bad shape financially. Chancellor of the Exchequer Neville Chamberlain proposed to merge the two companies in order to solve their financial problems. The merger took place in 1934 and launched the construction of the while progressively sending their older ships to the scrapyard. The Queen Mary was the fastest ship of her time and the largest for a short amount of time, she captured the Blue Riband twice, both off Normandie. The construction of a second ship, the , was interrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War. The Second World War was a conflict rich in events involving liners. From the start of the conflict, German liners were requisitioned and many were turned into barracks ships. It was in the course of this activity that the Bremen caught fire and was scrapped in 1941. During the conflict, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary provided distinguished service as troopships. Many liners were sunk with great loss of life; in the Second World War the three worst disasters were the loss of the Cunarder in 1940 off Saint-Nazaire to German bombing while attempting to evacuate troops of the British Expeditionary Force from France, with the loss of more than 3,000 lives; the sinking of , after the ship was torpedoed by a Soviet submarine, with more than 9,000 lives lost, making it the deadliest maritime disaster in history; and the sinking of with more than 7,000 lives lost, both in the Baltic Sea, in 1945. SS Rex was bombarded and sunk in 1944, while Normandie caught fire, capsized and sank in New York in 1942 while being converted for troop duty. Many of the superliners of the 1920s and 1930s were victims of U-boats, mines or enemy aircraft. was attacked by German planes, then torpedoed by a U-boat when tugs tried to tow her to safety. Decline of long-distance line voyages After the war, some ships were again transferred from the defeated nations to the winning nations as war reparations. This was the case of the Europa, which was ceded to France and renamed Liberté. The United States government was very impressed with the service of the Cunard's Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth as troopships during the war. To ensure a reliable and fast troop transport in case of a war against the Soviet Union, the U.S. government sponsored the construction of and entered it into service for the United States