Plan Worek
Plan Worek was an operation of the Polish Navy at the beginning of the Second World War in September 1939. Five Polish submarines were supposed to defend the coasts of Poland against sea landings and artillery attacks by the German Navy . The operation was a failure. Three submarine crews were interned in Sweden , two were able to break through to Great Britain .
History and planning
The Free City of Danzig was officially under the supervision of the League of Nations , but was de facto allied with the “Third Reich” . The Memelland was annexed to the Reich on March 22, 1939.
At the beginning of the war , the Polish Navy was far inferior to the German Navy. (see: balance of power at the beginning of the war )
The leadership of the Polish Navy under Rear Admiral Józef Unrug was aware of the German superiority and evacuated three destroyers to England on the eve of the war as part of Operation Beijing to remove them from German access. Plan Worek envisaged the use of all five submarines of the Polish Navy. The submarines were to patrol in Gdańsk Bay and north of the Hela Peninsula. In contrast to the two new boats of the Orzeł class , the three boats of the Wilk class were able to lay sea mines and were supposed to mine the opposing access roads. Each submarine was assigned a patrol area. During the night, the submarines were supposed to charge their batteries in designated sea areas.
The planned targets of the operation were possible German landing forces and warships bombarding Polish coastal positions. In particular, the central fortified base of the Polish Navy in Hel was to be secured. If possible, unarmed German merchant and transport ships should also be brought up and sunk in accordance with the internationally applicable prize law .
Course of the operation
Shortly after the fighting began on September 1, 1939, all five submarines left their bases and ran into the planned operational areas during the day. On the first day the submarines were from the German Luftwaffe extensively with water bombs attacked. The boats were pushed under water by the constant attacks and the area-wide air surveillance and were not able to act aggressively. The surface units were also not used. The larger warships ORP Gryf and ORP Wicher , which remained off the Polish coast , were incapacitated by September 3. By mid-September, the individual commanders of the submarines independently decided to abort the operation, which had become pointless, to leave the assigned sea areas and to sail to neutral or allied ports.
ORP Orzeł
The ORP Orzełs ordered sector lay in the west of the Gdańsk Bay east of Jastarnia and west of the mouth of the Vistula . Although the boat was attacked several times, it sustained no significant damage. Nevertheless, the boat left its area of operations on September 4th, entered neutral Estonia on September 15th and was interned the following day. However, the boat was able to leave on September 18 by a ruse by the crew and break through to Great Britain. Orzeł arrived in Scotland on October 12th.
ORP Wilk
ORP Wilk's planned patrol area was east of the Vistula estuary in the Gdańsk Bay. The boat laid 20 sea mines on September 3. Wilk survived several attacks relatively unscathed. On September 10, under orders from the base, the submarine left the assigned sector and reached Scotland on September 20. On December 7, 1939, the German fishing boat MFK Pil 55 ran into asea mineprobablylaidby Wilk and sank.
ORP Sęp
ORP Sęps assigned sea area was northwest of the Hel peninsula. The boat was attacked several times up to September 4th and was badly damaged. The battered Sęp was able to settle in neutral Sweden. The crew voluntarily interned there on September 16.
ORP Żbik
ORP Żbik was supposed to operate north of the Hel Peninsula. The boat wasattacked unsuccessfully with torpedoesby the German submarine U 14 on September 3. On September 8th, 20 sea mines were laid. The German minesweeper M 85 ran into one of these mines on October 1 and sank. That was probably the only success of Plan Worek . Żbik left his patrol area due to lack of fuel on September 25th. The crew were interned voluntarily in Sweden.
ORP Ryś
The planned area of operations of ORP Ryś was northeast of the Hel peninsula. On September 2, the boat was attacked with depth charges, but was able to lay its 20 sea mines east of Hel on September 3. After a subsequent artillery duel with German surface units and a heavy air attack, Ryś returned to the base for repairs on September 4 and ran out again the next day. The crew voluntarily interned in Sweden on September 18.
Final consideration
With the exception of a German minesweeper that ran into a mine shortly before the end of the fighting , none of the planned goals could be achieved. Since the German Navy did not land at sea in Poland in 1939, one of the planned tasks of the submarines came to nothing. The other German warships could not be attacked directly because the overwhelming German air superiority forced the boats into a defensive role and did not allow any offensive measures. The Worek plan was a complete failure.
The establishment of the ORP Orzeł in Estonia and their subsequent flight led to diplomatic entanglements between the Soviet Union, allied with the German Reich , and Estonia. The events surrounding the ORP Orzeł were referred to as the Orzeł incident in Soviet and German propaganda and served as one of the pretexts for the Soviet invasion of Estonia in 1940. As a result of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact ( Hitler-Stalin Pact ), the Soviet invasion of the Baltic States had in fact long been decided.
However, not a single Polish submarine was lost. All five boats were able to escape to friendly or neutral harbors.
An alternative to Operation Worek would have been to let the submarines operate in the open sea far from the German bases, where they could have taken action against German and later Soviet transport and merchant ships. Whether that would have led to a different course in the naval war is questionable in view of the overwhelming German and Soviet superiority and the narrowness of the Baltic Sea . This option would not have had any impact on the course of the war on land.
In retrospect, it would certainly have been more successful to evacuate at least the submarines of the then modern Orzeł class as well as the destroyers to England. But that would have meant a complete abandonment of the Polish maritime defense. The Polish High Command under Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły should have assumed a defeat within a month as early as August 1939. From such a quick and total victory but not even the German's high command understood, although they, unlike the Poles about the planned Soviet invasion in eastern Poland were informed. In addition, based on the Anglo-French declaration of guarantee of March 30, 1939 , the Poles hoped for quick and effective military support from their Western European allies in France and Great Britain, which did not take place.
literature
- Janusz Piekałkiewicz : The Second World War. With a foreword by Sebastian Haffner . Düsseldorf and Vienna: Econ, 1985. ISBN 3-430-17479-1 . ( Operation Worek is presented in the general context of the war events in September 1939 on pages 77 to 135.)
See also
Explanations and references
- ↑ In the Polish language , Worek means sack or bag .
- ↑ ORP is the abbreviation for Okręt Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej and the name prefix of Polish ships. ORP means ship of the Republic of Poland .
- ↑ There are contradicting statements about this attack. [1] confirms the attack by U 14 under Kplt. Wellner on September 3, 1939. [2] ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. goes from a failed torpedo attack by U 23 at position 55 ° 38 ' N , 18 ° 54' O under Kplt. Werner Winter on September 7, 1939. Winter reported a hit. Due to the German torpedo crisis , it is even conceivable that both statements are true, i.e. that there were two unsuccessful torpedo attacks.
