The U-boats (Unterseeboot in German or English underwater boat) was probably the most deadly weapon used against allied forces during the Second World War.
This submarine did not use advanced technology, despite being the best submarine built early in World War II. Its technology was practically the First World War. However, its versatility, reliability and training of their crews have made turned into a very lethal weapon of war during the early years of the war.
This can be explained by the fact that the German navy had built secretly in Holland U-boats, so that when the war began, there were about 65 copies ready.
Only in 1942 were destroyed in 1600 allied ships, mostly from the United States of America leading support for the United Kingdom. However, this submarine was unable to avoid radar and sonar, British inventions that were decisive in the campaign at sea against Germany.
The tactic was to navigate the submarine to the surface, submerging the sight of the enemy and track your route and speed. During the night, you could be on the surface and attack the enemy ships. Being underwater, you could make attacks with torpedoes and use the cannon to 88 warning signs. In addition, when they were submerged could detect the sonar and the noises of the boat through passive acoustic sensors that gave them the relative distance and orientation of the emitter.
When the Allied ships were equipped with sonar and radar, the effectiveness of the VII-C decreased gradually to zero. The German manufactured electronic devices to detect the radar, but it was not enough. Nor was it possible to navigate submerged indefinite since the battery does not allow the speed and were very low in water (only eight nodes). TheSchnorkel was used in war, and a part of the solution to the problem of detection by radar, however, there was not sufficient and model submarine, as the C-VII, not used.
During the war, more than 1,097 U-boats were built, was sunk about 785.De Anyway, this type of submarine was the most numerous and most effective of all and meant that Germany had been very successful in the war underwater.
The english version of this article will be available soon. In the meanwhile, the text above was the result of a Google translation from portuguese version to english.
