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The ''Kriegsmarine'' ((:ˈkʁiːksmaˌʁiːnə), ''War Navy'') was the navy of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It superseded the ''Imperial German Navy'' of World War I and the inter-war ''Reichsmarine''. The ''Kriegsmarine'' was one of three official branches of the Wehrmacht, the armed forces of Nazi Germany. The ''Kriegsmarine'' grew rapidly during German naval rearmament in the 1930s (the Treaty of Versailles had limited the size of the German navy previously). ''Kriegsmarine'' ships were deployed to the waters around Spain during the Spanish Civil War, under the guise of enforcing non-intervention, but in reality supporting the Franco side of the war. In January 1939 Plan Z was ordered, calling for naval parity with the Royal Navy by 1944. However, when World War II broke out in September 1939, Plan Z was shelved in favour of building submarines (U-boats) and prioritizing land and air forces. The Commander-in-Chief of the ''Kriegsmarine'' (as for all branches of armed forces during the period of absolute Nazi power) was Adolf Hitler, who exercised his authority through the ''Oberkommando der Marine''. The ''Kriegsmarine''s most famous ships were the U-boats, most of which were constructed after Plan Z was abandoned at the beginning of World War II. Wolfpacks were rapidly assembled groups of submarines which attacked British convoys during the first half of the Battle of the Atlantic but this tactic was largely abandoned in the second half of the war. Along with the U-boats, surface commerce raiders (including auxiliary cruisers) were used to disrupt Allied shipping in the early years of the war, the most famous of these being the heavy cruisers ''Admiral Graf Spee'' and ''Admiral Scheer'' and the battleship ''Bismarck''. However, the adoption of convoy escorts, especially in the Atlantic, greatly reduced the effectiveness of commerce raiders against convoys. After the Second World War, the ''Kriegsmarines remaining ships were divided up amongst the Allied powers and were used for various purposes including minesweeping. ==Command structure== Adolf Hitler was the Commander-in-Chief of all German armed forces, including the ''Kriegsmarine''. His authority was exercised through the ''Oberkommando der Marine'', or OKM, with a Commander-in-Chief (''Oberbefehlshaber der Kriegsmarine''), a Chief of Naval General Staff (''Chef des Stabes der Seekriegsleitung'') and a Chief of Naval Operations (''Chef der Operationsabteilung''). The first Commander-in-Chief of the OKM was Erich Raeder who was the Commander-in-Chief of the ''Reichsmarine'' when it was renamed and reorganized in 1935. Raeder held the post until falling out with Hitler after the German failure in the Battle of the Barents Sea. He was replaced by Karl Dönitz on 30 January 1943 who held the command until he was appointed President of Germany upon Hitler's suicide in April 1945. Hans-Georg von Friedeburg was then Commander-in-Chief of the OKM for the short period of time until Germany surrendered in May 1945. Subordinate to these were regional, squadron and temporary flotilla commands. Regional commands covered significant naval regions and were themselves sub-divided, as necessary. They were commanded by a ''Generaladmiral'' or an Admiral. There was a ''Marineoberkommando'' for the Baltic Fleet, Nord, Nordsee, Norwegen, Ost/Ostsee (formerly Baltic), Süd and West. The ''Kriegsmarine'' used a form of encoding called ''Gradnetzmeldeverfahren'' to denote regions on a map. Each squadron (organized by type of ship) also had a command structure with its own Flag Officer. The commands were Battleships, Cruisers, Destroyers, Submarines (''Führer der Unterseeboote''), Torpedo Boats, Minesweepers, Reconnaissance Forces, Naval Security Forces, Big Guns and Hand Guns, and Midget Weapons. Major naval operations were commanded by a ''Flottenchef''. The ''Flottenchef'' controlled a flotilla and organized its actions during the operation. The commands were, by their nature, temporary. The ''Kriegsmarines ship design bureau, known as the ''Marineamt'', was administered by officers with experience in sea duty but not in ship design, while the naval architects who did the actual design work had only a theoretical understanding of design requirements. As a result the German surface fleet was plagued by design flaws throughout the war. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Kriegsmarine」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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