"The Enlightenment" wrote in message
...



The Germans tried pretty hard to stop the Japanese committing suicide but
in
the end the two Japanese managed to do so. One of them was quite famous
for
inventing an automatic depth keeping controller. The Germans had
considered continuing on to Japan rather than surrender but were actually
afraid of being treated harshly because they had heard of harsh treatment
of
Europeans. This despite the fact that the Japanese had sworn on their
honor
to ensure their excellent treatment. Hirschfeld regretfully mentions that
it turns out the Japanese gave outstanding treatment to Axis caught in
Japan
after the surrender of Germany.

These subs I believe were not only mine layers but had been used as 'milk
cows' to rearm and refuel other subs. They were quite large and could
manage 40,000 nautical miles at 8 knots.



The Milch cows were type XIV boats outfitted as refuelling tankers,
they were all sunk by 1945, radar equipped search aircraft made their
mission suicidal. Of the 10 'Milk Cows' built 3 of them were sunk on
their maiden patrol and two had only been on patrols for around 2 weeks
when sunk.

Keith