How German Submarines Almost Defeated the Allies - Battle of the Atlantic Documentary

[@historigraph]

Thanks for watching everyone! There will be an episode 2 to this series looking at the Allied comeback from 1942-43 out quite soon. You can get early access to it (typically about a week before the public release) by supporting the creation of these videos on Patreon: patreon.com/historigraph

[@brokenbridge6316]

Nicely done video

[@sangeeta7744]

Please do more submarine related videos they are awesome

[@brokenbridge6316]

@@sangeeta7744---Maybe we can see individual battles from the Battle of the Atlantic.

[@joshuapearson2153]

never really seen how much of an effect the u boats had on the Allied war effort, 40% drop in the number of divisions and a 20% drop in aircraft production. did not know how big a problem it was.

[@cactusman1771]

I would check out the US submarine efforts against the Japanese. It got the results Germany dreamed of.

[@johnpaul3099]

@@cactusman1771 it was against a less industrialised foe

[@cactusman1771]

@@johnpaul3099 Not that much of a difference between Japan and the British isles. Both needed to import a lot of goods from across their empires/allies. Plus Britain is right on Germany's doorstep unlike Japan with America.

[@limelidl3160]

@@cactusman1771 Well it was a big difference Japan did not have really any kind of natural resources. Well the British isles could resycle much more steel and aluminium than what Japan had

[@HeinzGuderian_]

Now consider each ship sunk can no longer be used in the future. The shipment that gets sunk is just a tiny fraction of what that individual ship could carry for the duration of the war.

[@looinrims]

“It’s safe to say the early part of the Second World War didn’t go well for the British empire or her allies.” That’s a British level understatement

[@fizzyb00t]

Indeed. The Axis could've won that war if they hadn't made some serious mistakes.

[@oliverbatt3559]

@@fizzyb00t You could just as easily say that for the British and French at the start of the war had they not "made some serious mistakes" (e.g., the rush into Belgium without sufficient flanking protection in the Ardennes) that resulted in the effective routing of the BEF and elements of the French army. Good decision-making is a real thing, but it's not just affected by insight but also information (particularly asymmetries of information) and misinformation, so much so that it's hard to say luck doesn't also play a major role in determining whether a decision was, in fact, a "good one". Victory in war is often due in large part to good luck on your part and bad luck on the enemy's. Discipline, training, good equipment, intelligence, planning, good logistics and strength in resources all variously shift the extent to which a victorious outcome depended upon luck, but it still needed it (or, at least, an absence of bad luck). In some ways, despite their strong discipline and training and good equipment, it's still surprising that the Axis got as close to victory as they did. Good luck on their part and some bungled decisions on the part of the Allies - early in the war - played a crucial role. Had some units of the main Anglo-French OOB been delayed near the Ardennes or better still placed there along with the few French reserve units, the Battle of France could have played out very differently and historians would write of German overconfidence, recklessness and even foolishness, rather than tactical genius and daring.

[@looinrims]

@@fizzyb00t not really, the strategic situation was untenable

[@flakmag1004]

@@fizzyb00t yeah nah m8

[@doogleticker5183]

To place it in perspective, you have to look at the initial numbers of escort ships available from the RN and RCN, the lack of air cover and patrols, the innovations (e.g., ASDIC, hedgehogs depth charge mortars, etc.), enormous expansion of the escort forces of the RN and RCN, the arrival of air cover, the radical growth in competence of the anti-U-boat forces… The RN and RCN did an amazing job defeating the Kriegsmarine. No educated person would expect any better outcome. The U-boats did their best and killed 72000 sailors, and merchant sailors, but were eventually slaughtered, losing 30000 men (and no women). And if you are an American, don’t be bothered if “Greyhound” is complete fiction: there were no Fletcher-class destroyers escorting Allied ships, but when the USN entered the war, they certainly were a welcomed contribution to the convoy escort effort. To be fair, the ships under the Lend Lease Act, although obsolete, helped the battle before America was at war. Disrespecting either side of this battle does not do justice to the men that took part in this battle to supply Britain and Russia. Read more history!

[@TheWayne8698673]

"They had us in the first half, not gonna lie." - Winston Churchill, 1945, probably.

[@mynamejef7963]

Winston Churchill on December 8th 1941 hearing Pearl Harbor got attacked by Japan: WERE SO BACK BABYYYY

[@feonor26]

@@mynamejef7963 Never understood why Japan did that? The US wanted no involvement and if Japan had stayed away so would the US too probably. I'm glad they attacked Pearl Harbor tho. Who knows how the world would have looked like today if they didn't?

[@mynamejef7963]

@@feonor26 we stopped selling them oil so to continue their war efforts they needed to take over the east Dutch indies, Philippines and basically all of South Pacific, which some were our territories. Japan knew they couldn’t keep up with the industrial power of the us and would lose a long war so the idea behind Pearl Harbor was sink the carriers mainly but also the battleships of the pacific fleet and that would be enough to make us want to negotiate for peace, luckily the carriers weren’t in port that morning and bc of it they pretty much signed their contract for two suns that day

[@AFGuidesHD]

@@mynamejef7963 Churchill in June 1942 after the Japanese wipe out the remaining USN carriers in the pacific: ....oh.

[@comradepivot4570]

​@@feonor26Read the Tanaka memorial, Japan's own mein kampf. It is written that Japan wanted to cover the 8 corners of the world with a Japanese roof (influence/rule) which they started first by attacking Manchuria, Nothern China, Siberia (failed), and then South East Asia which they will cripple the US pasific fleet since they would be such a fuss for the Japanese expansion, and later on attacking mainland United States, and after that the rest of the world.

[@SennaAugustus]

It's often said the Enigma codes were just broken through the work of Bletchley Park, but it's no coincidence that the major breakthrough came in May 1941 with the capture of documents from U-110 by HMS Bulldog.

[@inklinggirl6724]

Glad that someone has gone more deeply into the Battle of the Atlantic and the U-Boats

[@asdfg2941]

The balls on the uboat commander to sneak into scapa flow and sink royal oak is unbelievable

[@ElizabethII-1952]

Gunther Prien

[@wendigo63music55]

Why do Americans equate resolution with testicles? As if women or men with no (or damaged) testicles can't have resolve.

[@oligultonn]

I'm an Icelander and my great grandfathers brother died at sea when his fishing vessel was either hit a mine, was torpedoed or engaged with the deck gun of a u-boat in early 1941.

[@wendigo63music55]

Ok. But, how do you know it didn't just sink, much as many fishing vessels sink in peacetime? Foundered or capsized as a result of rolling the dice too many times against the North Atlantic weather? (I guess it doesn't matter now, everyday tragedy from 80+ years ago.)

[@oligultonn]

@@wendigo63music55 we know because his ship had an actual radio and called for help.

[@Ensign_Nemo]

There were several previously neutral nations such as Norway, Greece, the Netherlands, and Vichy France that eventually joined the Allied cause (usually after being attacked by the Axis) that contributed large merchant shipping fleets. For example, Norway had the world's fourth largest fleet at over four million tons, and about 85% of it escaped and joined the Allies. This shipping made a significant contribution to Allied victory, although these ships could not be replaced during the war as those countries' shipyards were occupied by the Axis.

[@abdullahrizwan592]

The early losses of merchant ships during the Battle of the Atlantic had a profound impact on the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) namely the role and type of ships that it would operate. Because of the U-boat threat (and also Canadian shipbuilding capabilities), the RCN focused on commissioning escort ships mainly the flower class corvettes and later the river class frigates This focus was such that despite having the fourth largest navy by the end of the second world war, Canada had no capital ships and just two cruisers. Along with a few dozen destroyers, the rest of the ships were small and mainly built for escort duty including corvettes (mainly Flower class) Frigates (mostly River class) and minesweepers (Bangor class).

[@Wolfsong27FlyHalfFullHeart]

Germany had an amazing ambush strategy with their u-boats but now as time has become more modern and war weapons and transports became more advance soon came ways to find u-boat well within 2 miles of a ship, there are so many stories during war time which surpass some of the greatest works of fiction because it’s as if the stories are close to home due to most people having a relative or yourself as a defender of your soil, I’m so pleased you tell these stories with such a passion as us the viewers are as passionate about learning about wartime history

[@danreed7889]

This is a very long sentence

[@OrdinaryLatvian]

I yearn for the day you discover the period key.

[@danreed7889]

@@OrdinaryLatvian haha

[@stargazer4683]

but font glorify them geez

[@Wolfsong27FlyHalfFullHeart]

Im still searching for the period key😂 . Found it!

[@brokenbridge6316]

I had heard that the Battle of the Atlantic was one of the few fears Churchill had. And now I have a better idea of why. He was right to worry. But we all know it turned out alright in the end.

[@1stpogo]

Must say I'm rather disappointed the complete absence of any mention of the Royal Canadian Navy in this video, especially from a UK channel. Just some food for thought, the Flower class corvettes you mentioned, 122 were built in Canada alone, not to mention all the other ships built in Canadian yards. By the end of the way the RCN had over 400 commissioned ships, virtually everyone of them committed to the Atlantic.

[@DomWeasel]

Canada never gets the respect it deserves, for either World War. Frankly, I don't know how Canada has good relations with either the USA or the UK considering how its contributions are minimalised or just outright ignored or forgotten.

[@owie3130]

He even mentions the “destroyers for bases” agreement that placed dozens of American military bases in Newfoundland, many used during the Cold War & some of which were active until the late 90s. Let alone the fact that the only known land attack in North America from a u-boat was off the coast of Bell Island, I believe only killing a few cows lol. Would’ve been cool if they touched on that.

[@euanreid6682]

It's typical of them to do so... always taken for granted... by '41 Canada was basically feeding Britain... they never would of made it past BOB if not for the contributions Canada made.... considering WWI and WWII they should have the Beaver and Moose on their money and not the other way around.

[@euanreid6682]

@@DomWeasel The Americans had a standing room only Nazi rally at Madison Square Gardens '39... Henry Ford received a medal from Hitler for his efforts in helping to build the Nazi war machine.... Ford and GM got 33 million $$$ in reparations after the war for the bombing damage done to their German plants... some Americans didn't stop helping the Nazis until Oct '42 when finally the "Trading with the Enemy Act" was eventually passed... that means some Americans like Prescott Bush yeah Bush's grandfather were aiding the Nazis when Canadians were being killed on the beaches of France during the Dieppe Raid... could you imagine the outrage if the shoe was on the other foot.

[@wendigo63music55]

@@DomWeasel Cuz we 🍁 still gotta do business with these people . But I get it from the UK - while they have a slavish obsession with USA, acknowledging Canada's contribution would go too far. And Americans always want to toot their own horns. When they get uppety enough, we remind them of their dismal failure in the war of 1812, and how hockey, basketball and American football were invented by Canadians. 😃

[@parkertitle1923]

This is underrated. Logistics are important.

[@davidhochstetler4068]

This was incredibly interesting. Especially the percentage of strength allocated to the Army dropping by almost half

[@Jon.A.Scholt]

Could not have quicker faster; any day a new Historigraph video drops is holiday!

[@leggdad1]

Thank you for yet another excellent video. My (young) Father served on a US built Captain class frigate loan leased to the RN - HMS Dacres. Not only did this vessel undertake escort duties in the North Atlantic, it also supported the D-Day landings in 1944, and survived the war, before being returned after the war. Without the critical support of the US at this time, we surely would have eventually succombed to the nazi threat.

[@shanemcdowall]

Britain was never in danger of invasion. At the time Operation Sealion was supposed to happen Germany's operational surface fleet consisted of one heavy cruiser, three light cruisers, and five or six destroyers. They had zero landing craft. The British War Cabinet knew this at the time.The passing of the Lend-Lease Act in March 1941 was, however, crucial to Britain surviving. The German invasion of the USSR in June 1941 even more crucial.

[@leggdad1]

@@shanemcdowall Thanks for the response Shane. Only I didn't say we would be invaded, but succumb. If our supplies were cut off, we could not sustain a war indefinitely.

[@maxkennedy8075]

Currently reading “The Battle of the Atlantic” by Jonathan Dimbleby. Fantastic and fascinating look into how two forces, totally unprepared for the war they’d soon come to fight Most ww2 alt history axis victories are just a load of bunk but the Germans actually having the sub numbers Dornitz wanted as the war kicked off is one of the few ways I think the Germans could have forced the UK out of the war

[@bighamster2]

Agreed, although any increase in subs would have come at the cost of something else, so it makes the "what it's" more difficult. For example, without the surface fleet, it makes things like the invasion of Norway impossible. Or with fewer aircraft, it makes the Battle of France more difficult. etc.

[@lightfootpathfinder8218]

Also if the Germans would have commenced a massive U-boat building program in the pre war years the British would have built up their own forces to counter them

[@DomWeasel]

@@lightfootpathfinder8218 The war began with 57 U-boats and 164 Royal Navy destroyers. Considering it was primarily British mistakes like not implementing convoys at the start that led to the first 'Happy Time', these circumstances would likely still have played out even if Germany had 300 U-boats and Britain had 800 destroyers.

[@maxkennedy8075]

@@lightfootpathfinder8218 Thing is the UK was very overconfident in early ASDIC and the ability of planes alone to sink U boats. A great mass of escort boats was seen as an obsolete concept and that takes months if not years to fix

[@AFGuidesHD]

Most posts on the internet are bunk. There's so many realistic alternate pathways Germany had to victory it is quite astonishing that the Americans won as much as they did. Unlike the common assumption about simply american industry == guaranteed victory. American war planners in "Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare" paint a very bleak picture. Pretty much every American victory scenario relied on the Germans losing or remaining in Russia. My favourite bit is that they explain how D-day should not be attempted if the Germans have more than 14 divisions in the Le Havre area. IRL the Germans did have 16 undermanned divisions. I just love how less informed people think the allies could have overcome even 30 well equipped divisions. Never mind the 250 they had in Russia.

[@TheUstasha101]

It's insane to think that just 24 ocean going u boats did this, only 18 u- boats were completed in 1939 and when the war began only 2 per month were built barely covering the loss rate. Production only increased in 1941 just in time for barbarossa and the end of first happy time.

[@jonatanlj747]

Imagine if Germany had built up its submarine fleet more before the war instead of building the surface fleet... that could have made for a crazy timeline

[@TheUstasha101]

@@jonatanlj747 Not necessarily the fully completed ships in 1939 ( they still had their purpose), it was actually the flawed Plan Z program that tied down critical raw materials, dock space, workforce and time in the crucial 1939/1940 period ( it simply prevented the germans from expanding their u boat fleet when it matterd the most). In addition the germans also missed a golden opportunity in their magnetic sea mine (british could not sweep it) until it was captured in 1939.

[@berenger1002]

Great video - I knew that the U-boats caused significant damage but not as extreme as was depicted in this video.

[@Boxmediaphile]

I think the U boats were more closer to crippling Britain in WW1 than they were in WW2

[@lovablesnowman]

And even then that was a result of the pig headed refusal of the Admiralty to implement (or more accurately reimplement) convoys

[@silverhost9782]

Yes, in WW2 they never actually got that close to knocking Britain out of the war, whilst in WW1 they were potentially only a couple of months at most away from forcing the UK to peace out of the conflict

[@xxnightdriverxx9576]

@@lovablesnowman One thing that was not mentioned in this video was how the US basically refused the advice from the British Admirality in how to deal with Uboats at the beginning. Admiral King was not a big fan of the UK and the Royal Navy, thus he refused to implement some features that were standard for wartime britain. Obviously there is the refusal to use convoys along their own coast, as shown in the video, at least in the beginning (why did the order have to come from the president and not the head of the navy?). Another important thing is that the US refused blackouts at night time on their coastal cities. That had the effect that the background light from said cities enabled the german uboats to spot merchant ships at night. Even if those ships were completely dark, they would still create a shadow compared to the background lighting from the coast. That was enough to get a large number of them sunk.

[@ElizabethII-1952]

@@xxnightdriverxx9576 not sure why Historygraph didnt mention that Admiral King was an anglophobe

[@yorkshire_tea6875]

@@xxnightdriverxx9576 Admiral King also refused to allow US officers to be trained how to counter submarine attacks by WATU (Western Approaches Tactical Unit) who created methods proved worked and so got a lot of US service men killed

[@joshuahodge1181]

Absolutely amazing Segway great job.

[@yorkshire_tea6875]

Can not forget to importance of WATU who worked day and night working on how the u boats operated and attacked and the most effective counters

[@avipatable]

Superb, as always. Thank you Historiograph :)

[@zetectic7968]

A fairly good sprint through the early years of the Battle of the Atlantic but it meant there were serious omissions: 1. failed to mention how few U-boats were causing the large losses in the 1st year. 2. Outright hostility by RN to convoy system that had worked so well in WW1 as they wanted another Jutland or Trafalgar. Convoy protection was seen as a waste of resources. ( this error would be repeated when "Bomber" Harris blocked more aircraft from being allocated to Coastal Command) 3. No mention of the painful birth, rapid expansion & valuable contribution of the RCN (Royal Canadian Navy). 4. The 2nd "Happy Time"being the result of the refusal to implement the convoy system and a blackout on the East coast by the US ( see point 2) & the fact that Admiral King hated the English thus didn't want to help as he saw his priority as the Pacific. I know a lot of effort goes in to the videos & appreciate your time and effort however if too brief it can result in a less accurate story.

[@sato0660]

It would be great if this kind of World War II-related content continues to come, the narrative and content are of very high quality.

[@wedgeantillies66]

Great video and brilliant use of statics and factual information to show just how much of a deadly pain in the ass and havoc uboats played with allied shipping and logistics during the battle of the altantic and early efforts that were taken to counter them with limited success. Looking forward to watching the next video and seeing how the allies turn the tide in this battle with new tactics and massive attritional numbers of new warships designed to defend convoys and hunt down the uboats. .

[@nissethepear4743]

This was truly a historiograph

[@Bajirkus]

The U-boat attacks on the American coast were likely the impetus for the construction of the US's Intracoastal Waterway - a network of waterways just inland of the Atlantic that can take a ship all the way from Gloucester, Massachusetts to Miami, Florida with minimal exposure to the open ocean. The route around Florida's western coast is a bit exposed at times, but eventually boats can safely transit all the way to Brownsville, Texas. There's also the Great Loop, which uses parts of the Intracoastal Waterway, and connects the Atlantic Coast to the Mississippi River via canals from the Hudson and canals that eventually take ships to the St. Lawrence River near Montreal or the Great Lakes near Buffalo, New York. From there, ships can head to Chicago and down the Illinois River into the Mississippi River system, giving access to pretty much all of the Eastern and Central time zones.

[@danishkfd]

One of the most crucial battle in the entire war.

[@robgraham5697]

Very nice precis on the Battle of the Atlantic. Looking forward to the next part.

[@chrissan7043]

Love the great work!

[@sof5858]

Josh, you all involved deserves a 👏🏻 I've been subbed for a few years now. The content is getting better in each and every upload. The graphics, research, script, structure, and narration.....all of the highest quality. Well done. Eagerly anticipating Part 2.

[@maxpower9979]

Great video. I have heard a million times the part about Allied ships losses but not the part about its effects on Allied war effort! I would like to hear more about it. Also, you did not mention the total UK and US merchant ship tonnage or number?

[@RouGeZH]

90 millions GRT of shipping sailed for the Allies in 1939-45, 24 millions was lost all causes.

[@bradleywoods1999]

I'd love a series on other seiges of WW2, the videos in the Budapest series were some of the best you've made and we're fantastic to watch. You could do stalingrad, leningrad or Berlin there's so many options.

[@feonor26]

Watch the Norwegian movie War Sailor which is about true events during that time. The Norwegian government in London decided that their best contribution was to give the entire Norwegian merchant fleet to the war effort which was one of the world's largest merchant fleets at the time.

[@andrewsoboeiro6979]

Are the figures for British merchant ship production only for Britain herself, or do they account for merchant shipping built by Canada, Australia, &c?

[@davidfischer7528]

12:18 Wow!

[@sasinator6918]

Some of the best history content on YT. Will you ever make any hoi4 videos ever again?

[@Dayvit78]

Thank you for talking about the impact. It's not often reported.

[@martonpapp269]

I am excited about the continuation...

[@alexsmith-ob3lu]

Well done, as always!

[@dantetre]

6:46 Iceland should have been colored red previously since Brain invaded Iceland in 1940 May. And later transfered it to USA.

[@jehoiakimelidoronila5450]

Ah, the type 14 @ 8:48. Also aptly named "milk cows"

[@stefanebert7171]

Well done!!! Best from Hamburg, Germany

[@jg2382]

Enjoyed this! Thanks for another video

[@chipsawdust5816]

Good videos, just ran across this. Glad to see you got a sponsor as well.

[@EL20078]

Brilliant video! Looking forward to your next one!

[@well-blazeredman6187]

Good video. I have been looking at the escort requirements situation, as it would have faced the Admiralty in February 1939, with war clouds gathering. The numbers I came up with: 351 ocean escorts, and 44 coastal escorts - those being the numbers needing ordering immediately. Quite a shopping list! The good news was that Donitz was being denied the numbers of U-boats he wanted. Donitz - whose memoirs I'm currently reading - was set in his view that the crucial battles were on the trans-Atlantic routes, everything else being a distraction. He came close to winning: he had great successes in the early part of 1943 but then came 'Black May', a disaster he blames on, primarily, the arrival of centimetric radar in Allied escorts and aircraft.

[@bigsarge2085]

Incredible!

[@cuddlepoo11]

Awesome video!!!

[@napoleonibonaparte7198]

Americans were late to adopt the convoy system. They always do the proven right thing last after they've exhausted all other options.

[@DomWeasel]

They didn't adopt it because the British suggested it to Admiral King and King hated the British. His Anglophobia killed hundreds of American sailors.

[@dukeford]

Americans were assisting the Brits and Canadians with trans-Atlantic convoys in 1941. They instituted escorted coastal convoys in the spring of 1942 as soon as they had the ships and crews to do so.

[@jackbailey7037]

"Butal" -- everything in this series is "Brutal!"

[@RemusKingOfRome]

Excellent video, well explained !

[@Silverstream-74]

Excellent video thanks!

[@anthonysmith4784]

Fantastic work Well done 👍🏻

[@mrwigglez11]

Never directly mentioned Canada's contribution to the Battle of the Atlantic... A lot of Canadians gave their lives in that conflict.

[@historigraph]

They feature more in episode 2 of this series, which focuses on the allied response to the U boats

[@mrwigglez11]

@@historigraph Awesome, happy to hear!

[@airdaddy1706]

​​@@historigraphspoiler alert they didn't, not even mentioned once

[@patrickblanchette4337]

5:54 Wait, why has your Battle of the Bulge video been blocked in so many European countries?

[@diegomora1294]

Please for the next video add the operational U Boats in each year 1942, 1943, 1944

[@philiphumphrey1548]

Good video. I think the basic problem was the Kriegsmarine never had enough U boats, especially in the critical period up to the end of 1941 when they had a realistic chance of winning the war. And they were never able to successfully use their surface ships as the other half of a "double whammy". Neither Bismarck, nor Tirpitz were ready when they were really needed, and after invading the USSR in summer 1941, Germany was always short of oil to operate the big surface ships.

[@DomWeasel]

Donitz had informed Hitler before the war that the Kriegsmarine would need 300 U-boats to successfully blockade Britain, in pre-war conditions. When the war began, Donitz had less than a hundred and the majority were small coastal boats only good for operating in the North Sea. With that in mind, what the Kriegsmarine did achieve was quite fantastic. A testament both to the prowess of the German submariners and to the disastrous cock ups made by the British.

[@philiphumphrey1548]

@@DomWeasel Indeed. Before the war most countries were more concerned with surface ships, and building new big ships (2 Scharnhorst class, 2 Bismarck class and the Hipper class heavy cruisers) used up a lot of Germany's shipbuilding resources. But the real problem was that in the 1930s the German navy (Kriegsmarine) was a long way behind the Royal Navy in terms of numbers of all types of ships. If they had invested massively in building U boats before the war, the British would almost certainly have noticed and responded by building more escort vessels and antisubmarine technology instead of battleships and cruisers. Whatever the Kriegsmarine did, they were going to struggle in a naval war with Britain or France.

[@DomWeasel]

@@philiphumphrey1548 One of the reasons Hitler hated the navy was because of their 'pessimism'. Which really meant that they had a grasp on reality. Donitz made his assertion about how many U-boats he would need and Raeder pointed out it would take until 1945 for Germany to build a surface fleet that would match the Royal Navy, and that was only if Britain didn't build a single ship... And as you say, had Germany been cranking out U-boats, particularly the Type VII, before the war, Britain would have responded in kind with destroyers. As it was, Germany began the war with a mere 57 U-boats versus 164 Royal Navy destroyers. But the RN was spread across the world while the Kriegsmarine could focus on the North Sea and then the Atlantic.

[@catholicmilitantUSA]

I truly love your videos Historiograph :D I really do!!

[@bryanoflynn5938]

Thanks

[@coyote4237]

Thank you.

[@robbabcock_]

Fantastic video!

[@doogleticker5183]

The Battle of the Atlantic was from Sept 1939 to May 1945…making it the longest battle of the war.

[@jorhed2285]

Excellent!

[@marinsvec]

As much as i like this channel i must point out that subs were not the main reason of slowing down the production. It was the poor logistics. Many ships stayed in ports for days because there were no workers to load/unload them or waited for convoy departure. Train lines in uk were build from north to south, so getting supplies from west coast to east coast was complicated. "May 42 to May 43 - out of 173 convoys only 16 were severely demaged" Overy - why the allies won Even if half of the ships from those 16 convoys were lost it's still less than 5%. At this time UK almost run out of oil and as you can see, subs were not causing the problem. You can't just look at the sunken tonnage because the most demage was done indirectly. The bauxite problem shows this perfectly. There were physically plenty of bulk cargo ships that could have taken place for the sunken ones, but it took time to arrange it. Sorry for mistakes, not native

[@collinsx62]

Great video

[@nobbytang]

Lucky for the Allies ( us lot) that the radio controlled Fritz bomb was available or developed until 1943 because these were a lot lot cheaper than U boats to build and just as devastating…the Germans sank a newish Italian fast 15 inch gunned battleship ( The Roma) with just 1 bomb….

[@adamtruong1759]

I don't think the Fritz X bomb would affect the Battle of the Atlantic much, in the Med however, I can see the devastation. And Warspite managed to survive a Fritz X despite being a much older battleship, because Warspite.

[@lewiswestfall2687]

Nice segue.

[@craigkdillon]

What is rarely covered or explained is the American submarine war against Japan, and its success in crippling its war industry. The US has kept a lid on its Silent Service, and has not promoted publicizing its accomplishments. Too bad.

[@metagrossman1299]

This same channel also has a video on that from about a year ago. Good video, worth a watch if you haven’t already

[@euanreid6682]

The unsung heroes of WWII were the defenceless merchant seaman... every crossing was pretty much a suicide run.

[@seleukos-5700]

And it's not just ships and tonnage lost, it's also human lifes. We shouldn't forget that. Great video, looking forward to part two!

[@paulwood6729]

Why on earth has that video been blocked in Europe??

[@reiayanami713]

Ah he is back

[@JOGA_Wills]

I miss the old intro music. Set the tone

[@adamtruong1759]

Interesting, this makes me curious to how some people come up the conclusion that Germany didn't come close to winning the BotA.

[@eugenearanovich7405]

Yay! New video!

[@geordiedog1749]

Thanks for at least mentioning the coastal convoys. You also did a good job in your phoney war vid. I’m always appalled at total lack of appreciation of the poor colliers getting slaughtered just a mile off our coast. I’ve put in a proposal for my MA to do the coastal convoys arguing that Churchill sold the colliers down the bog just to keep ‘the home (counties) fires (literally) burning. London required 700,000 tonnes of coal a week and any reduction would have looked very bad to the ‘folks back home (in the SE). Thus the coastal convoys in their ‘dirty British steamers with their salt caked smoke stack’ where hammered by the Luftwaffe and kriegsmarine schnellboots. Sorry….. I’m ranting now. I’ll stop. Great vid. Looking forward to the next bit:)

[@mgytitanic1912]

So am I right in thinking that in Churchill's position you'd have left the South East, with all its towns, villages, cities, airfields, harbours and factories in darkness? Or are you just Churchill bashing becasue it's currently a craze to do so? How exactly did he sell them down the bog? I ask out of curiosity.

[@geordiedog1749]

@@mgytitanic1912 oooh straw man - tastic! - well, kind of….:) So…..I’m arguing that Churchill (who deserves bashing in my opinion but then I’m a damn Trot and have always bashed him so - not trendy:) chose to have the colliers continue to plod on down the coast without proper protection and part - Part - of his motivation was to keep the South East of England ticking over as if the lights/fires/cookers etc went out there it would be more injurious to his authority (that was precarious at the time) than say Exeter. It’s a myth (I admit) that it was solely about SE and Home Counties domestic coal as some colliers actually thought at the time and refused to risk the journey “to keep some posh git from Kensington warm” (Foynes, BotEC - Blyth colliers refused to sail believing this was why they were going) BUT I believe there was a degree of truth to it. Churchill’s lack of regard for the North and it’s workers was well documented. I also think that their lordships at the RN and also RAF planners badly screwed up in their preparations. I’d actually argue that the crabs messed pretty much everything up (this idea came from not reading an email properly for an on line debate during lock down where I thought I was supposed to be attacking the argument that the RAF were ineffective in WWII and realised with a day to go I was supposed to be doing the opposite. Yes, I’m that careless - just ask Mrs Geordiedog!)

[@mgytitanic1912]

@@geordiedog1749 Well, interesting argument to take. Firstly the RAF attempted, at great cost, to protect the convoys. The first few weeks of the Battle of Britain centered around those convoys. Trouble was, the Luftwaffe just had to nip over from France before anyone could spot them. The poor old Hurricane and Spitfires were left circling very slowly at medium altitudes, to conserve fuel, over the convoys. They got themselves bounced half the time. A lot of good pilots and machines were lost protecting convoys. There simply wasn't another to get coal south. The railways couldn't carry enough. Keeping the lights on is part of the job as PM, yes his position was tenuous until September 1940. But the lights didn't play a part. They would have done. You are aware that Spitfires and Hurricanes were built in the South East don't you? They proved very useful to have. The North East also needs to get over its victim mentality. What evidence do you have for this so called lack of regard for the north? Utter nonsense. Yes Churchill made mistakes. He was Human and Humans make mistakes.He was definitely flawed, but he certainly didn't sacrifice ships for his own ego. We had to keep the channel open and a lot of brave RAF airmen died trying to do just that. We were completely unprepared for war, but then we didn't want it. I think your argument the RAF messed everything up is very unfair. There were some bad leaders. People like Portal, and Leigh-Mallory among others. But for the most part they did the best they could, with what they had. It's worth pointing out that in the battle for France the Luftwaffe lost nearly 2000 aircraft, most to the RAF.

[@geordiedog1749]

@@mgytitanic1912 There’s no victim mentality north of the Tyne. Just saying. Anger and stuff… sure. Sunderland…. On the other hand…… No need for being patronising thought. And no need for the attempt on the moral high ground either. If I was looking for that I’d talk to Mrs GD (ah….. casual chauvinism…..). Sorry…. Too many full stops. Must be the pink gins. I love pink gins. More interesting is - would the RAF still have triumphed* if they’d just had Hurricanes. *a chap on here once was convinced that the Luftwaffe won the Bof B. Utterly convinced. Argued like a possessed person that they’d won. Hey ho….

[@mgytitanic1912]

@@geordiedog1749 Given the Hurricane downed more aircraft than the Spit, was more numerous, easier to handle and easier to repair, I'd say yes. The RAF would have won without the Spit. There is a prevailing myth that the Spitfires went for the fighters while the Hurricanes went for the bombers. This is false. Both types were told for the bombers, they were important. Not the fighters. At the altitudes most dogfights took place at the Hurricane was more than a match for the 109, and could outturn both the 109 ans the Spit. As one pilot put it "No pilot ever harmed a Hurricane by turning to tightly". The Spits asset was it was easier to upgrade than the Hurricane. Which is why it became the Tempest and Typhoon. Though it remained in service until the end. I wasn't being patronising, certainly not my intention. I was just proposing counter arguments. As for the argument that the Luftwaffe won the BoB, it was certainly a close run thing. I would say that they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Fighter Command was certainly on its knees towards the end of August. Not just lack of trained pilots, but also the damage to the Command and Control systems. Sector airfields had been badly hit, communications lines severed and gaps in the Chain Home stations. Aircraft production, thanks to Beaverbrook, was outstripping losses. There was a Spitfire pilot who landed his very badly damaged aircraft thinking he'd get a pat on the back for his flying. Instead his crew chief tore him off a strip, telling him he should have thrown it away, as they'd have had a new aircraft by the end of the day. Instead he and his crew now had to stay up all night fixing it. He was much chagrined. On a side note, I might be in the Royal Navy but have never acquired a taste for Pink Gins. A Gin and Tonic, yes. Pink Gin no. You are more than welcome to them haha.

[@Midgeman]

Nice thumbnail 😎

[@g8ymw]

This clearly demonstrates why Churchill said that the Battle of the Atlantic was the thing that scared him most

[@williamashbless7904]

Well, Yes and No. Germany nearly strangled Great Britain by use of their U-Boat War during WWI. The only thing that saved Britain was the introduction of convoys. Why the Admiralty(Naval Command) declined to institute the convoy system for so long is hard to say. WWII saw the need to return to the convoy system except for a horrible shortage of warships to provide protection to convoy ships. More ships were sunk out of convoys than in them. The Flower-Class Corvette’s were successful despite not really being warships. They were derived from North Atlantic whaling ships! Until the Allies were able to provide enough convoy protection (upgrades in RADAR were huge, AirPower sure helped as well), unescorted ships or under-escorted convoys we’re pretty well savaged by the U-Boats. A notable turning point(even though Germany refused to admit) was March of 1941. In ten days top three U-boat aces, Prien, Schepke, and Kretschmer were lost in convoy attacks. It so devastated Hitler that he withheld news of their loss for months and staggered news over months so as not to panic the public. After that, U-boats were shuffled around to areas that hadn’t the resources to institute the convoy system. They did have some successful convoy operations, but those were the exception. So, no, despite, Churchill’s preoccupation with the U-boat menace, their ability to succeed in starving the British Isles was not nearly as acute or successful as it had been in the previous war.

[@fizzyb00t]

This video is very good but could do with more statistics, e.g.: (1) what was the size (in tonnage & ships) of the UK merchant marine in 1939. Ditto for US merchant marine (2) How much money did the Germans and allies spend prosecuting the Atlantic war, both in absolute terms (converted to the same currency for easy comparison, e.g. 1940s USD), and as a proportion of their GDP? Without statistics it's very hard to answer questions like who as winning and by how much?

[@rickjames18]

I didn't realize the Americans could build so many ships and aircraft in such a short period of time back then.

[@DomWeasel]

During the 20s, American industry produced so much it directly led to the market crash of 1929. The automotive industry in the US alone outstripped the industrial capacity of other entire nations.

[@looinrims]

Why has the Bulge video euro banned for so long?

[@LimpVengeance]

Wait why is your channel being blocked in the uk?

[@charliedontsurf334]

At the National World War II Museum in New Orleans, LA, there is a plaque saying that a man had a 1 in 56 chance of getting killed in the armed forces and a 1 in 26 chance of getting killed in the Merchant Marine. o7

[@rajesrecipe2492]

Why did you change the thumbnail ? The one at the beginning was nice with the photo of Churchill.

[@looinrims]

This is quite the new lens to put the naval war in, I wonder what the equivalent numbers for the Japanese would be, if the German effort was this monstrous to the Americans who have almost a continent’s worth of resources

[@arielgoodall8825]

I thought Canada was producing a very large amount of aluminum for the US and UK?

[@rob5944]

Just how much the U boat menace affected production in the US never really occurred to me, nor has it to a great many of our contemporary American friends either.

[@itsharibonph]

It did cause both sides to suffer. US was the supplier for both

[@wesleyy2502]

WW1: Lets use convoys to protect our merchant ships. WW2: Lets have all our merchant ships sail on their own.

[@TrickiVicBB71]

I have to read Jonathan Dimbely's book on Battle of The Atlantic again. But if British Imports dropped below 1.2 million tons. The war effort would not sustained and the civilian population starving as it said in the book

[@dude97x]

Thank you for the video! I am a huge nerd when it comes to German WWII U-Boats and the Battle of Atlantic, and I like your style of making videos, to this is a perfect combination.

[@lilboy3102]

Nice ❤

[@736693]

There’s an article called “What If The Allies Didn’t Break The German Naval Code”. If the Allies had not broken the (Triton) Enigma code, the Allies would have suffered more shipping losses over more time. The Allies would have had greater difficulty finding & destroying the U Boats. The Allied invasions of Sicily & mainland Italy would have been delayed by three months. The Normandy invasion would have been pushed back into 1945;. Getting sufficient tonnage for such delayed ground offensive would have required transferring vessels from the Pacific, thereby postponing operations in that theater as well. Greater Allied shipping losses would have delayed if not outright frustrated lend lease to the Soviet Union. Dare I add my own hypothetical or theoretical & say that the US 8th & 15th Air Forces would have taken longer to fully participate in the Combined Bomber Offensive. This is because greater Allied shipping losses would have included the loss of more Allied planes that were being transported by Allied ships. Also, planes & pilots from the US 8th & 15th Air Forces might have been diverted to providing air civet for Allied ships or convoys traveling between North America & Europe (& vice versa) plus finding & destroying U Boats INSTEAD of bombing or strafing missions against Axis armed forces in mainland Europe & North Africa, or such missions over Axis occupied territories in mainland Europe & North Africa.

[@saturnv2419]

Hitler probably will never understand why Dönitz, whose son was lost in a U-boat, had said your war will not be won on land by over the sea.

[@WelcomeToDERPLAND]

With such massive losses caused by submarine warfare on the allied supply lines, its hard to consider any other single aspect of the enemy having a greater toll on the allied war effort overall, goddamn.

[@DomWeasel]

Germany lacked strategic bombers so U-boats did to Allied production what Allied strategic bombers did to Germany. Imagine if Germany had developed an effective strategic bomber...

[@WelcomeToDERPLAND]

@@DomWeasel Even if they had developed something comparable to the flying fortress, they didn't have the manufacturing power to keep control of the skies after the U.S joined the war in north Africa, after D-Day the Luftwaffe was basically playing defense for the rest of the war and it wouldn't have air supremacy ever again- making something like a strategic bomber useless to them. Now if they had it before the war started--- then Britain would have been in for a muuuuch harder thrashing during the battle of Britain than it did in our timeline, perhaps even operation sealion would have gone through.

[@DomWeasel]

@@WelcomeToDERPLAND I meant if they had strategic bombers at the start of the war. While the Blitz is a big part of British culture, it only killed 40,000 people and failed to make any appreciable impact on the British economy. The only real effect was to ensure that manufacturing remained dispersed which caused a short delay in aircraft manufacturing, but not significant. Conversely, Allied bombing raids wiped entire cities off the map and killed more than 40,000 people in a single night. If the Germans had possessed strategic instead of tactical bombers, they could have done measurable damage to the British war economy; enough to affect the outcome in North Africa perhaps. The Luftwaffe was playing defence long before D-Day. German fighters were deployed all over Europe for air defence and couldn't shield Germany from British bombers during the first part of the part. By Christmas 1942, the Red Army Airforce outnumbered the Luftwaffe on the Eastern Front 3 to 1 and that was before Kursk destroyed considerable numbers of German aircraft that couldn't be replaced and many German planes were diverted to Italy after the Sicily landings. If Sea Lion had happened, it could only have benefited the UK. Germany didn't have dedicated landing craft, nor the transport capacity to supply troops that got ashore. Not to mention that after Norway, the Kriegsmarine had lost a fifth of its destroyers leaving very few vessels to support an amphibious landing.

[@Brslld]

​@@DomWeaselthe failure of the blitz can be blamed with the huge part on the luftwaffe high command and tactics. Not the bombers.

[@DomWeasel]

@@Brslld A Ju 88 could carry 28 50kg bombs internally, with a couple of 250 or 500kg under the wings. The additional bombs under the wings weren't carried during the daylight raids on the UK so that's only 1400kg or 3000 lbs of firepower. A Heinkell He 111 could carry 1700kg or 3700 lbs of ordinance. A British Vickers Wellington medium bomber of comparable size carried 2000kg or 4500 lbs. The big four engine bombers used later in the war increased the gap even more. A B-17 could carry 3600kg or 8000 lbs. A Lancaster bomber could carry 5400kg or 12,000 lbs. The Luftwaffe was built with ground support as their primary mission. This was why their standard bomb was a small 50kg, to dropped to saturate enemy positions. Excellent for use as air artillery but not ideal for destroying buildings. And this is before we consider the monstrous conventional 'earthquake' bombs the British devised that were used to destroy heavy German fortifications, like u-boat pens, which had previously been thought immune to any kind of attack.

[@dumptrump3788]

The savage Darwinism of warfare meant that the U-Boats were always going to have a head start, but British weapons & tactics would evolve in response. Not mentioned here is the use of "Huff-Duff", or High Frequency Direction Finding (HF-DF) that allowed the locating of U-Boats long before Naval Enigma was cracked. Convoys were simply routed around them. There was enough capacity in the UK war economy to overcome the losses from U-Boats & survive long enough for the battle of the Atlantic to turn in Allied favor. While U-Boats were undoubtedly potent against a country such as Britain, with it's reliance on imports/exports, submarines are very vulnerable to attack either surfaced or submerged. While the Allies could replace their losses it's often overlooked that Germany could not, both in terms of material & personnel. Hitler never thought he'd have to fight Britain for an extended period of time & didn't prepare accordingly. To prepare his submarine fleet would've taken resources from elsewhere, meaning less surface ships, less tanks, less aircraft, less guns for his vision of Lebensraum in the East. Occupied, as such, with taking out the UK Stalin might've looked at the situation & tried to placate Hitler with further, deeper economic ties....or he might've launched his own invasion through Poland based on the belief that it was better to strike early & avoid facing a stronger Germany in the future when the UK had sued for peace. It's easy to play "Alternative History" & end up with Germany winning if things had been different. But then if the world's most advanced atom bomb project had been given the resources it needed we might've had a modified Lancaster turning Berlin into a wasteland with one bomb.

[@historigraph]

yea more of the allied successes are covered in the second part

[@benwilson6145]

It wasn't just about ships , it was the men who manned them, sadly not mentioned. The Merchant Navy lost a bigger percentage of men than, the RAF, RN or Army,