Those same submariners also had the highest non-return (fatality) rate
among the various branches of the navy. This also held true for the
submarine branches of other navies also, most especially the german
navy, The politicians got a very high return on their dollar
(pound/mark etc.) expended. In the US navies case, their were the only
viable fighting force in the far pacific for almost 2 years.
James N. McBride wrote:
Early in WWII about half the US torpedoes failed to operate properly. One of
my uncles was a destroyer torpedo man and was taken off ship and sent to
Penn State University to work on this problem. They built a water tunnel
there (like an aircraft wind tunnel) to do torpedo development work. After
he left the Navy he stayed there and managed that facility until he died at
the ripe old age of 46. /jim
<snip
In World War II, the US Navy spent ~2% of its resources on submarines (all
diesel), and the submarines were responsible for 50% of tonnage sunk. This
was in spite of the somewhat ramshackle nature of the then US submarine
fleet and especially their torpedeos. (For instance, Japanese torpedeos had
about four times the range.)
<snip
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|