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Donitz's Last Gamble: The Inshore U-Boat Campaign 1944-45 Hardcover – July 23, 2008

by Lawrence Paterson (Author)

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By the end of 1943 the German submarine war on Atlantic convoys was all but defeated, beaten by superior technology, code-breaking and air power. With losses mounting, Dönitz withdrew the wolfpacks, but in a surprise change of strategy, following the D-Day landings in June 1944, he sent his U-boats into coastal waters, closer to home, where they could harass the crucial Allied supply lines to the new European bridgehead.

Caught unawares, the British and American navies struggled to cope with a novel predicament - in shallow waters submarines could lie undetectable on the bottom, and given operational freedom, they rarely needed to make signals, so neutralizing the Allied advantages of decryption and radio direction-finding. Behind this unpleasant shock lay an even greater threat, of radically new submarine types known to be nearing service. Dönitz saw these as war-winning weapons, and gambled that his inshore campaign would hold up the Allied advance long enough to allow these faster and quieter boats to be deployed in large numbers.

This offensive was perhaps Germany's last chance to turn the tide, yet, surprisingly, such an important story has never been told in detail before. That it did not succeed masks its full significance: the threat of quiet submarines, operating singly in shallow water, was never really mastered, and in the Cold War that followed the massive Soviet submarine fleet, built on captured German technology and tactical experience, became a very real menace to Western sea power. In this way, Dönitz's last gamble set the course of postwar anti submarine development.

Print length

208 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Seaforth Publishing
Publication date

July 23, 2008
Dimensions

6.75 x 0.5 x 9.25 inches
ISBN-10

1844157148
ISBN-13

978-1844157143
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Peter Cremer
30
Hardcover
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“…recommend highly to anyone interested in submarine warfare of WW2, and for anyone interested in understanding how that effected naval warfare into the 21st Century. …very high quality history.”
IPMS/USA

About the Author

Lawrence Paterson has a long-standing interest in the Kriegsmarine.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Seaforth Publishing; Illustrated edition (July 23, 2008)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 208 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1844157148
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1844157143
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.45 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.75 x 0.5 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #3,205,648 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #5,437 in Military Strategy History (Books)
- #6,936 in Naval Military History
- #8,851 in German History (Books)

Customer Reviews:
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Lawrence Paterson
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I have been writing non-fiction Second World War Kriegsmarine history books since 2000; my first book published by Pen & Sword in 2002.
It’s a subject that has always interested me – not just military history but the Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in particular. This probably stems from both my Grandfathers; one of whom fought in the Australian Army during World War One at Gallipoli, the Somme and Paschendale to name but three, the other in the Royal Navy and Royal New Zealand Navy during World War Two in the Mediterranean Sea, Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Growing up in New Zealand there were many veterans of that conflict that lived nearby and the war still seemed very raw to most New Zealanders even 30 years after its end. However, rather than be part of the ‘black hat/white hat’ approach to Germans and other former enemies, both of my Grandfathers taught me that war is a very complex and personal experience and that most events were ‘shades of grey’. It is rarely a simple ‘good guy versus bad guy’ thing – regardless of whether the cause that soldiers serve is a just one or not. That lesson stays with me today.
The desire to write about the U-boat service first began when I was living near Brest in Brittany, France. I am a scuba diving instructor and spent a great deal of time diving on wrecks left behind by the Kriegsmarine, all in the shadow of the huge U-boat bunkers created in Brest’s military harbour. Encouraged by authors Jon Gawne and Robert Strauss I submitted the proposal for the ‘First U-Boat Flotilla’…and it went from there.
It has since been my privilege to write about many aspects of the Wehrmacht and also finish my first book on Allied forces about the remarkable men of Operation Colossus and the birth of the British Airborne service.
Some of my books have been translated into French, German, Finnish, Spanish, Dutch, Czech, Latvian, Japanese and Polish.
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Lawrence Paterson
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Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5

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William T.

5 stars

Reviewed in the United States on July 16, 2021

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excellent price, excellent service and delivered on time.

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Bayard B.

Very comprehensive book. Describes every U-boat sortie or mission and attack on coastal convoys.

Reviewed in the United States on April 21, 2020

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This is a very comprehensive book on the final U-boat offensive: the attacks on the British Isles inshore or coastal areas in late 1944 / early 1945. The book describes every U-boat sortie or mission and attack on coastal convoys and ships. There is also an analysis of the technological obsolescence of the Type VIIC submarine design and its hoped-for replacement by the new Type XXIII coastal version of the ocean-going Type XXI.

U-boat losses it this final campaign were huge: more submarines were lost than enemy ships sunk. Yet the Germans thought they were reasonably successful because of the vastly exaggerated numbers of ships that had been claimed to be torpedoed and sunk and the long time it took to realize that submarines had been lost. By the time this inshore campaign had begun, the Royal Navy anti-submarine escort groups, in conjunction with the aircraft of Coastal Command, had reached a peak of efficiency. By 1944 the Type VIIC U-boat, with a submerged speed of 7 - 9 knots and a battery endurance of 24 to 36 hours, had little hope of escaping attack by British escorts.

Some other books on related subjects that I think are very good are:

• “The Last Year of the Kriegsmarine: May 1944 – May 1945” by Tarrant (1994);

• “Weapons of Desperation: German Frogmen and Midget Submarines of World War II” by Paterson (2006);

• “Underwater Warriors: The Fighting History of Midget Submarines” by Kemp (1996). Chapters 15 through 17 (approximately 30 pages) describe the German midget submarine designs and attacks in late 1944 / early 1945.

2 people found this helpful

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scott bailey

Little known part of WW2 history

Reviewed in the United States on March 31, 2014

Verified Purchase

After reading this I was shocked at how the german u-boat arm was still operating till the end of the war. Great picyures and maps are seen through out this book. The position of sinking up to the end of the war and mine field that are laid by these subs. This book tells of an offensive towards the end of the war committed by the german navy laying mines around the UK.

3 people found this helpful

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Ralph D. Glashoff

Donitz's Last Gamble

Reviewed in the United States on February 24, 2010

Verified Purchase

Excellent book filling a serious history gap in the last month's of World War 2 involvement of the German U-boats. Well, done!

5 people found this helpful

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Lone Wulf

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on January 23, 2015

Verified Purchase

Great shape/ Great book Thanks

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Ned Middleton

This book fills a gap in our knowledge of the U Boat campaign.

Reviewed in the United States on September 1, 2008

As mentioned in a review of another book by this author, Lawrence Paterson has been writing about U Boats for many years and has already provided a detailed analysis of the 1st U Boat Flotilla, 2nd U Boat Flotilla, U Boats in the Mediterranean and in the Indian Ocean. In this work, however, he turns his attention to the change of strategy by Dönitz as the war in Europe started to reach it's final conclusion.

During the early part of WW2 the U Boat had strived to hold the United Kingdom as a hostage by denying her people much needed resources - including food, from overseas. Because the UK is an island nation, the U Boat became a far greater threat than would otherwise have been the case.

Britain had been slow to respond to this submarine menace which had already been identified as early as WW1. Consequently, the initial U Boat campaign against Allied shipping was very successful. As with all forms of warfare, however, any threat is followed by counter measures to contain that threat and it was not long before the Royal Navy developed a system of coordinated counter attacks which were very successful. So successful that, by 1943, the U Boat was almost defeated in the Atlantic and Dönitz had to completely rethink his strategy.

This continual rethinking culminated in his final plans which were put into operation after the D-Day landings. In a last-ditch attempt by one who is arguably the greatest naval genius ever produced by Germany, to turn the tide in his country's favour, Dönitz sent his submarines inshore to harass and attack shipping which was being used to support the newly created bridgehead into the European continent. No army can march and fight without being resupplied and Dönitz was trying to deny those supplies to Allied troops as they liberated Europe.

Curiously, this is an element of the U Boat war at sea which has never previously been told and has been fully researched and expertly put together by one of the world's leading authorities on all matters pertaining to the U Boat.

NM

11 people found this helpful

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Bowden Russell

Excellent U-boat book!

Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2009

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This book is a "must-have" for the individual who enjoys reading about the U-boat war.

2 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Penn Naim

For the die hard u boat reader

Reviewed in Canada on February 4, 2014

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The Battle of the Atlantic was already lost by Summer 1944, yet Donitz kept sending u boats to sea. And his crews responded by going, although with the knowledge that they probably weren't coming back. Some interesting anecdotes about this late stage of the u boat war, but the book strains to justify the coastal u boat sorties alone as a subject worthy of its own volume. Many of the stories about the u boats and their fates in this book are recounted in other more comprehensive histories, but for the diehard u boat reader there are some good tidbits. The introduction of the new type XXI and XXIII u boats is covered, but it was clearly too little, far too late to turn the tide.