Historical Article: Phantom of the Deep – Germany’s Underwater Wonder Weapon
By Steven Trent Smith @ Historynet.com
At the end of the war, American technical teams fanned out across Germany in search of Nazi Wunderwaffen, or Wonder Weapons: guided missiles, jet aircraft, super-heavy tanks. Of most interest to the U.S. Navy was a submarine capable of operating submerged continuously for days on end—the Type XXI U-boat. Americans had known of its existence for nearly two years, after the British had passed along sketchy intelligence about a “fast submarine.” They knew even more in January 1945, when Allied forces captured plans for the U-boat at a steel plant in Strasbourg, France.
