Turning the Tide: How a Small Band of Allied Sailors Defeated the U-Boats and Won the Battle of the Atlantic

In Turning the Tide, military reporter and author Ed Offley presents a rousing military history of the climax of the Battle of the Atlantic in World War II, when a handful of battle-hardened British, Canadian and American sailors successfully beat back the German U-Boats that were threatening the lifeline between the US and Britain. Tens of thousands of merchant seamen, naval gunners, civilian passengers and U-boat crewmen lost their lives in the Battle of the Atlantic, making it the deadliest naval conflict in history—but the losses were high because the stakes were even higher. If the U-boats had managed to sever the lifeline between the U.S. and Great Britain—as they seemed poised to do by late 1942—Germany could have denied the Allies their springboard into the European continent, effectively costing them the war. Using interviews with key survivors on both sides and extensive research in German, British, and American archives, Offley puts the reader into the heart of the pivotal episodes of this critical conflict, showing how the Allies nearly lost—and ultimately regained—victory in both the Atlantic and in Europe itself.

A rousing military history of the Battle of the Atlantic, when a high-seas showdown between the Allies and wolf packs of U-boats determined the outcome of the war against Nazi Germany.

“Offley skillfully blends history and statistics and analysis as well as heart-pounding narratives of sea-battles that have the immediacy of a good novel, only they tell of real people and real events.”—The American Spectator

The United States experienced its most harrowing military disaster of World War II not in 1941 at Pearl Harbor but in the period from 1942 to 1943, in Atlantic coastal waters from Newfoundland to the Caribbean. Sinking merchant ships with impunity, German U-boats threatened the lifeline between the United States and Britain, very nearly denying the Allies their springboard onto the European Continent--a loss that would have effectively cost the Allies the war.

In Turning the Tide, author Ed Offley tells the gripping story of how, during a twelve-week period in the spring of 1943, a handful of battle-hardened American, British, and Canadian sailors turned the tide in the Atlantic. Using extensive archival research and interviews with key survivors, Offley places the reader at the heart of the most decisive maritime battle of World War II.

Ed Offley has been a military reporting specialist for newspapers and online publications since 1981, including the Ledger-Star in Norfolk, Virginia, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Stripes.com, and DefenseWatch magazine. A graduate of the University of Virginia, Offley served in the U.S. Navy in Vietnam. He lives in Panama City Beach, Florida.