War at Sea (WW2)?

Question

I have been asked to summarise the 'War at Sea' during WW2 for a piece of History work. There is an arrow pointing from the War at Sea box to the Atlantic Ocean (presumably to show that the summary should focus on that in the Atlantic and not elsewhere), but I do not know what is meant by 'War at Sea'--could somebody either provide some information or a summary?

Answer 1

One of the many contributing factors to Brtiain's alignment with France in WWI had been a naval race between Germany and Britain, in which Germany, not content with its military predominence on the Continent, began to build a significant blue water navy capable of challenging Britain's predominence at sea.  That navy met the British navy in only one major confrontation at Jutland, which  was relatively inconclusive, and then permanently retreated from the North Sea for the balance of the war.  Germany then concentrated its efforts on submarine warfare, seeking to interdict supplies to the Allies, with some success.  When the war ended, Germany was prohibited from building large capital ships by treaty and severe restrictions were placed on submarines as well.

Come the run-up to WWII, Germany was possessing of a few small capital ships like the Gneisenau, the Prinz Eugen, the Grat Spee and the Scharnhorst, which were classed as "pocket battleships" more powerful than comparable cruisers, but less well armored than first line battleships which were the dominant element in the British navy.  Germany was also building or had just completed a couple of major capital vessels in violation of treaty agreements, the Bismarck class.  There were also plans, at one point to build a couple of aircraft carriers that were to additionally be fitted with two big gun batteries on opposite corners fore and aft--a compromise design necessitated by the German's not having enough surface ships to provide adequate escort for a carrier, but still in need of some defense against light cruiser and destroyer attacks.  However, these never got off the drawing board.

So it was, when Germany entered the war, it was badly outgunned in terms of surface ships, and its U-boat fleet was really not all that large either, and mostly antiquated.

The British did have a carrier force, in the Ark Royal, but even it was fitted with antique WWI-design Swordfish biplanes--torpedo planes that, when armed, lumbered along at a slow and stately  rate that made them vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire.

The French also had a fleet, fairly substantial really, that was promptly interned in Vichy controlled North Africa when the war broke out, and both the Germans and the British attempted to gain control of it.  When it became unclear what might actually happen to this fleet, the British sent a squadron down to demand its surrender or be sunk in port.  In a controversial move, the British opened fire on the French ships when surrender was not immediate, and sank the lot of them, killing many French sailors in the process.

Italy too had a fleet, and some pretty impressive capital ships along the lines of the Bismarck, from which designs were liberally copied.  However, as the British had substantial naval resources in the Mediterraean to protect trade rounte through the Suez Canal and its forces in Egypt, the bulk of the Italian fleet never ventured out, and many of the ships were sunk in their harbors as the war progressed.  The Italians did, however, enjoy some considerable success with small fast torpedo boats in sinking or severely damaging a number of British ships in the Mediterranean during the war.

So when the war began, Germany made early attempts to get its pocket battleships and eventually the Bismarck and its sister ships to sea, not to take on the British capital ships, but as commerce raiders to interdict supply lines.  These were mostly hunted down and destroyed, although not always before they had inflicted some considerable damage.

The major naval contest in the Atlantic, however, revolved around Germany's rapid build-up of technologically advanced U-Boats , the Type VII and Type IX boats that had great cruising range and substantial armaments.

Through late 1942 or early 1943 the U-boats inflicted enormous damage on Allied shipping in the so-called Battle of the Atlantic.  Britain emplyed convoys guarded by inadequate escort vessels, some of which were aging WWI destroyers lent to them by the U.S. under the so-called lend-lease program.  Many of the escorts were not even fast enough to catch German U-boats conducting hit and run attacks on the convoys on the surface and then fleeing.

Gradually, however, and with the U.S. entry into the war to help the British, more and faster ships became available.  The British also began to field some extremely deadly and long-range anti-submarine aircraft that could swoop in and attack when the U-Boats came to the surface to recharge batteries, take on air, or attempt their far more effective surface attacks (stalking from underwater being far too slow to be effective in interdicting faster moving conoys.

Additionally, escort carriers were built carrying a few attack planes to keep air cover over convoys out of range of land bases.  ASDIC, a precursor to sonor helped find U-boats.  Forward projecting depth charge launchers made hunters more effective.  Cracking German Enigma codes made submarine movements more predictable, and after the invasion of France following D-Day, Germany lost its forward U-Boat bases in France  Still, even before that, the U-Boats were suffering horrendous losses my mid-war, which Germany could not sustain.

Answer 2

http://www.war-experience.org/collection...

Answer 3

This may be a little bit too much but if you want to understand what seapower is all about read Alfred T.Mahan's book "The Influence of Seapower on History."

    Ships got the food, fuel, weapons and troops where they needed to be. The Allies warships supressed the ability of the Axis' ships to prevent the Allies from getting the supplies over. Also for amphibious assaults Allied warships provided powerful mobile artillery platforms to supress the beach defenses. Also in a new role aircraft carriers provided mobile landing platforms for airplanes to provide support to troops as well as defending other ships.

  That's it in a nutshell. Good Luck!!

Answer 4

Well, if you have been assigned to exclude the Pacific ar, then the Atlantic War at sea had a couple of really critical fights.  The biggest, longest and most critical was the so-called Battle of the Atlantic,  which was the struggle to supply the British (and the Soviets, later on) with equipment and weapons from North America.  The Kriegsmarine employed U-boats and merchant raiders in efforts to sever that line of supply, and in the first portion of the war, they were pretty successful.  By 1943, however, the strategy of convoy and the increasing effectiveness of new technologies like sonar and radar helped swing the tide (as it were), and the Kriegsmarine began taking heavy losses among their U-boats from destroyers as well as aircraft.  By early 1944, the sea lanes to Britain were increasingly secure, and even the run up to the Soviet port of Archangel was becoming somewhat safer.  he Battle of the Atlantic was won by the Allies due to mass, technological advances, and adaptive strategy.  Other than that, there was the sinking of the Bismark and a few other smaller fights, but the Battle iof the Atlantic would be the key.