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Allied shipping tonnage losses during May dropped to the lowest figure for any one month since 1940. Even German communiques reported a total of only 372,000 tons. German U-boat losses rose to the highest figure since the start of the war: nine sunk, four probably sunk, two possibly sunk -- not including those destroyed at bases and assembly plants.

German propagandists were hard put to it to explain why Admiral Doenitz' "inexorable U-boat warfare" (TIME, May 10) was working in reverse. Sample efforts:

> Submarine Expert Heinz Bongartz: "In pursuing the U-boat warfare Germany has the choice of two methods: either to sink as much tonnage as possible, as was done in 1942 (and which would inevitably lead to catastrophe for the enemy), or to apply attrition tactics aimed merely at 'neutralizing' the enemy's new building program."

> A German short-wave broadcast: "The exigencies of military operations require at the moment that the news of some sinkings be kept secret."

> The Trans-Ocean Agency: "There are simply not enough ships [left] to be sunk."

Of the effective Allied anti-submarine tactics now being used, some are new and secret, others are merely the old tactics of defense brushed up by experience or bolstered with stronger weapons. These include : 1) more escort ships and planes for convoys; 2) reorganized defenses and new defenses set up at strategic shore and island points; 3) a newly developed long-distance aerial patrol; 4) secret anti-submarine devices; 5) the strategic bombing of submarine bases, repair docks and factories.

The good progress so far made against U-boats does not mean that the U-boat danger is over. But to Navy Secretary Frank Knox the news was "very satisfactory." Said British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden: "The battle of the U-boats . . . is not yet decided, but at least we feel better about it than we have."

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