Four detonations in quick succession, then the mad gurgle and roar of the black flood . . . a cold hand creeps under my collar and runs down my back. I shudder.This is the story of a German U-boat, her commander and her crew, as they embark upon yet another hazardous patrol in the Battle of the Atlantic. Weeks in a small metal tube twenty feet by two hundred feet with fifty other men. Weeks of unbearable tension and terror. Weeks of crushing boredom, as the condensation drips down the walls and mould slowly blooms on the food.Written by a survivor of the U-boat fleet, this is a novel but not a work of fiction. Das Boot is one of the best and most truthful stories ever written about men in combat, a withering condemnation of the insanity of war.