The German Air Force and Torpedo Development.
Although the employment of torpedo carrying aircraft was part of the Luftwaffe’s per-war plans, they were incredibly backward in developing torpedo bombing.
German air theory believed in combined attacks by bombers and torpedo bombers as offering the greatest measure of success in direct attacks on ships. The lack of equipment, however, made this theory rather empty.
From the outbreak of war up to the autumn of 1941, the German Fleet Air Arm maintained two seaplane units consisting chiefly of He.115 floatplanes – a total of some 24 aircraft which were spasmodically engaged in torpedo operations against British shipping off the Scottish coast and south western approaches. Results were poor and, hampered by a shortage of torpedoes, development, showed little progress in launching methods since trials in 1939.
It was not until the full implications of the campaign against the Allied supply lines to the United Kingdom were realised in mid 1941 that energetic measures were taken by the Luftwaffe to rectify the omission of an alternative method to bombing in direct attack against merchant shipping.
Due to the increasingly effective defensive armament being developed by the Allies, the Luftwaffe turned afresh to the torpedo as a weapon which could reduce aircraft losses.
The efforts of the German Air Force in the field of torpedo development were, however, strenuously resisted by the Naval High Command. Data on development of aerial torpedo practice accumulated at naval establishments was consistently withheld from the Technical Office of the German Air Force and any independent development in collaboration with private firms was deliberately hindered.
Later in 1941, direct requests by the Air Force to take over the aerial aspect of torpedo development were flatly refused by the navy.
On its own account the Luftwaffe began exhaustive torpedo trial at the bombing school at Grossenbrode in the Baltic, and in spite of the lack of torpedoes proved that the He.111, at least, was a highly suitable aircraft for such work.
Matters came to a head in December 1941, when the subject of torpedo development was raised at a Technical Office conference and reported to Goering. A direct demand was made that the Luftwaffe should take over aerial torpedo development in both Germany and Italy, that it should open experimental establishments with the inclusion of such naval staff as had already been engaged in the aerial branch and finally, that a special Commissioner should be appointed to control Air Force torpedo development, supply, training and operations.
Within a month the German Air Force had been granted these facilities. Generalmajor Harlinghausen, the former Fliegerfuhrer Atlantik was appointed Commissioner for Torpedoes, and with the whole field of the airborne torpedo now in its hand, forged ahead with organisation and development with the utmost energy. Plans for conversion of existing Air Force units to form a torpedo force with a strength of about 230 aircraft were immediately put in hand. This figure was never reached as the Allied invasion of North Africa and then Italy intervened and upset the training plans.
With the onset of winter, the Air Force bomber school at Grossenbrode, where the first trials and conversion courses had taken place, was found to be unsuitable for torpedo development and training, so the whole establishment was, therefore, moved to Grosseto on the west coast of Italy, where winter training could proceed apace, and a close liaison could be maintained with the Italians who were progressing on the same lines.
Trials at Grosseto, with all types of German aircraft confirmed that the He.111, capable of carrying two torpedoes, and the JU.88 – with a better performance as to speed – were the most suitable aircraft. One of the two original anti-shipping units, I/K.G.26 was the first to undergo conversion and batches of crews were withdrawn from Northern Norway for the three week course. By the end of April 1942, some twelve crews of the unit were ready for operations and were based at the newly constructed airfields of Banak and Bardufoss in north Norway. By June, the whole Gruppe, with a strength of 42 He.111s was completely trained, and another Gruppe, III/K.G.26, was undergoing the same course armed with JU.88s. A month later, the Luftwaffe possessed a strength of 77 torpedo aircraft , the He.111s in Norway and the JU.88s at Rennes. The latter made the first massed torpedo attack on a convoy off the Scilly Isles on 3 August 1942 but only after having first been miss-used in a series of reprisal bombing raids on Birmingham. By September the whole of the torpedo force was being employed against the Anglo-American convoys taking supplies to the northern Russian ports.
AIR41/47
__________________
|
Re: The German Air Force and Torpedo Development.
