Hitler's price: Gibraltar?

[Ironmachine]

Hi, Sid.
I have just read your last post:

P.S. The following link implies that Portugal had no tankers of its own at the start of WWII and was probably not able to spare any for Spain:

That made me reread your previous post and I have noted that you wrote:

Do you have any information on the tankers you say Spain hired from other countries to import oil during the war? On the face of it, this would appear to be against Allied policy.

You made a mistake while reading my posts in the other thread, and I made a mistake when reading your posts here. I never poste that Spain hired tankers from other countries; what I posted in the other thread viewtopic.php?f=12&t=177255&hilit=Sid+Guttridge was:

In fact, there was a surplus of ships, and some of them were chartered for Portuguese and Switzerland .

That is, Spain had enough tankers for its needs (or for the approved Allied quotes!) and was able to hire some of them to Portugal and Switzerland to carry oil to those countries.

P.P.S. Page 6 of the following link to a 1942 document seems to say that Spain was leasing tanker space to Portugal and Switzerland, which would confirm it had some tonnage to spare:

Yes, IIRC that was one of the documents originally available at the link I provided in the other thread.

[Peter89]

Why wasn't the Italian submarine effort sustained?

In what sense?

the Axis never had 10 battleship in active service combined.

True, nine at most in 1940 (Littorio, Vittorio Veneto, Cesare, Duilio, Doria, Cavour, Bismarck, Scharnhorst, Gneisenau). Titpitz only entered service after Taranto. Though depending on when this hypothetical takeover of Gibraltar takes place, Taranto might not happen at all, and the Axis could have potentially operated ten battleships.

Even 30 operational battleships couldn't make a difference, because the British Isles were well-defended by the RAF, and the RAF could sink any number of battleships...

[corbulo]

It would enable the italian navy to leave the Mediterranean but given it;s overall performance during the war, it's unlikely to make much difference at all. See the performance of Italian submarines.'

In the Atlantic a couple of dozens of Italian submarines sank 600,000 tons of Allied shipping... During Betasom's period of operations, Italian submarines sank on average 34,5 tons of shipping per boat lost, whereas German U-Boats sank 40,6 tons per boat lost in the same timeframe. Not that much of a difference. In 1942-1943 Italian submarines operating in the Atlantic sank on average as much tonnage as their German counterparts.

The Italian fleet entering the Atlantic would have allowed the European Axis to jointly operate ten battleships, thirteen heavy cruisers, twenty light cruisers, a hundred destroyers... it would definitely have made a lot of difference.

True. The Italian navy just got mugged over at Taranto. They were decent though

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Guys,

Sank, or claimed to have sunk?

This is an important distinction as one Italian submarine (Barbarigo) wrongly claimed to have sunk two US battleships, which alone would have amounted to over 10% of the 600,000t total.

Cheers,

An inquisitive Sid.

P.S. In seeking to answer the question myself, I came across the following Masters Degree submission: https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a613508.pdf

Given that it contains absolutely no primary source material in its sources, and gives no sources for its statistical tables, it seems somewhat suspect, but it nevertheless gives some food for thought.

[LColombo]

Hi Guys,

Sank, or claimed to have sunk?

This is an important distinction as one Italian submarine (Barbarigo) wrongly claimed to have sunk two US battleships, which alone would have amounted to over 10% of the 600,000t total.

Cheers,

An inquisitive Sid.

Sank. Barbarigo's claims, like any other false or wrong claim, are not included in that figure. Giorgio Giorgerini's Uomini sul fondo provides the following figures:

Leonardo Da Vinci: 17 ships sunk, 120,243 GRT
Enrico Tazzoli: 18 ships sunk, 96,650 GRT
Luigi Torelli: 7 ships sunk, 42,871 GRT
Morosini: 6 ships sunk, 40,933 GRT
Barbarigo: 7 ships sunk, 39,300 GRT; another of 5,052 GRT damaged
Pietro Calvi: 6 ships sunk, 34,193 GRT
Comandante Cappellini: 5 ships sunk, 31,648 GRT
Giuseppe Finzi: 5 ships sunk, 30,760 GRT
Archimede: 2 ships sunk, 25,629 GRT
Guglielmo Marconi: 7 ships sunk, 19,887 GRT
Alessandro Malaspina: 3 ships sunk, 16,384 GRT
Reginaldo Giuliani: 3 ships sunk, 16,103 GRT
Michele Bianchi: 3 ships sunk, 14,705 GRT
Emo: 2 ships sunk, 10,958 GRT
Maggiore Baracca: 2 ships sunk, 8,553 GRT
Brin: 2 ships sunk, 7,241 GRT
Alpino Bagnolini: 2 ships sunk, 6,926 GRT
Dandolo: 2 ships sunk, 6,554 GRT; another of 3,678 GRT damaged
Ammiraglio Cagni: 2 ships sunk, 5,840 GRT; another of 22,448 GRT damaged
Argo: 1 ship of 5,066 GRT sunk; another of 1,337 tons damaged
Veniero: 2 ships sunk, 4,987 GRT
Otaria: 1 ship of 4,662 GRT sunk
Nani: 2 ships sunk, 1,939 GRT
Marcello: 1 ship of 1,550 GRT sunk
Mocenigo: 1 ship of 1,253 GRT sunk

Total, 109 ships sunk for 593,864 GRT and four more damaged for 32,605 GRT.

However, this needs to be revised as per result of more recent research by historian Francesco Mattesini: Morosini's tally needs to be revised downwards, to 37,769 GRT, and Bianchi's tally needs to be revised upwards, to 24,222 GRT. Therefore, the final result is: 109 ships sunk for 600,217 GRT and four more damaged for 32,605 GRT.

I can make a list with name, tonnage and date of sinking of each ship if needed.

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Lcolombo,

Excellent, fact-filled reply. Many thanks, indeed.

Cheers,

Sid