War+At+Sea-+Unrestricted+Submarine+Warfare+of+1915





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The Unrestricted Submarine Wafare was actually a war on merchant ships sailing towards and from England. Britain had blockaded Germany at the onset of war, declaring the North Sea as a war zone, as well as listing food as a 'contraband' and a resource of war, therefore forbidding any merchant ships carrying these resources to Germany. This tactic may actually be aiming at starving Germany to surrendering.This had a terrible effect on German society as people started dying, rationing was installed, and materials needed to produce weapons were running out. Germany, aware of this, wanted firstly break this blockade (Battle of Jutland) and secondly, to take revenge on Britain. Germany had decided to place Britain under blockade as well, so to cripple its war effort. =====

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Britain at the time was also heavily reliant on trade. Every week in 1915, 15,000 ships sail to and from British Ports. However, Germany couldn't possibly place Britain under blockade using its own forces.Britain had a very strong navy because of its long maritime history and tradition. Germany, though, has a number of U-Boats, or submarines as we now call them, wh ich was a novel technology back then. So Germany decided that the only solution to stop merchant ships from reaching Britain was to using these U-boats, posting them around the waters of Britain and shoot at merchant ships sailing through. It has sent a force of 20 submarines to start the operation, though numbers grew as the campaign went on. But even before that, 43,500 tons of British shipping had already been sunk by U-Boats. =====

The Mediterranean theater of the U-Boat Campaign was also a very important one. Britain, having an empire in Asia, relied on supplies and reinforcements to come through first the Suez Canal and then the Mediterranean, round the Iberian peninsula to the British Isles. French and Italian trade also relied heavily on the Mediterranean supply routes. Ships needed to travel several narrow points where U-Boats can be concentrated. The Mediterranean didn't have much storms which allowed greater amounts of submarine campaigns, as well as less neutral ships (such as ones from the US and Brazil) so risk of offending these countries were lessened. The campaign opened on October 1915, sinking a total of 18 ships, around 64,000 tons. Then on November, 44 ships, 155,882 tons, which was a great success. However by December sinkings dropped to 17 ships, 73,000 tons. Though this operation was very costly for the Germans, as they had to ship materials and manpower to the Mediterranean and build the submarines there because of logistical problems involving shipping the completed U-Boats, the losses dealt to Allied shipping had, to the Germans, justified the costs.

However, this Mediterranean campaign did spark some diplomatic conflicts. Because during this time Germany wasn't formerly at war with Italy, though Italy was with Austria. Germany wouldn't sink Italian vessels. Instead, the U-Boats were ordered to operate under Austrian flags so to disguise its attacks on Italian merchant vessels. The sinking of Ancona on November 1915, as well as a similar attack in August 1916, helped to push Italy towards the Allied side.

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The Submarine Blockade in the North Sea had enjoyed success, **sinking an average of 100,000 Gross Registered Tonnage per month**, about **1.9 ships daily.** On August, **sinkings reach****ed 185,000 tonnes, now exceeds the amount shipyards can produce.** =====