A History of Anti-Submarine Warfare
Since
World War Two the Royal Navy has been the acknowledged master of anti-submarine
warfare. With a capability and knowledge forged in the fiery waters of
the Atlantic in the last war and started in the home waters of the first,
it is a role that formed the corner stone of NATO's ability to deter a
possible Soviet threat. Creating safe passage for essential US and Canadian
reinforcements, countering the submarine launched missile threat, and insuring
that the UK's sea routes remain open were all part of the RN's wartime
role.
ASW
is difficult, requires a high degree of training and professionalism, up-to-date
equipment and involves action where the hunter can become the hunted all
too quickly and the battle is fought using only sound and radar. It has
none of the glory or glamour of traditional battle fleet actions; no new
Trafalgar awaited the Cold War silent service in the icy depths of the
Greenland-Iceland-UK gap. They face hour upon hour of mind numbing search,
fraught nerves and sudden action that may see the destruction of an enemy
submarine or the loss of a convoy charge. In short the Royal Navy's hot
war would have been a more deadly, more destructive, nuclear version of
the Battle of the Atlantic, a battle they came so close to losing.
It
is one of history's ironies; the very navy that would fight the largest
submarine battle in history (perhaps the greatest naval battle of history),
was the victim of the very first submarine attack. The 'Turtle' was conceived
as an after thought by David Bushnell to transport the real weapon, the
first underwater charge. The attack launched on 6th September
1776 was unsuccessful in damaging the target HMS Eagle. As the pilot Ezra
Lee tried to make good his escape he was spotted. To avoid chase he detonated
the charge in the water, which provided a sufficient demonstration of the
threat the Turtle posed and the fleet weighed anchor and moved out of New
York Harbour. There was a follow up to this in the war of 1812, when HMS
Ramillies was attacked by a copy of the Turtle but again was unsuccessful.
A century was to go by before the submarine threat reared its head again
and this time it came with guns and torpedoes.
The submarine, like so many other new innovations in weaponry, was scorned by the British. It was seen as an under-handed and sneaky device, and nothing more than a toy: not for the Admiralty this ungentlemanly weapon. Grand battle fleets of dreadnoughts and cruisers were the order of the day, patrolling the Empire, spreading influence and security and countering the threat of battle fleets from traditional enemies like France, the United States and Russia, as well as the new and emerging threat of Germany. It was a policy that would cost Britain dearly during the Great War. While the German battle fleet ventured out only once to face the Royal Navy at Jutland, the German submarine threat demonstrated that the White Ensign no longer ruled the waves. Striking with impunity at coastal shipping the U-boats chalked up many thousands of tons in British shipping losses. The Admiralty quickly learned the value of convoys and air protection and the U-boat menace was put on a tight leash. The war ended before greater technological advances could be made in anti-submarine warfare and the Royal Navy returned to its Imperial duties, the submarine menace being buried in the text of the Versailles Treaty.
A few projects did continue very slowly between the wars, including the development of anti-submarine weapons such as depth charges and bombs, and ASDIC. This was developed towards the end of the Great War by the "Allied Submarine Detection Investigation Committee", from which the equipment takes its name. But the lessons were forgotten, the convoy system abandoned and the notion of air-cover ignored: it is worth mentioning that while WW1 aircraft and balloons lacked the ability to attack U-boats, their presence prevented attacks and no convoy with air-cover in WW1 was attacked. World War 2 saw the Royal Navy thrown into the full whirlwind of U-boat capability.
The
Germans had developed longer ranged ocean capable submarines with well-trained
and high morale crews. Shipping losses, both civilian and military, were
immense and during the middle of the war outstripped the production ability
of the Allies. If there was one single theatre where the war could have
been lost, even if victory was achieved else where, it was the Battle of
the Atlantic. Convoys were quickly established, ending what the German
U-boat crews called their "Happy-time", but the early war years saw many
major warship losses including the battleship HMS Royal Oak in a daring
attack within Scapa Flow. The aircraft carrier HMS Eagle was lost in the
Mediterranean as was one of the prides of the Royal Navy, the large fleet
carrier HMS Ark Royal. Technology continued to develop, as did the vessels
carrying it. The Royal Navy, while not defeating, or by any means controlling
the U-boat threat, had made inroads into protecting convoys and awaited
better equipment by the time the Americans entered the war.
The
"second happy time" as it was called by the U-boat crews, lasted from January
until June 1942. U-boats had free reign over the US coastal waters and
the US Navy, forgot the lessons of WW1 and also ignored the lessons presented
to them by the RN in the first 30 months of the war! Things got worse before
they got better, but by war's end the clumsy, stomach churning, corvettes
with their poor armament, crude ASDIC and zero night ability had been replaced.
Purpose built frigates carrying all the latest ASDIC and listening devices,
RADAR to provide capability at night and a full array of weapons that would
almost ensure destruction of a U-boat if caught were escorting convoys
safely across the Atlantic.
Crews
were highly skilled and dedicated, the first true ASW expert officers were
commanding ships, and in the air dedicated aircraft of the RN, RAF, RCAF
and US Navy were sweeping the sea lanes clear of U-boats long before the
convoys arrived. The lessons had been hard learnt and forged in the death
of thousands, but by 1945 the RN had been changed forever. No longer was
it an Imperial yacht club of heavily armoured capital ships, but a modern
ASW capable force truly able to maintain the sea lanes that Britain desperately
depends on to this day and ready to meet the challenge of the Red Bear
and the most powerful submarine force ever assembled.
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