Battle of the Caribbean
The Battle of the Caribbean refers to a naval campaign waged during World War II that was part of the Battle of the Atlantic, from 1941 to 1945.[3] German U-boats and Italian submarines attempted to disrupt the Allied supply of oil and other material. They sank shipping in the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico and attacked coastal targets in the Antilles. Improved Allied anti-submarine warfare eventually drove the Axis submarines out of the Caribbean region.
Background[edit]
The Caribbean was strategically significant because of Venezuelan oil fields in the southeast and the Panama Canal in the southwest. The Royal Dutch Shell refinery on Dutch-owned Curaçao was processing eleven million barrels per month, more than any other oil refinery in the world at that time. The refinery at Pointe-à-Pierre on Trinidad was the largest in the British Empire and Lago Oil and Transport Company was another large refinery on Dutch-owned Aruba. The British Isles required four oil tankers of petroleum daily during the early war years, and most of it came from Venezuela, through Curaçao, after Italy blocked passage through the Mediterranean Sea from the Middle East.[4]
The Caribbean held additional strategic significance to the United States. The United States' Gulf of Mexico coastline, including petroleum facilities and Mississippi River trade, could be defended at two points. The United States was well positioned to defend the Straits of Florida but was less able to prevent access from the Caribbean through the Yucatán Channel. Bauxite was the preferred ore for aluminum, and one of the few strategic raw materials not available within the continental United States. United States military aircraft production depended upon bauxite imported from the Guianas along shipping routes paralleling the Lesser Antilles. The United States defended the Panama Canal with 189 bombers and 202 fighters, and based submarines at Colón, Panama and at Submarine Base, Crown Bay, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.[5][6] United States Navy VP-51 Consolidated PBY Catalinas began neutrality patrols along the Lesser Antillies from San Juan, Puerto Rico on 13 September 1939; and facilities were upgraded at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base and at Naval Air Station Key West.[7]
The United Kingdom based No. 749, 750, 752 and 793 Naval Air Squadrons at Piarco International Airport on Trinidad. British troops occupied Aruba, Curaçao and Bonaire soon after the Netherlands were captured by Nazi Germany. The French island of Martinique was perceived as a possible base for Axis ships as British relationships with Vichy France deteriorated following the Second Armistice at Compiègne. The September 1940 Destroyers for Bases Agreement enabled the United States to build airfields in British Guiana, and on the islands of Great Exuma, Trinidad, Antigua, and Saint Lucia. On 11 February 1942, United States forces replaced British soldiers on the Dutch refinery islands and began operating Douglas A-20 Havocs from Hato Field on Curaçao and Dakota Field on Aruba.[8]