| abstract | - German submarine U-3519 was a Type XXI U-boat of the German Kriegsmarine during World War II. The Elektroboote submarine was laid down on 19 September 1944 at the Schichau-Werke yard at Danzig, launched on 23 November 1944, and commissioned on 6 January 1945 under the command of Kapitänleutnant Richard von Harpe. U-3519 was a brand new, high technology electric boat which could run constantly submerged rather than having to surface to recharge her batteries every day the way submarines until that point had had to do. Unfortunately for the Germans, these advanced vessels were only introduced to the Kriegsmarine late in 1944, much too late to influence the Battle of the Atlantic, and too late for many of them to serve in an offensive capacity at all. With the end of the war near, training on U-boats had dropped to a minimum due to lack of fuel, falling morale and the effectiveness of allied attacks on U-boat construction and preparation. The exception to this were the new Type XXI boats, which continued to train in the Baltic Sea. To prevent this, the Royal Air Force dropped thousands of sea mines into German territorial waters, in the hope that submarines entering or leaving harbour or training in shallow waters would be lost on them. This is what destroyed the U-3519 on 2 March 1945, when she ran afoul of an air-dropped mine near Warnemünde, in position and sank to the bottom taking all 65 of her crew with her.
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