Otto Kretschmer

The Life of Germany’s Highest Scoring U-Boat Commander

By: Lawrence Paterson

Narrated by: Bruce Mann

Otto Kretschmer was only in combat from September 1939 until March 1941 but was Germany's highest-scoring U-boat commander, sinking forty-seven ships. This definitive work details his personal story and the political backdrop from his earliest days.

After completing his officer training and time on the training ship Niobe, he served aboard the light cruiser Emden. In December 1934, he was transferred to the light cruiser Köln, then in January 1936 made the move to the fledgling U-boat service. During the Spanish Civil War, Kretschmer was involved in several patrols as part of the international non-intervention force.

He demonstrated a cool approach to combat: his mantra "one torpedo for one ship" proved that the best way for his boat to succeed against a convoy was to remain surfaced as much as possible, penetrating the convoy and using the boat's high speed and small silhouette to avoid retaliation.

His nickname "Silent Otto" referred to his ability to remain undetected and his reluctance to provide the regular radio reports required by Dönitz. Alongside his military skill was a character that remained rooted in the traditions of the Prussian military.

©2018 Lawrence Paterson (P)2023 Tantor

another great read

if you like sub content you will like this very interesting read action packed and will keep you riveted

A good updated bio on Kretschmer

I've read Terrence Robertson's The Sea Wolves recently -- I've had the book forever -- but it's from the '50's. No matter that Robertson was a good writer, it's been 50 years so an update is due. Paterson delivers a tightly war career focused bio not far off from Robertson's but with a bit more detail. He is at pains, naturally, to give the HX112 battle as much air and space as possible and that he does. The POW years are covered but not in great detail or at length but the riot at Kretschmer's camp was interesting along with the fact that it was the loose basis for a movie. But both his postwar life and his early years are treated shabbily. I would think it was very important to the time and the man to discuss his childhood and parental influence at greater length and then go into the grim and gritty of how Otto reacted to the onset of Nazism. He goes to great pains to assure us that Otto was not a fellow traveler or sympathizer let alone a Party member and that the Kriegsmarine in its formative years was apolitical in nature. I find this a bit much to stomach -- and there's a revealing quote from Otto to David MacIntyre aboard his destroyer after being captured that ought to give a biographer pause. When Otto says it was the fault of politicians that made it necessary for the "only 2 decent nations in Europe to fight each other" that ought to spark your interest as to what the man thought of the other nations of Europe and why they weren't "decent". Paterson swings and misses on this crucial passage.

Overall good enough but it's still a very shallow treatment of the man; we never get inside his head. Also odd is his insistence to try to solve the mystery of Prien's loss in U47. He comes up with the summation that Prien was lost due to a floating mine on no better evidence than the Admiralty at the time of the sinking gave credit to HMS Wolverine. It's an odd thing to chase down and his conclusion is not convincing.

Narrator note: he's got an odd delivery and a bit of a hitch at times. Not the best.

Even More Britshit…

I really want to know more about the German perspective on the war and this doesn’t do it. No credible historian would use the pejorative allied propaganda term “Nazi” for starters. Narration almost seems designed to make you stop listening. Sigh. I have Brit Fatigue…

Dry Toast

I'm no more than 1 hour into the book and can't take much more. The Narrator's steady dry cadence and momo-tone voice is making me want to fall asleep while driving. It's like listening to an 80's robot. I Hate to because there are very few books written from the German side on U-Boats. I was hoping this would be one I can listen to over and over again.