Travel the timeline back to the World Wars; what do you see? Archduke Ferdinand, League of Nations Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Atom Bomb, Pearl Harbor? Yes, of course these are a few of the inerasable reminiscences of the most disastrous war in the history of mankind. As you trot about the globe, you come to country of Germany, one in the days of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. What is the first thing that strikes your mind as you think of Germany and the World War II. In all probability, your mind exhibited a myriad of snapshots of the famous U-boats, the titans of the thalassic domain. The iconic submarines of Germany used in the world wars, especially in the second, have taken definitively progressive strides in technology inculcated into the underwater Ulysses.
The Oxford defines “submarine” as a” watercraft capable of independent operation underwater”, which is not to be nonplussed with the “submersible” that is far behind the submarine in applications and usability underwater. Submarines are generally classified as boats irrespective of their size. It is notable that the word “U-boat” which the English baptized German subs as is derived from the German word, Unterseeboot.
Germany has been famed for commanding the largest fleet of iconic models of submarines during the Second World War and it is also a fact that these submarine forces caused devastations of untold multitudes, attempting vainly to cut off Britain from the world by sinking her mercantile vessels. The ingeniousness of the communication tactics pulled off by German forces was extremely commendable, for they had encrypted their plans using the acclaimed “Enigma” machine, which unfortunately led to the downfall of the U-boats too.
The U-boats undertook solo operations, trying to track down enemy ships, shadow them inconspicuously, allowing their counterparts to find the cavalcade, before razing it down at night. Despite the impeccable efficiency and unmatched fighting demeanors followed by the U-boats, they soon fell prey to the ever-growing sphere of technological advancements. Their already frugal triumphs were dwarfed by the invention of radar and sonar which allowed ships to steer away from trouble i.e. wolf pack attacks, in addition to the augmented securities provided to the convoys.
In those days, the submarines needed air to fire up their diesel engines and therefore an array of batteries accompanied every sub for electrical functioning of the U-boats. With the invention of snorkels, however, the ill-effect was substantially nulled. The German Navy to fuel the boats with “hydrogen peroxide”, but the allies thwarted this attempt by developing chemical sensors that recognized residues from the submarines.
Germany’s submarine force has virulently grown from the days of the U-boats and today, the underwater naval force of the nation stands tall and mighty. Post World War, the country was not allowed to have any submarine fleets till 1955, when the Bundesmarine was permitted to command a small force. The 1960s witnessed 450 tons of German steel lurking the waters of the Baltic, looking for Soviet threats. By then, its technology had been upgraded to an extent that they made subs of non-magnetic steel to keep away from maritime mines and magnetic anomaly detectors. A string of failures were faced, such as with the Type 201, but Germany also achieved unbridled successes with Type 205 which was commissioned in 1967.
The nomenclature of U-boat persists through the 21st century too with the advent of Type 212, which has an independent propulsion system powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Italy, Greece, South Korea, Turkey, etc. are esteemed customers of the German Navy’s U-boat. The latest to be commissioned was the U-34 (a Type 212), in July 2006.
Germany has learnt from its past errors and has healed its bruises of the World War-II.
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