SOE

by Fredric Boyce

  Sanction for an initial 1,000,000 incendiaries was given and trials of the device were carried out on 9 January 1943. The Station IX device consisted of a small incendiary filled with petroleum gel and ignited by a Time Pencil fuse with a 30-minute delay. It would burn for four minutes and reach a temperature of 2000°C. The instructions were printed in English, German, Russian, French, Polish and Czech to reach a wide readership among the hundreds of thousands of forced labourers in Germany. Trials of the parachute qualities of the instruction cards were carried out from the tower of Birmingham University. Lord Selborne, who was also SOE’s minister, was very keen on the project and the Prime Minister gave his tentative approval for Scheme II. With half a million incendiaries due to be ready by mid-April and a further half million by mid-May, an additional three million devices were sanctioned on 8 February. An interesting and typically devious proposal was for the dropping of large numbers of the instruction cards rolled into little balls as if thrown away by potential saboteurs who had read the instructions and hidden the incendiaries. The problem of how best to drop the devices was addressed and it was considered that low-level drops were too dangerous, while high-level drops would result in too great a spread of the devices on the ground. The latter was thought, on balance, to be the more acceptable.

  Between October 1942 and January 1943 a certain Capt Bannister was experimenting with incendiary devices he had invented, suspended from beneath small balloons. These were to be released in favourable weather conditions from eastern England in the somewhat naïve anticipation that the fire-raising part would be released, presumably after a set time delay, over an enemy target. Even with the best weather forecasts of those days, the unpredictability of the wind strengths and directions at various heights made such a venture a forlorn hope. Nevertheless, Bannister submitted his proposal. When Col Davies, SOE’s Director of Research, Development and Supply, heard of this he was somewhat alarmed and considered it dangerous. He said Bannister must not be allowed to drop them as they could forewarn the enemy and spoil project ‘Moon’.2

  Some experiments were carried out on the achieved spread at ground level from drops at height. With parachutes designed to give a rate of descent of 30 ft per second with the packages envisaged for Scheme I, a satisfactory spread was achieved from 20,000 ft at a speed of 200 mph. If this was not considered satisfactory it was suggested the drop be made from only 5,000 ft.

  The final form of the incendiary, which was designed by the leader of the Incendiary Section, Maj O.J. Walker and Dr C.H. Bamford, an ex-Cambridge chemist, was 6 in long by 1½ in by 3/8 in and it was estimated that 720 of them would, on average, replace each bomb which would otherwise be dropped. The production rate of incendiaries began to present a problem. The anticipated rate of 500,000 per month was found to be impossible to achieve, so 300,000 per month had to be accepted. It was proposed to drop 250,000 in the spring over north-west Germany, where there was much forced foreign labour and which was relatively easy to reach, followed by 100,000 in different parts of Germany every fortnight.

  By May 1943 the project had been renamed Operation Braddock, though there were signs of a diminution of enthusiasm with queries being raised about whether to continue with production of the devices. In September, Scheme I was finally abandoned.

  At the end of August an impatient CD wrote to Lord Selborne suggesting that Braddock II should be used over Italy as soon as possible after the British invasion but in a reply from AD/S.1 his proposal was turned down. Italy would get out of the war as soon as it could, said the memo, and the incendiaries should be kept for Germany.3

  Lord Selborne, still anxious to set Operation Braddock in action, wrote to the Prime Minister on 4 October 1943 arguing that there were an estimated 7,700,000 prisoners of war and forced workers propping up German industry and that among these would be plenty of potentially welcoming recipients of the devices. If only 1 per cent of the 2,500,000 incendiaries then available were picked up and used, 25,000 fires would break out in Germany and a high percentage of them would be of some importance. But Churchill had to choose his moment to take the Americans along with him and he judged this was not the right time.4

  In the second quarter of 1944, with almost four million incendiaries for Scheme II manufactured, production was stopped. It was calculated that it would require 400 heavy bomber sorties to deliver them, a demand that was sure to meet with resistance from the RAF if it was seen as merely alarming the Germans and perhaps igniting some fires in prominent Nazi establishments. It was decided that Braddock II was to be used only inside Germany and not in enemy-occupied countries. Furthermore, its use should be delayed until conditions had loosened the Gestapo’s hold and workers were desperate due to the continued and increasingly severe privations as the Allied armies advanced across Europe. The Minister did not feel competent to judge when this situation was likely to come about.5

  With the invasion of Europe imminent Churchill wrote to Lord Selborne to say that he could not bother Gen Eisenhower with this matter at the present.

  Selborne tried yet again on 24 July 1944. News of the ‘trouble in Germany’, by which he was probably referring to the 20 July assassination attempt on Hitler and to some rioting in various parts of the country, although being suppressed by the Nazis, seemed to augur well for a start to the operation. He suggested a preliminary shower of half a million Braddocks (as the incendiaries came to be known) on the Ruhr, which was the centre of German Communism and contained many foreign workers. He noted that the PWE (Political Warfare Executive) would need several hours’ warning to lay on instructions to finders of Braddocks. Churchill struck through the word ‘several’ and substituted 7 in his red ink.6

  Churchill’s hesitation was in part due to his concern that the enemy would wreak retribution against prisoners of war, but the very next day Selborne tried to allay his fears by quoting the Geneva Convention which seemed a pretty weak argument when one considers the Nazis’ record of contraventions of the Convention. Selborne also had intelligence that the Germans were already nervous about the large number of foreign forced workers in their midst.

  With almost four million incendiaries waiting to be dropped and production of them at a standstill, Gen Ismay’s frustration at the lack of action led him to suggest to Churchill on 28 July that he remind Eisenhower of the existence of the weapons and the plan to use them.

  Braddock II was started on a very small scale and SHAEF was pleased with the results. The US Air Force dropped 250,000 devices on 25 September 1944 in daylight despite the Deputy Chief of Air Staff and Gen Spatz claiming night drops would be better. The Nazis were irritated and puzzled and went to the trouble of distributing warnings throughout Germany. Although there were no reports of actual arson attacks, a modest success was claimed by the disruption caused and Gubbins lent the project some token support, advising Selborne that SHAEF was still considering a large-scale drop. Further efforts by Selborne in November 1944 to inject urgency into the operation met with a ‘the present is not the time’ reply, which exasperated him still further.

  Time slipped by till 8 March 1945, when Churchill’s friend and scientific adviser, Lord Cherwell, exhorted him to use the weapon. But now Gen Ismay was having second thoughts and expressed his worries that Braddocks might fall near prisoners of war, prompting reprisals. For the same reason air supply drops near PoW camps were vetoed by SHAEF. Another concern was that they might get into the hands of the German Wehrwolf organisation which was forming groups to infiltrate Allied lines.

  Operation Braddock finally ground to a halt on 18 March 1945 when Churchill wrote across the minute in red ink ‘No action’.7

  OPERATION BARBARA

  Throughout 1943 planning had been taking place for the initial operation using SOE’s first venture into the field of small submersible craft, the one-man Welman. Vessels had been prepared and crews had undergone rigorous training at bases in Scotland, terminating at Lunna Voe in the Shetland Islands, as close to Norway as one could ge
t. To transport them to the target area SOE had applied for the supply of three American sub-chasers, but in case this request was turned down they had an option on some motor torpedo boats in the north of Scotland. The ideas for transporting the mini-subs in Sunderland flying boats or within the casings of conventional submarines had proved either impractical or inopportune. Much to SOE’s satisfaction, their application for sub-chasers from the USA had been approved and three were due to be delivered by the first week in October, complete with three American crews until Norwegian Navy Independent Unit (NNIU) members could be fully trained in their use. When they arrived the boats were described as wooden, stoutly built and beautifully fitted out,8 and there were sixty NNIU ratings waiting to be trained in crewing them. But when the time arrived it was not these fast boats that were to be used in the Welman’s initiation.

  At last the Welman was to see action. The operation against targets in the Bergen area in German occupied Norway was given the codename ‘Barbara’ and was planned in great detail by Lt Cdr A.C. Halliday RN. Thirteen pages of handwritten Operational Orders were drawn up and included equipment to be taken, tidal details, speeds and courses to steer. This information was supplemented by air reconnaissance photographs and maps of the region. On 14 November nine men signed the orders to confirm that they had read and understood them. The nine were Lt J. Holmes RN, Lt B. Maris RNVR, Lt C.A. Johnsen and Sgt B. Pedersen who were the nominated team, with A. Cole, J. Lee, R. Hobson, A. McIntyre and J. Rowley as back-up.

  On 20 November 1943 Operation Barbara, (also mistakenly referred to in some documents as Operation Guidance which was, in fact, an X-craft mission), set off with the two Norwegians, Johnsen in Welman W45 and Pedersen in W46, while the Royal Navy officers Maris and Holmes piloted W47 and W48. The Welmans were transported in davits by motor torpedo boats MTB 625 and MTB 635 from Lunna Voe to the entrance to Solviksund near Bergen to attack shipping and the Laksevaag floating dock in Bergen harbour.

  The plan was for Welmans W45 and W46 to attack shipping at Puddefjord and the Dokkeskjaer Quay while W47 and W48 tackled the floating dock. After the attacks the Welmans were to make for the deep water at Dyrsviken where they were to be scuttled and their crews were to swim ashore and be picked up by MTB at Hindenaesfjord 48 hours later. In case this location proved unusable, an alternative of Sordalen was given.

  After the Welmans were launched from the MTBs they made their way to the small, allegedly uninhabited, island of Hjelteholmen close to Bergen from where the party was to wait till nightfall. On this journey Maris ran on to a rock and had to climb out to push the boat off. However, throughout the 21 November the island was visited by a number of local fishermen, some of whom entered into conversation with the party. Johnsen claimed to know and trust the fishermen so they decided to continue with their plan. After waiting for an inbound convoy to pass the four Welmans began their run-in to the targets at 18.45, leaving fifteen minutes between each departure.

  Pederson, who had taken part in the limpeting of the Nordfarht9 with its cargo of pyrites at Orkla was piloting the leading craft. Drizzle and patchy fog made visibility difficult and when he spotted a small boat heading for him, he dived. After fifteen minutes underwater, by which time he estimated he should be inside the German watchboats, he surfaced but found he had to open the hatch and stand up. Some accounts state that he encountered a net and was forced to surface. Only 50 yards away was a patrolling German minesweeper NB59, which immediately caught him in its searchlight and started firing with its 20 mm gun. Before he had time to dive again, the Welman was hit, so Pederson flooded it in the hope of sending it to the bottom of the fjord. The Germans now approached in a rubber dinghy, which he was forced to jump into. He had reckoned that, had he managed to submerge, the area would have been depth-charged with the likelihood of disabling the other three Welmans.

  Meanwhile, Welman W48 with Holmes in control was found to be leaking through the stern gland and had to return for repairs. On his second attempt in the early hours the craft continued to leak, and Holmes was also aware that the harbour defences were on high alert, with many small craft searching with lights. He therefore sank his Welman and returned to wait on the island. Maris in W47 became lost in all the searchlight activity and abandoned his Welman near Bratholm while Johnsen in W45, having run aground and pushed the craft back to sea, eventually scuttled his at Vidnes. It was only by good fortune that the three officers escaped after sinking their craft and swimming ashore. They were eventually recovered by MTB two and a half months later after several unsuccessful attempts – but Pederson found himself a prisoner of war and, what is more, his Welman did not sink fast enough to prevent the Germans retrieving it.

  MTB 626 was due to sail to the pre-arranged pick-up point for survivors of the Barbara I raid but, with MTB 686, was destroyed in a petrol explosion and fire following the accidental discharge of an Oerlikon gun on MTB 686 while refuelling at Lerwick on 22 November. MTB 686 lost four of her crew and MTB 626 lost one. Bad weather delayed further attempts. The sub-chaser Hessa sailed on 13 December to the rendezvous at Hindenaesfjord but the three men were not found, having already left the area. A message was received that they were still waiting at Sordalen on 28 January 1944 but bad weather again hampered the rescue. The three, two British and one Norwegian, were finally picked up on the night of 5/6 February 1944 by MTB 653.10

  On their eventual return the three men were able to confirm that the only mechanical defect which had befallen them was the leaking propeller shaft seal on W48. Initial concerns about the effectiveness of the Direction Indicating devices fitted had not been realised.

  The Welman that had fallen into the hands of the Kriegsmarine was studied in depth as the Germans were at that time interested in midget submarines. They produced the one-man Biber submarine which had certain similar features to the British craft.

  A second proposed Barbara operation was a Welman attack against an anchorage at Askevold. Agents were put ashore on local islands but encountered difficulties and had to be picked up and returned to Shetland. An advance party for Barbara III was landed from a MTB in the Bremanger area on 5 February 1944, the night the survivors from Barbara I were rescued, and prepared to receive two Welmans for an attack on Gulenfjord. The Welmans sailed on 13 February, presumably on the deck of a MTB or sub-chaser but were forced back by bad weather. The raid was postponed till early March in the hope that the atrocious weather period would be past.

  A little later, agent Antrum Green was landed in the Syvdefjord area to prepare for another Welman raid, Barbara IV, on enemy shipping. He reported that shipping directions and convoy anchorages were continually being changed, which made planning such a raid impossible. No further Welman attacks were attempted, and so ended the short career of this novel craft.

  OPERATION GUNNERSIDE

  The late 1930s saw an upsurge of work on atomic physics, and with it the realisation that it might be possible to release the enormous energy associated with the atomic nucleus, either in a controlled fashion or in an explosion. The basic step, nuclear fission, was discovered by the German physicist Otto Hahn early in 1939. Research in the following months opened up the possibility of the creation of an atomic bomb. This was both rapidly appreciated by the physicists involved and sensationalised by the press. Attempts to suppress publication of the scientific work failed. An important step in the production of fissionable material involved the use of large quantities of deuterium oxide (‘heavy water’) whose production was slow and required considerable amounts of electrical energy. In early 1940 only limited amounts of heavy water were available in the USA and UK and the only major production facility was the Norsk Hydro hydrolysis plant at Rjukan in the Vemork region of Norway.

  Norway was well aware of the strategic value of its stock of heavy water and refused to export any to Germany in 1939. With their invasion by Germany imminent, they sent their entire stock to France from where it is believed to have been shipped to the USA. With the invasion of Norway in
April 1940, the heavy water plant fell into the hands of the Germans who immediately ordered an increase in production. German scientists from the Wehrwirtshaftstab were looking for 4,500– 5,000 kg per year. Although Hitler was eventually to place his faith in the V1 Flying Bomb and the V2 ballistic rocket, by 1942 interest in the prospect of developing an atomic bomb (or at least a nuclear reactor) was growing and so the occupiers demanded a further increase in output.

  At about this time the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, the body coordinating the research effort in various industries throughout the United Kingdom, approached SOE for information regarding supplies of heavy water going to Germany. Where exactly was it going to and for what was it being used? It soon appeared that the Germans might be in a race to produce an atomic weapon, a prospect which, even at that stage of limited knowledge, caused great consternation in the War Cabinet.

  What they did not know was that the German scientists’ calculations showed that they could not hope to produce sufficient uranium 235 to construct a bomb within the likely duration of the war. So they were working towards a nuclear reactor to produce power. Fortunately for the Allies, the Germans had made an error in their calculations: had they discovered it the outcome might have been different.11

  Production of heavy water required a specialised plant and was a slow process. It was therefore thought best to deny the materials to the Germans by attacking its source. Rather than bombing the plant with the risk of collateral damage and casualties, putting the electricity supply to a large part of the country out of action, and perhaps not destroying the real target, a Combined Operations attack of some strength was considered.