An Englishman Abroad
Page 10
Such conclusions attest to SOE’s poor analytical skills, which mirrors the lack of wisdom of those who had failed to ask the RAF about any missions planned in the area before deciding Neck’s launch date – or who even thought that such missions might actually be of benefit to Mallaby’s. Moreover, it should not be forgotten that such statements, which would be seen by the upper levels of Allied military and political leadership, were aimed at reducing both the rightful apportioning of blame and internal responsibility for what happened.
The memorandum’s author concluded by suggesting the following: firstly, avoid drops during full moons (in contrast to current practice); secondly, change aircraft trajectory and altitude before, during and after drops.75 While those frantic messages between London, Bern and Algiers were summarizing the details of Neck and its immediate failure, two dispatches, sent on 25 and 27 August 1943, reported that an OSS agent had been made aware of Mallaby’s capture (presumably via McCaffery’s office). Although the affair had not created excessive problems, reading between the lines the annoyance generated by the circulation of this embarrassing episode is clear. It was ordered to investigate, so as to prevent such things from happening again, ‘as future cases of this kind may cause serious breach of security’.76
For Dick Mallaby it was time for a radical change. His salvation and the radical transformation of his status were not far off. Any doubts, or secret plans, harboured by the Italian security services were soon to combine with the achievements of a separate group of Italians, hundreds of kilometres away in Portugal, involved in another top-secret mission, led by Brigadier-General Giuseppe Castellano.
4
From Disaster to Triumph
Mallaby, the Armistice and the Allied Invasion, August–September 1943
(Or: how Mallaby is rescued from capture to become the person in charge of communications regarding the Italian surrender to the Allies, and takes part in the flight of King Vittorio Emanuele II and Marshal Pietro Badoglio from Rome.)
Wars can be won or lost. What matters most, when things go wrong, is to lose with dignity.
However, I fear that our country will not be able to overcome the storm and face defeat with dignity.
Giuseppe Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo
(1901–44)
Since Italy’s entry into the war, Italians anti-fascist and even fascist had made a range of somewhat fanciful, unstrategic approaches towards Great Britain in an effort to reach a separate peace. The Italian will to negotiate a final agreement became clearer and was more intensely felt after the defenestration of Mussolini.1
Brigadier-General Giuseppe Castellano was tasked with conducting secret peace negotiations with the Allies – without Italy’s allies knowing anything about this. The sole aim of Italy’s new government was to dissolve their alliance with the Germans in the simplest and least harmful way, without getting into a fight with them.
Castellano spoke no English, and so he was supported in this mission by an Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs civil servant, Franco Montanari, a half-American Harvard graduate who was distantly related to Marshal Badoglio.2
Castellano was supposed to gather information on the Allies’ intentions and the military situation, and to seek Allied guarantees of military help in withdrawing Italy from the Axis. But even he lacked the appropriate credentials for negotiating with the Allied Command because of the fear that he might be intercepted by the Germans.3
Thus, Montanari and Castellano’s Iberian mission was kept hidden not only from most of the Italian ruling executive, but also from the vast majority of Italy’s military leadership (as well as the secret services). It was also flawed in other basic ways: the instructions given were vague and the presumed significant bargaining power was in truth non-existent.
Using a false identity (‘Commendator Raimondi’), Castellano left Rome by train with Montanari on the evening of 12 August, and reached Madrid three days later, where he presented himself to the British Ambassador Sir Samuel Hoare. Castellano presented himself just with a note written by Francis D’Arcy Godolphin Osborne, Britain’s Minister to the Vatican, and declared the aims of his secret mission to Hoare, who immediately informed London.
The Italian duo then travelled on to Lisbon, arriving on the evening of the 16th.
There Castellano and Montanari held a preliminary meeting on 17 August with the British ambassador to Portugal, Ronald Campbell. Two days later, at 10.30pm, Castellano began talks with several top Allied envoys: the American General Walter Bedell Smith (Chief of Staff at Allied Force HQ), George Kennan (US chargé d’affaires in Lisbon) and Kenneth Strong (Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence at Allied Force HQ). The Allied envoys were dressed in civilian clothes to maintain absolute secrecy.
The secret meeting ended at 7am on 20 August.4
Whether out of a desire to play a leading role, or through projecting his own opinions onto the entire Italian armed forces and people, or just as part of a hasty, ill-conceived tactic, Castellano overstepped his mission boundaries and the vague instructions given to him by wrongly informing the Allies that the Italians wanted to fight the Germans.5
In the end, Castellano failed in the difficult undertaking of securing an honourable exit from the war for the Kingdom of Italy. But not through his fault alone: in point 10 of Ambassador Campbell’s report on the meeting sent to the Foreign Office, it was recorded that ‘General Smith’s handling of the shrewd Sicilian general was masterful’ – perhaps aided by the minor historical detail of the usually abstemious Castellano partaking of several rounds of whiskey-based drinks.
Confusingly, another Italian general became involved. The leadership in Rome had become alarmed by the lack of contact from Castellano and so dispatched Brigadier-General Giacomo Zanussi, accompanied by an interpreter, Lieutenant Mario Lanza, and the British General Carton De Wiart – a prisoner of war in Italy – to vouch for him.
On 25 August, British ambassador Sir Ronald Campbell handed Zanussi the terms of what was known as the ‘Long Armistice’ in error. This document featured many more clauses, which were significantly harsher and outlined the political and economic conditions of surrender, of which Castellano (consignee of the ‘Short Armistice’) was totally ignorant.
Zanussi was supposed to come back to Italy. But when Eisenhower was informed that the Italian general had been given the Long Armistice, he angrily ordered Zanussi’s flight to be diverted to Algiers in order to prevent the Italian leadership from discovering its terms, for fear of the Italians baulking at the drastic clauses and withdrawing entirely from the armistice negotiations. Zanussi was effectively imprisoned, albeit comfortably, for a few days at Massingham, which was enough time for the Italian leadership to confirm acceptance of the surrender.
Zanussi finally returned to Rome on 31 August. He was in the company of Castellano, who told him that he knew what was in the document containing the additional clauses of the Long Armistice given to Zanussi. At this point, Zanussi became convinced that the document was not particularly important, and once in Rome delivered it without indicating its priority.
To add to this, the Allies made inaccurate assumptions regarding the will and the intentions of the Italian people and those of the German Army.
To both sides, it seemed that the odds were stacked against a positive outcome. And it turned out that way. Italy firstly unconditionally surrendered and then split into two parts: one part fighting with the Allies against the Germans, and the other part fighting with the Germans against the Allies.
That led to a civil war, the effects of which linger into the 21st century.
In the short term it meant that the Allies conquered the Italian peninsula very slowly, and if this distracted the Germans from their other fronts, it also led to a series of bellicose managerial, operational and political complications that stretched beyond April 1945.
However, the meeting between Giuseppe Castellano and Eisenhower’s staff led to unexpected developments for Mallaby’s O
peration Neck, his salvation, and his personal involvement in the major events that followed.
A message from the 23 August records the decisive turning point in the negotiations for the Italian capitulation and also in Mallaby’s destiny, acknowledging a previous dispatch sent on the ‘Lisbon’ question.6
The handling of communications between Rome and Allied HQ in Algiers provided a considerable challenge, and in fact was the first operational problem that the Allies, in coordination with the Italians, were required to face up to.
Efforts had been made in the previous weeks to establish a secret radio link with the Italian leadership, but only during the Combined Chiefs First Quebec Conference (codenamed ‘Quadrant’: 17–24 August 1943) was it decided that the matter was a top priority.
So Eisenhower was ordered on the morning of 18 August to send two officers to Lisbon for the meeting with Castellano (there were actually three: Bedell Smith, Kennan and Kenneth Strong) and to establish a wireless link with Italy. He passed this task to Harold MacMillan, who actioned Douglas Dodds-Parker at Massingham. It was decided that a brand new, double transposed code plan would be used. Roseberry rushed after hours and without permission from the relevant office to obtain the necessary code plan.
When the clerk asked if authorization had been given and what name had been assigned to the plan, Roseberry, bluffing and perhaps with tongue in cheek, reported that the name was ‘Monkey’. This also generated the historic codename of the radio station that Mallaby would use in a few days’ time.
Roseberry was unable to board the plane for Lisbon on the 18th, and on the 19th the flight was cancelled. Finally, on the night of the 20th, he managed to make it to the Portuguese capital, arriving there early the following morning.
The official account of the meeting in Lisbon that began on the evening of 19 August noted that Castellano was to be given a radio, a cypher and full instructions for their use, and, on his return to Italy, ‘he would take steps to recruit Italian operators who could use the appliance’.7 Communicating quickly and in secret was essential, firstly because, on the basis of the agreements reached between Castellano and the Allied representatives, by midnight on 30 August 1943 the Italians had to communicate a response to the surrender proposals and their intention to continue talks.
So, just a few hours before Roseberry’s arrival in Lisbon, the need of an effective and secure transmission system from Italy had become top priority for the Allies alongside the urgent necessity of a skilled operator fully able and English-Italian speaking. And just a few hours before, Roseberry received the official confirmation that Mallaby had been captured, but was still alive. Roseberry realized that Dick Mallaby’s chances of survival were increasing, but also that his agent could become the top player in the crucial business that had arisen in Lisbon.
The importance of the solution that Mallaby offered can also be inferred from the fact that, in the light of the events that ensued, many in the Allied camp attempted to claim credit for it.
Kenneth Strong, who was personally present at the meetings with Castellano in Lisbon, recalled:
We gave a radio set to the Italians and reminded Castellano that Dick Mallaby, a member of Special Operations Executive recently captured by the Italians, was in prison in Milan … We suggested they should free him and make use of his expert signal knowledge.8
Had Roseberry been unable to reach Lisbon in time, the following alternative options were foreseen: parachute drop or infiltration of wireless operator and equipment; arrival in Rome of an SOE wireless operator; use of couriers; instructions to Castellano himself regarding the use of codes and radio; and having the wireless operators Carlo Montelli and Vincenzo Bruzzoni (two Italian SOE collaborators) shadow Castellano, with due guarantees given.
Bedell Smith, Strong and Kennan had by now left, and Roseberry found himself in Lisbon in blissful solitude to manage the situation.
Castellano, even after the meeting, was unaware of the exact details relating to communications, and knew only that he would receive a radio and a cypher before his departure.
Roseberry finally met with Montanari on the evening of the 21st, before the departure of the Italian duo.9 The Italian version of events is provided in the memoirs of Brigadier-General Castellano:
All communications will be made in Italian … Montanari, sent by me to the British Embassy, had received the radio, in an elegant leather suitcase, the cypher and the instructions … The cypher key had to be deduced from a phrase that was known to radio station operators. It was agreed that this sentence was to be taken from an Italian book, one copy of which was sent to Algiers, one to London and a third to Rome. In Lisbon, Montanari found three copies of the book L’omnibus del corso, by Sanminiatelli. At the British Embassy he was approached by a gentleman who said he was a major in the British Army, who asked him to bring about, as soon as he reached Italy, the release of the parachutist Lieutenant Malloby [sic] who had been captured by us a few days before. The latter knew perfectly how to use the radio apparatus we took to Italy.10
Apart from the spelling error in Mallaby’s surname, Castellano confirmed that Roseberry met only Montanari at the British Embassy. He also stated that Roseberry’s intervention was both unofficial and at the last minute, perfect SOE style.11
According to British reports, Roseberry met Montanari and Castellano, showing them the portable radio, codes and other required items, and emphasized that the preference was not to use Italian equipment, for obvious reasons of uniformity between the transmitting and receiving stations, and security. Roseberry stressed the need to follow the correct anti-interception procedures and to adhere to the prescribed transmission schedules with maximum precision too.
At this point the two Italians, who ‘were daunted by these difficulties’, asked how they might be resolved, admitting that they had no radio operator available who could perform these tasks in the manner required.
Roseberry evidently enjoyed pointing out the existence of an English agent who had parachuted into Italy for this kind of mission, telling Montanari and Castellano that although Mallaby was an English national, he had been born in Italy, a nation he loved and for which he was ready to risk his life in the struggle against Fascism. He also stressed that there should be no delays, given the agent’s predicament.
The Italians raised the issue of how to convince the British agent to collaborate with them. In order to persuade Mallaby that he was not about to fall into a trap, information was provided that only agent Olaf and Massingham personnel could know, and some sentences containing elements that only Roseberry could have added and which Mallaby had also been trained to use if forced to communicate under duress.
The next question was: ‘Where is he now?’
The answer was: ‘In prison, in Como.’
Roseberry had achieved all of his aims: the Italians and Allies got not only the desired mean of communication, but also the right man to operate it.
Agent Olaf’s status changed in an instant, immediately and dramatically, even if the implementation of this radical change was dangerously complicated.
Castellano and Montanari boarded their train to Italy on 23 August 1943, bearing the red-hot surrender documents, the B2 radio in its ‘elegant leather suitcase’, and the cypher based on Bino Sanminiatelli’s book L’omnibus del corso, ‘the only one which Montanari had managed to find three copies of, after a laborious search through all of Lisbon’s bookstores’.12
The transposition of the Monkey code would have been based only on this book, so the other two copies were personally taken back to London by Roseberry. The copy intended for Algiers was then entrusted to the chosen courier, Major Harold Meakin, who left London on 24 August: he arrived at his destination at 6.00pm on 28 August. It was just in time, because the following day, messages started coming from a new station in Rome.
According to what had been agreed, as soon as Castellano arrived in Italy, he was to order Mallaby’s transfer to Rome.
Phase one
of the operation may have passed off successfully, but the subsequent phases were even more complicated and far more risky.
Castellano’s mission probably saved Dick Mallaby’s life, but most of all, if Mallaby had been unavailable, the difficulties in communications and in the negotiations between the Italians and the Allies would have been very marked indeed.
Then there were the security problems concerning communications, which worried SOE greatly.
The British feared that Mallaby had been tortured, or had revealed details in good faith, believing that he no longer needed his codes and, therefore, this could do no harm, given that the enemy did not know the verification and security codes.
In practical terms, this impasse was not unimportant, as it was impossible to be sure that Mallaby could operate using a complete and secure code system, in spite of what he would be provided by Castellano.
In Cairo, a code system based on Papini’s book (which was found on Mallaby at the time of his capture) had been drawn up; from this, phrases could be extracted for his cross-coding operations. In Massingham Mallaby had been made to memorize a poem, to be used if, for any reason, the codes extracted from the novel were unusable. In Massingham fear was that the codes extracted from the novel had ended up in Lake Como – which, on the one hand, was good news (compared with their discovery by the Italians), but, on the other, represented an operational problem. In this promising, but very complicated, situation began one of SOE’s most important operations, which, beyond its clear and positive outcomes, the Baker Street Irregulars would have enjoyed for the priority and exclusivity it was granted over its British and US service competitors. While the exclusion of the Italian intelligence services (driven by Castellano) brought only unnecessary complications and delays, excluding the British and American secret services ensured maximum satisfaction and boosted the confidence of SOE’s personnel at a critical moment for the executive.13