Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "German U-Boat Action Pacific" video.

  1. I can only imagine how miserable the crew of U-862 must have been patrolling in tropical waters. German subs had no air conditioning, and their ventilation systems were built for heating the ship in the North Atlantic, not dealing with 90 degree waters in the Pacific. The log of another U-boat, U-195, tells of condensation below decks so bad that green strings of moss hung from every horizontal surface and water ran down the interior hull, along piping, and dropped in the men's faces while they slept. It was rare for a German sub to reach Penang with any working radios because the condensation had shorted them all out. The Italian subs weren't obsolescent. In many ways they were superior to the German boats for Pacific operations. Because they build to operate in the warm Mediterranean, their ventilation systems were far better than on U-boats. They had higher surface speeds and marginally higher underwater speeds. The Italian boats were just too large and clumsy to operate successfully against Atlantic convoys. Their size and long range (more than 10,000nm) made them ideal transport boats between Europe and Japanese ports for a two way trade in strategic and scarce minerals and supplies. Two Italian boats became the only Axis naval vessels to serve under the flags of all three Axis powers.
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