Beacon II? [Conclusion]

This is coolbert:

"The first U-boat to spot the convoy would signal its position to U-boat headquarters, and send out homing signals to assemble the rest of the pack."

Again - - A German U-Boat, establishing contact with and shadowing an allied convoy during the Battle of the Atlantic, was able to send a "homing" signal to other U-Boats. Gather the "crowd" [U-Boats approaching the convoy] for a mass attack against mouth-watering and tempting targets vital to the war effort.

This did not happen!!

My intuitive and first impression upon reading about the "beacons" was that this was a good idea. Allowed for a mass gathering and mass attack upon an allied convoy without the gathering U-Boats having to do a lot of fancy navigation, regardless of weather, radio contact, day or night, etc.

But, then also intuitively and with some second-thought, the use of such beacons would have been fraught with great danger for the U-Boat crews.

These beacons, if actually having been available, would have operated at low-frequencies [less than 500 KHZ on the radio band!], been omni-directional, and transmitted not continuously, but at intervals? During the period, these transmissions might have been called "buzzers"?

AND BEEN SUBJECT TO INTERCEPT BY THE ALLIED VERY-LONG-RANGE-AIRCRAFT [B-24] OF NAVAL AVIATION! Beacons that would not only have attracted other German U-Boats, BUT ALSO ALLIED BOMBER AIRCRAFT SEEKING TO DESTROY GERMAN SUBMARINES!!

Furthermore, those beacons could have been subject to what is called meaconing!! The sending of false navigation and homing beacons. Allied units could have sent out their own signals to deceive the gathering U-Boats, even lead them into A TRAP!!

"Meaconing is the interception and rebroadcast of navigation signals. These signals are rebroadcast on the received frequency to confuse enemy navigation."

"Successful meaconing can cause: Aircraft to be lured into 'hot' (ambush-ready) landing zones or enemy airspace, ships to be diverted from their intended routes, bombers to expend ordnance on false targets, or ground stations to receive inaccurate bearings or position locations."

Whoa boy!!

Just too much danger with beacons of this nature!! Beacons of the sort to gather U-Boats did not exist, were not used, and if had been in existence and were used, would have been too susceptible to counter-measures to be effective.

coolbert.