THE WAR AT SEA
UNRESTRICTED SUBMARINE WARFARE: FEBRUARY 1917
THE THREE CAMPAIGNS AND THE CONVOY SYSTEM
THE BATTLE ON AMERICA’S EASTERN SEABORD: APRIL 1917
Acknowledgements
Intro: spartacus-educational.com War Zone: Wikipedia.com Ships lost to U-Boats: wikiwand.com Pic Left: quora.com by German artist Willy Stöwer Pic Centre: thoughtco.com by the German artist Willy Stöwer Pic Right: sancturies.noaa.gov by Germn artist Willy Stöwer Convoy System: pinterest.com Ships Lost: weaponsandwarfare.com U-Boats Lost: weapons andwarfare.com Freedom of the Seas: nara.getarchive.net Eastern Seabord: curriculumnacional.cl US loses: slideplayer.com Submarines: youtube
The battle of Jutland had proved – if further proof were needed – that Britain still ruled the waves, particularly those in the North Sea. Here, the British Grand Fleet had the German High Fleet well and truly trapped, and its ports firmly closed to vital imports, particularly food and war material. Denied, therefore, the possibility of imposing a blockade on Britain and France by means of surface ships, the Germans resorted to submarine warfare within a zone encircling the British Isles (4th February 1915). Needless to say, this form of attack was very much in its infancy – Germany only had 30 submarines when the war began (against the 50 French and the 75 British), but it soon became evident that, given a marked increase in these under-water vessels, they had the potential to bring both Allied powers to their knees ….. and particularly Britain. The introduction of the submarine was nothing short of a revolution in the nature of sea warfare, and, given time, might well provide the means to victory.
Initially, however, the U-boat, in accordance with the so-called internationally agreed “Prize Rules”, was required to ensure the safety of the crew before sinking its target. This made the U-boat highly vulnerable to attack, and especially so when, as noted earlier, the British introduced Q-ships, merchantmen which, in fact, had a considerable amount of armaments concealed aboard, all of which were readily available to deal with its attacker. As a result, the Germans quickly abandoned these rules and were soon sinking two ships a day. The British Navy, lacking the weaponry and the tactics required to counter this new menace, was virtually powerless. However, this unrestricted submarine warfare resulted in the sinking of an ever increasing number of neutral merchant and passenger ships. As we have seen, matters came to a head with the sinking of the passenger liner RMS Lusitania in May 1915, and the loss of 128 American lives. In face of strong protest from the United States, the German government (not, be it noted, the naval high command), agreed to suspend its first submarine campaign on the 18th September via the so-called “Arabic Pledge”. (The passenger liner SS Arabic was sunk by a U-boat the previous month.)
It was against this background that on the 1st March 1916, despite the suspension put in place in the September, the German naval command gained government support to introduce the second campaign of unrestricted submarine warfare (with passenger liners excluded!). As expected, this caused another outbreak of protest, particularly from the Americans and the Dutch, and, following the sinking of the passenger ferry Sussex on the 24th March, injuring two Americans, the United States again threatened war. As a result, the German government, via another assurance, “the Sussex Pledge”, put an official end to the campaign on the 4th May, but in this short period – less than two months – 52 U-boats were in action and 143 merchantmen were sunk for the loss of 4 submarines. This spate of losses perturbed the British, but opened a promising path to victory for the Germans. Was it not imperative to put this new weapon to good use whilst – as they saw it – time allowed?
On the 22ndxDecember 1916, following close on from the bloody Battle of the Somme and the failure of the German forces to capture Verdun, Admiral von Holtzendorff, the new Chief of Admiralty Staff, produced a memorandum calling for the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare across the North Atlantic. Given an increased number of U-boats on active service, the plan envisaged the sinking of 600,000 tons of merchant shipping a month, an amount that, it was confidently held, would force the British to sue for peace within six months, well before the United States could take any decisive action. In addition, it was hoped that neutral countries, suffering loses or simply fearing loses, would cease trading with Allied members, thereby adding to the blockade. On the 9th January the Kaiser, only too aware that his army was bogged down on the Western Front, and supported by his field commanders Hindenburg and Ludendorff, agreed to the resumption, beginning on the 1st of February. The third, and final submarine campaign was under way. The results were spectacular. Over the first four months an average of close on 630,000 tons of shipping were destroyed, and over June and July more than 100,000 tons were sunk (close on a quarter of all ships bound for Britain). In comparison, U-boat loses were modest. Over the first three months only nine were destroyed The question could be asked – as Admiral Beatty did – are we going to blockade the Germans and bring them to their knees or are they going to do the same to us? In the British navy and the British government there was deep concern about the possible success of the German blockade and the real dangers it posed. Admiral Jellicoe spoke of “the disaster to come”, and in his memoirs, Winston Churchill, one time First Lord of the Admiralty, wrote that an Allied collapse in 1918 “began to loom black and imminent”.
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Facedxwith such a threat, the Allies desperately sought the means to counter this powerful onslaught. Depth charges were improved to some extent, and there was even the development of a primitive sonar device, but it was, in fact, the introduction of the convoy system that turned the tide. There was a large number of pundits who opposed this idea on the grounds that it simply provided an abundance of “sitting ducks” for U-boats out on the prowl – and Admiral Jericoe was firmly among that number – but in fact, the movement of vessels en masse ensured that the submarines, obliged to approach the convoy, were more easily located, and this gave the escorting warships a much better chance of a “kill”, and the merchant ships a greater chance of survival. By May a regular system of convoy was under way, and by August improved tactics were proving successful in destroying U-boats and reducing the loss of merchant ships crossing the Atlantic. From then on the monthly losses never exceeded 500,000 tons, and 5 to 10 U-boats were being destroyed each month. A typical convoy was made up of ten to fifty merchant
vessels, and escorted by a cruiser, six destroyers and a pair of torpedo boats. Assembly points were established along the Atlantic coast of America, and by the end of the year, 99% of convoy ships were safely making the crossing. In addition, a vast number of mines were laid in the Channel and around the entrances to the U-boat bases in Belgium (Ostend and Zeebrugge). And, furthermore, when it came, the entry of the United States into the war greatly increased the number of merchant ships available and under construction.
As was to be expected, the decision by Germany to resume unrestricted submarine warfare in British waters (taken in February 1917) had profound consequences from across the Atlantic. As we shall see, in response to this new campaign, President Wison severed all diplomatic relations with Germany on the 3rd of February and then, strengthened in resolve by the sinking of three American vessels on three consecutive days in March (the U.S. registered freighter Vigilancia, the steamship City of Memphis and the tanker Illinois) – the United States Congress declared war on Germany on the 6th April. This clearly put serious pressure on the Germans, but, at this juncture, they remained confident that the shortage of food in particular, would cause widespread unrest in the near future, and would certainly force the British government to seek a settlement. It was an optimistic assessment but, at that time, it was estimated that Britain only had six weeks’ supply of wheat.
And they were likewisexconfident that a war with the United States would open up yet another zone for Germany’s rigorous policy of unrestricted submarine warfare. When the war did come, six long-range U-boats were swiftly dispatched to the waters of America’s eastern seaboard, where there was an abundance of large sailing boats and small steam ships. Over time (1917-1918) U-boats were to sink close on 190 such vessels, but they also destroyed ten larger ships, including the Diamond Shoals Lightship, the American armoured cruiser USS San Diago, the British tanker SS Mirlo, and the merchantman USS Merak. An area along the North Carolina coast came to be known as “the graveyard of the Atlantic”. However, due to the improved counter measures, they proved of little danger to the Atlantic convoys, and the transport of troops to Europe was achieved without loss.
In the meanwhile, however, confident that unrestricted submarine warfare was the gateway to victory, the Germans extended this role into the Mediterranean, where there was a plentiful supply of Allied merchant ships and a fair assembly of British, French and Italian warships. As we shall see, for close on a year they sank an enormous amount of Allied tonnage, forcing many merchant ships travelling to and from the Far East to avoid the Mediterranean and Suez Canal, and take the much longer route around the Cape of Good Hope. And the Austro-Hungarians also had a measure of success. In mid-May 1917, their warships won the Battle of the Otranto Straits, weakening the Allied barrage that attempted to keep them confined to the Adriatic, and, at the same time, sinking a French and Italian destroyer and badly damaging a British light cruiser. Fortunately for the Allies, as we have seen, counter measures were to prove successful against this U-boat menace.
