Page 85 - NS-2 Textbook

78 MARITIME HISTORY

The submarine chaser was a ship designed by the U.S. Navy especially for antisubmarine patrols in the North Sea and the Mediterranean. This
squadron of sub chasers is getting under way to head for home at the end of the war.

A minefield, however, is often far more dangerous in 1918, and again in July 1918, during the Second Baltle of
the minds of those who must try to cross it than it may the Marne. American forces, including over 25,000
actually be. How many V-boats declined to try to make marines, bore some of the heaviest fighting at Chateau-
the trip through the minefield is unknown. It is docu- Thierry, Belleau Wood, and the Meuse-Argorme fronts
mented that morale among the submariners was falling and succeeded in throwing the Germans back. Large-
fast at this time, partly because of the minefields. And it caliber naval guns mounted on railway flatcars helped de-
was the German submarine force that led mutinies that stroy German railroads, bridges, and mnmunition dumps
undermined the whole German fleet as the war neared during the first Allied offensive in late summer 1918.
its end. The American shipbuilding industry built several
Ail' Waif are. Air operations had been carried out by thousand merchant ships to carry supplies and war mate-
the British against submarines since early in the war rial to England and France. These supplies, along with the
vdthout lunch success. With the advent of the convoy, manpower and the highiy successful convoy system of the
however, careful coordination of air patrols with convoy v.s. Navy, were essential in helping the Allies to victory.
schedules began to payoff. The early airplanes flying
these missions had no effective "weapons to sink sub- ALLIED VICTORY
marines, but they did attack and damage a number of
them, and this served to discourage the V-boats. Im- Forttmately for the Allies, the Americans had entered the
proved weapons and detection methods would make the war at the decisive time. Russia had surrendered to the
airplane an important antisubmarine weapon during Germans in late 1917 after the Russian Revolution and
World War II. terrible defeats on the eastern front. This released large
nUlnbers of Gernlan troops to the western front/ ,,\There
they outnumbered the Allies for the first time since 1914.
AMERICA'S ROLE
New tactics and equipment-aircraft, tanks, and mobile
The U.S. Navy did not take part in the dramatic surface artillery-had been adopted by the Germans. The Amer-
warfare actions that had occurred in the early years of icans arrived just in time to help stop these fierce drives.
the war. Our Navy's role was mainly to patrol and con- But Germany could not keep up its last offensives. It
voy the huge numbers of troops and enormous amOlmts had temporarily avoided starvation with the capture of
of supplies needed by the ground forces on the western Romania and the Russian Ukraine in early 1916, but the
front after the American entrance into the war. By mid- British blockade gradually caused widespread famine
summer 1917, just a few months after the Vnited States and shortages of war material. By October 1918 its sub-
entered the Wat; 50,000 troops a month were crossing to marines ,,\Tere defeated/ and the Allies ,"vere advancing
France. A year later, 200,000 were crossing each month. rapidly toward Germany. Its High Seas Fleet began to
All told, over 2 million Americans crossed the Atlantic to mutiny because ships could not sortie without heading
the war zone, and not a single troop ship or soldier ,vas into certain death. The convoy system had not only
lost to V-boats. destroyed the V-boats, it had also made the Allies
On land/ these American forces ,vere vital in stop- ovelwhelmingly powerful on the sea and in the field. The
ping major German offensives against the Allies in early German people ·were starving and near revolution. On