Small submarine
The term small submarine describes a military type of ship that, in contrast to the usual fleet submarines, is very small and with little sea endurance, crew and armament can only operate missions of tactical importance.
General story
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Even the first submarines used for military purposes, such as the American Turtle from the War of Independence or the Hunley from the War of Secession, show typical tasks of a small submarine in their type of use, namely the close-up attack on enemy ships with the help of explosive charges . However, since in the following years the development of submarines through powerful machinery instead of pure muscle power went towards ever larger vehicles, the original deployment concepts and tactics were discarded. At the beginning of the 20th century, submarines were large ships that operated for weeks on the high seas and were supposed to attack enemy ships from a distance with torpedoes while on patrol .
The Italian Navy , which used the so-called Mignatta during the First World War, is considered a pioneer in terms of modern micro-submarines . These are modified torpedoes that could transport a combat swimmer instead of a warhead , who could then use this device to penetrate into enemy ports and place explosive charges on ships there. However, this type of operation required a mother ship that brought the combat swimmer and his Mignatta into the area of operation. One of the successes of these combat swimmers was the sinking of the Austro-Hungarian battleship SMS Viribus Unitis in the port of Pola on November 1, 1918. The other powers of the world war did not develop such concepts; only the Imperial Navy used the UB class, a small type of submarine that could be used in shallow coastal waters.
During the Second World War , the Italian Navy again relied on its experience with the maiali and used similar vehicles. In an attack with such boats on December 18, 1941, the battleships HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Valiant were badly damaged in the port of Alexandria and sank to the bottom of the harbor basin. Coastal submarines were also used in the Mediterranean and Black Seas.
Likewise, Japan used numerous small submarines under the code name kō-hyōteki ( 甲 標的 , "target A"), which were transported by larger submarines and armed with torpedoes. In the attack on Pearl Harbor , however, all five boats used were sunk. In another notable operation, the micro-submarines attacked Sydney Harbor in June 1942 , where minor damage was done. The Kaiten , a manned torpedo for suicide attacks, was also developed.
The small submarines of the Royal Navy , which were known under the names X-Class and Chariot (German: chariots), gained greater fame . In October 1942, an attack on the Trondheimsfjord was planned with combat swimmers on Chariot carrier torpedoes in order to attack the German battleship Tirpitz ( Operation Title ), but in bad weather the torpedoes towed by a cutter were lost, so that the attack was unsuccessful. In September 1943, as part of Operation Source, four type X small submarines were towed by submarines off the coast of Norway, from where they advanced to the anchorage of Tirpitz in the Altafjord and a total of four-tonne explosive charges under the ship deposited. All four boats were lost and some of the crews were taken prisoner, but the explosive devices detonated and damaged the ship at its supposedly safe berth. In the Pacific from 1945, the small submarines of the modified type XE were used; Among other things, they succeeded in damaging the cruiser Takao in the port of Singapore in July of that year . In addition to such missions, special missions such as cutting undersea telephone cables were carried out with these boats. Another British development, the Welman type , was unsuccessful; rather, a specimen captured in Bergen in 1944 was taken as a model for the German type Biber .
After the Second World War, interest in micro-submarines for commando operations sank again because - as the example of the Tirpitz had shown - targeted missions were also possible from the air. In Great Britain, the stickleback class emerged as the successor to the X and XE boats in the mid-1950s . The US Navy introduced in 1954 with the X-1 it is currently the only small submarine in service, but only for experimental purposes, for the harbor defense. Small submarines are still being built for shallow coastal waters, including submarine class 202 of the German Federal Navy . For the Soviet Navy , the two-seat Sirena as well as the Triton-1M and the three-seat Triton-2 were developed as small submarines. North Korea (“Yono” class) and Iran (“Ghadir” class) also operate such small weapons. In addition, torpedo-like vehicles continue to be used as a means of transport for combat swimmers.
German Navy
In Germany towards the end of the Second World War, various types of micro-submarines were developed that were supposed to carry out commando operations. They were so-called small weapons with which the German navy tried to inflict losses on the enemy in the final phase of the war. Their operations were organized by the small arms command .
Small submarines were thus equivalent to a torpedo controlled by human hands (sometimes only one man was needed) and were mainly used against valuable military targets near the coast. The one-man torpedo called " Neger " consisted of a converted torpedo with a combat torpedo on the underside.
The carrier torpedo had a modified electric drive and, instead of the warhead, space for the pilot. The cabin was covered with a dome that was open at the bottom for breathing air supply, so that this construction was not submersible and was therefore only suitable for night use due to the risk of discovery. In addition, the operational value was extremely limited by the low speed of 3 to 5 knots and the operational radius (around 50 nautical miles), plus the Spartan navigation equipment. In addition, the man who could not open the dome from the inside was at risk from the fact that seawater could get to the battery when the waves were blowing and chlorine gas could form.
One measure to ward off the "negroes" used against the invasion fleet was to distribute fuel oil on the surface of the water, which smeared the surface of the dome and the crews were disoriented by the restricted view. Often the following day, one-man torpedoes that were detected were pushed underwater by patrol boats. Incidentally, the name "Neger" came from the fact that one of the people responsible for the development was the naval construction officer Richard Mohr, and the synonym of his surname was chosen as the name.
After a submersible variant called Marder and the larger models Molch , Biber and Hecht , all of which were still built from torpedo parts, the seal was the first independent design for a small submarine. In contrast to its predecessors, the "seal" was larger, more seaworthy and could operate for days from its fuel supply. Boats of this type achieved little success in sinking in the last months of the war, but they were offset by immense losses from enemy action and accidents.
Further developments during the war meant that the killer whale and dolphin types were driven by an external air-independent Walter turbine , which would have meant significantly higher performance. However, only prototypes were produced until the end of the war.
See also
literature
- Paul Kemp: Manned torpedoes and micro-submarines in use 1939–1945 . Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-613-01936-1
- Cajus Bekker : ... and still loved life , 1956
- Gerhard Bracke: The lone fighters in the navy. One-man torpedo and explosive boat drivers in action . Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1981, ISBN 3-87943-795-5
- Harald Fock: Naval Small Combat Means. Manned torpedoes, small submarines, small express boats, explosive vessels. Yesterday - today - tomorrow . Nikol, Hamburg 1996, ISBN 3-930656-34-5
- Klaus Mattes: The seals. Small submarines; last German initiative in naval warfare 1939–1945 . Mittler, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 1995, ISBN 3-8132-0484-7
- Klaus Mattes: Development of the small submarines of the Kriegsmarine , in: Stephan Huck (ed.): 100 years of submarines in German navies. Events - technology - mentalities - reception . With the collaboration of Cord Eberspächer, Hajo Neumann and Gerhard Wiechmann. With contributions by Torsten Diedrich, Peter Hauschildt, Linda Maria Koldau , Klaus Mattes, Karl Nägler, Hajo Neumann, Kathrin Orth, Michael Ozegowski, Werner Rahn , René Schilling, Heinrich Walle and Raimund Wallner, Bochum (Dr. Dieter Winkler Verlag) 2011 ( Small series of publications on military and naval history, vol. 18), pp. 69–80. ISBN 978-3-89911-115-6 .
