Like Baltic Sea wreck robbers, nautical wars and historical heirs endanger

You will certainly not be bored, ”promise the organizers of the“ Navy of Schiffswrack Week 2025 ”. They advertise for diving at least a dozen German shipwrecks in the Bay of Gdansk, five days in July for around 600 euros. For example, the Franconia, a hinged ship that was hit by air bombs on April 8, 1945, broke into two parts and sank. Or the submarine U-367, sunk on March 15, 1945 by a mine, 43 dead, no survivors. Another diving provider recommends diving passages to the Moltkefels, in April 1945 sunk by a Soviet flying attack. Several thousand German refugees were on board the freighter, around 500 of them are said to have died. The Baltic Sea is the “most interesting place to dive wreck worldwide,” enthuses one of the providers.

“There can be no question of a rest of the dead under water,” says Christian Lübcke. He is a historian and state manager of the Volksbund Deutsche Wargräberfürsorge in Hamburg. The association takes care of the dead of both world wars on behalf of the federal government and looks after more than 800 war graves. The tasks also belong to the navigator. Lübcke observes an increase in illegal dives with great concern. Seekriegsgräber would be looted in the Baltic Sea. The principle of those who do not bring anything would often have been there. “What you would never allow yourself in a cemetery are made at sea.”

80 years ago, in the last weeks of the Second World War, thousands tried to flee across the sea in front of the approaching Soviet army, on everything that could somehow swim. Countless of them died in the Baltic Sea at the time. On Wilhelm Gustloff alone, there were estimates of up to 9,000 people, on the Goya more than 7000, on the Steuben up to 4200.

“At least 40,000 people have died in the Baltic Sea in the last four months of the war. These were more nautical war on grade than before in the first four years of the war,” says Lübcke. Among them were women, children and old people at the mass exodus from East Prussia. Most still rest on the bottom of the sea. It was often only recovered what is washed up. Around 1,300 German nautical wars are identified and cardographed, around 2500 German sea decline graves are available, says Lübcke. Sunken aircraft also included.

It often means divers that have not been seen, but the dead are often no longer recognizable, said Lübcke. The condition of bones under water is very different. Sometimes there are complete skeletons in the Baltic Sea, sometimes only bunch of human tissue. But you can see leather goods: sandals or children's shoes. But also remnants of strollers. But it is completely irrelevant what is still there. “Every nautical war grave is equally worth protecting for us. The legal situation here is also unmistakable. The wrecks are the property of the German state, no matter where they are,” said Lübcke.

There are still many relatives who were waiting for news about the whereabouts of their relatives, says Lübcke. “Young people broke out into tears when they learned about their fathers.” In his presentation, there are also positive examples: wreck finds, in which cross -border cooperates and the case is historically processed; in which wreaths are laid down at sea. As in the case of two submarines from the First World War last year in Belgian waters. Many divers adhered to the rules. Reported wrecks, consideration.

But the feeling of legal sensation of others is not very pronounced. For example, spell miles that were built around important wrecks would not be taken into account. Above all, submarines had great fascination on militia collectors because they retained everything from the past like a “time capsule”. Homepages and internet forums from divers read such as collecting albums of looting and illegal dives. “It can't go on like this,” says Lübcke. It is necessary to take a closer look at the allocation of diving licenses, to sensitize more to the topic in diving training.

If you talk to divers, it sounds different. The Volksbund is completely overwhelmed with the topic of sea engraving graves, says Reinhard Öser. He operates Marine Research Germany. It organizes “research expeditions” for wrecks for which participants have to pay. In May about a diving trip in the Baltic Sea, six days for 888 euros. The description states that the aim of the “expedition” is the “scientific recording of shipping -technical underwater monuments”. The trips are “privately financed”, but some of them have “research institutions” on board, says Öser. Accordingly, he receives a grant of a few hundred euros from public offices and authorities. Öser confidently says that he is the “top dog” on the subject of shipwreck diving, the only one in the Baltic Sea that offers such tours. Former fighting swimmers, pioneer divers and underwater biologists worked in his company. If you ask him if the wrecks should not simply be left alone, he replies: Nobody does that anyway.

Do you see human remains while diving? “You have to be lucky there,” says Öser. There is “not everything full of corpses”. To see them, you have to have “an eye” for it, also because bones are often blackened under water after 80 years. In any case, water corpses opened, would be washed up. Sometimes people were also wedged under water. And if you would see a dead man, you'd better say nothing. Otherwise there is a “huge avalanche” with the police and public prosecutor, said Öser. If it is known that a wreck is a nautical war, you don't go in there. Öser has sharp criticism of war graves. Their employees told a lot, but could hardly implement anything, do not know how it worked, and would not have any money. He himself is always ready for cooperation.

Wreck robbery also exists through the employees of the companies that built offshore wind turbines, says Öser. The construction of the wind farms requires a lot of technical staff, craftsmen, divers. The reason would be examined in detail before building. “They see exactly when a wreck is somewhere. And they will have the end of the day.” You can't find gold and silver there. But historical things.

In addition to Öser, Polish diving companies in particular seem to be active in the Baltic Sea. BalticTech is called one of these groups. For example, she had dipped the freighter Moltkefels. Lübcke criticizes this sharply, accuses the group of not involving the war grave care nor German authorities. Attempts to talk with the head of the group, Tomasz Stachura, had repeatedly found in the knowledge that “apparently there is a very different interpretation of the legal situation as well as ethical and moral limits”.

Stachura, who also leads a diving equipment company and specializes in wreck sub-water photography, writes when asked that there is obviously a “misunderstanding” here. He and the BalticTech team have been studying wrecks from a historical perspective for many years. They are concerned with identification, documentation and the traces of the fate of the victims. “We do not take part in the recovery of artifacts.” In the obvious contradiction, there is a photo that BalticTech published on his own website of a dive in June 2019. It shows the steuben ship bell, which was previously taken from the ground. From the ship on which up to 4200 people died. Laughing and proud, the divers pose with the bell, including Stachura. The photo says: Although the wreck was looted, they have succeeded in finding and getting this bell. The bell went to the National Marine Museum in Gdansk.

The history of the Moltkefels freighter has been researching BalticTech for years at the request of survivors, writes Stachura. The dive was given with the permission of the naval agency in the Polish city of Gdynia. Lübcke from the Volksbund says that all the neck hair was troubled when he heard that the actions around the naval decline grave moltkefels were supposedly “at the request of survivors”. “The few still living survivors of this terrible catastrophe are very old people who have no idea what BalticTech does or will do.”

The Polish company Divehouse, which offers the “Navy of Schiffswrack Week 2025”, but has also organized “submarine weeks”, is justified on request. All activities at the diving week are legal, Divehouse employees write. “Our goal is to promote responsible diving with great respect for the shipwrecks and their history we visit.” They want to protect and preserve the history of the shipwrecks visited. The wrecks are listed in the catalog of shipwrecks, which are open to the tourist diving and are published by the naval agency in Gdynia. The proposed wrecks were examined by the responsible institutions. “No human remains were found on these wrecks.”

No German state property is affected, and the shipwrecks are officially opened for the tourist diving, so it is not necessary to obtain additional permits from the German side, according to Divehouse employees. However, one would be happy to work with the war grave care and want to contribute to the preservation of the historical heritage under water and to commemorate the fallen. And the documentation of the “Navy Schiffswrack Week 2025” is very happy to pass on.

Lübcke from Volksbund says that many diving companies would be the guise of an alleged “research” on the outside. But the divers actually disturbed the resting places at sea for commercial reasons. “If this were really serious research, the owner and those affected would be involved and constantly informed and constantly informed.” War graves are usually only informed by really righteous divers – and mostly only for diving projects in distant sea areas. The last divers who really asked for permission were British, Belgians and Danes. The providers of the diving tours usually do not interest that the legal situation of such diving tours and that there are still relatives of the dead on the wrecks.