General Discussions
This is the place to discuss general issues related to the U-boat war or the war at sea in WWII.
Re: German U-boats in Argentina after WW II
Posted by:
Guido Sambucetti
()
Date: December 10, 2002 10:51PM
<HTML>Hi Johan,
You are right, U 530 and U 977 surrendered in Mar del Plata well after the hostilities had ceased in Europe. Both boats were sent to the US (I believe after a couple of months) not only as a result of pressures excerted by the Allies (remember that all through the war British merchantmen loaded cargoes of food at Argentine ports) but also as a consequence of Argentina being at war with Germany at the very end. That declaration of war was actually the result of the Allied pressure.
I don´t know much about U 530, but the U 977´s CO wrote a book some time after were he says that his idea of surrendering the boat to Argentina was the knowledge of the good treatment that survivors of the Graf Spee had got here, which induced him to believe they would be spared the POW treatment. Unfortunately for him that was not the case.
After the two surrenders there was a tidal wave of periscope sightings along the coast, but actually none of these were confirmed. There are stories about more submarines being scuttled at different points near the beach (it`s almost 600 miles long) and of Nazi leadership landing and then fleeing to other countries, but none of this was ever confirmed (meaning their transportation by U Boot). Both crews were subjected to in-depth debriefings and nothing was found on this matter.
As to the type XXI, believe me, there was never one here. If a type IX and a type VII had raised such a pandemonium, you can imagine the impresion that would have caused a state-of-the-art type XXI!! That wouldn´t have been possible to keep secret.
About the submarine operating in the South Atlantic, U Boote were in fact deployed to operate along the Brazilian coast. But as far as I know, the southernmost area of operation was about the latitude of Rio de Janeiro, 1350 miles north of Mar del Plata.</HTML>
You are right, U 530 and U 977 surrendered in Mar del Plata well after the hostilities had ceased in Europe. Both boats were sent to the US (I believe after a couple of months) not only as a result of pressures excerted by the Allies (remember that all through the war British merchantmen loaded cargoes of food at Argentine ports) but also as a consequence of Argentina being at war with Germany at the very end. That declaration of war was actually the result of the Allied pressure.
I don´t know much about U 530, but the U 977´s CO wrote a book some time after were he says that his idea of surrendering the boat to Argentina was the knowledge of the good treatment that survivors of the Graf Spee had got here, which induced him to believe they would be spared the POW treatment. Unfortunately for him that was not the case.
After the two surrenders there was a tidal wave of periscope sightings along the coast, but actually none of these were confirmed. There are stories about more submarines being scuttled at different points near the beach (it`s almost 600 miles long) and of Nazi leadership landing and then fleeing to other countries, but none of this was ever confirmed (meaning their transportation by U Boot). Both crews were subjected to in-depth debriefings and nothing was found on this matter.
As to the type XXI, believe me, there was never one here. If a type IX and a type VII had raised such a pandemonium, you can imagine the impresion that would have caused a state-of-the-art type XXI!! That wouldn´t have been possible to keep secret.
About the submarine operating in the South Atlantic, U Boote were in fact deployed to operate along the Brazilian coast. But as far as I know, the southernmost area of operation was about the latitude of Rio de Janeiro, 1350 miles north of Mar del Plata.</HTML>
