Germany's Laughably Awful Attempt at Naval Special Forces
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- Опубліковано 15 жов 2024
- In the opening days of the Second World War at sea, the U-boats of the German Kriegsmarine reigned supreme. Attacking in deadly, coordinated wolf packs,these stealthy vessels cut swath through Allied shipping convoys in the north Atlantic, threatening to sever Britain’s vital lifeline to North America and starve the island nation into submission. But this “happy time” -as U-boat crews called it -was not to last, for by 1943 major developments in Allied naval technology and tactics -from radar and sonar to escort carriers and long-range patrol aircraft -had succeeded in turning the tide, putting the once-feared U-boat arm firmly on the back foot. Meanwhile, the German surface fleet -never large to begin with -remained largely bottled up in port, its commanders hesitant to commit their expensive capital ships to battle. With the Allies pushing into mainland Europe -first in Italy, then in France -theGerman Navy began to look increasingly irrelevant. In response to this changing strategic situation, the Kriegsmarinedecided to switch gears and think small, deploying a variety of bizarre miniature attack craft from human torpedoes and midget submarinesto frogmen and explosive, remote-control motorboats. While certainly creative, the combat performance of these weapons of desperation was less than impressive, and ultimately had little impact on the course of the war. This is the story of Nazi Germany’s hilariously awful Naval Special Forces.
Author: Gilles Messier
Host: Simon Whistler
Producer: Caden Nielsen
Simon as the french soldier in the Python thumbnail is absolutely brilliant! 😂
Instead of farting he drinks diet Coke and burps in their general direction
You and The Fat Electrician channel are what I use to keep my 17 year old interested in History. Him and his friends watch all the time and now are all way more interested and excelling at History class. So thank you kindly Simon and all the writers for making all these great channels up and amazing and engaging. ❤
Yaaay! Another Fat Electrician fan! 🍻
Habitual LineCrosser, The Fat Electrician, HistoryHit, and the legendary Simon Whistler are the reason I’ve found a love of history and keeping knowledge of current events. I can’t thank them all enough.
Fat electrician is a total propagandist.
@@andrewking9454I smell a commie
@@andrewking9454clearly a psyop, stating facts in a entertaining way, terrible capitalist pig tbh
I laughed at the boats name and almost thought I misheard only for Simon to clarify i had not.
Can’t believe he said the N word that many times.
@@tbonr87 Why didn't you simply say the word 'nigger' instead of 'the N word'? Hate speech is only hate speech when the ''context'' is considered. You need to learn more about the Freedom Of Speech Laws.
Wait until you hear about the ice ramming ship, the Kochenbohls!
_[*Disclaimer; the Kochenbohls may not be a real ship and entirely made up by Narwahl. Call your doctor if you have issues with Kochenbohls. Void where prohibited. Limit one per customer.]_
@@tbonr87it's literally history. Get over it
@tbonr87 The name's origin doesn't help🤣
So we’ve known since the 40’s that sealing a submersible hatch from the outside is a bad idea?
It's '40s*
@@thefisherking78 thank you captain pedantic
@@thefisherking78No one cares
7:48 editing error. Empty box. Barely noticeable. Thanks Simon! You're a complete legend!
Who would've thought an island nation with a 477 year old established Royal Navy and about 20,000 years of continuous seafaring existence would have the better navy.... Weird....
And yet the german frogmen still saw succes, and i wont even start with what italy did
@@Bandog23 Weird here's me thinking Germany and Italy both lost WWII, good thing we have you to tell us otherwise... Please tell us about these Toadfrau's and how they made a significant impact and won the war for Mein Scheissenführer.....
There were a lot of recces or failed frog attacks that are never registered. The failed frog attack on Bridge 9 (location better known for 'Joe's Bridge later on) on September 15 1944, just 2 days prior of Operation Market-Garden from the Krause/Richter area is one.
MEK65 and 60 operated since Normandy and during this attempt from 's Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands.
The succesful attack on the Kruisschanssluis at Antwerp was done by 6 frogmen MEK60 'Prinzhorn' and 2 'Linsen' K-Flotilla 216 on Sept.17 1944 at the start of operation Market-Garden.
Goal was to damage the Albert-Canal Lock to raise the canal level in order to disrupt the British crossing at Beringen and Geel at the Albert-Canal.
Privious there had been a failed MEK frog attacks on the Beringen Bridge under II./723.I.R. 'Bierenheide' and later Leutnant Ulmer of III./Fallschirmjager Rgt.6 '.
After the succesfull frog attack at the Nijmegen bridges MEK65 and 60 were relieved by MEK40 who continued the attempts at the Nijmegen bridges and in the Scheldt Estuary.
On January 22/23 1945 they succesfully demolished the huge Water tower at De Sluis at the St.Philipsland Peninsula which overlooked the entire German held Schouwen-Duiveland Island.
There was a set back to destroy the forward Allied Troop Commandpost as one of their teams was almost entirely taken out action during it's landing.
But they were able to destroy one Post and it's OP.
Simultanously there was another raid on Fort Sabina.
The Germans had planned to used it Port as LZ for various invasion plans since November 1944.
3 days later the 3rd and last Allied attack to neutralize the German Kapelse Veer Bridgehead in the Adjacient Sector took place that lasted until the 31st of January 1945.
One of their last raid must have been the the attack on WN401 at Stavenisse, Tholen Island against a section of 11 men of 9./Netherlands Interior Forces, Commando Brabant.
Although all but one were cornerd into the living pillbox S1, most maneged to escape and MEK40 captured only 2 of which one die soon after due to wounds or due to interrogation at Noordgouwe.
His name was Stormtrooper Cees van der Werff and was found in August 1945 after the war and reburried at Scherpenisse, Tholen Island.
This was more a recce to gather intelligence , but also to keep up the idea for possible invasion plans to the Allies.
Mid March it was clear to the Allies that there was no longer a threat of a German invasion towards the Port of Antwerp that lies some 30 to 40 Km to the south.
For a period of 5 months there where no significant Allied troops between this part of the Western Front line, that was actually nothing more then an observation line, and the Port of Antwerp.
And the German Commander Kurt Student knew carefully managing this front to keep it like that, but never received permission to exploit this opportunity.
Simon got his N pass!
I didn’t know the Nazis got stuck at Dunkirk too. Could you do a video on that on one of your channels? Perhaps here or Warographics.
Germans had a large garrison in the city of Dunkirk. As they already had enough ports the Allied forces did not fight over the city and simply went around it, with only some units being left there to prevent the Germans to escape from the city. Large part of the besieging forces were Czechoslovaks.
@@richardaubrecht2822
I didn’t know that. Thanks!
Love the thumpnail! Classic 😂😂😂😂
A man of culture
THUMBNAIL 😂
@@MarsellusWallace2024dumpfnail
I LOOOOOVE the Monty Python reference!! I’ve watched that movie more times than I can count.
The thumbnail sucked me in. Why are there no French insults? Edit: not even a raspberry.
The Japanese submarine I-21 was involved not only in the Pearl Harbour and Sydney attacks, it was also the sole submarine responsible for the Bombing of Newcastle AU. During WW2 Newcastle was the most defended town in Australia as it was where the steel for the armament for the AIF was being produced.
0:56 Frogmen hahaha
3:17 Called the WHAT?!?!?!?!
I think you'll find it's called the Submarine of colour 😁
Its Neger and latin for black, and according to wiki a nickname for the inventor. Not in European culture Neger (black) have nothing to do withe slaves..... However Slavic, as in Slavic people are linked to word slave.
They really hated those minesweepers 😅
I clicked solely for the thumbnail but knew I wouldn't be disappointed with the video. As always ❤😊❤
The Italians did Naval Special Forces really well , arguably where the best at it .
very argueble
@@pollyg562 of course I did put that clause in ....... But for a military that gets mocked in WW2 no one mocks their Naval Special Forces.... It was in its infancy after all
Lily Von Shtupp would’ve perked up at the notion of those subs.
“Schnitzengruben?”
One of the main reasons I like Simon so much is he talks fast. I read and comprehend fast, so I can also listen fast. He speaks at the speed level of my brain and I hear every word he says. It's awesome to get knowledge delivered at the rate my brain accepts.
Ikr. Whether UA-cam channels or tv documentaries, far too many are slow and drawn out and repeat the same info ad nauseam, and my ADD brain and I just check out in a few minutes, coz it very quickly gets boooooooring!
And despite Simons frequent and often hilarious mispronounciations, he speaks quite clearly, and I as a non-native English speaker have no problems following him.
It’s the perfect speed. No yawning, just cool info.
If you like Simon's verbal delivery I think you'd love the literature videos done by Overly Sarcastic Productions. Red, their narrator, has some seriously rapid flow.
@@johnkirby8939 Thanks for the info 😀. I will be checking it out as reading is one of my favourite pastimes.
@@johnkirby8939
Huh. Have followed their channel forever and never even thought of that. Red does indeed have a rapid flow as you so eloquently described it.
How many Simons are there, and why are they all doing info channels?
Not "Flippers"...
Fins!
I'd love to see an episode about German special forces if Operation Sea Lion had ever happened. Due to the obvious German naval superiority, just imagine the special forces that could have been used for the supply chain. An entire branch of naval horse-drawn carts that could have been used in that made up invasion. 😂
Today I found out there is another Simon Whistler channel out there!
3:18 Called the WHAT
By far the most offensive thing the Germans ever did.
*See thumbnail.
Oh yeah? I fart in your general direction.
Barrage balloon vessel?
Could you do a video on one of your channels (possibly side projects?) About different vessels used during WWII?
Years ago I thought destroyers, torpedo boats, and landing craft were the smaller of the ships used. But escort carriers aren't covered often, I saw your video on liberty ships, there's few stories out there about coastal patrol boats, and at the time I hadn't realized that destroyers had destroyer escorts. I thought destroyers were meant to be escort. Now I'm learning that some zeppelins were used in WWII and there were boats for deploying balloons? I thought these were WWI weapons. Seems there's a great deal I have to learn and a great many mis-steps I've taken in my assumptions.
Simon just got the pass recently, apparently lmfao
The canopy can only be opened from the outside???? ..... sod that for a game of soldiers! 🤔
3:15 *sigh* let’s see the commen- oh, surprisingly civilized
I noticed the reference to breakfast in the ‘subs’. M
Simon,
I think I have said this before on here regarding the effectiveness of the Kriegsmarine in WWII; their performance was woeful when compared to that of the High Seas Fleet of WWI. Of all the convoys crossing the Atlantic less than 20% are attacked in anyway; and even during the 1st happy time (,the 2nd happy time is solely an American problem caused by Admiral King being blinkered by his own prejudice,) successes were barely meeting the targets that were needed to achieve the stranglehold that compared to the performance of 1917.
The biggest German failing was not coping with the WWI strategy of submarine minelayers, which caused by far the most significant number of maritime losses to both merchant and navy losses, for very little risk to the submarine forces. Very few of the type VII and IX U-boats were adapted to be minelayers and mines had the advantage that far more mines could be carried compared to the number of torpedoes. No this would not have worked mid Atlantic, but this is where Germany had its biggest problem, how to find convoys with enough submarines to make the wolf-pack tactics really count.
Then add on to this that German over reliance on Enigma, which once the code could be broken almost in real time, that almost all U-boats concentration areas could be diverted around very easily.
This is why the majority of convoys were never attacked, the in effective information war the Germans fought in WWII, and let's not forget Admiral Canaris also working against the Germans as that British "double agent", ensuring that Enigma security was never called into question for the first few years (39-41) and once HMS Bulldog and 40 commando had captured four rota machines in late 1942, the inteligence gap was that had opened up with the addition of that 4th rota was closed again.
Can’t help but wonder how many times Simon woke up from a nightmare after reading this script 🤣😂
bro basically just explained that he was saying the n word and where it came from
Why the constant rush? Your narrative style makes it challenging to absorb the content while watching. Incorporating brief pauses at the end of sentences helps break down the speech into more digestible segments, greatly enhancing the overall comprehension of the lecture-especially for non-native speakers.
I hope you're not being chased!
Simon, you can't call them Midget Subs, it's Little Person Subs
German Historian here. When i saw that Title i thought "What do you mean Awful Attempt?!" then saw it's about WW2 and thought "Of course it's about the WW2 one!"
Great Topic! In general i'd recommend everyone to read up on all kinds of Countries early Special Forces Efforts, both the succesful (Like the German "Brandenburger" Regiment among many others) but definitely also the failed ones In the early Days of Special Forces every Country was stil figuring Things out and many ended in Failure, definitely not unique to Germany at the Time
I especially recommend People to read up on the Italian "Decima Flottiglia MAS" which had a Unit of Frogmen on Board who have done some of the craziest and amazing Special Forces Missions during WW2. I don't want to spoil it, but i'm still surprised how unknown those are, even among Historians.
And if you don't want to learn about early Special Forces among the Axis Countries ( though i recommend you do ) there are of course tons of Books on especially the American and British early Special Forces Attempts, succesful and failed ones.
It's a fantastic Topic over all and i'm glad to see Videos made about it. Hope more of those Failed Attempts in the Vein of this one will be made in the Future!
Prost & Cheers from Berchtesgaden in the Bavarian Alps
The title is misleading as hell and I sense an overall decreasing lvl of professionalism in the channel that really bothers me. It's become dull to a degree, looking like either the host or the whole team doesn't take much interest in it anymore.
@@kocoloris3337
In one way i agree with you, in another way i also kinda get why a UA-camr who lives from UA-cam would choose such Titles for the Video, or Thumbnails of course.
So i'm split on that, i absolutely hate Clickbait Titles etc. but if i imagine myself being a UA-camr i kinda get why you'd go with those if it's your Income.
Thank you for teaching me how to spell Berchtesgaden, I never would've been able to sound it out! That was one of my favorite episodes of Hogan's Heroes. I agree, the early days of everyone's modern militaries were fraught with an equal measure of success and failure. Cheers & Prost to you from the USA!
A units effectiveness is proportionally to how much of its success is written in English.
I mean not like Germany has a good military now either. entirely different reasons why but not untrue.
Relying on hit and run tactics against a superior force is hardly the same as 'reigning supreme'.
'Happy Time' in the U-boat context refers most often to the period after Pearl Harbor, specifically to 'Operation Paukenschlag'. This was preceded by 'Operation Rheinübung' (1941) which ended with the demise of the 'Bismarck'. The surface ships of the Reichsmarine exit the scene (to live happily ever after in Marvel Comics). Recurring pattern, it starts with easy pickings, 'l'embarras du choix', probably somewhat akin to a 'heroine rush', but that was over once the other side took your measure. Happy time 1 (1939, post Poland), happy time 2 (1942, post Pearl Harbor). Only a handful of U-boats had the range to be deployed off-shore in North and Central America when that became an option.
Most of the remaining big ships of the Reichsmarine found a refugium in Narvik. (The Royal Navy set up shop in Island.)
If all mini-subs are a joke than what about the 'Turtle' (1775).
Everything is possible but the story of the beached operator left to suffocate in the Plexiglass dome of his sub does not match other rescue reports.
It is usually a dark hour when a government whose sole legitimacy rests on spectacular feats (also known as Fleischmann&Pons syndrome) has to pull all the stops without quite knowing what it does.
"I told them we've already got one!"
Did the French Naval Special Forces call themselve _Frogmen_
The tiny long range Kreigsmarine U boat numbers available at the beginning of WW2 was one of Hitler's biggest strategic blunders.
the closed captions are peculiar, even 5 minutes in...
Dude, you mailed this one in. Something wrong with your life?
Despite or because of the "chemical Asistance"?
Before this video I watched a video about Noah Knigga, now this 🤯
the neg-what?
A human torpedo, called. The. What?
Aptly named channel..didn’t know any of this.
I didnt know about the Brits 4 man mini subs.
Theres a picture of 3 captured ww1 German subs in the quay of great yarmouth
It’s almost unbelievable how every time the Germans hit a ship the Allies would inform us that it was destined to be sunk as a breakwater ! Huh ! 😊😊
Listening to Simon saying the N word over and over was hilarious
I'm super interested in finding out if UA-cam tried to demonitize this epsiode for the use of the word "midget". I wonder how tough that algorithm is.
Thumbnail is great.😂😂
The whaaaat?!?!?!
Simon over here dropping hard R's.... Expecting this one to get demonetized or pulled down.
I hope I never see Simon out in public cause I’ll be off to jail right after
If Simon and The Fat Electrician could meet up that would be epic, i would sell my soul to see simon on the Unsubscribe podcast.
99% of all my time on UA-cam is now spent watching Simon's channels. Some of, if not the best content on here! Thank you good sir! 🤓
Yeah. Places and Astrographics are wonderful
Same, he annoys me greatly but I enjoy the content.
Y’all are like “omg he said the woooord”
Turn captions on. He could have said it a LOT more.
They couldn't get the plane out of the sank bank..And so left it and the living pilot alone? What to just go in and out with the tide until he suffocated? What the hell.. are you sure we got the facts right on that one?
When you understand german and realize Simon just uses the N Word casually because of the slightly false translation😂😂😂
> the slightly false translation
The translation is perfectly correct. There's only one word in German. Whether you translate it the way Simon did or the other way is a judgement call.
@@deanjacks270 actually you’re right
I guess you guys didn't hear about the E-Boats???
To be fair it sounds like their subs were crap, not the special forces.
They sound quite competent.
Hey man, I think you should take a breath.
Best video pic EvEr!
sounds like those little death tubes were manufactured by bmw. they were just reliable as their current vehicles.🤣
10:28 actually, haifisch is German for shark😁
It sounded like "Haai", the dutch word for shark.
Wolfpacks really came into operation much later than the start of WW2, at the start of WW2 in the Atlantic, Wolfpacks weren't used much.
Yeah that guy does not not seem like he knows much about what he talks about.
This guy has about a hundred different yt channels. He just shows up and reads the script that's been prepared for him.
Wolfpack tactics, such as Hartmann's Wolfpack, were used since the beginning of the war just not successfully.
The German Navy made the mistake to implement the Z-Plan before the war before the war.
@15:19 in the subtitles!!! 🤪
At least they tried and failed
theres some ww2 weaponry that reminds you how normalized amphetamines were in the era. Because they definitely were having a feast when designing this
You guys make great videos but your German pronunciation is bad. If you need help with that, let me know. I can assist.
I'm surprised there aren't more Brain Blaze comments about taking the white flour while inside wet Beavers.
(3:25) OMG he dropped the N-Word. 😳😧
Good thing it was named after the inventor. For a moment there, I was worried that the nazis were racist.
A human torpedo called what now!!??
Edit* i was trying to make a bad joke and then Simon was like no thats actually correct and now im bummed out.
I can’t be the only one that heard it…. 😂
The Whaaaaaat????!!!!!!😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
So, Germany was using the N-word as a SURNAME for a person of African descent before Americans ever even THOUGHT to use it as an insult? Did I hear that right?
Hmmmm...... yep, this is bait. Hey guys, this here's some bait!
Well, it's not as though 'naval special forces' had been much of a thing anywhere. It was pioneered a bit before the war but really only put to the test in it. The British and US did it the best* and largest, if one counts commandos and all special ops amphibious or raiding ops.
* Pound for pound or per capita the Italians were the best by a significant margin.
With one or two exceptions the Germans didn't do Special Forces well, period.
I don't think you are allowed to say that word, Simon! 😬
I'm still confused why there is an English Frenchman on the thumbnail. >_
Oof name aged perfectly 🤦🏻♂️
The happy time didnt actually starve britain. Only about 10% of ships were sunk and issues arose from getting stuff wrom western ports to the rest of the country
The thumbnails as British as an insult gets. Guess that’s why America was the first to beat the British (the Norman’s don’t count).
America WAS British, so it took the British...to beat the British?
@@Horticarter41 The Americans that fought back the British were... American. Their status as "Brits" would've been far removed by generations of breeding with existing Natives & established colonists hailing from other European countries.
Completely ignoring the fact that Britain had lost a couple of wars against the Dutch at that point.
Think this video is going to (probably unintentionally) really piss some people off. Who woulda thunk it?! Nazi Germany would name some of their military hardware something HIGHLY offensive! Ouch.
You sound like somebody who made up his mind in advance. The Seehund mini-submarines was reasonably effectively, for what it was. The kampfschwimmer(s) did destroy several bridges on the western and eastern fronts, that make them a effective special force and the "Marine infantry" did fight well at the end of the war. So how can you say it was laughably attempt?
What do you expect them to do? Win the war? If the Nazi-German did have British commandos the result would be the same. I agree that the maned torpedo and one man mini submarines was a total failure.
I am sorry, but you use the NWord a lot...
The British
At least its not the hard r ig 😄
Just a heads up - the word used here is basically the German version of the N-word.
It's always been a derogatory word/insult.
'Moor' is closer to the term 'negro' in colloquial use. While obviously outdated (and pretty offensive by todays standards), it didn't have the same racist connotations than the German N-word.
Well, the less said about Simon's pronunciation of German words, the better.
The first specialized weapon was a human torpedo called the what now? 3:18.
Ayo
Honestly, I respect him actually talking about history without a ton of filtering / censorship.
Saw an opportunity and took it. Said it for 2 minutes straight. 😅.
Third?
Lol you're first on mine 😄
😎
Simon saying Naga still have me flinch each time lol
NORTHAMERICURRRR
I wonder how many RETAKES it took for Simon to get through this video's narration without making any unfortunate 'mistakes'?
😂 my thoughts exactly!
Still not as laughable as space force