"Axis U-Boats: In Far-Eastern" Topic

"A few months after Pearl Harbor, the German underwater war rose to its height. Admiral Donitz's wolf pack was registering record victories against Allied shipping. All seven seas were soon to become death rings for Allied ships with the entry of the Japanese in the wararena. The increase of Allied ship traffic in the Indian Ocean was followed by a U-boat infiltration round the Cape of Good Hope.

A wolf pack would operate in the Indian in 1943 to reinforce the isolated U-boats and surface raiders plying these waters. There were no organized convoys in the Indian Ocean as in the Atlantic, because of a shortage of warships as escorts. Thirteen squadrons of British land planes or flying boats were all that were available to cover the vast expanses from Africa to Australia, from India to the southern latitudes. As an example, twelve freighters were sunken in June and 17 in July 1942. A German U-boat base had been set up at Penang in Japanese-occupied Malaya, where crews and boats could recuperate and repair from their long sea voyages…"
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Amicalement
Armand

I regard the German operation of submarines outside their zone of concern as a waste of limited resources, thus hurting their strategic chance to win.

Those few subs merged with larger forces in the Med, Red Sea or in the Atlantic would have increased the German ability to limit British supply routes.

Depends. If you make your enemy use proportionally more resources defending places you don't intend to conquer than you use threatening them it's a win for you. Otherwise, and in this case I think you're right, but hindsight is often 20/20.

Since the submarines german code was disqualified, they have not any chance.

Amicalement
Armand