Chapter 743: The Gap in Weapons

In another corner unseen by the poor sailor, another periscope was, in fact, continuously observing the every move of the transport fleet. At this delicate moment, the German submarines finally revealed their full killing power, beginning to pour their deadly torpedoes at the defenseless opponent.

The sailor who had spotted the German submarine on his port side had not even had time to run far after cursing before a torpedo struck the steel plate of the ship’s hull below the deck where he was standing.

The immense inertia caused the torpedo to slam heavily into the steel plate. The shock then triggered the torpedo’s fuze, igniting the explosives behind it. In just an instant, the detonation sequence was complete, and the entire body of the torpedo was torn into countless, invisible fragments by the terrifying chemical energy.

Before this poor sailor and those around him could even process their next thought, the blast wave and flames had consumed their bodies. The seawater, pushed aside by the torpedo’s explosion, began to repeatedly vibrate and tear, twisting and destroying the ship’s hull.

In the face of such savage power, the human body seemed so humble and insignificant. As the shockwave spread, these sailors, who were close to the epicenter of the explosion, were thrown high into the air. Then, because the force was too powerful, they were torn into several, or even dozens, of pieces during their ascent.

There was no longer any need to notify the other ships, nor to inform their own captain. Because as long as you weren’t blind, you could see this brilliant firework. As long as you weren’t deaf, you could hear this deafening roar.

Seawater poured into the interior of the vessel. A merchant ship without heavy armor protection could not possibly withstand this terrifying weapon. A force so powerful that even a battleship could not resist had instantly destroyed the ship’s structural support. The sound of twisting steel could be heard clearly, even amidst the noise of the huge explosion.

The buoyancy of the two ends of the hit transport ship did not change in a short period of time, but the middle, due to the cargo and the large amount of incoming water, had its weight dramatically increased while losing its buoyancy. And so, with a crackling sound, the already damaged steel keel began to break. The immensely strong, huge steel bars were forcibly twisted into two by an even more powerful force.

With the deformation of the keel, the sturdy rivets on the surrounding steel plates were squeezed out like bullets, flying everywhere inside the ship’s hold, tearing through the chests or stomachs of the unlucky sailors. Blood seeped into the seawater, turning it a glaring, dark red.

In just a dozen or so seconds, this transport ship broke in two from the middle. The stern and the bow were both lifted high, leaving the sea surface with dripping seawater. The bottom of the ship, which had been submerged for years, was covered in marine life, looking far from as smooth as the other parts.

“Transport H19 has been sunk! My God! That’s the port side! There are enemy submarines over there too! There are enemy submarines over there too!” In the core of the formation, a crewman, holding his binoculars, shouted. His voice was filled with despair, as if the Grim Reaper was already standing over his head.

To protect the safety of the entire fleet, and to better protect the important and scarce supplies, the large convoys heading for Iceland all arranged their ships according to their importance. The ships on the outermost perimeter generally carried less valuable goods like grain or cheap materials. Further in were personnel and some weapons and equipment. The things loaded on the ships in the very core were more dangerous, either fuel or ammunition.

In the current situation, the entire fleet’s formation was already in chaos. In addition, the Germans had clearly come prepared. The situation looked very bad. At this unlucky time, to be sitting on a ship loaded with 10 tons of explosives and 30 tons of artillery shells was clearly a very despairing thing.

Sure enough, before the crewman on this munitions transport could figure out how to improve his current situation, he saw a transport ship in a core position not far away being hit in the hull by a stray torpedo. In an instant, the column of water from the explosion shot at least 20 stories high. Accompanying this explosion was the spectacular sympathetic detonation of the oil tanker in the fleet that was carrying the most fuel.

This huge fireball, like an ultimate explosion, sounded the horn for the British collapse. Some of the transport ships on the edge, which could easily break away from the main body, began to take evasive action while leaving the fleet and fleeing in other directions. And the destroyers that were supposed to be protecting the merchant ships were now scrambling to deal with the troublesome German submarines.

The periphery of the fleet was not peaceful either. As time passed, the British destroyers had already dropped a series of depth charges, which made a series of dull sounds in the depths of the ocean. The huge explosions repeatedly pulled at the seawater, eventually spreading this powerful tearing force over a considerable distance.

However, these exploding depth charges clearly did not achieve their intended effect, because the location of the explosions was simply too far from the targets they were supposed to attack. The U-47 had already used its superior speed to shake off the pursuing British destroyer. After all, the sound of the distant explosions had affected the sonar detection of both sides. The current combat environment was very harsh, which was conducive to the submarine’s evasion.

If one were to ask the Royal Navy to rank the German ships they hated, the first place would undoubtedly belong to the German submarines. In the minds of the British, this damn weapon should never have appeared. This thing was simply a trampling on the inventions of the British Empire.

As for that world-shaking Battle of the English Channel, the British always felt that the German Navy’s carrier fleet had won unfairly. They believed that if it hadn’t been for a German spy conveniently appearing at a critical moment, then the final winner of that naval battle would surely have been the Royal Navy. Therefore, even after losing control of the sea, or rather, losing air superiority at sea, the British Navy was still full of confidence in victory.

The Nelsonian spirit, which had been deeply ingrained in their bones for a hundred years, and the pride and strength that had been built up over a hundred years, could not possibly be affected by one small setback. The only thing that was deeply engraved in the minds of the Royal Navy was the shame of losing their homeland.

They even believed that the only real threats to the Royal Navy were the German submarines and that damn battleship, the Grand Admiral Raeder. As for the aircraft carriers, as long as the carriers that the United States was supporting Britain with were in place, they were not a big threat at all.

Unfortunately, ever since that phantom had appeared in the North Atlantic, the British had begun to take their opponent seriously. When one battleship after another was sunk by German torpedoes, the British finally felt a thorn in their back, and unease began to fill their hearts.

Now, a despairing situation had appeared. The phantom, which had originally been only one, had now become several. The technical solutions prepared to deal with the German phantom submarine were still in the laboratory, with no possibility of mass production.

Some had envisioned using decoys and a large number of aircraft to set up an ambush to take out this phantom. But to this day, there had been no record of an aircraft ever spotting it. This was so coincidental that it could no longer be explained away as good luck.

The technical departments analyzed that the Germans had made progress in the miniaturization of radar technology. At the very least, they could install radar on this type of submarine, thereby evading all sorts of aerial patrol aircraft.

A large number of spies active in France had also taken blurry, long-distance photos of this type of submarine. From an analysis of the reference objects in the photos, it was determined that this submarine had a larger tonnage and had done away with weapons like anti-aircraft guns, thereby reducing some of its underwater noise, making it more stealthy and faster.

As for why this submarine could reach a speed of over 15 knots underwater and could remain submerged for a long time, this could only be summarized by speculation and deduction. The naval technical departments of Britain and the United States believed that this submarine very likely used an unknown type of propulsion. Some clues suggested that this phantom submarine was equipped with a very high-performance battery system.

Coupled with this submarine’s known ultra-high torpedo firing rate, it formed a rough outline of this submarine. This weapon was already sufficient to be described as epoch-making. At the very least, the intelligence agencies of Britain and the United States had offered a sky-high price: anyone who could obtain the design blueprints or partial design blueprints of this thing would be rewarded with 5 million US dollars.

As for why the German torpedoes could attack ships head-on, this was a simple technical trick. The two German submarines lying in ambush ahead, waiting silently for the enemy fleet to approach, had, through the simple calculation devices on board, changed the torpedoes’ contact detonation fuzes to time-detonation and had set the detonation time.

This simple computer was the latest product of the Turing working group. Although it had not yet reached the pre-set complex calculation requirements, it could perform some simple, fixed calculations and was just right for use on the new submarines to help set this kind of timed fuze. The torpedoes did not explode because they hit the enemy’s hull, but because they had reached the designated time and had exploded in the vicinity of the hull.

It was precisely because of this attack method that Prien had arranged for two submarines to block the way in front of the British transport fleet. And it was precisely because the enemy’s ship formation was dense that the hit probability of this delayed, automatic-detonation fuze was increased. The British would probably never have thought that the Germans had used a mathematical method rather than a technical one to increase the attack modes of their torpedoes.

This was a technological victory, a deliberate weapon development, a revolutionary subversion of outdated tactics and equipment. If classified from a technological perspective, the German submarines had already half-stepped into the threshold of modern submarine design, while the British escort ships and escort methods were still stuck in the pitiful late stage of the First World War.

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