessel, were responsible for the crew that you've just got disembarked. And that doesn't mean that you just, ~you know, ~make sure they're in the lifeboat. You actually had to take care of them. So this is a very clear effort, I would say in the 1930s to sort of make u-boat warfare, submarine warfare unviable. ~Um, ~and what's remarkable is that the Germans, through the opening phase of the war actually try pretty hard to carry out their tonnage war, their submarine warfare, ~um, ~within those prize rules, right? So throughout, of course, the, you know, we have to also bear in mind the target of the submarine warfare is the tonnage, is the merchantmen, right? They're not generally interested in the crews, the crews. At worst, our collateral damage, right? But it, that's not the target. It's not to [00:38:00] kill the men. So, ~um, you know, ~that's another factor. And very often, ~you know, ~again, this is not to sort of paint them as saints in any way, but another factor to bear in mind is that there's a lack of opportunity to actually commit any sort of atrocities against, against the crews that you've just sunk. If you think of an infantryman on the eastern front, you are coming across POWs, you're coming across, ~um, you know, uh, uh, ~civilians all the time. So if you add the opportunity to the ideology, which is telling you that these people are subhumans, whatever it might be, then it's very easy to see how atrocities were so common and not just by the Ss as we, as we well know, I mean by as well. So. Again, if you, if you transpose that to the Western theater, if you look at that in France, there's much, there's many fewer examples of atrocities committed in the French theater in western Europe. And again, the ideology is the, is the, the absent factor. Because the ideology is telling them that the French, for example, or the [00:39:00] British in 1940 are, are not subhumans, they're not, they're not life unworthy of life. So you treat them with a, at least a modicum of respect of course. Notwithstanding that there were some massacres. And we know that, ~like ~you think of adore, you think of ~um, uh, uh, ~vau and others in 1940. So it's, it's ex amalie as well in 1944. So it's, it's ideology is opportunity crucially as well. So in terms of opportunity, the u boatman, the, with the exception of the captain, nobody else on that ship, probably on that ~uh, ~U-boat, ~uh, ~even probably sees that target. Certainly not the men that were on it, right? So they're all working, ~you know, ~below, below the surface. They don't, and they'll, they'll, they'll hear over the tunnel, ~you know, uh, you know, ~merchant man, whatever it is at, ~at, uh, you know, ~300 yards or whatever, or 3000 yards. And they try to engage it, but they don't see it. ~Um, ~and even if they, as some standard practice, if they surface afterwards, they might try and find a, ~you know, ~a life raft or something to inter interrogate them, usually to find out what the ship, what the ship was, because they didn't [00:40:00] know this is the middle of the night in Mid-Atlantic. ~You know, ~you're just taking a pot shot at a passing, passing merchant vessel. That's all it is. ~Um, so, you know, ~that's the ~sort of ~standard practice later on in the war. So you're surfacing and you, you're saying, right, what was that ship? ~Um. ~At that point, very often you have the crews saying, okay, well the nearest land is that way. ~Um, ~do you need blankets? Do you, do you need, do you need water? Do you need food? Right. And that's, that was not unusual. And as far as I can see, there's many, many more examples of that, of care, at least the, at least the barest modicum of care for the crews that they've just sunk. Then there are the opposite, which is, ~you know, ~the stereotype, as we said, ~of sort ~of machine gunning survivors. Now, we know that happened once the police case in 1944, for which the crew that were responsible were executed post-war as, as war criminals. It's quite possible that it happened a few more times, but, ~you know, ~maybe those crews that, that maybe committed those crimes, ~you know, ~they killed all of the, all [00:41:00] of the survivors and then, then themselves were sunk later in their patrol. No survivors, no one ever talks about it. It's lost to history. That's entirely possible. Even bearing that in mind, I would suggest there are many more cases of Ebert crews actually helping the crews that they've just sunk than the opposite. And it's interesting that right slap bang in the middle of the war, September, 1942. There's the, the example of the Laconia. So the Laconia was a, a British passenger ship that sunk off West Africa in, ~uh, ~September 42. ~Um, ~and the Ebo captain concerned his name was Vanner Hartenstein, ~uh, ~surfaces. It's the middle of the night he surfaces, ~um, ~hoping to interrogate someone as to what it was and where it was going and all the rest of it. And he realizes that the men in the water are all Italian POWs 'cause it was carrying Italian POWs. So he then begins, and others, I mean British passengers as well, polish, ~uh, ~military personnel, incidentally, British military personnel. So huge mixture, but he decides at that point. [00:42:00] Okay, I'm gonna save as many as I can. He spends five days out at sea on the surface, rounding up these, you know, survivors on rafts, on bits of debris, on upturned, um, lifeboats, ~um, ~radioing out on Claire. So unencrypted saying, come and help me. You know, I won't attack you if you don't attack me. Come and help me. We're having a bit of a, you know, humanitarian catastrophe here, and in the end he's attacked. By American aircraft. Incidentally, he's attacked by American aircraft from the air, ~uh, ~and has to dive. And he has to leave, leave everything that he's been trying to do for the last four days in the water. And that is a scandal. And the, the, the, ~um, ~donuts has to go and tell Hitler what's going on. Hitler goes mad. And this says, what, what the hell are we doing saving these crews? Right? ~Uh, ~and the result is the Laconia order from Duritz who says, okay, from now on, this is September 42. He says, from now on, we, we will not be helping any of, any of the, uh, shipwreck crews, but that's September [00:43:00] 42. So it gives you an idea as to how long that practice, and it wasn't done every time, of course, because circumstances didn't allow it. But it gives you an idea as to how long the practice persisted. Al: Yeah, let's talk about the, briefly about the progress of the war. ~Um, ~so like in, ~uh, ~in five minutes, what are the phases of the undersea war? Of, of the, or I can, Jim Holland would correct me, the semi-submersible war, which, which doesn't sound good. It doesn't sound Roger: It doesn't. Al: ~Uh, ~under, no, it does not. What are the phases of the undersea war? Phases of the U-Boat War --- Al: Um, from, from the German perspective, Roger: Yeah, so the, the opening phase where, ~you know, ~the allies, um, of British really introduce, uh, reintroduce convoy, ~um, uh, ~tactics right from the outbreak of war. So that is, that is done pretty much from the outset, the German score. Pretty good numbers in that opening phase. They call it the happy time. Um, really up until, I suppose then mid [00:44:00] 42, you could say, ~um, you know, ~they've got very experienced, some very experienced sailors, some very experienced crews. The weapon works pretty well. Generally the type seven is later, the type nine comes on stream, it's slightly bigger. Um, it's a pretty, it's a pretty useful weapon. It works pretty well. Um, and Allied countermeasures are still a little bit halting. You don't have the various factors that combine to turn the, the, ~um, ~the battle at the Atlantic or the YDU boat War in the allies favor, and not yet really crystallizing, ~you know, ~those being particularly the, the, the consistent breaking of enigma. Uh, that's one of them. Um, the development of aerial radar. ~Um, so, and, uh, uh, uh, ~aircraft mounted radar, um, closing the Atlantic gap. So there's nowhere for the U-boats to hide. So you've got, ~you know, ~that logistical development that you can cover the all of the Atlantic with aircraft. ~Um. ~Uh, and ~you know, ~the, the Americans coming on stream after Pearl Harbor 41, and in 1942 you've got, ~you know, ~the, the mass construction of Liberty ships, for example, which [00:45:00] more or less replaces you said you gave the figure, I think of, of 3000 plus Allied vessels sunk, I think it's nearly 3000. I forget the precise figure, but it's the high two thousands, 2,700 is the total of, of Merchantmen built under the Liberty ship program. Right? So Liberty Ships basically replaces pretty much everything that was lost in real time, right? So in that opening phase, ~you know, ~this is the, this is what the Germans call the happy time. This is the sort of golden hour where they had the opportunity but they didn't have the numbers to make it tell from late 42. Duritz then has his 300 U-boat force, but. The, the game is then already shifting, right? So you've got the Liberty ships are replacing what's lost. They're replacing what's lost much quicker than the Germans can replace their lost U-boats. So Dnis is going toe to toe with the allies at that point, late 42 into early 43. ~Um, you know, ~this is like two heavyweight boxes ~sort of ~slugging out at each other. ~Um, ~and quite simply, the, [00:46:00] the Western resources and the Western ability to, to knock out u-boats much more effectively by the, by the early 43 is just, is far in advance of what the Germans can do. So at that point, hit, ~uh, ~during, its actually pulls his forces outta the, ~uh, ~out of the Atlantic, pulls the wolf packs outta the Atlantic. So you're left with ~sort of ~isolated surface raiding. Al: Mm-hmm. So this is, and that's May, that's May Roger: May 43. Um, and from then on, so that, that was ~the sort of ~the, the, the most perilous period from the West Western perspective, from then on, you have basically, um, a deterioration in the, ~uh, ~effectiveness of the Ubo crews because partly 'cause all of those experience crews are, most of 'em are dead. So you've got inexperienced, ill trained crews, less well able to fight against an en an enemy who is much, much better prepared, much better, supplied, much better technologically than you are. ~Um, ~and they just Al: and has a better, Roger: again. Al: and has a better theory and practice of [00:47:00] training, which I think we'll get to in just a, a second. Roger: so all of that stuff, ~you know, ~they're so up against it in the second half of the war. It's becomes essentially a ~sort of ~Turkey ch ~if you like, you know, um, you know, the, ~the, the, the lifespan, statistical lifespan, which is one of these points that I make in the book of a German u-boat crew at the beginning of the war in the opening phase is between seven and nine missions, seven and nine patrols. By 1943, it's down to three by 19 end of 1944, it's down to, ~you know, ~about one, one and a half. So they're basically from, from that stage on the last year of the war, they're effectively going out on suicide missions. Statistically speaking, ~uh, you know, ~it, it, the, the way the war turns against 'em after 43 is absolutely brutal. If you look at the statistics, it's brutal. The Type XXI: Wonder Weapon or False Hope? --- Al: So I could never resist an opportunity to take a kick at technological determinism, and this is the perfect moment to do so, ~uh, ~because, ~uh, ~there is. A frankly, unhealthy discussion, ~uh, ~has been probably since 1946. It's about [00:48:00] rockets, it's about jets. If, thank God Hitler didn't have this in 1939, ~uh, ~and, and for some people, um, disturbingly, it's if only Hitler had this in 1939. Um, but, and one of those, uh, wonder, the wonder weapons is the type 21 and the type 2023 as well, right? We skipped type Roger: Type 21 was, the Type 21 was the, was the, the more serious threat? Yeah. Al: And, and these, and these are finally, this is, um, jonas's ambition. Uh, and what a submarine could do are not in sync. Um, and in many ways these are the, in some ways these are the first actual submarines. They're not the, they're not semi-submersibles. These are if just put a nuclear power plant in it. You've got the modern sub, you've got the, the modern, modern, modern submarine. ~Um, ~you got, you've got 21st century submarine. So could you describe them and describe them, why they weren't all that? Roger: Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a wonderful part. It's a strand obviously, of this story, and it's a, a wonderful [00:49:00] part of it. ~Um, ~the Germans were tremendously enthusiastic about type 20 ones. It had come, come about largely by accident. There was a, ~um, you know, ~from the middle of the war, ~you know, ~after that the war turns against them in the way that I just described. There's a lot of effort and a lot of energy and, and, and money given to, to various, ~you know, um, ~boffins we could say, ~you know, ~sort of mad scientists within, within Germany to try and, ~you know, ~essentially square the circle and enable, um, submarines to be more independent of air. Essentially like you just described, right. ~Um, ~so there was a, a, a, ~uh, um, ~a guy called Valter. There's these, these Valter powered submarines, which is sort type 1617, I think it was, which would never, never anything more than prototypes. ~Um, ~and they were designed to stay, ~you know, ~essentially exists submerged and then to, to surface when required. So kind of the reverse of what we're talking about with the standard type seven. ~Um, ~those went nowhere because the propulsion system didn't work, but the, the sort of the frames and the sort of [00:50:00] hydrodynamic, ~um, ~frame and, and the body work of it, if you like, was used to develop the Type 21, which is slightly larger than type seven. It's more generous inside. ~Um, ~and crucially it's designed to stay submerged. So it has a, you know, huge banks of, of batteries, electric motors. It's faster submerged than it is on the surface, which is the opposite of the type seven. The type seven can do like something like 17, 18 knots on the surface. It can only do walking pace like five knots beneath the surface. So it's really, really slow. Type 21 is the other way round. So it's properly designed to spend more of its time underwater. So it points to all the technological developments that we're, we're gonna see in, in the post-war, right? So it's a real step change in, in submarine technology. ~Um, ~and the Germans are tremendously excited about it. They thought it was absolute game changer. You know, if you can get it into, into, it is in production, but if you can get it into theater, you know, this could change the game. And you can see as well, you know, there's, at the same time as this, there's a, there's a program of [00:51:00] retrofitting snorkels to type sevens and type nines, and that actually gives the ubo arm. A, a belated advantage in late 44 and early 45, ~uh, ~against the allies because they can't really be seen. 'cause all you're seeing potentially is a tiny snorkel above, above the water. It can't be picked up by radar. Right? Al: and we should, yeah. And we just should say, if your point, that aerial radar is really what ends the U-boat threat. ~Um, ~and that's because the radar is reflecting off the conning tower because u-boats are on the surface most 95% of the time. But once it's only a snorkel radar has in the, in the race between, you know, ra of radar, radar isn't at that point yet. We're not Roger: Can't pick it up. Al: what is it? S symmetric anyway, whatever it is. But really good, really good radar hasn't come around yet. It's like that's a Roger: No, exactly. And, ~uh, you know, and, and, um, ~a radar equipped aircraft ~could, ~could see a surface submarine from potentially 15 miles and they could be on top of it pretty rapidly ~in, in, ~within a couple of minutes. [00:52:00] Um, by the time the U-boat has spotted the aircraft, you probably had about 30 seconds to submerge before you're gonna be attacked. So you can see statistically, like the image that we have in World War II ~is of, ~is of depth charging, right? Big blunt weapon barrel bombs, basically. ~That's the, ~that's the stereotype we have. That's what's in, you know, das Sport. That's what's in Greyhound. The recent film. ~More, ~more u-boats are lost to aerial attack from ~a, ~from radar equipped aircraft than they are ~to, ~to depth charging without question. Right? So that's the game changer ~is, ~is actually aerial radar. Um, but yeah, so ~when, so that sort of. ~The counter to that was to retrofit the snorkel to existing submarines, and that works pretty well. Late 44, 45 ~gives the, certainly ~gives the allies a fright late on in the war. Um, and the type 21 would've taken that to another level because it was, you know, it had really good characteristics, submerged, as I said, it could, ~very ~comfortable submerged. The problem with it was that [00:53:00] because of the allied bombing of Germany, which had been, you know, ramped up again since end of 42, 43, um, they'd taken ~the, ~the decision, which is a radical one to, um, ~um, sort of ~dissipate production ~to, ~to spread production right across Germany. So there are about eight sections ~to a, ~to a Type 21. So they, you know, one particular factory would make, you know, the stern section and then another factory would make the next bit and so on, and then they'd pull 'em all together and they'd try and create ~the, ~the finished article. And this was to so that, you know, entire production wasn't, ~wasn't, um, ~you know, at the risk of being bombed in one and knocked out in one air raid. Um, the problem with that, of course, I mean, it sounds ingenious, right? But the problem with that of course is that, you know, um, ~the, ~the poor people who are actually working in those factories are. Forced laborers ~of the, ~of the concentration camp system, most of whom don't really, if they're not actively sabotaging, which ~some of ~some of whom ~were, ~were brave enough to do, they're certainly more concerned [00:54:00] about where their next bowl of food is coming from than whether the tolerances are right on the machine that they're working on. Right? So what they produce might look okay, but then by the time you go and try and put it together, nothing fits properly. So you put it all back together. You try, ~you know, ~you launch your type 21 and the first lo and behold, the first time it dives, it springs a thousand leaks, because that's ~the, that's the, the, ~the risk with that production method. ~Um, ~so the first type 20 ones are actually launched already at, in the summer of 1944. And they could have in a, ~in an, ~in an ideal world, they could have under undergone sea trials and, you know, ~the, the, ~the necessary, ~um, uh, sort of, uh, ~you know, testing and so on. And they could have been in production by the autumn, but they're not. They're so flawed because of that construction method that then they never see combat. So, you know, they produce over a hundred of these things, ~uh, ~none of them ever see combat. So yes, potentially this is another game changer like a V two. You know, and it is genius if you look at it on paper, if you look at it in terms of the, the [00:55:00] development ~of the, ~of the submarine through time, the Type 21 ~is, ~is absolutely up there. But in terms of, ~you know, ~its potential to change the war, ~um, ~yeah, maybe if you could stop the things from leaking, but that meant that you would have to build them with workers that were, you know, concentrating on their job rather than saving their own lives. So in a sense, it's another one of those ~sort of.~ False storms, if you like, ~of, of, ~of German technology. And it does get, ~sort of ~ramped up, the Type 21. So in a sense I was trying to a little bit to try and bring a bit more reality into that particular discussion. It was never gonna change the wall. It is brilliant on paper, but it was because of the methods and by which it was constructed. It was never going to and could never change the wall. Churchill's Fear and the Reality of the U-Boat Threat --- Al: We have to start drawing things together here, ~uh, ~hopefully with a neat bow. And I, I think we should, ~um, ~do that by talking about, ~um, ~well, a claim that a publisher has made for a recent book. Winston Churchill once remarked that the only threat to truly frighten him was the peril of Nazi [00:56:00] U-boats. That's actually from basic books. ~Uh, ~they're their blurb, ~uh, ~for Roger Morehouse's Wolfpack inside Hitler's U-Boat War. ~Um, ~is that true? ~Um, ~I, a I asked the witness, ~um,~ Roger: Well, it's true that it, it's true that he said it or wrote it, rather. He wrote that in his memoirs. Al: he wrote that, but is what, but should he have, if he was actually concerned or frightened, should he have, should he have Roger: In retrospect. Yeah. Al: and then we should, then we should gallop through some of the stats that you Roger: Yeah. Yeah. ~Um, ~I would, my argument on that would be that no, he shouldn't. ~Uh, ~in retrospect at, at the time, I understand why he was, ~um, you know, ~he, he, the, when he wrote that in his memoir post-war, he was referring to the winter of 19 40, 41, which was a particularly perilous time. ~You know, ~British imports at that point in January 41, for example, were precisely half what they had been in January, 1940. And I think from his perspective, and of many Britains that were, you know, had their finger on the pulse at the time, they could see [00:57:00] if this trajectory continues, we're gonna be in trouble and we are gonna be forced to, ~you know, uh, ~curtail our operations or even negotiate whatever it might be. So I think that when he says that, when he is referring to. It makes sense that he would be worried. But as I said, as I said before, this is the period in which, you know, the Allied countermeasures are developing. ~Um, ~this is still very slap bang in the, in the German happy time when they're scoring their best figures. ~Um, ~so it makes sense from that perspective. But in the round, ~you know, ~I think this is basically one of those that, ~um, you know, ~generation of historians and commentators have kind of taken that phrase, ~excuse me, ~have taken that phrase and kind of run with it and applied it almost to the whole of the Yuba War. When really they don't need to. ~Um, ~and as I said, in retrospect, if you look at all the stats, particularly about the Sinkings, as we just mentioned, ~you know, um, ~over 3000, ~um, ~allied vessels sunk, you know, you've got nearly 3000 are being built under Liberty Ship, Liberty ship program, the allied, ~um, ~fleet, for example, ~um, ~which starts out at [00:58:00] I think about 18 million tons, which is the British, you know, the British merchant fleet, which was the biggest in the world at the time. Add to that, ~you know, ~the, ~um, ~the Empire, so, ~you know, ~Australians, south Africans, and so on. Add to that, after 41, the Americans add to that the Liberty ships that are being, being produced, ~you know, ~by, by the end of the war, the allied merchant fleet is 40 million tons, right? It's grown from 18 million. 40 million. Right. So the Germans right. They managed to make that graph kind of plateau at the beginning in that happy time of the first couple of years after that, it just goes up. So the idea of of of the allies or Britain being knocked out by the U-boat war, ~uh, ~is, is statistically a nonsense. It's, it's just not gonna happen. Al: And add. And then against that, we've got the what happened to you boats. And it's like we were discussing before we started recording. One of the things that Hitler is best at, other than killing lots of Jews, is killing Germans. [00:59:00] And, you know, numerically probably better at killing Germans. ~Uh, ~to in total, ~um, ~you say is striking that more than a third of all the U-boats that were lost during the war. Were lost on their first patrol, their maiden patrol. ~Um, ~that statistic alone you go on, should suffice to give pause to the enduring image of the U-boat Man is a brutally efficient, cold eyed killer, but the majority of u-boat crews were despite their own best efforts, surprisingly unsuccessful. Of the 859 Combat U-boats that entered service during the war, more than half, 465 of them failed to sink. Anything at all of the remainder, those that actually succeeded in attacking enemy shipping. 71 sank more than 10 ships, and only 27 sank more than 20 ships. ~Um, ~30% of the allied ships that were lost were sunk by 2% of the U-boat commanders. Now you do mention the Pareto principle. I would say Pareto would say, I, I I said [01:00:00] 20% of causes for 80% of consequences. That's not even Roger: we're nowhere near that. Yeah, yeah, Al: this is my, my stupid cousin Pareto principle. ~Um, ~this is, ~uh, ~so that's extraordinary. And it has something to do with, we talked about the training at the beginning, but as, as the. There is a way in which this, it, it, it avalanches down as there is as some die. Then the ne more people die next because of the inability to train and bring up to the standard the donuts would've expected his crews to be at in 38. Roger: Yes, absolutely. So you've, ~you know, ~you've got that first generation of ubo, ~uh, ~commanders and crews, many of whom had pre-war experience, many of whom had experience in, ~you know, ~in the merchant fleet before that. And then by, you know, if you shift to the, the, the back end of the war, as I described, after 43, you are down to say the third and fourth generation of, of certainly commanders, ~uh, ~many of whom are very young. So they, they could be, you know, 24, 25, [01:01:00] which I mean, that alone is kind of terrifying. And there's, there's a generation of commanders who take commander view boats at the end of the war who weren't even in the Navy at the beginning, right? Because they were children. Um. So, ~you know, ~their, their, their training programs have been curtailed both for commanders and, and crew as well, uh, and streamlined. But that means it's, ~you know, ~much less effective than it had been. Um, they're even put, ~you know, ~donuts even has this policy of pulling naval officers from desk jobs, uh, and with a modicum of training, putting them in command of a u-boat by the second half of the war. So you could be a, ~you know, ~someone that's got a lot of experience in the CREs Marina, but uh, in, for example, naval gunnery, right? Or coastal gunnery or something like that. You've never even set foot on a U-boat. And then with a basic kind of, ~you know, ~almost like a conversion course, they stick you in, ~you know, ~in a, as a, as an officer and often a senior officer in a U-boat. So the crews that are, that are manning these, these vessels at, to the, in the [01:02:00] back half of the war, are chronically less able to actually, uh, defend themselves to survive. Under the extreme stress of the situation of being counterattacked and so on, they're less able to do their job, which is to try and engage, ~you know, ~the, the convoys and so on. Um, and they're, and crucially, they're less able to, to survive in the face of much enhanced technologically, ~you know. ~Brilliant. ~And, and, and, uh, uh, uh. Uh, you know, ~much, much enhanced technology on the other side. So, allied countermeasures were really up to speed. You know, it's much more, it's not much less about defense, it's about actual, you know, going after the u-boats, what they called hunting them to exhaustion, where they would literally, you know, keep at them, keep at them, knowing that they would submerged beneath, beneath the surface, knowing that they had to surface at some point to, to recharge their batteries. Otherwise they would just, they're all doomed at the bottom of the sea. So just waiting for that to happen. Depths, charging them depths, charging them, waiting for that to happen. As soon as they surface, they are the surrender or they're [01:03:00] gonna be shot to pieces. And this is this hunting to exhaustion so that they have the resources and the ability and the technology to do that by the second half of the war. Revolutionary Regimes and Human Cost --- Al: we're over time, but you're the perfect person to ask this question too. And this, we, we were talking about the, the nature of Hitler as a revolutionary regime, and I. The Putin's, uh, the tactics of the Russian army in Putin's war in Ukraine, ~um, ~have made me rethink some of the stereotypes of the Red Army in the Second World War. ~Um, ~you know, or of an age that we heard lots of people, uh, who were to may maybe, ~um, ~you know, ~uh, ~guardian readers, ~uh, or um, uh, ~but in the United States as well, who would say, well, you know, look how much the Soviet Union suffered, ~uh, ~in, in the second World War. And we say, oh gosh, that's a, you know, shucks, that's a really, that's a really good point. That is said. But I realize now of course, it's because talent didn't care about people. ~Um, ~and Putin doesn't care about people and Hitler doesn't care about people. And this is sort of the nature of a revolutionary [01:04:00] regime. ~Um, ~and you can see how. Fatally subversive, that is to success. And just this example of U-boats, ~um, ~the way when you view humans as, uh, replaceable cogs, your training regime, your training doctrine isn't all that. It might not be up to spec and you increasingly then suffer the frustrations of, ~uh, ~having it, you know, blow up in your, basically of, of all your U-boats being sunk or what a third of them being sunk on their made in patrol. I mean, that's one of the consequences of, of running a revolutionary regime, which sees people as dispensable ideological vessels. Roger: Yeah. Absolutely right. And it, ~and it is, ~and it is brutal. And they, ~they are, ~they are just seen as, as expendable, ~you know, ~essentially the, ~you know, ~the generation of young men. Um, and you end up, ~you know, ~of, of the, uh, I think you alluded to this at the beginning, Al, but ~you, ~you know, of the 40,000 men that served in the Uber arm, uh, 30,000 are killed during World War [01:05:00] ii. 75% are killed. ~And it's, ~and it's astonishing. It's the highest loss rate of, Al: it's beyond, Roger: ~you know, it's ~highest loss rate of, yeah. Highest loss rate of any, any, um, arm of service, of any army in, in, in the modern era, I would say. Um, so it, it's quite astonishingly wasteful for one thing. And, but the, ~you know, ~just the way in which that, um, ~you know, ~one thing that strikes me, and I've, I've mentioned this a few times and I've been talking about the book when I was, uh, looking in the, in the British archives, the National Archives in London, um. One really good source of information was these, um, uh, interrogation reports when they used, used to take prisoners from the Ubo arm, and they sort of compile them into, ~you know, ~it was done by vessels. So there'd be, ~you know, ~this is the, the, uh, the surviving crew of U 30, whatever it might be, right? And they would interrogate them, and then they pull all the data together and that produce a report. There are loads of these for 1940. There's loads of them. For 1941, there's 42, 43, there's kind of less 44, there's less. [01:06:00] Again, um, from the middle of 44, there aren't any, right. And the obvious answer to this is they're no longer, there are no longer prisoners surviving a sinking by the middle of, ~you know, ~middle of 1944 because of all the things we've talked about, the countermeasures, the effectiveness of the allied effort and so on, and the inexperience of the sailors themselves. They're just not surviving the engagement. This is why you get that, ~you know, ~that vast swing of the, ~you know, ~the vast numbers of in the back half of the wall, total losses, right? Half of the half of the vessels are total losses. Everyone is killed. They go straight to the bottom. It's The Survivors: Psychological Damage and Aftermath --- Al: Do we? It's shocking. Do we have any sense ~of, ~of. The 25% who survived. I mean, ~you, ~you actually begin to preface with a amazingly fam a family anecdote. And I'm, if I wonder if you could describe that, and I wonder, ~uh, ~how that experience can be generalized Roger: I, yeah, the, the, well, I'll tell you the anecdote. ~Um, ~first, ~um, ~[01:07:00] I'd already started working on the book and ~I, ~I had a, ~um, ~Sunday lunch, you know, with the family, with my in-laws. So my mother-in-law is German. ~Um, and ~I said I was working on a book about the Ubo war and, you know, vague interest ~as, ~as usual. ~Um, and ~then my mother-in-law sort of said, oh, I had a, I had an uncle that was in the Ubo arm, and I kind of like fell off my chair and I said like, how did I not know this kind of thing? And she said, yeah, yeah, yeah. He used to, ~um, ~yeah, he, yeah, he survived. He survived. And he used to come to the house, like when she was growing up and I said, wow, you know, tell me more. Yeah. And she just sort of vaguely remembered this man who used to arrive in the middle of the night. And she said, well, we had to always call the police and the police had to take him away. And we sort of investigated this for, it's quite of a dim, sort of a dim memory. And it turns out that he was one of the, one of the sort of 25% that survived the war, but was so damaged by the experience that he spent the rest of his life in a succession ~of, ~of psychiatric institutions from which he used to occasionally escape and [01:08:00] he'd go to the only place that he knew, which was his sister's house, right. ~Um, where, ~where the, my mother-in-law was growing up and he'd appear in the middle of the night and ~they, ~they had had a standing order, they had to call the police 'cause he never knew what he was gonna do. But now it, to generalize from that, which just goes back to your question. That is beyond the remit of my book, to be fair. I stop it in, in 46 with the, with the, you know, the destruction of the surrendered ebos operation deadline. So that's beyond the remit of the book. But I think it's fair to assume, and I, a lot of the book, ~I do, ~I do, one of the threads that I tease out is this of combat stress ~and, ~and, and how prevalent it was. And that, when I heard that, ~you know, ~fairly early on in the project, I, it just reinforced my, um, I suppose determination is a very sort of pious word, but yeah, a determination thing. There is a, there is a human story that here that I need to try and tease out and bring out because that is a, you know, even for those that survived, this is not a happy ending. ~You know, ~they, they were, they were profoundly damaged by the [01:09:00] experience in many cases. Al: My guest today has been Roger Morehouse. He's the author most recently of Wolfpack Inside Hitler's U-Boat War. Roger, thanks for once again being part of historically thinking Roger: My great pleasure, Al, thanks for having me. Conclusion --- Al: Thank you for being part of Historically Thinking. If you haven't already subscribed to Historically Thinking, please subscribe. If you haven't already reviewed historically thinking on the podcast platform that you use, please review it. But the best thing that you can do to help historically thinking grow is to share the podcast with a friend, or preferably with many friends. I'm Al Zambon and I'll be back next week.