Convoy PQ 12 (1–12 March 1942) was an Arctic convoy sent from Reykjavík in Iceland by the Allies to Murmansk, to supply the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The Germans conducted Operation Sportpalast with the battleship and three destroyers against the convoys but found neither.
The Home Fleet attempted to intercept the German flotilla but in the fog and storms both sides lacked the air reconnaissance necessary to find their opponents during the passage of the convoys. The British managed an air attack with Albacore torpedo-bombers on as it returned to base but were unable to hit it and lost two of the bombers.
The convoy reached Murmansk for no loss but suffered ice damage to its bow on the night of 6/7 March and had to be detached from the convoy. On 9 March, one of the escorts, the whaler , capsized in a storm after ice formed on the superstructure, all but three of the crew being lost.
Both sides pondered their prospects after the convoy operation. Tovey thought that concentrating the Home Fleet in seas patrolled by U-boats was too risky and that making a maximum effort to sink German ships mattered more than attacking a convoy. The Admiralty took the view that protecting a convoy was the best way to bring the German ships to battle.
(SKL, the command staff of the ) thought that had, by luck, narrowly escaped severe damage at least and it did not sail against a convoy for three months. With the responsibility of protecting Norway from invasion and attacking convoys, SKL decided to reserve the big ships for anti-invasion operations and to attack convoys with destroyers.
Background Lend-lease
The Soviet leaders needed to replace the colossal losses of military equipment lost after the German invasion, especially when Soviet war industries were being moved out of the war zone and emphasised tank and aircraft deliveries. Machine tools, steel and aluminium was needed to replace indigenous resources lost in the invasion. The pressure on the civilian sector of the economy needed to be limited by food deliveries. The Soviets wanted to concentrate the resources that remained on items that the Soviet war economy had the greatest comparative advantage over the German economy. Aluminium imports allowed aircraft production to a far greater extent than would have been possible using local sources and tank production was emphasised at the expense of lorries and food supplies were squeezed by reliance on what could be obtained from lend–lease. At the Moscow Conference, it was acknowledged that 1.5 million tons of shipping was needed to transport the supplies of the First Protocol and that Soviet sources could provide less than 10 per cent of the carrying capacity.
The British and Americans accepted that the onus was on them to find most of the shipping, despite their commitments in other theatres. The Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, made a promise to send a convoy to the Arctic ports of the USSR every ten days and to deliver a month from July 1942 to January 1943, followed by and another more than already promised. In November, the US president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, ordered Admiral Emory Land of the US Maritime Commission and then the head of the War Shipping Administration that deliveries to Russia should only be limited by 'insurmountable difficulties'. The first convoy was due at Murmansk around 12 October and the next convoy was to depart Iceland on 22 October. A motley of British, Allied and neutral shipping loaded with military stores and raw materials for the Soviet war effort would be assembled at Hvalfjörður in Iceland, convenient for ships from both sides of the Atlantic.
From Operation Dervish to Convoy PQ 11, the supplies to the USSR were mostly British, in British ships defended by the Royal Navy. A fighter force that could defend Murmansk was delivered that protected the Arctic ports and railways into the hinterland. Before September 1941 the British had dispatched 450 aircraft, of rubber, 3,000,000 pairs of boots and stocks of tin, aluminium, jute, lead and wool. In September representatives from Britain and the United States travelled to Moscow to study Soviet requirements and their ability to meet them. The representatives of the three countries drew up a protocol in October 1941 to last until June 1942. British supplied aircraft and tanks reinforced the Russian defences of Leningrad and Moscow from December 1941. The tanks and aircraft did not save Moscow but were important in the Soviet counter-offensive. The was by then reduced to 600 operational aircraft on the Eastern Front, to an extent a consequence of being sent to the Mediterranean against the British. Tanks and aircraft supplied by the British helped the Soviet counter-offensive force push the Germans further back than might have been possible. In January and February 1941, deliveries of tanks and aircraft allowed the Russians to have a margin of safety should the Germans attempt to counter-attack.
Signals intelligence
Ultra
The British Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) based at Bletchley Park housed a small industry of code-breakers and traffic analysts. By June 1941, the German Enigma machine Home Waters () settings used by surface ships and U-boats could quickly be read. On 1 February 1942, the Enigma machines used in U-boats in the Atlantic and Mediterranean were changed but German ships and the U-boats in Arctic waters continued with the older Home from 1942, Dolphin to the British). By mid-1941, British Y-stations were able to receive and read W/T transmissions and give advance warning of operations. In 1941, naval Headache personnel with receivers to eavesdrop on wireless transmissions were embarked on warships.
B-Dienst
The rival German (, Observation Service) of the (MND, Naval Intelligence Service) had broken several Admiralty codes and cyphers by 1939, which were used to help ships elude British forces and provide opportunities for surprise attacks. From June to August 1940, six British submarines were sunk in the Skaggerak using information gleaned from British wireless signals. In 1941, read signals from the Commander in Chief Western Approaches informing convoys of areas patrolled by U-boats, enabling the submarines to move into "safe" zones. had broken Naval Cypher No 3 in February 1942 and by March was reading up to 80 per cent of the traffic, which continued until 15 December 1943. By coincidence, the British lost access to Atlantic U-boat signals when the Shark cypher was introduced and had no information to send in Cypher No 3 that might compromise Ultra.
By February 1942, German naval intelligence had established the evolution of Arctic convoys; PQ convoys departed from Iceland (possibly Seyðisfjörður) heading to the south of Bear Island () then eastwards to around 38°40′E, turning south to 70°N then dividing for Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. The reciprocal QP convoys went more to the south or east, ships bound for Britain heading direct for Scotland. The convoys had departed at eight-to-ten day intervals but recently had appeared to be operating on a fifteen-day cycle, voyages lasting nine to ten days, with about ten to fifteen ships apiece. Until the end of February, the British had lost only one ship ().
Arctic Ocean
Between Greenland and Norway are some of the most stormy waters of the world's oceans, of water under gales of snow, sleet and hail. The cold Arctic water was met by the Gulf Stream, warm water from the Gulf of Mexico, which became the North Atlantic Drift. Arriving at the south-west of England the drift moves between Scotland and Iceland; north of Norway the drift splits. One stream bears north of Bear Island to Svalbard and a southern stream follows the coast of Murmansk into the Barents Sea. The mingling of cold Arctic water and warmer water of higher salinity generates thick banks of fog for convoys to hide in but the waters drastically reduced the effectiveness of Asdic as U-boats moved in waters of differing temperatures and density.
In winter, polar ice can form as far south as off the North Cape and in summer it can recede to Svalbard. The area is in perpetual darkness in winter and permanent daylight in the summer and can make air reconnaissance almost impossible. Around the North Cape and in the Barents Sea the sea temperature rarely rises about and a man in the water will die unless rescued immediately. The cold water and air makes spray freeze on the superstructure of ships, which has to be removed quickly to avoid the ship becoming top-heavy. Conditions in U-boats were, if anything, worse the boats having to submerge in warmer water to rid the superstructure of ice. Crewmen on watch were exposed to the elements, oil lost its viscosity and nuts froze and sheared off bolts. Heaters in the hull were too demanding of current and could not be run continuously.
Prelude
Two U-boats were based in Norway in July 1941, four in September, five in December and two in January 1942, seven in February, nine in March and one in April, 23 boats in all, a number maintained for the rest of the year. Hitler contemplated establishing a unified command but decided against it. The German battleship arrived at Trondheim on 16 January, the first ship of a general move of battleships and cruisers to Norway. British convoys to Russia had received little attention in 1941, since they averaged only eight ships each and the long Arctic winter nights negated even the limited reconnaissance effort that was available. After , the cruisers and arrived on 23 February. On 21 March the cruiser arrived and on 26 May joined the fleet. The U-boats reinforcements to Norway in 1942, along with the big ships, allowed the to contemplate more ambitious operations against Arctic convoys.
The arrival of more ships in Norway was of little use without fuel and in November 1941 the oil reserve of the stood at with a monthly use of and another delivered to the and a monthly allotment of . In February the fuel reserve had declined to and deliveries down to , the Channel Dash consuming . In March the fuel crisis was such that "fleet operations of any importance [were] absolutely out of the question". In April the fuel shortage worsened with receipts of of fuel from Rumania instead of the expected causing a suspension of operations, even by light forces. (The British followed this crisis through Ultra decrypts with great interest.)
(SKL, Naval Warfare Command) of the (OKM) had been given contradictory instructions by Adolf Hitler, to hold the ships in Norway ready to repulse a British invasion attempt and to attack Allied Arctic convoys. Defence against an invasion needed the big ships to remain operational when attacks against convoys courted damage and losses, leaving the short of ships to counter an invasion. Either way, the navy needed the cooperation of 5 to reconnoitre the convoy route through the Greenland Sea, Norwegian Sea and the Barents Sea and to attack ships at long distance from Norway. Before these matters had been agreed and SKL had issued instructions for the use of and , General Admiral Rolf Carls, the head of (MGK ) approached Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, the head of OKM, for permission to attack the next Arctic convoy with and three destroyers.
5
In mid-1941, (Air Fleet 5) had been re-organised for Operation Barbarossa with (Air Region Norway) headquartered in Oslo. (Air Commander Stavanger) the centre and north of Norway, (Fighter Leader Norway) commanded the fighter force and ( [colonel] Andreas Nielsen) in the far north had airfields at Kirkenes and Banak. The Air Fleet had 180 aircraft, sixty of which were reserved for operations on the Karelian Front against the Red Army.