WHY GERMAN NAVY FAILED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22243, 31 January 1947, Page 5

WHY GERMAN NAVY FAILED

NOT PREPARED AERIAL ATTACK RADAR INADEQUATE LUFTWAFFE WEAKNESS (11 a.m.) LONDON. Jan. 30. Germany in one sense lost the war before it began because Germany was never prepared for a naval war against England, according to Admiral Doenitz in historical documents dealing with Germany’s naval war published by the British Office of Naval Intelligence. Naval War Not Envisaged The documents comprise an essay by Doenitz covering the whole course of the war and also appendices, one of which reports the interrogation of Doenitz in September, 1946. Doenitz in the essay attributes the inadequacy of the German Navy to the fact that the German armed forces were designed for a Continental war with England, either neutral or on the side of Germany. Germany never envisaged the possibility of a naval war against England until 1938 because the Government was ill-advised politically. Doenitz says Germany’s failures to invade England, to occupy the Eastern Mediterranean, and to prevent the Allied invasions of North Africa and Europe were all due largely to inadequate naval forces. U-Boat Production Delay A factor in the last months of the war which contributed most directly to Germany’s collapse was the overwhelming Allied aerial bombardment, which, among other things, delayed the production of a new type of U-boat.

Doenitz says Germany failed before the war to recognise the significance of radar, which was a decisive disadvantage in the conduct of the war at sea. Doenitz criticises Hitler's decision to form flying units needed by the Navy within the framework of the Luftwaffe, which precluded the formation of an efficient naval air arm.

Doenitz says the destruction of the British Expeditionary Force in France and the weakness of the English land defence “caused us to entertain the idea of deciding the war in our

favour by rapid invasion of England.” Hitler, therefore, began to prepare an attempt at invasion before the autumn of 1940, but decided to abandon the invasion when the Luftwaffe failed to defeat the R.A.F.. since it was clear that the German Navy could not protect the invasion forces against the Royal Navy.

Doenitz said that when the battle of the U-boats ended, 30,000 men had been lost out of a. total approximate strength of 38,000. Germany had expected in March, 1945, that the U-boat warfare would enter a new successful phase with the operation of the new typo of prefabricated U-boat. One type had a range of 20,000 miles, and was capable of scouring all the waters of importance to the U-boat war without surfacing, but “the German capitulation cut short this new effectiveness.’’