Because Great Britain and the Allies successfully defended several of her convoys, May 1943 became a key turning point in the Battle of the Atlantic. One particular convoy, SC-130, departed Halifax, Canada, on 11 May, with 37 merchant ships and six naval escorts. Proceeding toward England, they sailed for eight days unthreatened through the North Atlantic. The Germans, however, were aware of the convoy’s route and prepared for an assault. With approximately 30 submarines in the Black Pit, they planned to coordinate their strikes by using Rudeltaktiks, or wolf-pack tactics.24

On 19 May, the convoy sighted a distant U-boat and detached naval escorts to drive it underwater. At about 0400, the first RAF B-24 arrived over the convoy. Using airborne radar, it discovered a surfaced submarine and forced it to submerge. Diving down to one hundred feet, the plane crossed over the enemy vessel and dropped three 250-pound depth charges and two acoustic homing torpedoes. After an explosion, U-boat 954 became the B-24’s first confirmed kill.25

Continuing its patrol, the Liberator sighted five more U-boats. It successfully forced four to crash-dive and then flew over one submarine that remained on the surface. After the plane sprayed it with machine-gun fire, the U-boat submerged. In each attack, the aircrew marked the spot and called in naval escorts to continue the pursuit. By the end of the three-hour patrol, the Iceland-based B-24 had destroyed one submarine and forced five others to submerge.26

During the rest of the day, five more aircraft rotated in and out of the Black Pit. Upon arriving over the convoy at 0915, the second B-24 attacked one submarine and forced six others to crash-dive.27 In the afternoon, three more planes continued the surveillance.

Air coverage was suspended during the night and restored at first light. During the two-day battle, seven Liberators sighted 24 U-boats and forced 16 to submerge. Of the eight submarines attacked, three were destroyed.28 When results of these air attacks reached Germany, the high command decided to withdraw their submarines from the Black Pit. Thus unopposed, Convoy SC-130 arrived in Great Britain four days later.

Until this battle, the Germans believed that their U-boats in the Black Pit could fight with impunity. The presence of land-based airpower and other factors such as better intelligence, radar, and the eventual introduction of escort carriers forced a tactical change. During May 1943, Germany lost 41 submarines; of these, 28 were destroyed in the mid-Atlantic.29 At this point, acknowledged Adm Karl Doenitz, commander of all German U-boats, wolf-pack operations “were no longer possible.”30 “I accordingly withdrew the boats from the North Atlantic.”31 One historian summarized this campaign in these terms:

The VLR [very long range] B-24 Liberator aircraft of RAF 120th Squadron was the weapon system which tipped the battle in favor of the Allies. What made the aircraft such an effective weapon against the U-boat was their high speed relative to a surface vessel, a speed which permitted them to search a much greater area than a ship.32

Doenitz, however, redeployed his submarine forces into the South Atlantic. Since most of the U-boats departed from French ports, patrols began by sailing across the Bay of Biscay. Incapable of transiting totally underwater, these submarines had to surface periodically. As a counter, the British sent long-range aircraft into the bay and began a sea-control campaign later known as the “Big Bay Slaughter.”33

The lessons from the Gulf War are neither necessarily universal nor applicable in other conflicts.

In October 1942, the US Army Air Forces entered the Atlantic war by creating several land-based antisubmarine squadrons. Officially known as the US Army Air Forces’ Antisubmarine Command, these units were designed to help the US Navy hunt for enemy submarines, which, at the time, were patrolling along the Atlantic coast and in the Caribbean.34

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As the ferocity of battle in the Bay of Biscay increased, two Army Air Forces antisubmarine squadrons joined the hunt. In November 1942, 21 American B-24s landed in South England and began flying out of St. Eval, Cornwall. Between December and March, they flew several patrols across the bay searching for and attacking various German submarines. On occasion they encountered German Junkers Ju-88 aircraft and had to fight their way back to England.

During the bay campaign, the Americans found 20 U-boats and attacked eight. One was a confirmed kill, and three others were classified as damaged.35 Of the 21 Liberators that began the operation, one plane was lost in combat and six in various accidents.36

In March 1943, the two American squadrons were redesignated the 480th Group and sent to Port Lyautey, French Morocco. Here they joined a US Navy squadron of PBY Catalinas, which patrolled primarily along the littoral, up to two hundred miles out. The 480th, however, extended this Atlantic coverage to over one thousand miles.37

After several successful submarine attacks, a B-24 crew sighted a U-boat on 17 July about two hundred miles west of Portugal. As the Americans began their attack, the enemy sent a hail of fire into the plane’s cockpit, wounding the navigator, bombardier, copilot, and radio operator. Despite damage, the crew dropped a 350-pound depth charge and then struggled back to Port Lyautey. Photos confirmed that the submarine was destroyed.38 In total, the 480th sank three U-boats and damaged four others.39 After a four-month tour in Morocco, the 480th deployed to Tunis, where it provided air coverage for Mediterranean convoys.

While the Battle of the Atlantic continued to the end of the war, the spring of 1943 was a turning point. In that year, in addition to land-based airpower, the Allies deployed more convoy escorts, including carriers, and thus extracted a heavy toll on the German U-boats. “The combination of support groups of carriers and escort vessels,” acknowledged Winston Churchill, “aided by long-range aircraft of the Coastal Command, which now included American squadrons, proved decisive.”40

In the Pacific, victory over Japan ultimately depended on the Allies’ ability to destroy the enemy’s maritime capabilities. As an island nation, Japan depended heavily on imported materials to fuel its steel mills and other industries. Thus, land-based aircraft were used early in the war to attack the Japanese naval and merchant ships. Beginning in September 1942, Fifth Air Force planes, flying out of Port Moresby, New Guinea, started bombing the port city of Rabaul. Through continuous attacks, the Americans eventually sank over 373,000 tons of shipping.41 After Rabaul, the Fifth flew strikes against enemy vessels in the New Guinea harbors of Wewak and Hollandia.42

One of the most successful sea-control strikes occurred off the east coast of New Guinea in March 1943. In that battle, known as the Battle of the Bismarck Sea, approximately one hundred Allied planes, including modified B-25s carrying five-hundred-pound bombs, attacked and successfully destroyed an entire Japanese convoy.43

Flying at one hundred feet above the ocean surface, American B-25s skipped their bombs across the water and into the hulls of these ships. At the battle’s conclusion, 12 cargo ships and four Japanese destroyers were sunk or severely damaged. Commenting on the Bismarck Sea battle, one historian claimed that airpower “finally achieved what General Billy Mitchell had so breezily predicted 15 years before. They had destroyed an enemy fleet at sea unaided by naval surface forces.”44

In China, Chennault’s Fourteenth Air Force flew against ships in the Gulf of Tonkin, Haiphong Harbor, and Hong Kong and helped close down the Yangtze River. During the fall of 1943, his planes conducted a six-day blitz in which they recorded great achievements. In addition to 71 Japanese aircraft destroyed, contended Chennault, these successes included “three ocean-going ships sunk and damage to docks, coal piles, supply depots, and airdrome installations.”45

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