GERMAN U-BOATS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 305, 27 December 1939, Page 7

GERMAN U-BOATS.

SECRET BUILDING.

Orders Placed In Foreign

Shipyards.

DUTCH, riNNISH, SPANISH.

German submarines were being built in foreign countries—in Holland, Finland and Spain—years before the war began, according to Maurice Prendergast, in an article in the November number of "The Navy," organ of the Navy League.

The disarmament of Germany under the Versailles Treaty included a strict injunction that she should not build or acquire any further submarines for her fleet. Though she could not touch the weapon so prohibited (says Mr. Prendergast), she kept within reach of it, against that day when she could snatch it up again and brandish it defiantly in our face. Despite the Versailles prohibition, submarines continued to be built to German designe and by German labour—but they were built in shipyards outside the frontiers of the Third Reich!

First of all, there was established in Holland a concern known as the "Nederlandsche Ingenieurskantoor voor Scheepsbouw," which title may be translated as the "Dutch Technical Centre for Shipbuilding." Outwardly it was a Dutch organisation, "but inwardly it contained a etrong assembly of German naval architects and technicians; all proficient in the designing and building of war vessels. Most significant was the fact that the presiding genius of the N.I.V.S. was no other than the famous Dr. Techel who, during the war of 1914-18, had been Chief of the Submarine Building Branch of the great Krupp-Germania shipyard at Kiel.

Skilled Labour Supplied. In 1927 a Dutch firm produced, under the auspices of the N.1.V.5., two submarines for the Turkish Navy. They were pretty well replicas of the "U. 8.111. Type" which had been built for the Kaiser's) Navy in 1916-18. Next came the acquisition of a large share in the Crichton shipyard at Abo, Finland, by the German Vulkan A.G. of Stettin, whereupon the production of submarines for the Finnish Navy was begun. The construction of submarines is a highly specialised branch of shipbuilding; it requires expert design, competent supervision, skilled labour and special plant.

No such talent and equipment existed in Finland in 1929; they had to be acquired from abroad. It was the N.I.V.S. at The Hague which provided the necessary plans and technical knowledge; the requisite skilled labour and plant were transferred from Germany to Finland.

In 1930 the Crichton-Vulkan firm began to build a small submarine to the order of nobody in particular. Following this came news that the firm of Echavarrieta y Larrinaga at Cadiz, in Spain, was building a mysterious underwater vessel which had not been ordered by any Government. For her building "plans and material were being imported from Holland."

The designs, once again, were the pro duct of the N.I.V.S. Rumours ran cur rent about this time that certain Ger man "patriotic societies" had been provided with funds and were making attempts to get submarines built in shipyards outside Germany.

' It was therefore suspected that these Finnish and Spanish vessels, which were alleged to be pure speculations on the part of their building firms, were actually "pattern boats" which were being created to serve two purposes. The first was to test the rapidity with which identical vessels could be assembled in German shipyards; the second was to prove the sea performance of new types before they were put into production. Disguise Dropped. After this, large contracts were placed with German marine engine builders for sets of high-speed Diesel engines, and the outside world was told that such machinery wae required for "new coastal shipping." Sectional parte for construction of submarine hulls were quietly collected in the German yards— and then all disguise was dropped. Germany declared that she had resumed the construction of U-boats.