01x03 - The Hunted

[bunniefuu]

The Atlantic Ocean.

The scene of one of World w*r II's
bloodiest battles.

The Battle of the Atlantic.

This is the forgotten frontline.

It's a battleground that saw the deaths
of thousands of British sailors.

And here, danger was everywhere.

Not only did they have the harsh
Atlantic weather to contend with,

beneath the waves
could be a German U-boat.

Ready to fire a torpedo.

The Battle of the Atlantic is much
more than just a single battle.

It's a bloody and devastating campaign.

In this w*r, we can't just survive it,

we have to win it.

Britain's forces risked
everything they had.

The w*r was an extraordinarily
bloody conflict.

As an ex-Marine,

I'm going to reveal
how British troops coped with

the constant threat
of German U-boats.

Over the course of just a few months,



And as an engineer,

I want to get to grips with these
incredible k*lling machines.

What made them so deadly.

The more ships it took down,

the greater the fame and accolade.

And how they were
eventually defeated.

This time, Churchill plots
to wipe out the U-boats.

It was an idea

that if they just kept dropping
bombs on the U-boat pens,

eventually they would break.

The Royal Navy struggled
with sailors' mental health.

If something goes wrong,
they're going to be k*lled.

And that preys on sailors' minds.

And an epic showdown

for the control of the Atlantic.

They're not the hunters anymore,
they're the hunted.

This is the campaign

that decides the outcome
of World w*r II.

At the end of 1942,

the Battle of the Atlantic has been
raging for over three years.

And essential supplies are running
perilously low.

Defeat for Britain

is a real possibility.

If the Nazis are to be beaten,

Britain and her allies
must work together.



Morocco.

The location of a
top-secret Allied meeting,

held on the shores of the Atlantic.

The meeting is so secret,

it's given the codename, Symbol.

And it's attended by two leaders
fighting the Battle of the Atlantic.

British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill

and US President
Franklin Roosevelt.

And they're both determined

to plot a fight back
against the U-boats.

Nobody knew that Roosevelt
or Churchill had gone to Morocco.

It's an opportunity for them
to digest the state of the w*r.

After their first day of talks,

the Allied press arrive in Casablanca

to hear from the two leaders.

This is a chance to get together
face to face

to discuss the next steps.

One of the key decisions
that they make

is that they should seek

unconditional
surrender from Germany.

And that the Atlantic
was the critical battleground.

Churchill and Roosevelt are already

plotting the D-Day landings.

They need to build up a huge
military force on British shores,

ready to carry out the largest
amphibious attack of all time.

In order for that to happen,

you're going to have to
bring across the Atlantic

about 1,800,000 men.

You also need munitions,

you need aircraft, you need food.

That means the Atlantic
needs to be a safe space.

And in January 1943,

it isn't.

Lurking beneath the waves,

n*zi U-boats are still a
deadly threat to the Allies.

During their meeting,

Churchill and Roosevelt devise a plan

to wipe out the U-boats.

Not out at sea,

but on land.

After its first day,

a directive is delivered
to the Royal Air Force.

It's frank and brutal.

A decision has been made

to subject the following bases

to a maximum scale of attack.

This is Churchill declaring all-out w*r,

ordering British bombers to use
anything they have in their arsenal

to flatten the German U-boat
bases at any cost.

And in order to get the job done,

he turns to his trusted
Commander-in-Chief, Arthur Harris.

Harris was an absolute zealot who
believed that the answer to everything

was a lot of bombers.

It was a question of faith.

He believed that strategic
bombing was the answer,

because that was the whole mantra
that the Air Force had been built on.

Arthur Harris's great vision
was for area bombing,

for bombing not just military targets,
but also civilian cities,

to really strike at the heart
of the German w*r effort.

The night after
the directive is issued,

British bombers begin preparations

to destroy U-boat bases.

One base has been marked
for special attention.

L'Oreal in France,
a U-boat command centre.

And in the early hours
of the 14th of January,

the bombing begins.

We're talking about something
like the Blitz of London.

Thousands of tons of incendiaries
and bombs dropped.

It really wasn't about targets.

An area bombing sums it up.

When you b*mb the area,
you don't b*mb the target.

On the first night,


to raid the city of Lorient,

and it's estimated that about


are dropped on the city altogether.

By the second night,
that figure doubles.



The scale of the bombing offensive
on the city of Lorient is shocking,

and it quickly
reduces the city to rubble.

It was an idea that if they
just kept dropping bombs

on the U-boat pens,

eventually they would break.

They didn't break,

and they remain intact.

The city of Lorient lay in ruins,

but Commander Harris writes,

the concrete shelters
housing the submarines

were impenetrable.

The task of destroying
the U-boat pens

and wiping them out
has been a failure,

and the biggest question that
Churchill has, naturally,

is after such intense bombing,

how are these shelters
still standing?

As an engineer,

I want to find out
how the U-boat pens survived

such a ferocious bombardment.

And the answer lies in images

that reveal the secrets
behind these structures.

I've got here some images
that help illustrate

the U-boat bases along
the west coast of France.

Now, at the beginning of the w*r,
these bases were relatively open,

relatively open to attack,

and so in 1941,

Hitler ordered that they were
all to be b*mb-proofed,

and it was the b*mb-proofed bases
that became known as U-boat pens.

Now, this U-boat pen in Lorient

was completed in January 1942,

and it was absolutely enormous.

These blueprints reveal
the scale of this project.

The base is able to protect
up to 24 U-boats.

Each huge pen has a hydraulic system

capable of lifting U-boats
out of the water.

And if we take a closer look
at some of these photos,

you start to get an idea
of that scale.

I mean, look at this one here.

I mean, down here,

these are people.

And this is part of that U-boat pen.

And I can see from these blueprints…

that what makes
these pens b*mb-proof

is the roof.

Some of those U-boats
were protected by roofs

consisting of concrete
up to 16 feet thick,

which was almost impossible
to penetrate,

even with a direct hit from above.

Churchill's plan to destroy the U-boats

has been a failure.

One person who celebrates
the failure of the British bombing

is Admiral Doenitz,
the head of the n*zi U-boat.

He now knows that the
submarine's pens are untouchable.

And January 43 ends with another
good piece of news for Doenitz.

Hitler sees fit to promote him

to Commander-in-Chief

of the entire German Navy.

He's now, in essence,
got to a degree

what he wanted in the first place,

which was full access to Hitler

and his key priorities to go

and try and up U-boat production.

He's managing to win a few more
of those battles about resources,

to get a few more people,
a few more tons of steel,

using proper mass
production technology

to mass produce U-boats.

Doenitz is delighted
as U-boat production increases.

Now, more and more
of these deadly vessels

are heading into the Atlantic
than ever before.

He tries to make sure that the U-boat
commanders and their crews

to focus attention on this critical
moment in the Battle of the Atlantic.

And really, the fate of the entire battle

and the entire Allied w*r effort
is hanging in the balance.

After surviving
the Allied bombing raids,

the U-boats head out

to strike back against the Allies.

Doenitz reassures
his U-boat commanders

that they are his priority.

He still believes that destroying
the Atlantic supply line to Britain

is the key to winning the w*r.

Doenitz believes that this radical
increase in U-boat numbers

will be a game changer.

To fight back,

Britain turns
to an unlikely individual,

a university lecturer.

South of Iceland,

British tanker Cordelia

is struggling to keep up

with the other ships in her convoy.

Under the cover of darkness,

a U-boat attacks.

The Cordelia sinks,

k*lling all but one of her crew.

She is just one of 57 Allied ships

sunk by U-boats in February 1943.

Sinkings have rocketed by 70%
in just one month.

After nearly three and a half
years of fighting,

the total losses in the Atlantic

are truly staggering.

March 1943

is an especially dark month

for Britain
in the Battle of the Atlantic.

U-boats are hunting in packs
across the ocean with great success,

and with every passing week,
Allied losses grow.

By the end of the month,


totalling 700,000 tonnes,

have been sunk.

It's the fifth highest monthly total
of the w*r so far.

With fewer supplies
reaching British shores,

there could soon be huge shortages

in food, fuel and weaponry.

The early months of 1943,

things start looking bad
for the Allies,

things are looking problematic,

the sinkings are going
up and up again.

The Allies can't afford to lose
control of the Atlantic.

If they do,
it will be almost impossible

to launch their
D-Day landing in Europe.

Helping the British
government fight back

is an unexpected figure.

University lecturer,
Professor Patrick Blackett.

Patrick Blackett is a
really interesting figure.

He is an academic,

he's a professor of physics,

so his job is to try and find

advantages through technology

and through examining,

in an almost mathematical way,

what's happening.

His famous line was that

you can't run a w*r
on gusts of emotion.

Blackett heads up a team
of statisticians and scientists

who become known as
Blackett's Circus.

Their analytical approach makes
huge differences.

They suggest simple things like

repainting the underneath of planes

from black to white

to camouflage them in the sky.

And when Blackett's team focuses
on Atlantic convoys,

they make a major discovery.

The size of the convoy

has no effect on whether
it's safe or not.

And what he argues for is that
they should be increased.

His thinking was bigger convoys,

more easily protected,

not necessarily requiring
any more of an escort,

and not even really requiring
much more air support.

So, all in all, your losses will be
thoroughly reduced.

Given that a submarine only has

one chance to attack
as the convoy goes past,

the more ships that go past at once,

the less are going to be sunk.

Blackett's discovery means
Atlantic convoys grow much bigger,

many in 1943
contain over 60 ships.

More supplies are now reaching
Britain's shores in fewer crossings.

But as the months pass,

a growing problem emerges for the Allies.

Most sailors have never experienced
a long conflict like this before,

and it's beginning to take its toll.

In 1943,

the Royal Navy is witnessing
a growing number of sailors

unable to carry on with their duties.

Each month, more and more are
proving incapable of doing their jobs,

and, quite frankly,
they're becoming liabilities.

Doctors examine them,

and after listening to their complaints

and analysing their symptoms,

decide that they're all suffering

from what's being called fatigue.

As a trained Marine,
I know being in the armed forces

can be incredibly stressful.

So to understand how years
of fighting in the Atlantic

took its toll on those brave sailors,

I'm meeting with Professor Edgar Jones.

We hear the use of the word fatigue

when referring to the mental
state of military personnel.

It's a bit of a soft term, really,
to describe what they're experiencing.

In order to disguise
a psychiatric diagnosis,

they come up with the term fatigue.

So fatigue is the term
that the Royal Navy use

in the latter part of the w*r
for all of those

stressed-out, traumatised sailors

who are no longer able to function.

Why did that have an effect on

the state of mind of sailors?

Well, those sailors knew
that going to sea was dangerous.

They know that the chances are that

if they're in a big battle
and something goes wrong,

they're going to be k*lled.

And that preys on sailors' minds
over time.

What do they do about it?

They open four specialist

naval hospitals
for psychiatric casualties.

So they improve the monitoring
and treatment process,

but then they also try to
manage their sailors better

and try to spot those sailors
who are vulnerable

to psychological stress.

I can't imagine fighting
for over three years

against a UVO enemy
hidden under the waves.

And it's no surprise to me that
as the battle in the Atlantic continues,

thousands more sailors
struggle to fight on

due to psychological issues.

Luckily, Britain is not alone.

Brave men and women from
the British Empire join the fight,

but only after a prejudice
rule is abolished.

At the start of the w*r,

the RAF, Navy and Army

refuse to accept anyone

who isn't of European descent.

Now that the numbers of fit
and capable adults is declining,

this policy is shelved,

and Britain steps up its search
for new recruits overseas.

India, Australia and Canada
all provide

thousands of troops
ready to fight.

And they joined up to defend Britain,

a Britain that they felt
that they were also part of.

And so they rose up
to defend the Empire,

which they felt was under threat.

There were others who joined up

because they understood
the political implications.

Should fascism win?

Because they felt that if Britain fell,

fascism would spread
to the rest of the world.

One of these new recruits
is Wasudev Guraya,

who signed up from Mauritius.

I'm meeting his daughter Prabha

to understand how her father ended up
fighting in the Battle of the Atlantic.

Prabha, what do you think
would have motivated your father

to join the forces here in the UK?

I mean, the w*r would have seemed like
a million miles away from Mauritius.

Personally, I probably thought
that he would have seen

a means of leaving the island and
getting a broader perspective on life and

you know, doing something,
you know, for his country.

Wasudev is assigned as wireless operator

on one of the most incredible vessels

used in the Battle of the Atlantic.

A short Sunderland.

This flying boat is capable of hunting
down and attacking U-boats,

but can also land on water
to rescue Allied sailors.

It takes several months of
training around the UK,

including Scotland and Pembrokeshire,

before Wasudev is able to fly
his first mission.

If he was based up in Scotland and
Blackpool and places like that,

flying around in Sunderland
flying boats,

he must have spent some time out
in the Atlantic over the convoys,

looking after them.

Yes, he would be going out
over the Atlantic.

They used to go out and do escorts

and because all the convoys
were coming in from America

with all of the supplies,
the troops, everything,

and looking for submarines

that were tracking the convoys

and trying to torpedo them.

They spotted a periscope
and they dropped,

if you see the bombs up there,

they obviously dropped some of those
on the periscope

and then they went up
into the clouds out of the way.

Also quite hard to hide in the clouds
as well, I would imagine.

The Atlantic, you probably had
a lot of clouds to hide in.

Are you proud of your father?

Yes, I am actually.

I'd like to make sure that

future generations and
you know my nephews

and their children in the future
and their children

will be able to read
about their granddad,

their great granddad, and know
what he did in the w*r.

The commitment and bravery of
people like Wasu Dave Guraya

enable the Allies to keep fighting

against the relentless
n*zi w*r machine.

This influx of new sailors and airmen
are able to take advantage

of new technology.

Since the start of the w*r,

there's been a mad rush to stay
ahead of the technological curve.

Britain's become a hive of creativity
and evolution.

And in 1943,

there's a breakthrough

that might just remove
the U-boat's greatest strength,

its stealth.

This equipment could be
the final piece of the puzzle.

The Allies need to win the
Battle of the Atlantic.

Early April 1943,

a convoy of over 60 ships

is travelling from Canada to Britain.

Out in open water,
they're attacked.

A large U-boat wolf pack strikes

and six of the convoy are sunk.

But the Allies hit back…

with an aircraft that's changing
the Battle of the Atlantic.

A Liberator arrives,

damaging five U-boats
and destroying two.

This aircraft is becoming
a common sight,

flying above convoys,

providing essential air support
over this vast ocean.

I want to understand how the Liberator
became so influential

in the skies over the Atlantic.

So I'm meeting Harry Raffel
at London's RAF Museum.

This aircraft was a game changer
for the Allies' journey.

During the Battle of the Atlantic,

why did we need an aircraft
with such vast range?

This can reach much further
out into the Atlantic

and stay out there
for a long period of time

and effectively protect the convoys,

observe U-boats and drive them
beneath the surface,

and that's hugely important.

The Liberator provides
an essential role in the Atlantic.

Since the start of the w*r,

there has been a mid-Atlantic air gap,

where convoys are exposed to
U-boat attack without air support.

Liberators are adapted
to be very long-range,

enabling them to close the gap.

What sort of endurance
would that give this aircraft?

How long could it stay airborne?

So for the very long-range types,

they could get 2,100 miles
in terms of an operational range

and patrols, well in excess of 12 hours,
are not uncommon for VLR types.

These aircraft carried out an offensive
role.

They struck out at the U-boats.

What sort of munitions did it carry?

Well, the depth charge is probably the
most effective weapon that it carries.

And Importantly, they need to land
and detonate in close proximity

to the U-boats.

It's important to remember

that as much as this is a w*r about
trying to sink submarines,

more important than that
is the w*r to protect the convoys.

So even those patrols
which go out don't

make an offensive attack
against a U-boat.

They're doing a hugely important job,

because what they're doing
is stopping that U-boat

attacking a merchant ship.

The Liberator really is a bit of
an unsung hero, isn't it?

Absolutely.

More than any other aircraft,

this helps win
the battle of the Atlantic,

and in many ways win the w*r.

The Liberators are one of the last
pieces of the puzzle for the Allies.

Convoys traveling through
the treacherous mid-Atlantic gap

now have the peace of mind
in knowing should they be attacked,

they've got essential air cover
right behind them.

There are key
developments for the Allies

on the waves of the Atlantic, too.

Since the start of the w*r,

destroyers have been crying out
for an accurate radar

to hunt down U-boats.

In 1943,

improved equipment is installed
in more and more Allied warships.

To find out how this impacts
the battle of the Atlantic,

I'm meeting with naval historian
Richard Holdsworth.

Can you tell me a little bit about how
radar and radar technology developed

during the battle of the Atlantic?

Radar at the beginning
of the w*r is in its infancy.

The big challenge that the Navy faced
was actually getting things small enough

to be able to be mounted on ships.

What was the capability of radar systems
on ships towards the beginning of the w*r?

The bigger ships and
sort of surface warning radars

would be able to pick out
surface ships at a distance.

They were able to detect
large things close up,

I think, as its crudest level.

Large things close up, yeah.

But then towards the end of the w*r?

Towards the end of the w*r,
they have got much more accurate.

They're at a position where, actually,
you can pinpoint a periscope.

A few miles away through radar
as it pops up.

And that is a game changer

for attacking submarines
that are submerged.

And I guess one of the massive
advantages in the battle of the Atlantic,

being able to detect German U-boats
at night time.

Yes.

Yeah, and actually
picking up threats to you

earlier than you could do before.

Yeah, and what a huge
advantage that was.

Yes, very much so.

With this evolution in radar,

U-boats are no longer
the hidden enemy.

Now, Allied ships in the Atlantic
can see a U-boat's conning tower

surfacing from over 12 miles away.

Constant innovation of the radar systems
throughout the battle of the Atlantic

has helped transform the fortunes
of those brave sailors battling U-boats.

And this mass-rollout of the radar
has arrived at just the right time.

There are now
more and more U-boats

patrolling the Atlantic
than ever before.

By 1943,

the Allies' anti-submarine warfare
is really coming together.

And it's the culmination of
lots of different strands

that are knitted together.

The developments in sonar,
the developments in radar,

the developments
in long-range aircraft,

and the increasing capacity

of the destroyers to search,
locate, and destroy U-boat activity

meant that the U-boats were
now often isolated.

While the Allies enjoyed
major technological advances,

the same cannot be said
for the Nazis.

The standard German weapons in 1939

were as good as or better
than everybody else's.

By now, they've fallen behind
in key areas.

Germany is caught
in a technological gap,

and it's not able to catch up.

One of their failings
wasn't to see out of the box.

That's partly because
it was an authoritarian regime,

so people are more afraid
to think out of the box.

You know, you're going to get stripping
down a 90-minute rant from Hitler

possibly be k*lled.

You know what I mean?

You're not really going to try
going for too much blue sky thinking,

thank you very much.

The Nazis put their faith in numbers,

and the Allies put theirs
in innovation.

It leads to a major confrontation

in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

In late April 1943,

a convoy enters the Atlantic
en route to North America.

Among the 43 merchant ships
are some older vessels

that slow the speed of the convoy
down to just 8 miles an hour.

The convoy is given
a large armed escort,

two destroyers, four corvettes
and a frigate.

And in charge of this
deadly battle group

is Commander Peter Gretton,

and he's a no-nonsense kind of
commander with a very loyal crew.

His son, Mike Gretton,

explains what his father thought
about this Atlantic crossing.

His expectations were
of a very difficult crossing

because intelligence had reported
a large number of U-boats out there.

They were under no illusion this was
going to be a very, very difficult crossing

and they had to fight
their way through.

The convoy travels around
the edge of the Atlantic

to try to avoid the waiting U-boats.

But this doesn't keep them safe.

They got up to just south of
Iceland and past Iceland,

which is where the action started,

and they had a couple of
quite bad nights.

On one of the difficult nights,

my father had four separate
contacts with submarines.

It was a staggering number.

There were neither submarine losses
nor merchant ship losses.

And then got into some really
very nasty weather indeed.

Strong winds batter the convoy,

which means maintaining
formation is very difficult.

Their speed slows right down
and worse is yet to come.

Admiral Doenitz has sent at least


to hunt down and attack this convoy.

This was the largest
concentration of U-boats

that they'd been up
until that time in the w*r.

U-boats strung out in a great line,

waiting to hit the convoy

as it approached the danger zone.

Doenitz at this point is thinking that

he's got enough U-boats
heading for this area

that he really ought to be able to
to effectively force a m*ssacre.

The convoy is about to face
the greatest show of power

ever seen from the n*zi U-boats.

Doenitz issues a rallying cry
to his crews.

Something can and must be
achieved from 31 boats.

He expects his U-boats to send this
entire convoy to the bottom of the ocean.

A large Allied convoy is eight days
into its Atlantic crossing.

It's being tracked by the largest U-boat
wolfpack the Atlantic has ever seen.

Lieutenant Commander Peter Gretton
prepares for battle.

But suddenly, he is faced
with another opponent.

As the convoy continues,
it's battered by a Force 10 gale.



As the slow ships scatter
because of the weather,

it makes the defending
escort's job of protecting them

very, very difficult.

Gretton's son explains how the storm
isn't the only problem his father faces.

At that stage,
my father had his worst fear.

He was running out of fuel.

The convoy still has over 1,000 miles
until they reach their destination.

With the worsening weather and low fuel,
Gretton is left with only one choice.

He has to leave the convoy.

I simply can't imagine
how I would have felt

in those circumstances,

responsible for this
very important convoy.

It must have been appalling.

If this weakened convoy is destroyed

and the Nazis take
control of the Atlantic,

the Allies' D-Day plans
will lie in tatters.

When night falls,
the U-boats strike.

Admiral Doenitz has given
very specific orders.

He wants his U-boat commanders
to create an Allied bloodbath.

He's sending out signals like,

do not underestimate your enemies,
strike them dead.



In 24 hours,


As the U-boats circle their prey,
preparing for another as*ault,

they're stopped in their tracks.

There was then a dramatic
change in the weather.

It went from hurricane
to flat calm and fog.

The Allies use their radar
to navigate safely through the fog.

The U-boats can't do anything.

They're unsighted.
They're blind.

Technological innovations give the Allies
an advantage in this crucial battle.

For the Germans,
this is not a disaster.

Because the escorts now have got radar.

They can fight the battle on screen.

They can see when the U-boats can't.

The escorts and the aircraft
had an absolute field day.

Suddenly, out of the air
they'd be attacked

or by surface ship
they'd be attacked.

Over the next 24 hours,

six U-boats are sent
to the bottom of the Atlantic.

Doenitz had had enough.

He orders the U-boats
to break off their attack.

And even though the odds were
stacked heavily in the Germans' favour,

the Allies had managed to fight back
and force them to retreat.

It's the ultimate vindication
of that process

that was set in place early in the w*r

and all of the efforts
of all of those people

who came together to fight that w*r

on land, in the air and on the sea itself.

This battle isn't just a one-off.

New technology has helped
turn the tide for the Allies

and the month of May
becomes a time to celebrate.

The U-boat losses
that month alone are over 40.

And by the end of the month,
Doenitz realises that the game is up.

In the end, Germany's out-gone,
out-manned, out-resourced.

They're not the hunters anymore,
they're the hunted.

After nearly four years of fighting,

the Battle of the Atlantic
is all but over.

Although this is by no means
the last attack in the Atlantic,

crossings are now significantly
safer for the convoys.

The number of ships sunk
falls dramatically,

from 39 sunk in May
to just seven in June.

And losses stay low
throughout the rest of 1943.

Tactical improvements
and technological advancements

mean that the Royal Navy
and Air Force

now have the edge
over the n*zi U-boats.

The Allies now have
command of the Atlantic Ocean.

If the Navy and the Merchant Navy

had not driven the U-boats
out of the sea,

Britain and the Allies would not
have been able to launch

their campaign in Western Europe.

That would have been impossible.

D-Day would not have happened

without the control of the Atlantic.

This epic battle that started
on the very first day of the w*r

has come at an enormous sacrifice.

During the course of the w*r,

it's estimated that over


fighting to control the Atlantic.

The battle of the Atlantic has been won
and it's been great to look back

and really understand how that battle
was played out and that it wasn't easy.

It's hard for us to quantify or understand
what life would have been like

had those convoys not been successful.

There were thousands of sailors lost

and you can't imagine how awful
it must have been for them out there.

But this is so important for the Allies.

I mean, Rob, let's have a look
at the D-Day landings.

Look at all the materials that landed
on the beaches in Normandy.

I bet you 95% of them came
from those convoys in America.

The Battle of the Atlantic was the turning
point that allowed D-Day to happen.

And it's really important, I think,
to acknowledge that.

It's quite sobering thought, actually,
when you look into the detail and

understand how important
the Battle of the Atlantic was

to the eventual outcome of
the Second World w*r.

It was a hard-fought battle.

It certainly was.