Pinned post for Q&A :)

Drach is making an understatement when he reports that the bosun of the O16 "swam to a nearby island". In fact, there were were six survivors of the sinking, who had all been on the bridge at the moment the sub hit the mine. None had a lifesaver. Over the next day, all drowned one by one until only quartermaster Cor de Wolf remained. After swimming for 34 hours he reached an island 80 kilometres from the spot where the sub sank. He was rescued by locals and delivered after a trip by sailing boat and through the jungle to Australian troops on Malaya and from there to Singapore. Amazingly, within days of his return to Java he was back in the submarine service, survived the war and retired in 1962 as a skipper.

Nice to have a story about Dutch WW2 vessels that doesn't conclude with "and then the whole class was sunk".

Helfrich predicted the Japanese would start the war by attacking Pearl Harbor. He probably deduced it from the the fact that the Japanese began the Russo-Japanese War with a surprise attack on Port Arthur.

At the end of the Pacific war my father was interned in a camp close to harbor (he was 10). In that harbor a few K boats were in dock to recover and get repairs. One day the Red Cross took the kids from the camp to those subs, my father was welcomed by the K XIV. He was a very skinny small kid and “adopted” by the crew, at the end of the day they went back to the camp. My father who wanted to see more escaped (the camp was still guarded by Japanese, now for protection against the Indonesians) the camp and hitched quit a few times to the K XIV, he was regarded as one of the crew, and was spoiled by them, he took a lot of food back to the camp which he gave to the other people. He even was taken on a small test ride.
Till this day he remembers the kindness of the crew, perhaps they saw in him the son they had at home, we never know.

Can we just take a moment to appreciate the fact that a boat named HMS Truant wasn't present for the first days of the Pacific campaign?

Imagine you're assigned to HMS Truant and you report for duty late

The Australian submarine fleet of WWII was almost entirely Dutch, with a few British and American subs thrown in for good measure. After the loss of the Dutch East Indies, along with many coastal warships, aircraft and soldiers, many Dutch submarines made it to Australia to continue the war. Fremantle, WA, was host to a large flotilla of submarines, but none were actually Australian (the last Australian submarines had been decommissioned in the 1930s due to the Depression, and the next round of Australian subs were nearly 20 years away). Like so many forces in the South Pacific and Eastern Indian Ocean, it was truly a united Allied force, not just forces from one nation or another. And the Dutch were a massive part of that alliance.

My Dutch grandad fought in ww2 in the exiled Royal Dutch Navy in England and after problems over a girl with an officer he went to the Royal Navy. Because of his knowledge of german He manned the anti submarine sensors on destroyers HMS Eskimo, HMS Whitshed and others. He saw Murmansk, d-day, the bombing of Pantellaria and many other places. Channel dash on the Whitshed. He was always a great example of service to me.

Great topic to cover. The level of knowledge about the contributions of everyone outside of the Americans in the Pacific is alarmingly low from my experience. These videos at least do something to spread the information around

Shows what US subs could have done early in the war if they had working torpedoes.

Three cheers for the Royal Dutch Submarines! All these efforts from a fleet whose home nation was, at the time. under German occupation. One can only imagine how that fact would weigh in the minds of their crews. It is difficult enough to fight in a war when one's family is home safe, but how much more difficult when ones family is not safe.
As an American, I'm grateful for the Dutch efforts. Naturally I never learned about this effort before today.
This also makes me feel even more satisfied to know that the British and Americans did try to liberate the Netherlands in the autumn of 1944, at the earliest opportunity. Though Market Garden failed it did cement long term feelings of friendship between all three nations that will, God willing, persist as long as our nations last, a very long time indeed.

As a Clevelander whose hometown museum ship is the USS Cod, the Dutch sub O-19 has a special place in my heart.

Sorry to hear you lost the rights to your old intro music. Great video - as always. I especially like your description of the correct procedures to get the Mk XIV torpedo to properly engage the enemy.

The Dutch O-Boats be righteously kicking some Japanese backside.
In the early-war context of almost uniform naval disaster for the Allied side it is strange that the Dutch submarine successes are rarely mentioned. Well done!

I can’t help hearing how the Dutch apparently uses oboes as warships

For a naval force far from home, adjusting to the fact said home had been conquered and were now fighting a totally different enemy, the Dutch subs put in a heroic shift. And given how Japan was always struggling for enough transports, a force that they likely considered (not entirely unreasonably I think) defeated taking a not insignificant toll is damn impressive. I know Dutch sub technology was world-leading but still, any force that can recover from that kind of shock and still perform is to be celebrated (And the free-French and Polish forces often do get a lot of deserved praise for that reason)

A solitaire board game on the USN Pacific submarine campaign I've played called "Silent War" includes an option to include the Dutch submarines.  For their limited numbers and capabilities they do their part.  And it's also nice in the early campaign to have some submarines that are not stuck with the effects of the Mark 14 torpedo.

O24 was commanded by Piet de jong from  from 25.10.1944 to 08.04.1946. He later became minister of defence (27 june 1959 – 24 july 1963) and even prime minister of the Netherlands (5 april 1967 until 6 juli 1971) After O21 (ten kills) the O24 (7 kills one of them being the Chosa Maru) ,was the most succesfull Dutch submarine in WWII

The Dutch submarine industry is featured in the 1943 British film The Silver Fleet starring Sir Ralph Richardson.