The Last U-Boat Attack 1982

Don't worry, you haven't read the title of this video incorrectly. The last U-boat attack by a German submarine actually occurred not in 1945 but in 1982. Where? During the Falklands War, and the targets of the German torpedoes were British warships. At the end of World War II, German submarine technology led the world. Working at a frenetic pace, designers and engineers had created two revolutionary U-boat designs, the Type 21 and 23 Electro boats, which were way ahead of anything the Allied navies had. But these fast U-boats, with much improved underwater endurances and performances, arrived too late to prevent a German military collapse. In the immediate post-war period, the Germans were forbidden from designing or operating submarines. In the mid-1950s however, Germany was once again permitted to have a navy, and a submarine service was formed. A single old Type 21 U-boat was used as a testbed platform, and two Type 23 U-boats raised from the seabed and repaired for use as training vessels. By the late 1950s the German navy wanted to replace its ageing submarines with modern German built diesel electrics, and building on the Type 23, the Type 201 appeared in 1960. The Type 201 was progressively upgraded until it became the Type 209 U-boat in 1971, a special class of U-boat built only for export, to arm small or inexperienced navies at a reasonable price, and be cheap to operate. Sixty-one Type 209s have been built between 1971 and today, including under licence in South Korea and Indonesia, and 58 are still active in 2022. Argentina purchased two of these little U-boats, naming them the ARA Salta and San Luis. At the time of the Falklands conflict in 1982, the Argentine Navy's Submarine Force Command was equipped with one old US Balao class submarine, named the ARA Santa Fe, built in 1944, and the two aforementioned Type 209 U-boats, Salta and San Luis. Her surface fleet included one ex-Royal Navy aircraft carrier, an ex-US Navy WWII era cruiser, the General Belgrano, and some relatively modern guided missile destroyers, frigates and patrol boats. The decision to invade and occupy the Falklands was seen by the military dictatorship of General Leopoldo Galtieri as a populist move, predicated on the theory that the Falklands belonged to Argentina and were being occupied by British colonists. In fact, the British had been in possession of the islands since 1833, and the small population being almost exclusively of British descent. With his government's popularity falling, Galtieri conceived the capture of the Falklands as a cynical move to deflect attention away from his misrule, and accordingly, in early April 1982, Argentine forces landed on the Falklands and also the British possession of South Georgia. The landings were not unopposed, the small Royal Marine detachments of both possessions fought back against overwhelming odds until forced to surrender. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher ordered the Falklands recovered, involving sending a huge task force of British warships and thousands of marines and soldiers to recover the islands by force, operating 8000 miles from the UK in the inhospitable edge of Antarctica. The British strategy was built around two aircraft carriers, HMS Hermes and Invincible, whose Sea Harrier aircraft would be critical in establishing air superiority over the islands before any amphibious landings could be contemplated. The Argentine Air Force was as determined to destroy one or both of those British carriers, if this happened the British operations would have ended in defeat. The valuable aircraft carriers were heavily protected by destroyers and frigates, and British nuclear-powered submarines were also dispatched to patrol the waters around the Falklands to deter interference by the Argentine Navy. As well as firing exocet missiles at the carriers from Super Etendard jets, the Argentines wanted to send its submarines to menace the Royal Navy and hopefully sink a carrier. But unlike the British, the Argentines only had three submarines in service in April 1982, and only two of those were operational, the World War II era Santa Fe and the Type 209 U-boat San Luis, the most modern submarine they possessed. The 1,200 tonne San Luis had a crew of 36, and was armed with 14 Mark 37 anti-submarine torpedoes and 10 West German manufactured SST-4 wire-guided torpedoes of advanced design, capable of a maximum surface speed of 21 kilometers an hour and a submerged speed of 42. The San Luis was a formidable little U-boat with a maximum dive depth of 500 meters. On the 3rd of April, while Argentina celebrated the recovery of what they called Las Malvinas, Captain Fernando Azueta was ordered to ready the San Luis for a war patrol around the Falklands. A sister submarine, the Salta, was undergoing repairs and was unavailable. Also at Mar del Plata naval base was the Santa Fe, having recently returned from supporting the initial invasion of the Falklands. The San Luis was not in any condition to undertake a war patrol. The snorkel, used to vent diesel exhaust fumes from the submarine when it ran its main engines whilst just under the surface, was leaking. Her bilge pumps were malfunctioning, and one of her four diesel engines was non-operational. But orders were orders. Divers spent a week cleaning crustaceans off the hull and propellers, while engineers tried to rectify her many problems. With the British fleet closing rapidly on the Falklands, the San Luis went to sea on the 11th of April and took up a holding position, while higher command argued about what their next move should be. The Santa Fe departed on the 17th of April, carrying a party of Argentine marines to reinforce the garrison at South Georgia, arriving successfully on the 25th of April. In the meantime, the San Luis continued to suffer from mechanical issues. The fire control system, used to auto-guide three torpedoes at once, broke down eight days into the mission. No one aboard knew how to fix it. On the 25th of April, the Santa Fe was detected by radar by a Wessex helicopter from the destroyer HMS Antrim, part of a small force of British warships carrying Royal Marines and SAS to retake South Georgia. The Wessex dropped depth charges, which crippled the Argentine submarine, forcing it to the surface. HMS Plymouth's Westland Wasp and HMS Brilliant's Westland Lynx helicopters attacked, raking the submarine with machine gun fire, before the Wasp from Plymouth, plus two others, fired several AS-12 air-to-surface missiles at the Santa Fe, hitting her several times. The submarine struggled into Gritviken harbour in South Georgia, where she was abandoned. The next day, the San Luis was ordered to the Falklands. The Royal Navy task force was now close, but the threat from Argentine aircraft and submarines was significant. On the 29th of April, Captain Azueta received permission to open fire on British warships. But the Argentine communications were heard by the British, and warships and helicopters deployed to hunt her down and destroy her. In the meantime, the Argentine surface fleet had two main battlegroups headed for the Falklands in an attempt to attack the British task force. One battlegroup was built around the aircraft carrier, 25th May, and the other around the era light cruiser, General Belgrano. The British judged the Belgrano to be a very serious threat, owing to its large 6-inch main guns that could outrange the British warships, and her thick armour making her immune to modern missiles. The Belgrano was shadowed by the Royal Navy's submarine HMS Conqueror, the British monitored the situation carefully. But in the meantime, the St. Louis entered combat. On the 1st May, the U-boat's passive sonar detected the British warships, HMS Brilliant and Yarmouth. Lining up for a shot, an SST-4 wire-guided torpedo was launched at a range of 9km, but fortunately for the British, shortly after launch, the guidance wire cut out. However, HMS Brilliant detected the attack. Frigates and helicopters started searching aggressively for the Argentine submarine, and Captain Azueta resorted to World War II U-boat tactics of sitting on the bottom, engines off in dead silence. The British dropped 30 depth charges, as well as the helicopters dropping homing torpedoes at suspected targets, but these turned out to be unfortunate whales. On the 2nd May, the British command advised Prime Minister Thatcher that the General Belgrano must not be allowed to approach the task force. The light cruiser was struck by three World War II era 21-inch Mark VIII torpedoes fired by Conqueror. She sank in 20 or so minutes, taking 323 crew with her. 772 survivors were rescued over the next three days. With the Belgrano sunk, the Argentine aircraft carrier group returned to shallow home waters, leaving the air force to try and stop the British landings on the Falklands. The only Argentine naval vessel opposing the British now was the San Luis. Over the next week, the San Luis was hunted ruthlessly. All attempts to fire torpedoes ended in failure due to malfunctions. On the 8th May, Hathueta was convinced that a British submarine was close and fired one of his Mark 37s at the submerged target. It exploded, but it was not a British submarine that was sunk, most probably instead a whale. The 11th May, the San Luis detected two British frigates covering the task force, HMS Alacrity and Arrow. The noise of the frigate's engines masked the approach of the U-boat. About five kilometres from Alacrity, San Luis fired a single SST-4 torpedo and reloaded for a second shot, but the wire guiding the torpedo went dead. It has been surmised that the torpedo struck a towed decoy behind Alacrity, but failed to explode. A frustrated Hathueta radioed headquarters that his torpedoes were useless. He was returning to base, where he arrived on the 19th May. After the war, the West German firm AEG, which manufactured the SST-4 torpedo, investigated and corrected the problems for the Argentine Navy. Fortunately for the British, the malfunctions prevented hits being scored on Royal Navy warships. The British landings on the Falklands were opposed by suicidally brave Argentine pilots running a gauntlet of sea harriers, missiles and small arms to try and bomb British ships close to shore. They suffered heavy losses, but managed to sink two destroyers and two frigates, plus damaging or sinking several other British vessels. But the ground campaign was a success, with British troops fighting several battles before taking the Argentine surrender on 14 June 1982. As for the San Luis, she left Argentine service in 1997. Thanks for watching, please subscribe and share, and also visit my audiobook channel War Stories with Mark Felsen. You can also help to support both of my channels at PayPal and Patreon, details in the description box below.