U-boat Archive - Eastern Sea Frontier - January 1942



NORTH ATLANTIC
NAVAL COASTAL FRONTIER	WAR DIARY	JANUARY 1942

Chapter IV

The Operations Plan of the Fifth Naval District

Throughout the past month, one of the most critical regions of submarine activity lay in the waters under the immediate protection of the Fifth Naval District. The nature of the defense system built up against the U-boat can perhaps best be explained by an examination of the operations within this area. The endangered waters lay within a rectangle bounded roughly on the west by the coastline, on the north by the 38th parallel, on the south by the 34th parallel and on the east by a diagonal running from a point at 34-00N; 75W to a point at 38-00N to 72-38W. Almost 28,000 square miles of water are enclosed within these limits.

On each day of the past month, there have been approximately forty-five or fifty merchant vessels somewhere in this dangerous area. Several enemy submarines have also been operating in these waters during the past two weeks. Beginning on the 18th., eight attacks, seven wholly successful from the German point of view, were made upon the merchant vessels by the submarines before January ended.

The favorite hunting ground was in the waters off Cape Hatteras. Ordinarily two U-boats were stationed there operating on a carefully prepared schedule. From eight in the morning until four in the afternoon they lay on the continental shelf somewhere between the 34th and 36th parallels. "During this lying in the period of daylight, they seem to have established a custom of rising to the surface for air and sunlight at sometime during the late forenoon, submerging


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	again if sighting any object." Late in the afternoon they began the day's activity against the shipping lanes. "So far they have operated from the surface against merchantmen or at least displayed periscopes before firing." From four until ten in the evening, the U-boats attacked any targets that presented themselves, though occasionally they varied their schedule with operations undertaken just as dawn was breaking.

	Five days after the first sinking in the area occurred, the Commandant of the Fifth Naval District presented Commander, North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier with a general plan for reducing the effectiveness of the enemy attack. The coastal sea lanes, he believed, had proved a "sound proposition, but he proposed supplementary measures by which he hoped to increase the security of the threatened sea lanes."

	In the first place he suggested a plan to provide more complete air coverage and surface patrol over the area assigned him for protection. Instead of dispersing the existing forces along the entire length of the sea lanes, he recommended that the lanes be divided into 3 sectors in which particular forces could concentrate their efforts.

	In the second place it was proposed that if special danger from submarines existed in any one sector, all ships should be routed by the Commandant of the Fifth Naval District into an unaffected area out to sea.

	Finally he suggested that each District under the Coastal Command, set up a striking force that could be summoned to attack submarines when they had been located.

	In the course of the next few days, these general proposals were developed into an Operation Plan. The Commandant estimated that he had available to him


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	The following categories of forces:

	1. Division of Destroyers (Ordered).
	2. Surface vessels of the Inshore Patrol.
	3. Planes shore based in the District of the Fleet Air Arm.
	4. Coast Guard planes based in the District.
	5. Army bombers stationed at Langley Field.
	6. Coast Guard surf boats and small Coast Guard vessels attached to life saving stations in the vicinity of the coast.
	7. A Coast Guard Cutter.

	These forces would be set the following general tasks:

	1. In good weather destroyers and Inshore Patrol should carefully and systematically search on the continental shelf between latitude 36-00 and 34-30.
	2. "Planes of the Fleet Air Arm, Coast Guard, and Army that can be made available, should be equipped with depth charges or delayed action bombs and search the area. This should be systematically divided into small sectors."
	3. Coast Guard cutters and armed Coast Guard vessels available should likewise aid in this search.
	4. Coast Guard surf boats in good weather ----- should carefully search within fifteen miles of the beach in the sectors which naturally fall to their station.

	These general suggestions were, on January 31st, reduced to a plan on which the available forces could conduct operations. In the Fifth Naval District, three sectors - between Lat. 38-00N and 37-00N, Lat. 37-00N and 35-30N, and Lat. 35-30 and 34-00 were established. To patrol and search these sectors the following Task Force was organized:

	A. Patrol Wings Atlantic
	Available Fleet Planes
	B. Naval Air Station
	Available District Planes
	Coast Guard Planes
	C. Inshore Patrol
	Navy Patrol Vessels, Coast Guard Vessels, Mine Sweepers
	D. Destroyers

	Added to this assortment of forces were the Army planes operating from Langley Field, that were to take care of Sector One. The Fleet Air Arm was to patrol and search Sector Two and the Naval Air Station Planes were to be


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	responsible for Sector Three. The Inshore Patrol patrolled and searched the surface of all three sectors sided by the destroyers that would serve "in areas as directed by Commander Inshore Patrol."

	This plan, providing for the integration of the forces of Army, Navy, Coast Guard, the District and the Fleet, is comprehensive and carefully developed. It depends for its successful operation entirely upon the forces available to implement it.

	During the last week of January the Inshore Patrol had the following vessels at its disposal. There were five patrol craft of varying size and efficiency, available for immediate duty. Several more were laid up for overhaul and repair. The backbone of this force were several old 110 foot sub-chasers. In addition there were four Coast Guard vessels. A total of nine craft in all could be used in offshore anti-submarine operations. In the last week of the month following a request from the Commander, North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier, for "at least one destroyer to cover Hatteras", a destroyer was assigned to duty in the District for ten days. In all, therefore, there were ten vessels, one of them only temporarily available to carry out the search and patrol of an area of 28,000 square miles.

	The situation in the air is explained in the figures that follow. The Fleet Air Arm, land based at Norfolk, consisted of 17 planes. These had been recently assigned to the Frontier forces. On January 14th. the Commander of the North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier sent a letter to Commander in Chief in which he urged the definite need for at least one squadron of patrol planes "the necessity for which cannot be overemphasized." At that time there were no planes attached to the Frontier capable of maintaining


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	"a long range seaward patrol." On the 25th., Commander in Chief, U. S. Fleet, as has been noted previously, made aircraft of the Fleet available to Coastal Frontier Commanders. It was upon this source that the Commandant of the Fifth Naval District drew, but the assignment of the planes was qualified in the following fashion: "this employment should be considered as an emergency measure and should not unduly interfere with scheduled operations of fleet aircraft, mainly those pertaining to escort of convoys." In addition to this restriction, the usefulness of the planes is likely to be impaired by the fact that most of the flight personnel"is very largely inexperienced and in a training status."

	At Elizabeth City, from which the Coast Guard was to patrol Sector 3, there are "temporary arrangements to take care of 300 men and 50 officers", in addition to facilities for bomb storage, gasoline, and planes. But there were in the last week of January, only three utility planes for offshore patrol work. These were assigned on the 25th. and were taken from the Atlantic Fleet pool. The Commandant of the Fifth Naval District recommended on January 24th that twelve additional planes be assigned to Elizabeth City because of its strategic location and improved facilities. To this request the Commander, North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier added in an endorsement, that "The need is most urgent now not only for these planes, but for additional planes to be stationed all along the Atlantic Coast to be used for patrolling coastal waters and for anti-submarine warfare." The difficulty was that no more planes were available.

	Four planes were assigned to the Naval District but three were experimental and the fourth was a Utility, requiring an hours notice before it could be ready for flight with a depth bomb.


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	The Army at Langley Field had 19 bombers and 20 observation planes but was unable to divert more than enough for two flights a day over Sector One from the normal Army work.

	The judgment made by Commander, North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier in a memorandum written at the end of the month on conditions in the Fifth Naval District was that "The available forces have been entirely inadequate to handle the situation properly. COnstant offshore patrols should be kept off the Capes and the critical Hatteras area. This is impossible with the forces available."

	The strength of the available forces was further weakened by other than material factors. It has been remarked that the flight personnel of the Fleet Air Arm were inexperienced and for the most part in a training status. Even more inexperienced, in naval flying, were the Army pilots who had not been thoroughly trained, inevitably, in recognition of naval vessels and types and who had no familiarity with naval weapons. On January 20th. Commander in Chief, U. S. Fleet, informed all Commanders, Naval Coastal Frontiers that "Army air units in Naval Command have not been properly instructed in the use of naval munitions such as aerial depth bombs. This has happened in one instance."

	Greater weaknesses in the operating forces might well be expected from inadequate means of communication. Much of the success of warfare against submarines depends upon rapid, and accurate transmission of information. In two instances the means of communication between the forces operating in the coastal waters of the Commandant, Fifth Naval District leave something to be desired. The Army planes from Langley Field operate under the orders


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	of the First Bomber Command at 90 Church Street, New York. This means that information must flow from the endangered area to New York before decisions based on that information can go back to the forces at Langley Field. The liaison between Langley Field and Norfolk was not direct until Commander, North Atlantic Naval Coastal Frontier asked Bomber COmmand to instruct Langley to inform Norfolk of Army operations. This system of communication was designed, quite properly, to insure unity of command for Army planes and rapid exchange of information between the Frontier headquarters and the Northeast Defense Command, but these desirable things have been achieved at the possible sacrifice of rapid interchange of information between the naval and military forces in the zone of activity.

	A more serious defect in communications can be discovered in the lack of facilities for rapid exchange of information between the air and surface forces. The craft of the Inshore Patrol were not provided with the necessary equipment to talk directly to the planes that were engaged in patrol and search. The single destroyer assigned to ten days temporary duty was the only ship capable of adequate communication with the air arm.

	The plan submitted by the Commandant of the Fifth Naval District lays down principles for anti-submarine warfare and neatly fits together the separate forces of Coast Guard, Army and Navy. But the deftness of the joinery cannot conceal the fact that the joint operations were necessitated by the inadequacy of each individual force to perform the necessary duties. Nor can the general excellence of the plan itself disguise the fact that its success depends primarily upon the strength of the combined forces to implement it.


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	These forces, it is apparent as the month ends, are not in themselves sufficient to eliminate the enemy submarines from our coastal waters. Whatever possible grounds there may be for optimism must be found in the hope that the forces available can be manipulated in such fashion as to limit losses to bearable proportions. January gave some promise that such manipulation was possible. From the 18th to the 25th, when there were no planes at Elizabeth City, six sinkings occurred within a radius of fifty miles of Cape Hatteras. On that day three J2F-5s began a patrol from the city "with the center of the assigned area Diamond Shoal Light Vessel buoy." In the remaining six days of the month not one vessel was sunk in the area. Thus, if January was a lesson in the weakness of numerical inferiority, it was also a demonstration of the effectiveness of forces properly used. In this, there are grounds for hope and for an optimism that will grow only as the number of ships and aircraft grow.










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