Germany Calculated It Could Sink Ships Faster Than America Built Them

November 1942. The German navy was winning the "tonnage war" by sinking Allied ships faster than they could be built. But they didn't factor in a California shipyard that was about to do the impossible: build a 10,000-ton cargo ship in just four days. Before the war, it took almost a year to build a single merchant ship. But to win the Battle of the Atlantic, the Allies had to replace sunken ships at an unprecedented rate. Enter Henry Kaiser, a dam builder who knew nothing about ships. By replacing rivets with welds, using prefabricated sections, and hiring a workforce of housewives, farmers, and migrants, American shipyards turned a slow craft into a high-speed assembly line. This is the true story of the Liberty ships—the ugly, expendable vessels that broke the German arithmetic and won the war of production. If your mother or grandmother welded in a shipyard, or your father or grandfather sailed in the merchant marine or served in a naval gun crew aboard a Liberty ship, honor them by leaving their name in the comments below. Hit the Like button to help keep the story of these incredible workers and sailors alive, and Subscribe for more history about the ordinary people and plain machines that decided the outcome of the war. Chapters The Arithmetic of War Part 1: The Tonnage War Part 2: An Emergency and an Old Design Part 3: The Man Who Had Never Built a Ship Part 4: Who Built Them Part 5: Four Days Part 6: What the Stunt Proved Part 7: The Curve Crosses Part 8: The Honest Record Part 9: The Verdict #LibertyShips #WWIIHistory #BattleOfTheAtlantic #MerchantMarine #TrueStory