WW2 German Submarine "Top Secret" Briefing

Smithsonia · June 21, 2010, 03:34:04 PM

Likely you have never seen this WW2 secret briefing. It was done semi-monthly during WW2. Activities of Civil Air Patrol, the Navy, Coast Guard, and Air Corps are reviewed in this previously *Top Secret Document*.

From June '43 the Anti Sub war was was just turning in the favor of the Allies. As such, this briefing document is momentous.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/33334781/WWII-1943-U-Boat-Monthly-Report-June

Give it time to load.

This and several thousand similar documents will be posted online in early July. We'll announce this significant history research website shortly
(in about 2 weeks)
this document has come to me through the excellent research of Lt. Col. Mark Hess of the Georgia Wing

NIN · June 21, 2010, 06:16:26 PM

wow, that was quite magical..

Smithsonia · June 21, 2010, 06:41:34 PM

This briefing would have been available to CAP Sub hunting base commanders, Ops, and intel officers only but wouldn't have been distributed. Pertinent information would've been gleaned, summarized, and briefed to crews. Personnel at large would've been out of the loop.

I found the depth of understanding, resources, and compositing of information stunning. BUT, this is a document that I haven't seen before. If they were putting out a 60 plus page document every two weeks... well there must have been a huge staff to build these briefing books.

Once again. This is just a pass along by me. The real credit belongs to Lt. Col. Hess.

johnboy · June 22, 2010, 10:30:13 PM

It's not top secret if you are telling us about this!

MIKE · June 22, 2010, 11:01:42 PM

Hence the UNCLASSIFIED stamped all over it.

RiverAux · June 23, 2010, 12:26:47 AM

I think there is the potential for a ton of WWII-era CAP materials to be found in various archives. Its unfortunate that probably our most well documented era is that one and that future historians will have so little to work with regarding the rest of our history.

Smithsonia · June 23, 2010, 04:00:35 AM

^^^^
RiverAux;
I've been working on a history website that is on Scribd with Lt. Col. Mark Hess for nearly a year. That site will be launched next month. Eventually we will have more items from the 50s than the 40s. I'll post those addresses after the 4th of July.
.

tsrup · June 23, 2010, 05:08:29 AM

I found it interesting that the CAPCP was only about 3000 hours behind the Army Air Force Anti sub command in total flying hours.
Good on em, and thanks for digging this up!

Smithsonia · June 23, 2010, 10:55:39 AM

Here's the same semi-monthly Sub Hunt briefer for an earlier time, Dec, '42:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/33383846/WWII-1942-U-Boat-Monthly-Report-Dec
This one is from a day when things weren't going quite so well.

Again, allow it time to load.

Major Carrales · July 01, 2010, 03:07:02 AM

How much stuff these days is "FOUO" in CAP that the public has no idea we are doing? There is a parallel with somethings...I wonder what gems are amid these documents waiting for us to uncover.

Smithsonia · August 20, 2010, 07:57:09 AM

From the marvelous archives of Lt. Col. Mark Hess. From Feb 19 '42 through July 7 '42 these are the ships reported as sunk by U-boats to CAP Base 3
SHIPs name:

S.S. Pan Massachusetts - Republic - W.D. Anderson - Cities Service Empire - SS Leslie - SS Korsholm - La Paz - Ocean Venus
Laertes - Sama - Eclipse - Halsey - Amazone - Java Arrow - Ohioan - Lubrafol - Potrero del Liano - Umtata - plus 4 more unnamed
vessels

Total Lives lost: 155
Total Lives saved: 492

N Harmon · August 20, 2010, 12:10:51 PM

Excuse me. Does this website work for anybody? This Scribd.com? I have tried opening this in IE, Firefox, and now Google Chrome and all I get an utter mess of a webpage. Am I missing a browser add-on?

vento · August 20, 2010, 03:44:09 PM

Quote from: N Harmon on August 20, 2010, 12:10:51 PM
Excuse me. Does this website work for anybody? This Scribd.com? I have tried opening this in IE, Firefox, and now Google Chrome and all I get an utter mess of a webpage. Am I missing a browser add-on?

I just tried, it worked ok with my IE8. Just be patient, it took a good while to load the first page. It looked gibrish before it loaded completely...

Smithsonia · August 21, 2010, 12:30:07 AM

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
It was loading slow for me too - but 15 seconds for the first page and 5-10 seconds per page... then 3-5 seconds towards the last half of the download... 180 pages is going to take a bit of time. 10 to 12 minutes should be the loading time. At least it was for me.

Scribd.com takes some load time but these documents are worth the wait.