Convoys of the Second World War
Sinking some 5,000 merchant ships at a cost of an approximate 15,000 Allied lives, Germany’s formidable U-boat fleet nearly brought Great Britain to her knees during the early years of the First World War, forcing merchant and naval vessels to band together to move desperately-need war materiel and fighting men across the Atlantic and other formidable oceans.
Q-ship Decoys
The Allies also employed Q-ships, which were lifelike decoys designed to draw U-boats into unsuspecting traps for ambush and destruction. Nearing the end of the war, Germany developed even longer range U-boats that threatened shipping off the East Coast of the United States, sinking thirteen ships off the coast of Florida in May of 1918 alone, prompting Congress and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to develop the Intercostal Waterway system in 1924, for the protection of ships in the event of future world wars. After Japan’s unprovoked attack on American naval assets at Pearl Harbor, by the dawn of 1942, the U.S. Navy had only 81 ships to help the Allies fend off the growing U-boat menace, prompting German Admiral Karl Dönitz to ramp up wolfpack attacks on Allied shipping.
Fast and Slow Convoys
Resuming the convoy tactics of WW1, merchant and naval ships formed up into fast convoys versus slower ones, consisting of 45 to 60 ships on average, although the largest during the war made up some 166 ships. Steaming in nine to twelve columns with 1,000 yards between columns and 600 yards between ships, due to their inherent vulnerabilities, oilers and munition ships were placed in the innermost columns, with the convoy commodore, as he was known, as the lead ship in the center column. The convoy system also maximized the efficiency of shipping operations, wherein ships within a convoy could share resources such as fuel and supplies, making the overall transportation process more sustainable.
Improvements in Warfare Techniques
Fast convoys usually zig zagged to complicate a U-boats’ targeting abilities, while slower convoys usually steamed straight ahead in the interest of speed. By May of 1943, however, antisubmarine warfare techniques had turned the hunters into the hunted, including improvements in radar, sonar, radio direction finders, magnetic-detection equipment, anti-homing torpedo devises and hedgehog depth charges, leading to an Allied victory during the Battle of the Atlantic. Despite their ultimate success, the Allies paid an extremely high price for victory, losing 3,500 merchant ships and 175 warships by the Japan’s surrender, making convoys of WW2, one of the most instrumental tactics of the Second World War.