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Since the beginning of the war battles had been going on at sea, mainly in the Atlantic Ocean. The sea battles in this war involving Britain were centred on two main points. Firstly the need to bring supplies in, mainly from the US who were not, as yet, at war. These supply ships usually sailed together in convoy as this made them easy to protect. Secondly the need to destroy German ships who attacked the convoys. While Germany had some very large battleships, the deadliest of the attackers were the U-boats, the submarines. They could, until radar came into being, sail undetected past the protecting Royal Navy ships and pop up and torpedo the merchant ships. This naval war continued through till 1943, although U-boats were a threat until the end of the war. Over 3,500 merchant ships were lost and about 30,000 merchant seamen. But many did get through and kept the British people and her forces supplied during the war years.
It was in 1941 that the British navy finally destroyed Germany's biggest battleship called the Bismarck. This was a great victory for Britain in what had become known as the Battle of the Atlantic. This battle actually lasted the whole length of the war with Germany, a total time of 5 years, 8 months and 5 days.
1941 also saw two other turning points in the war. One reason the bombing of London was reduced was because Hitler made what turned out to be a very stupid decision. He invaded Russia. Despite having signed a non-aggression pact with Russia, he went against it and invaded Russia and his army set off to Moscow. That removed some of his planes from being available to bomb Britain. It also meant he was now fighting in the west and the east. Initially, things went well in Russia but the Germans never made it to Moscow, the capital, and then winter arrived. It's cold in Russia in winter. German troops were stuck and some couldn't even get supplies.
Then, on December 7, Japanese planes bombed the US fleet in Pearl Harbour in Hawaii. Up till then the US, although helping supply Britain and allowing us to not pay for these supplies till after the war, had not been officially at war with anyone. Now they were. Japan had been trying to expand for some time and, after Pearl Harbour, Japanese troops set out across Asia and, as Britain had some colonies there, British troops were sent out there too.
A few more points about this war. It was not only won in the skies,
on the seas, or on land. Scientists and mathematicians helped too. In 1941 the Royal Navy captured a German submarine and with it a machine that the Germans used
to send coded messages. The machine was called enigma. Over several months British mathematicians led by a man called Alan Turing worked to crack the code.
They succeeded and it is said their work shortened the war by 2 years as the allies could read many secret German messages. It was a long time before the Germans realised
that we were reading their messages, if they ever did.
Forward to 1942AD
