As this well researched work reveals, Hitler’s handling the German Navy during the Second World War was full of contradictions.

The seriousness of the U-boat threat was never in doubt and in the dark days of 1940 – 1942, the Donitz’s daring strategy coupled with the courage and determined actions of the captains and crews became perilously close to starving Britain into submission.

But, despite having built and nurtured a surface fleet with capital ships of formidable power, Hitler was uncharacteristically cautious of employing them aggressively. Examination of the reasons for this make for fascinating reading, possibly stemming from the early loss of the Graf Spee and the fact that, whenever possible, the Royal Navy threw all its weight regardless of cost at the Nazi threat; the loss of the Hood in the pursuit of the Bismarck being one example. Even Goebbels could not ‘spin’ the loss of a battleship.

The War against Hitler’s Navy describes in fascinating detail the many fronts on which the adversaries faced each other and analyses the reasons for the ultimate outcome.