Originally Posted by
Danny42C
lederhosen (#4).
I believe that, if you exclude small-scale Special Forces, being a member of a U-Boat crew was the most dangerous job in the war (the second most dangerous was of being a crewman in our Bomber Command).
The statistic we established for QI was that ~75% of the people who had ever served in a German U-Boat during the war died in a U-Boat before the end of the war.
Personally I find this both an awe-inspiring and sobering statistic. It's like the one about american gang members who are convicted of murder in capital punishment states - the first thing that happens is their life expectancy *increases* because they are more likely to live longer awaiting execution than on the streets.
PDR