'Breslau' was a U-boat wolfpack operation against the OG.75 and HG.75 convoys on the Atlantic route between the UK and Gibraltar (17/29 October 1941).

The wolfpack comprised six boats (U-71, U-83, U-204, U-206, U-563 and U-564), and for the loss of Kapitänleutnant Walter Kell’s U-204 sank nine ships (24,576 tons) including the British destroyer Cossack and corvette Fleur de Lys, and damaged the 6,746-ton catapult-armed merchant ship Ariguani.

On 2 October a pair of Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor four-engined long-range maritime reconnaissance bombers of Hauptmann Daser’s I/Kampfgeschwader 40 sighted and reported the OG.75 convoy of 25 merchant vessels and nine escorting warships west of the North Channel. The convoy was again sighted from the air during 3 and 4 October, but the outbound U-71, U-83, U-206 and U-563 and the inbound U-204 and U-564 (released from escorting the outbound blockade runner Rio Grande) failed to intercept. On 5, 6 and 7 October air reconnaissance located only a small 744-ton freighter, which was bombed and sunk, and on the following day another Fw 200 sighted and reported the convoy, which was by now off Cape Finisterre.

U-83 approached during the day and U-71 briefly during the night, but on 9 October contact was again lost in bad weather. On 10 October an Fw 200 again reported the convoy but the U-boats fell astern because the convoy’s speed had been underestimated. Kapitänleutnant Hans-Werner Kraus’s U-83 sank a large floating crane and, on 12 October, the 2,044-ton Portuguese Corte Real. U-563 again approached the convoy on 12 October, but was forced to submerge when an aeroplane appeared. Kapitänleutnant Herbert Opitz’s U-206 sank Fleur de Lys off the Strait of Gibraltar just as she was about to enter port. U-204 and U-564 put into Cadiz during the night to take on fuel from a German tanker.

On 17 October the 'Breslau' wolfpack was deployed with U-206, U-563 and U-564 near Cape Trafalgar in expectation of the departure of the HG.75 convoy from Gibraltar, while U-204, U-71 and U-83 patrolled off Cape Spartel and, farther to the west, the Italian boats Archimede, Galileo Ferraris and Guglielmo Marconi were also available. On 19 October, U-206 and Kell’s U-204 each sank one ship, the 3,081-ton British Baron Kelvin and 9,158-ton British tanker Inverlee respectively, but the latter boat was then sunk by the sloop Rochester and corvette Mallow. U-71 attacked but missed a destroyer.

The HG.75 convoy, supported by Lieutenant Commander C. B. Allen’s British 37^th Escort Group (the sloop Rochester and the corvettes Campion, Carnation, Heliotrope, Mallow and Free French Malouine and Commandant Duboc) bolstered by a support group comprising the destroyers Cossack, Legion, Lamerton, Duncan and Vidette, finally sailed during the afternoon of 22 October.

The convoy was reported shortly after 24.00 on 23 October by U-71. Attacks by U-206 and U-564 failed, but the boats were able to maintain contact in spite of the strong escort. During the night 23/24 October Fregattenkapitän Reinhard Suhren’s U-564 sank the 1,352-ton British Alhama and Oberleutnant Klaus Bargsten’s U-563 torpedoed and damaged the destroyer Cossack, which went down on 26 October, and U-564 sank the 2,176-ton British Ariosto and 3,670-ton British Carsbreck.

The U-boats then lost contact, but in the afternoon of 24 October the convoy was spotted by an aeroplane of the I/KG 40, and in the evening by U-71. On 25 October, U-71, U-83, U-206 and Archimede were all driven off, partly by aircraft and partly by the escorting warships. Galileo Ferraris sprang a leak in a fuel tank as a result of the bombing of a Consolidated Catalina twin-engined flying boat and, forced to surface, was approached by the destroyer Lamerton and sunk after a long gun duel on 25 October. During the night of 25/26 October, U-83 and U-563 gained attack positions, and Kraus’s U-83 torpedoed and damaged the 6,746-ton CAM-ship Ariguani. U-71 and U-564 maintained contact during the following day, but the attacks by U-563 and U-564 during the night of 26/27 October were unsuccessful. On 28 October Marconi was sunk by the destroyer Duncan. U-564 and U-563 maintained contact until 28 October and directed Kapitänleutnant Heinz-Otto Schultze’s returning U-432, which sank the 1,574-ton British Ulea. On 29 October the three German boats, having expended all their torpedoes, started their return to base.