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Explained in plain English

Why scuttle your own ships?

Scuttling means deliberately sinking your own ship. It's often done to prevent the enemy from capturing the vessel or its technology, or to block a waterway. In this case, the German fleet scuttled their ships in the Danube in 1944 to obstruct the advancing Soviet forces, a common tactic in wartime to slow down an enemy's progress.

Stories that explain this

Drought reveals dozens of sunken WWII German warships in Danube River

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