Japan SUB Doctrine

[feryveroweb]

Hi friends my question of the day is...Historically what was the japanese sub doctrine ? and secondary What about american sub
doctrine? Thanks

[RalfBHV]

Hi,

the japanese sub doctrine is as follow:
It´s only honorable to attack war-ship´s.

The US-sub´s attack all target´s on his way.

Nessaja

[Full Moon]

I once asked same question on different forum and below was a reply.

Japanese sub training and doctrine said that the purpose of subs was to engage US warships as part of the "Battle of Attrition" that would precede the "Decisive Battle" to determine the course of the war. That's why you had japanese HQ subs with recon aircraft capabilities, subs with mini-sub hangers, and the like. Subs in their doctrine were too valuable to use against merchant shipping - they had to be preserved for the "vital phase" of the war.
Interestingly, the Japanese sub doctrine almost completely failed to account for the ability of aircraft to act against subs. Their large, long-range subs were VERY slow to submerge - a prime liability when facing air power.

And about USN sub doctrine,
As I know merchant ships (marus) were the primary target of USN subs after they suffered lots of casualties by attacking Japanese warships.

[Feinder]

Actually, USN sub doctrine remained pretty much, "Take a shot at anything you can put a fish into." throughout the war.

In fact, USN submarines accounted for more tonnage of capitol ships (CL, CA, BB, BC, CVE, CVL, CV) sunk, than any other "weapon" (including CVs).

USN subs also managed to bring IJN merchant traffic to it's knees by mid-1944.

The cumulative efforts of US subs in WW2 made Germany's wolf-packs look like a bunch of amatures. But because they rarely participated in any of the high profile battles, much of their exploits were simply glossed over.

-F-

[Mr.Frag]

The cumulative efforts of US subs in WW2 made Germany's wolf-packs look like a bunch of amatures. But because they rarely participated in any of the high profile battles, much of their exploits were simply glossed over.

I don't think it was really an issue of glossing over it as much as the bad publicity involved. Germany was painted as being very evil due to how they used their sub fleet. It would not have looked good to say that the good guys were doing exactly the same thing as the bad guys.

Sneak attacks (although the real objective of any war plan) are not publically acceptable from a political standpoint. There has always been great debate that the USA government knew all about the attack on PH, but instead of defending against it used it to motivate those who didn't really see any reason to join into that silly war in europe. Of course there is no proof, but ... the same group of folks would have us believe that Kennedy was shot by a single gunman :rolleyes: with magic bullets.

[Apollo11]

Hi all,

Originally posted by Feinder

The cumulative efforts of US subs in WW2 made Germany's wolf-packs look like a bunch of amatures. But because they rarely participated in any of the high profile battles, much of their exploits were simply glossed over.

I think this is _VERY_ wrong analogy.

The IJN had no convoy system and almost no escort navy.

The US submarines thus had "happy days" hunting Japanese ships through the
whole course of war.

On the other hand German submarines were facing most determined and the most
organized convoy system world has ever known (escort ships were very good and,
as war progressed, the commanders and crews were getting better and better as
well).

Also let's not forget allied success in code braking (i.e. their ability to
read both German and Japanese codes), HF-DF (i.e. locating of enemy ships and
submarines) and air power (especially good used against German submarines)...

Thus comparing US and German submarines is like comparing the apples and
oranges - they were simply facing the very very different enemy and
circumstances.


Leo "Apollo11"

[crsutton]

German subs were better built, but other than that Allied subs had tremendous advantages. The most important is surface radar which I don't think any Japanese or German sub possesed. This radar combined with the scarcity and ineffectivness of Japanese ASW assets made for some easy killings. American subs were pretty fast on the surface and could use their radar to shadow and effectivly run ahead of ships and task forces without being unseen and without losing contact. Germans subs did not have this advantage and had to rely on dead reckoning to accomplish any sort of stalking.

Don't forget,it was Allied airpower that really put the crunch on the German submarine effort. Japan never really got its act together in this respect and American subs had a much sucess-especially after the torpedo problems were solved.

[Feinder]

(* eats crow *)

I got my statistics BACKWARDS. Doh!

USN total tonnage sunk by subs = 5mil tonnes.
DKM total tonnage sunk by subs = 14mil tonnes.


And yes, it was over-zealous of me to use the word "amatures" (to apply to either sub service), as the situation was very different in both theaters.

It is true however, that US subs accounted for more than half of the total Japanese tonnage sunk (merchant and military) in WW2. The tonnage attributed to USN subs was greater than all other "forms of attack" (surface, LB air, CV air) combined. Wow.
(* weak exit *)

Don't mind me. I'll be going now... :^)
-F-

[Feinder]

Just thot this was an interesting summary (found it while goofing off at work)...

SCORECARD

GERMANY U-boats claimed 14.4 million tons, but Germany lost 821 U-boats. Allied aircraft were responsible for (or directly involved in) the loss of 433; surface ships, 252; mines, 34; accidents 45, submarines 25 (only one of which happened when both hunter and victim were submerged); unknown, 15, scuttled by their own crews, 14; interned in neutral ports, 2; sunk by shore battery, 1.

UNITED STATES: American submarines sank at least 1300 Japanese ships, 5.3 million tons, including one battleship, eight carriers, eleven cruisers and 180 smaller warships. The U. S. Navy lost 52 boats; 22 percent of the submarine personnel who went on patrol did not return. It was the highest casualty rate of any branch of service– but not as high as that of the German submarine force, which lost an astonishing 630 men out of every 1,000 who served in the U-boat fleet.

SOVIET RUSSIA: The Soviets started the war with the largest submarine fleet: 218. They added 54 and lost 109. They did not have much impact on the course of the war. However, S-13 was credited with the single greatest disaster in maritime history: the 1945 sinking of the German liner "Wilhelm Gustloff," engaged in an effort to get German soldiers out of the path of the advancing Red Army. There may have been more than 8,000 troops and civilians aboard; fewer than 1,000 were rescued.

JAPAN: Japanese submarines had great success early in the war, especially in the Indian Ocean area. However, the tide of battle began to turn with the Allied invasion of Guadalcanal in August, 1942, and Japanese submarines were pulled off combat duty and assigned to carry vital supplies to beleaguered troops or to pull troops out of failing campaigns. The Japanese built submarine landing ships; the Japanese Army built twenty eight cargo submarines.

Japanese submarines scored a few important victories – the carriers "Yorktown" and "Wasp," and the last American surface warship sunk, the cruiser "Indianapolis" in late July, 1945; overall, however, they sank only about one-fifth as many ships as did the American submarine force.

On the last day of the Pacific war, Japan had only 33 submarines in commission (excluding midgets), seven of which were in the training command. Except for the midgets, the submarine force had become irrelevant.

[Lord_Hexer]

For good submarine history in WW2, with main accent on tech details, see E.Bagnasco, Submarines of the world war 2. Its in same hardcover as M.J.Whitley's Destroyers of WW2, Cruisers of WW2 and Battleships of WW2. I am not 100 % sure on the english title of the book, as I own it in german.

Well, about soviet subs, they were pretty good, and had good crews, but their disposal between the fleets and tac usage was a bit faulty. As most of them were placed in Baltic and Black seas. In Baltic, they had no chance to go to hunt without running in the mines between 1942 and 1944, due to Juminda Defence line, which blocked the entire gulf of Finland... In Black sea there were no real enemy shipping lanes, with very few targets.

Only North fleet was more or less active, but it had really few boats, and hunting convoys in norvegian fjords was a hazardous business, as german sub chasers and other escorts were pretty effective. However the 4-torp salvo of K21 on Bismarck, about which is still arguing if it hit or not, but it scared german attack force, so it broke off the attack on PQ17 convoy.

Soviet pacific subs were neutral all the time, and 7 days of war with Japan was not enough to score any good results, however smaller units of navy (Patrol Ships, etc) came into the action, one of them with my grandfather's brother onboard )