in the battle of the atlantic..?

Question

why was it important for britian and the world?
why did the brittish win in the end?
pls help
DOM XX

Answer 1

The Battle of the Atlantic was won at Bletchley Park, where Alan Turing's "bombes" and other ingenious equipment decoded the supposedly unbreakable German "Enigma" and similar code messages. These revealed the locations of the U-boats, and critically of the huge supply U-boats which were meant to enable them to remain on patrol in the Atlantic for months at a time.

Other offensive measures such as air cover and sound detection kept improving, too, but without the codebreaking it is not at all certain that the convoy system could have been kept going for long enough to build up the supplies for D-day. It would have been another "damned close-run thing".

Answer 2

At the time of the Battle of the Atlantic in WW2, Britain stood alone in Europe against the Nazis. France had been occupied and plans for the invasion of Britain were well advanced.

The USA was supplying Britain with food and armaments and, of course, this was coming across the Atlantic. It was therefore critical that the sea lanes were kept open to keep the resources flowing into Britain.

The reason the British won in the end is actually two-fold (it is far more complex than this, but these are the basic reasons). Firstly the Navy and RAF managed to disable, destroy or keep out from the Atlantic the powerful battleships that the Nazis had built (Bismark, Scharnhorst, Tirpitz, Prinz Eugene). Secondly, air support became better as aircraft had the ability to fly longer ranges and anti-submarine tactics improved, so that convoys often had air cover as well escort cover in the latter stage of the battle.

Answer 3

Shunt and all the others are correct. Let me add a little though. Firstly the Battle of the Atlantic (1939 to 1945) was won (barely) by the combined forces of the UK and the USA.

The importance of the Battle (and the quote from Churchill is correct) was simply this: the Germans came very close to destroying the entire 'free world' merchant fleet. Warships count for a lot in war, as do soldiers and aeroplanes. But merchant ships carried the petrol, the machine parts, the ore, the food, and the weapons from the place where they were produced to the place where they were needed.

The ability of the US manufacturing miracle to keep the British - and the Soviets - supplied with weapons and ammunition depended upon their being sufficient ships to get the stuff to where it was needed. If the number of ships sunk exceeded the number being built over a long enough period, then the British would have been unable to continue the fight in North Africa which would have (very likely) resulted in the Middle East falling into German hands, and a link up of the Japanese and the Germans in an India racked by famine (for lack of imported grain) and rebellion.

The conduct of the Battle is an extraordinary story, not just of convoys and destroyers and flying boats, but of shipbuilders (particularly in the USA) and the strategists (the Combined Chiefs of Staff - US and UK). The strategists (Marshall in the US and Brooke in the UK) had to balance the need to build merchant ships with the need to construct more convoy destroyers, with the need to build landing craft (and ship them from one invasion (North Africa, the Pacific and Normandy) to the next). All the while Brooke and Marshall had to balance the need to keep up the pressure in the Pacific against Japan, while advancing the invasion of Europe as quickly as possible in order to keep the Soviets in the War (on our side).

The key factors in winning the Battle were the convoy system, the ability of the US to increase ship building (using novel techniques like ferro-cement), and the ability (later in the war) to provide continuous air-cover over the convoys from bases in Newfoundland, Iceland and Northern Ireland, as well as from special convoy aircraft carriers. The greatest factor though was the ability of the allied strategists to organise all of these elements while still keeping up the minimum necessary supply lines around the world (not just the Atlantic).

If you want just one book that tells the story 'from the inside' get a copy of 'Yankee RN' - it's out of print but readily available second hand. It is an absolute classic true story of a Wall Street banker who enrolled in the British Navy at the outbreak of World War 2.

Answer 4

The Battle of the Atlantic was vital to maintain trade links between the UK and the USA. Britain won in the end first because of the convoy system with merchant ships protected by destroyers etc whcih could seek out and try to sink u-boats. The system was fairly brutal in that there was no stopping to pick up sailors, (merchant or navy) whose ship was torpedoed. As the war went on, the technology for finding and destroying u-boats became more and more sophisticated including aircraft which were on permanent patrol and which were equipped with equipment to locate subs and destroy them

Answer 5

Least we not forget the severe attrition of the Kriegsmarines in the u-boats. They were limited in their abilities to build new subs and train qualified captains. Also the U.S. coastguard cutters had the technology of sonar. This improved as the war dragged on. The ability of long range planes to finally eliminate the "blind spots" in the crossover from the U.S. to Brittan was fundamental. The overall tonnage the wolfpacks destroyed, as well as loss of life was tremendous. Churchill said after the war that the only time he was really worried that Brittan would lose the war was in the Atlantic. Being an island nation she has always required exports to subsidize her economy, in war and out.

Answer 6

Since you never really said which era you wanted, look at some of these web sites to find your answer.

http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/

http://www.historyplace.com/

http://www.history.com/

http://www.kbismarck.com/

Hope this helps,
Kevin