Operation Seeräuber (ii)

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'Seeräuber' (ii) was a U-boat wolfpack operation in the Atlantic against the RS.3 convoy (22/30 March 1943).

The wolfpack comprised U-67, U-123, U-159, U-167, U-172, U-513 and U-515, and for the loss of none of its own number sank three ships (15,389 tons) of the RS.3 convoy, comprising nine ships (three merchantmen, one cable-layer and five tugs) bound from Gibraltar to Freetown, Sierra Leone, and initially escorted by two corvettes that left the convoy during the morning of 28 March to reinforce the escort of a northbound convoy.

Kapitänleutnant Kurt Sturm’s U-167 sank the 5,412-ton British Lagosian, Kapitänleutnant Carl Emmermann’s U-172 the 4,621-ton Belgian Moanda, and Kapitänleutnant Helmut Friedrich Witte’s U-159 the 5,319-ton British Silverbeech. On the following day a strong Allied air escort was provided, and the Germans broke off the operation, the boats then dispersing to undertake individual operations.