by Tom Keene
As 1942 drew to a close, however, not everything was champagne, medals and garden parties. Behind the scenes in Whitehall, a row was brewing – and it wasn’t a new one. The old argument about the conflicting merits of SSRF and the priority that should be accorded small scale raiding was gathering in intensity, sharpening in focus. Despite Mountbatten’s early protestations as espoused by his Chief of Plans back in November, there was still a significant, ongoing and intractable conflict of interest between SIS and Combined Operations/SOE that, despite Churchill’s romantic vision of that ‘hand of steel’ reaching out across the Channel, simply could not be permitted to continue.
As has been shown, the welcome expansion of SSRF in early October after Operation Aquatint had come with strings attached: plans had to be submitted to Hughes-Hallett and pre-raid clearance had now to be given by the naval commander-in-chief – Plymouth or Portsmouth – in whose sea area SSRF intended to operate. Thus, in December 1942, Operations Weathervane and Promise were both ‘cancelled by C-in-C Plymouth owing to interference with SIS’.23 Weathervane had been planned as a twelve-man recce, attack and prisoner snatch on a German OP at Pte de Minard, south of Paimpol in northern Brittany; Operation Promise was a similar mission on Pointe de Sahir, south of Trebeurden in the Baie de Lannion.24 Both were vetoed. That monocled Admiral, Sir Charles Morton Forbes, GCB, DSO, commander-in-chief, Plymouth, was keeping German sentries alive in Brittany.
Notes
1. No Colours or Crest, 59.
2. Rooney papers: information from private papers loaned to the author by Chris Rooney, son of Major Oswald ‘Mickey’ Rooney.
3. No Colours or Crest, 62.
4. Rooney papers: information from private papers loaned to the author by Chris Rooney.
5. Ibid.
6. Personal anecdote recounted to the author by Chris Rooney.
7. DEFE 2/109.
8. No Colours or Crest, 64.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid., 66.
11. Ibid.
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid.
14. Ibid.
15. In fact, on or about that same evening, Graham Hayes was laid up in Le Manoir, the home of resistant Suzanne Septavaux in Le Pin, outside Lisieux.
16. Although Appleyard ‘signed off’ the after-action report on Operation Batman on 19 November, it seems unlikely, given his leave commitments, that he was also navigator aboard MTB 344 on that particular mission.
17. ADM 116/5112.
18. Ibid.
19. ADM 116/5112.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. Geoffrey, 138.
23. DEFE 2/694.
24. A third mission, Operation Trelliswork, had been planned at around this time as a canoe-mounted beach recce on Sept Isles, northern Brittany, by four SSRF. Pre-raid mechanical problems with the MGB carrier resulted in the mission’s cancellation.
19
Eclipse
November 1942 closed with yet another review of the arguments for and against the stepping up of small scale raiding with the new Director of Naval Intelligence, Rear Admiral Edmund Rushbrooke, observing: ‘The value of naval intelligence obtained from raids has been negligible compared with that which is obtained by other methods … As far as operations of NID(C) [Slocum’s section] and NID(Q) [SOE’s naval section] are concerned, any increase in the enemy’s vigilance is, of course, also most undesirable.’ He concluded more constructively: ‘From every point of view it would seem desirable that each raid should be considered on its merits, in the early planning stages, by an impartial authority with knowledge of the above considerations.’1 But those ‘above considerations’ had more to do with SIS’s view of their side of the hill than that of Combined Operations.
Admiral Rushbrooke’s points were robustly rebutted by Mountbatten’s Chief of Staff, Brigadier Godfrey Wildman-Lushington who pointed out on Christmas Eve 1942:
CCO [Mountbatten] has received clear and definite instructions from the Prime Minister and Chiefs of Staff to intensify small scale raids and his letters, to which C-in-C Plymouth refers, are in accordance with those instructions … the arguments in favour of the raids are clearly formulated. There is no doubt that the most valuable result is that they tend to make the Germans employ more men on work of a purely defensive nature … in so far as German Divisions in France are resting from the Eastern Front, the raids disturb their rest, and generally help to make the individual German long to go home … Recent information indicates that the enemy dislikes these raids intensely.2
Such repeated purely tactical arguments, however, cut little ice. The Director of Naval Intelligence’s suggestion of pre-raid review by ‘an impartial authority’ on 29 November 1942 was more than just a random straw in the wind; it was a portent of what was to come.
Mountbatten recognised the clash of priorities for what they were – a direct threat to his raiding policy – and resolved to address the issue head-on, writing to the Chiefs of Staff on 22 December 1942:
At a meeting held on 13th October 1942, the Chiefs of Staff took note with approval that, in accordance with the Prime Minister’s instructions, the Chief of Combined Operations would intensify his small scale raiding operations.
Since then I have taken steps both to increase the small military force available for carrying out such raids, and the number of operations; but recent experience has brought to light two points with regard to the agreed small scale raiding policy which I feel should be brought to the notice of the Chiefs of Staff.3
Mountbatten went on to point out that the northern coast of France – with the exception of the Brittany peninsula – was strongly guarded, making it unsuitable for small scale raids. The Dutch and Belgian coasts presented similar difficulties. Which meant that the only bit of the French coastline suitable for raiding was that which lay west of the Cherbourg Peninsula – precisely the same area favoured for the same reasons by SOE and ‘C’ – SIS. Mountbatten did not mince his words:
Intensified small scale raiding is likely to stir up these coasts, to increase enemy vigilance, and to make the task [of SOE and SIS] considerably harder, and there is no doubt that small scale raiding runs directly counter to their activities … west of the Cherbourg Peninsula strong representations have been made that such raiding activities should cease owing to ‘C’s increasing difficulties caused by the occupation of unoccupied France …
In view of the intensification of these raids I think that the Chiefs of Staff should be aware of their implication on the activities of [SOE and SIS] and should give their general agreement for the continuation of numerous small scale raids in the areas which I have mentioned …
No guidance has yet been given to the various Commanders-in-Chief regarding the importance which should be attached to the despatch of these small scale raids; nor has the policy, stated by the Prime Minister and approved by the Chiefs of Staff concerning these small operations, been communicated to them. It is suggested that the attached signal ‘A’ should be sent stating their agreed policy in order that the Commanders-in-Chief will have some guidance in assessing their importance.4
Signal ‘A’ availed Mountbatten little. Early in the New Year the Chiefs of Staff met on 4 January to discuss small scale raiding. Mountbatten, however, arrived late. In his absence the Vice Chief of the Naval Staff, Sir Henry Moore, stated that the Admiralty had already encountered difficulties adjudicating between the conflicting demands of SIS, SOE and Combined Operations. He then circulated his own note suggesting the way forward. With Mountbatten still not in the room, the representative of the CIGS,5 Lt General Archibald Nye, and the RAF’s Air Vice Marshal Charles Medhurst, Vice Chief of the Air Staff, both stated that, as far as they were concerned ‘the information provided by ‘C’ [SIS] was of such importance that his activities should have priority over both SOE and small raids’.6 At which point, with battle-lines already drawn and the outcome virtually decided, Lord Louis Mountbatten, Chief of Combined Operations and the latest additi
on to the Chiefs of Staff Committee in his own right, entered the room.
Stating that in preparing to implement the Prime Minister’s decision to intensify small scale raiding, he had come into competition with ‘C’, who claimed that his plans would ‘interrupt and possibly destroy’ the channels through which SIS obtained vital information, Mountbatten said – perhaps a little mildly in view of what was at stake – that he could not ‘altogether’ accept that view. But everybody else, it appears, could. Brushing aside his remarks by stating simply that it was the responsibility of the Chiefs of Staff to ensure that meeting the PM’s raiding demands did not adversely affect the interests of SIS, General Nye then explained – presumably for the benefit of Mountbatten who had missed the crucial discussion – why the Chiefs of Staff had decided on the course of action they had. The crucial first two paragraphs of the new policy stated:
The Committee
(a) Agreed … Where the proposed activities of SOE and SIS and minor raids clashed in any area … SIS would ordinarily be given priority;
(b) Agreed that it was for the Admiralty to decide whether the Chief of Combined Operations’ sea-borne raiding operations and the activities of SOE did in fact prejudice the security of SIS operations.
Paragraph four stated that the planning of all clandestine seaborne operations, whether originated by Combined Operations, SOE or SIS, would be co-ordinated by the Admiralty or the Flag Officer delegated by them with the conduct of each operation – from planning through to operational deployment – directed by the commander-in-chief concerned. For SSRF, this meant C-in-Cs Plymouth and Portsmouth. An exception would be made only in those instances when the Chief of Combined Operations was authorised to be the operating authority. Lord Mountbatten asked if the new policy would come into immediate effect: he had prepared a comprehensive programme of raids which he was anxious to start during the present dark period. Yes, replied the naval Vice Chief promptly, the Admiralty was prepared to take up its new responsibilities immediately. And that, really, was that. The Admiralty – and thus SIS – was firmly back in control.
But what had not been directly addressed – for the moment, at least – was Mountbatten’s question regarding raiding west of the Cherbourg peninsula and, during that brief hiatus, the first raid of the SSRF in the New Year attempted to slip under the wire. Members of the SBS had now joined No 62 Commando. Operations Criticism and Witticism on the night of 8–9 January 1943 were one and the same thing: attempts, on separate nights by four members of No 2 SBS attached to SSRF, to paddle into St Peter Port, Guernsey, by canoe and destroy enemy shipping with limpet mines. All attempts were frustrated by bad weather.7
Operation Frankton8 – the iconic Royal Marines’ raid on Bordeaux docks in December 1942 by canoe-borne raiders who later gained immortality as the Cockleshell Heroes – had by then become ‘notorious’9 because of the lack of mission co-ordination between Combined Operations and SOE. As a result of this needless duplication on a mission which cost eight brave men their lives, the Admiralty set up a ‘Clearing House’ to ensure such wasteful duplication could never be repeated. Run by ACNS(H) – Assistant Chief of Naval Staff (Home), Rear Admiral Eric Brind – it was he who now bound the Small Scale Raiding Force’s operational restraint still tighter, writing the same day SSRF/SBS abandoned Operation Witticism:
The Operations now being undertaken by ‘C’ are of such importance as to make it necessary to refrain from small raids west of Cherbourg Peninsula for the present. Any particular operation required by CCO [Mountbatten] in the Bay will be considered according to the circumstances at the time.10
On the bottom of that handwritten memo from ‘E.J.P.B.’ – Admiral Brind – an unidentified hand has added a bitter note to the Vice Chief of Combined Operations the next day:
I may have got it all wrong, but the situation implied in the last paragraph of ACNS(H)’s letter appears quite unacceptable. The suggestion, as I see it, is quite clearly that CCO [Mountbatten] can carry on planning and mounting raids for submission to ACNS(H) who has the right of last minute rejection.11
A pencil-corrected draft response for Mountbatten to send to the Admiralty from Combined Operations on 11 January 1943 states:
I am assuming that this restriction does not apply to islands west of Cherbourg peninsula … I will now be obliged to inform the Chiefs of Staff that, as a result of ACNS(H)’s decision, my small scale operations are being practically completely stopped … I have no alternative but to submit that, for the reasons given in my memorandum attached, I am unable to implement the instructions of the Prime Minister COS (42) 146th meeting to intensify small scale raiding unless this decision is altered.12
A penned footnote in an unknown hand adds: ‘Consider that the Norwegian situation (e.g. Cartoon) which is also being sabotaged [sic] by ‘C’ must also be mentioned.’13
Operations Weathervane and Promise had been cancelled by C-in-C Plymouth in December 1942. The New Year would see the cancellation of Operations Underpaid (a recce/prisoners raid on Cap Fréhel, Brittany), Woodward (Île Vierge), Hillbilly (Plouguerneau) and Mantling (Île Renouf).
The writing was on the wall, some of it put there by Major Ian Collins, Chairman of the Small Scale Raiding Syndicate. Briefing Mountbatten on 10 January 1943 about the implications of Channel restrictions that would leave the activities of SSRF ‘very considerably curtailed’,14 he reviewed SSRF’s bleak Channel options for February, recording on 14 January:
I am submitting the programme for February, but the following facts must be faced.
1. It is unlikely that more than one or two operations at the most will take place as the Brittany coast is still closed to us … MTB 344, after six months more or less continuous work, is going in for overhaul … This would take from 3 to 4 weeks which more or less covers the non-moon period. MGBs (Class C) are not really suitable for operations in the Cherbourg Peninsula or the Channel Islands
[…]
7. There is no doubt that with the few operations taking place the less risk we are inclined to take in attacking objectives, since as the effect of policy (series of small scale raids) is barred, one is less inclined to risk a force unless the object is very worthwhile, and the force itself cannot have the same confidence if only operating every two months.
8. As long as the present ban exists on any force operating every alternate night in the Channel west of the Isle of Wight, the number of days on which operations could take place is very limited.15
An undated draft letter for Mountbatten to send to the Chiefs of Staff at this time stated:
A decision has been given by the Admiralty that I must refrain from any operations west of the Cherbourg Peninsula meantime … I have no alternative but to submit that … I am unable to implement the instructions of the Prime Minister to intensify small scale raiding unless this decision is altered … I submit that the number of seaborne operations carried out by SIS in this area will be found to be so few that I still hold very strongly the opinion that this decision should be reconsidered.16
It was not.
Effectively forbidden from raiding west of the Cherbourg Peninsula, Mountbatten’s Chief of Staff, Brigadier Godfrey Wildman-Lushington, fought a valiant rearguard action, pressing ACNS(H) on 21 January 1943 for confirmation that the islands west of the Cherbourg Peninsula were not included in his ban. He attached to his letter a summary of the planned raids which had been – or might yet be – affected by his decision. Operations Woodward, Weathervane and Promise – as already stated – were on the list; three unnamed raids against the Brittany coast were now ruled out and a further five raids against islands west of Cherbourg planned for the next non-moon period – i.e. between 30 January and 14 February – also now hung in the balance. Combined Operations Planning Staff waited anxiously for the Admiralty’s reply. So too did Stirling’s SSRF raiders in their five scattered out-stations along the south coast. The no-moon period passed with no decision. Most of February came and went in a shoal of bad weat
her – and still there was no reply. Nothing ventured, Combined Operations decided to press ahead with Operation Huckaback anyway.
In concept, Huckaback was originally planned as a recce-in-strength on three islets close to Guernsey: Brecqhou, Herm and Jethou. Bad weather scrubbed the original mission; when it was revised Huckaback – like Operation Branford on Burhou in September 1942 – was to discover if it would be feasible to land artillery to support a possible invasion, not of Alderney this time, but of Guernsey. Operation Huckaback was led by Capt. Pat Porteous of Lord Lovat’s No 4 Commando, a man who had stepped into legend during the raid on Dieppe in August 1942. Shot through the hand during the initial assault on the Varengeville battery set back to the east of Orange 2 Beach on the western flank of the invasion area, he had first bayoneted his assailant, saved the life of his sergeant and then led his men in a desperate bayonet charge in the face of withering enemy fire before collapsing wounded on the objective. Two months later he had heard that he had been awarded the Victoria Cross.17 Now he was leading ten commandos ashore on Herm, an island just 2,500 yards long and 800 yards wide. Scrambling up a steep cliff, they established that Herm was unoccupied and that Shell Beach on the north-east of Herm would support artillery. The party withdrew after three hours ashore without seeing anyone, German or civilian, and returned to Portland without incident.
And still no formal word from ACNS(H). Finally, prods from a Rear Admiral of equal rank in Combined Operations on 3 March 1943 elicited a grudging response eleven days later. But it was a response which failed to address directly the crucial question relating to those islands west of Cherbourg. Were they on or off limits? It did not say. But its bleak, concluding paragraph to Mountbatten left little room for doubt: