Episode 40: the Battle of the Atlantic

As with the bombing campaign, the Battle of the Atlantic was a long, protracted, battle against the enemy’s ability to make war itself. In the bombing campaign, the allies sought to disrupt german industry directly by destroying it. In the battle of the Atlantic the Germans sought to starve the british, and to a lesser extent the soviet union of raw materials, finished goods, and of food itself. If the U-boat campaign had succeeded the british home islands would have literally run out of food and the red army would have been denied the most basic resources needed to execute a modern maneuver war; namely trucks, boots, and winter coats but also tanks, aircraft and ammunition.