The Strategist
Sea Warfare, 1939-45: A German Viewpoint. By Vice-Admiral Friedrich Ruge. (Cassell, 42s.) SEVEN-TENTHS of the earth's surface is covered by water. Whoever controls the sea in war possesses also, therefore, the power to move freely and economically over what may not illogically be considered 'the largest 'continent.' The aim of naval war is thus to deny the enemy the use of the sea as a means of transport, while using it to the maximum for one's own purposes.
To an Englishman this seems obvious, and its repetition the most soporific of bromides. Yet continental States have often failed to under- stand the nature and importance of sea power; throughout the eighteenth century, for example, France, though she possessed a fine fleet and all the other essentials for the successful exercise of sea power, continued to face eastwards and think in continental terms. This led logically to her exhaustion and final defeat during the Napoleonic wars. A similar lack of understanding fatally affected German strategy in the two world wars of the twentieth century.
Yet one must not make the mistake of thinking that naval warfare takes place independently of the land. A powerful fleet is not enough in itself to gain and exploit control of the sea. A merchant fleet, troop transports, world-wide bases and a strategy planned in terms of the sea are also required. This is the vital difference between a full sea power and a merely naval one.
In neither world war—despite the powerful fleet she had in 1914—did Germany succeed in being more than a purely naval power. She lacked the geographical position and the bases to bring the full weight of her naval forces to bear on the main ocean shipping routes. Yet she was strong enough each time to strike shattering blows at British sea power—and this despite a fundamen- tally continental strategy, taking little or no account of the sea.
Admiral Ruge's book makes it clear that the German naval staff did the best they could, especially tactically, with the limited resources allotted them. For the German Navy was not designed to operate against Great Britain. It was replanned after the Treaty of Versailles with Poland as the prospective enemy; France and Russia were added later as possible opponents. Right up to 1938 Admiral Raeder prohibited war games or exercises that visualised Great Britain as an enemy. Until the Sudeten crisis the German naval aim was a small balanced fleet which, with Italy as an ally, would be able to maintain naval superiority over France.
In late 1938 Hitler's headlong pursuit of his political aims made it necessary to re-examine
the structure of the German Navy. The choice was between a balanced fleet and concentration purely on U-boats and pocket battleships. Even after Munich—or perhaps because of it—Hitler was still confident of being able to avoid war with England until 1946. He thus decided on the longer-term Z plan, based on developing a high- quality, relatively small but balanced fleet. The German design was to compel the British to divide their stronger fleet, then to defeat its separate parts in detail. From a purely naval standpoint this policy was sound enough; it failed, however, to take Hitler's political impatience and lack of understanding into account. The alterna- tive plan, providing for full-out attack on British shipping and power of sea movement, would, as it turned out, have proved far more effective.
This is an important and unusually interesting book, with much new material. Its author, apart from being a senior naval officer of wide experi- ence, has a clear understanding of the interaction of sea and land operations. If! have concentrated in this review on the questions which faced the German naval planners in the Thirties, it is because they seem to me more immediately per- tinent to our present defence problems in this country. There is, however, much else of absorb- ing interest—not least an account of operations in the Black Sea from 1942 to 1944; the almost complete failure of the fifty Russian submarines in the area to achieve any significant success is particularly encouraging, though - one would obviously be wrong to take this example as an index of their present efficiency. Admiral Ruge's book is a 'must' for any serious student of stritegy; it is good from the NATO point of view that a sailor with such a wide outlook and so conscious of the folly of neglecting the sea should be currently at the head of German naval affairs.
A. J. WILSON
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