Dieppe Raid

• 1. Introduction

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  The Dieppe Raid took place on the 19th of August 1942, and within ten hours it was over. More than 6,000 men had crossed the English Channel in the night. By the time they were counted, 3,623 of the 6,086 who had landed were dead, wounded, or in German hands. Of the roughly 5,000 Canadians who took part, 68 percent became casualties. It was one of the bloodiest single days in Canadian military history, and it happened not during a full-scale invasion but during what was officially described as a raid.

  The official name was Operation Jubilee. The target was the German-occupied port of Dieppe in northern France, a coastal town built along a long cliff overlooking the English Channel. The plan was to hold it briefly, test the possibilities of an opposed amphibious landing, gather intelligence, and get out. What actually happened raised questions that would haunt the Allied command for years: why were the cliffs never secured first? Why was there no heavy bombardment? Why did so many men land in the wrong place, at the wrong time, against defences nobody had properly mapped?

  The answers involve a tangle of personalities, political pressures, intelligence failures, and institutional rivalries that reached from Ottawa to London to the headquarters of the Soviet Red Army. And embedded in the wreckage of Operation Jubilee, Allied planners found lessons they would carry all the way to Normandy.

• 2. The Road to Jubilee

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  After the Dunkirk evacuation of May 1940, British military planners began building a substantial raiding force under Combined Operations Headquarters. The goal was to develop both the techniques and the equipment for amphibious warfare. By late 1941, a scheme had been proposed for landing twelve divisions around Le Havre, assuming a German withdrawal eastward to fight the Soviets. From that ambition grew Operation Rutter, the plan that eventually became Dieppe.

  Two forces pushed the raid toward happening. The first was the Royal Air Force's Fighter Command. After the Battle of Britain in 1940, the Luftwaffe switched to night bombing and the RAF's day fighters were left with no immediate mission. By the spring of 1941 they were flying search-and-destroy missions over France, and in the second half of that year those aerial engagements intensified sharply. The RAF lost 411 British and Canadian aircraft over France in 1941. By the spring of 1942, the Luftwaffe had deployed the new Focke-Wulf Fw 190, which proved superior to the Supermarine Spitfire Mk V and the Hawker Hurricane. In the first six months of 1942 alone, 259 Spitfires were lost over France. Fighter Command was convinced it was winning; it reported the destruction of 197 German aircraft in the same period. The leaders of Fighter Command lobbied hard in early 1942 for a raid on a French port specifically to provoke the Luftwaffe into fighting at a time and place that favored the RAF.

  The second force was political. Joseph Stalin was pressing the Western Allies to open a second front in France. His demand was specific: he wanted at least 40 German divisions drawn away from the Eastern Front. At the Second Washington Conference in June 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill decided to delay the cross-Channel invasion and schedule Operation Torch, the landing in French North Africa, for later that year. A large-scale Canadian-led raid on the French coast was to serve as a stopgap, demonstrating Allied commitment to relieving the Soviet Union.

  Dieppe itself was selected partly for a practical reason: it lay within range of RAF fighter aircraft, which meant the planned air battle over the port was feasible. Two large artillery batteries at Berneval-le-Grand and Varengeville-sur-Mer guarded the approaches, and the town's harbour was served by two rivers, the Scie and the Arques.

• 3. Mountbatten and the Chain of Command

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  Louis Mountbatten was recalled from command of an aircraft carrier under repair in the United States in 1941, at Churchill's personal directive, to serve as adviser on combined operations. He replaced Admiral Roger Keyes, who had fallen out with both the chiefs of staff and Churchill. On the 4th of March 1942, Mountbatten was promoted to chief of combined operations and, unusually, raised by Churchill to full membership of the chiefs of staff meetings with acting rank of vice-admiral, air marshal, and lieutenant general.

  Churchill had briefed Mountbatten personally that he wanted raids of increasing intensity, building toward an invasion of France. But the chiefs of staff directive formally limited Mountbatten's authority to approving only small raids using special service troops. His position was therefore hybrid: officially constrained, but personally backed by a prime minister who found him dynamic and audacious. Churchill reportedly dismissed First Sea Lord Dudley Pound as "too old, too sleepy and too cautious" while being, in the words of the source, "englamoured" by Mountbatten's manner.

  Pound, who privately feared for his job, approved Operation Rutter in May 1942 despite his own doubts, rebutting Churchill's charge that he was excessively cautious. Air Chief Marshal Charles Portal of the Air Staff supported the operation as a chance for Fighter Command to defeat the Luftwaffe in favorable conditions. The Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Alan Brooke, privately considered Operation Rutter unsound but felt his position was too insecure to oppose all of Churchill's plans. He later wrote in his diary that the disaster at Dieppe could be partly traced to his inability to kill Operation Jupiter, a proposed Norwegian invasion that Churchill also favored.

  General Bernard Montgomery, who commanded South-Eastern Command, argued that if the raid did not actually take Dieppe it would be seen as a failure. He pressed for a frontal assault rather than the flanking pincer movement Combined Operations HQ had proposed, on the grounds that flanking attacks could not succeed within the fifteen-hour window available. Montgomery also warned explicitly that without a heavy preliminary bombardment, German defences along the beaches would decimate any attacking force. That bombardment was first approved, then cancelled, partly because Air Marshal Arthur Harris of Bomber Command was stoutly opposed to diverting his aircraft from the strategic bombing of German cities, and partly because Roberts himself argued that a bombed-out Dieppe would block his tanks.

  When bad weather and a German air attack on the assembled ships forced the cancellation of Operation Rutter in early July 1942, Montgomery ceased his involvement. Mountbatten proposed relaunching the operation six weeks later, arguing that the Germans, having expected Dieppe once, would be least likely to expect it a second time. His argument: "the very last thing they'd ever imagine is that we would be so stupid as to lay on the same operation again". No records of the revived plan were kept.

• 4. What British Intelligence Missed

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  On the 25th of April 1942, an intelligence briefing given to Mountbatten and the COHQ chiefs stated that Dieppe was held by 1,500 troops of the 110th Division, with its headquarters at Arques-la-Bataille. That assessment was wrong in almost every particular. The 110th Division had captured Dieppe on the 31st of May 1940, but had been sent east in April 1941 to take part in Operation Barbarossa. It had been replaced by the 302nd Division, a low-quality unit formed in Bavaria in October 1940, whose 6,000-strong garrison in the Dieppe area was four times the number British intelligence had estimated. The divisional headquarters were not at Arques-la-Bataille but at Envermeu.

  Starting in September 1941, the Organisation Todt had used slave labour from Eastern Europe to build a network of fortifications the Germans called Festung Dieppe, Fortress Dieppe. British planners knew something was being built, but most of the fortifications were unknown to them. Critically, they had no knowledge of tunnels that had been cut into the two headlands flanking the beach, housing rail-mounted artillery capable of bringing devastating fire onto any force attempting to land. Many veterans of Dieppe later believed those guns did more to stop the attack than any other single factor.

  The planners' assessment of the beach itself had been based not on proper surveys but on holiday snapshots. Those photographs led to a systematic underestimation of the terrain and of German strength. The outline plan for Operation Rutter stated that intelligence reports indicated Dieppe was not heavily defended and that the beaches were suitable for landing infantry and armoured vehicles.

  On the 10th of August 1942, nine days before the raid, Oberstgeneral Curt Haase of the 15th Army issued a warning to his men that an Allied operation was imminent. Generalmajor Konrad Haase of the 302nd Division summoned all his officers and had them take a public oath to fight to the death. Based on his reading of the tides, Haase ordered the division to remain on its highest state of alert until the 19th of August. The defenders had also received word from French double agents that the British were showing interest in the area, and had detected increased radio traffic and landing craft concentrating in British coastal ports. German forces at Dieppe were waiting.

• 5. Six Beaches, One Hour

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  The landings were planned across six beaches: Yellow, Blue, Red, White, Green, and Orange, running east to west along the Dieppe coastline. No. 3 Commando was assigned Yellow beach, the Royal Regiment of Canada was assigned Blue, the main assault on Red and White beaches was assigned to the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry, the Essex Scottish Regiment, Les Fusiliers Mont-Royal, A Commando Royal Marines, and the armoured regiment. Green beach was assigned to the South Saskatchewan Regiment and the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada, and No. 4 Commando to Orange.

  At 03:48 on the approach, the landing craft heading for Puys and Berneval stumbled into a small German coastal convoy in the dark. The exchange of fire alerted the shore defences. No. 3 Commando's craft were scattered; German S-boats torpedoed some of the landing craft and disabled Steam Gun Boat 5. Only eighteen commandos under Major Peter Young got ashore on Yellow II beach, reaching the perimeter of the battery via Berneval. They could not destroy the guns but managed to distract the gunners long enough that the battery fired erratically and hit none of the assault ships off Dieppe. Young himself ended the engagement being towed part of the way back to England in the water, clinging to a line tied to the stern of ML 346.

  The one clear success of the entire day was Orange beach. Lieutenant Colonel Lord Lovat led No. 4 Commando, including fifty United States Army Rangers, in a landing six miles west of Dieppe. They climbed a steep slope, attacked, and neutralised the artillery battery of six 150 mm guns at Blancmesnil-Sainte-Marguerite near Varengeville. They withdrew at 07:30 as planned. Lord Lovat was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and Captain Patrick Porteous of No. 4 Commando received the Victoria Cross.

  At Blue beach near Puys, the Royal Regiment of Canada landed twenty minutes late and without smoke cover. The Germans had had time to man their positions. Of the 556 men in the regiment, 200 were killed and 264 were captured. At Green beach at Pourville, the South Saskatchewans landed without being detected at 04:52, but many of the landing craft had drifted west of the River Scie, putting the battalion on the wrong side of the only bridge they needed to cross. German machine guns and anti-tank guns were positioned on the bridge before the Canadians could reach it. Lieutenant Colonel Charles Merritt repeatedly and openly crossed the bridge under fire to show his men it could be done. He was awarded the Victoria Cross. Of both battalions combined, only 341 men reached the landing craft and got away.

• 6. The Main Assault

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  The frontal assault on Red and White beaches began between 05:30 and 05:40. The Essex Scottish Regiment and the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry were meant to land alongside Churchill tanks from the 14th Army Tank Regiment, but the tanks arrived late and the infantry had to begin their attack without armour support. They were met with heavy machine-gun fire from emplacements dug into the overlooking cliffs.

  Captain Denis Whitaker of the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry later described the scene: soldiers were being cut down along the sea wall while his commanding officer, Colonel Bob Labatt, tried to use a broken radio to reach General Roberts. Whitaker recalled: "The place is in the shape of a saucer. Christ, they were firing at us from behind as well as the front and both sides."

  When the tanks arrived, 29 attempted to land. Two sank in deep water; twelve became mired in the soft shingle beach. Only fifteen crossed the seawall. Beyond it they found a series of tank obstacles that blocked entry into the town. Forced back onto the beach, the tanks provided cover for the retreating infantry. Several had their tracks broken by German fire, but none had its armour penetrated while fighting. All were eventually lost; no tanks returned to England and every crew member who landed was either killed or captured.

  General Roberts, unable to see the beaches through the smoke laid by the supporting destroyers, sent in his two reserve units. The Fusiliers Mont-Royal in 26 landing craft came under heavy machine-gun, mortar, and grenade fire; only a few men reached the town. The Royal Marines who followed suffered similarly. Their commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Phillipps, stood on the stern of his landing craft and signalled the rest of his men to turn back. He was killed moments later.

  At 09:40, under heavy fire, the withdrawal from the main beaches began. It was completed by 14:00. By that point, RAF Fighter Command had flown 2,500 sorties over Dieppe, cycling as many as nine squadrons overhead at peak moments. The Spitfire Mk IX flew its operational debut at Dieppe. Despite that effort, the RAF lost 106 aircraft against 48 German losses. The Royal Navy lost 33 landing craft and a destroyer.

• 7. The Radar Mission

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  Attached to the South Saskatchewan Regiment at Green beach was RAF Flight Sergeant Jack Nissenthall, a radar specialist. His mission was to reach a German radar station on the cliff-top east of Pourville, learn what he could about its capabilities, and return. He was accompanied by a bodyguard unit of eleven Saskatchewan soldiers.

  Nissenthall volunteered knowing that his bodyguard unit carried orders to kill him rather than allow him to be captured. His knowledge of Allied radar technology was considered too sensitive to risk. He also carried a cyanide pill. After the war, Lord Mountbatten told author James Leasor, during research for the book Green Beach, that had he known of those orders he would have cancelled them immediately.

  Nissenthall and his bodyguards could not overcome the station's defences. But he crawled to the rear of the building under fire and cut all the telephone wires connecting it to the outside. The operators inside switched to radio to communicate with their commanders, and those transmissions were intercepted by listening posts on the south coast of England. From what was heard, Allied commanders learned a great deal about the accuracy, location, capacity, and density of German radar installations along the Channel coast. That intelligence helped convince Allied planners of the importance of developing radar jamming technology. Only Nissenthall and one South Saskatchewan soldier from the bodyguard unit returned to England.

• 8. What Both Sides Learned

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  When the Germans captured a copy of the Dieppe plan, Field Marshal von Rundstedt criticised it sharply, calling it not a plan in the German sense but more a position paper or the intended course of an exercise. General Konrad Haase found it "incomprehensible" that a division had been expected to overrun a German regiment supported by artillery, given the wholly insufficient naval and air support provided. The Germans were unimpressed by the Churchill tanks left on the beaches, judging their armament and armour inferior to German and Soviet equivalents.

  The Luftwaffe was satisfied with its own performance. One report described the Fw 190 as suitable in every way as a fighter-bomber, and attributed its success despite numerical inferiority to the aggressiveness and superior training of German fighter pilots. The air battle had been intense enough that by day's end only 70 of the 230 airframes available at the start were still combat-ready, and the Luftwaffe had exhausted all its 20mm cannon ammunition in the West, leaving insufficient stocks even for routine operations over the next few days.

  In October 1942, Hitler's high command produced a memorandum on coastal defence, provoked substantially by Dieppe, which established that air superiority was the key to any successful coastal defence strategy. Rundstedt was anxious that the Germans not fall behind in drawing lessons: "Just as we have gained the most valuable experience from the day of Dieppe, the enemy has learnt as well. Perhaps he will do this to an even greater extent because he has paid so dearly for it."

  On the Allied side, Churchill and Mountbatten both later stated that the lessons gained had outweighed the cost. Among those lessons: a preliminary aerial bombardment and artillery support were necessary before any opposed landing; intelligence on enemy fortifications had to be accurate; a frontal assault on a defended port should never be the primary approach; and capturing a major port at the outset of an invasion was no longer a strategic priority. Prefabricated Mulberry harbours would be built and towed to the beaches instead. Tanks were redesigned specifically for beach conditions. A new integrated tactical air force was created to give ground forces proper air support. On the 21st of December 1942, Churchill wrote to Cabinet Military Secretary Hastings Ismay that the time had come to be informed more precisely about the military plans, calling the frontal assault on Dieppe "very much out of accord with the accepted principles of war." When Ismay replied on the 29th of December 1942, Mountbatten's own report to the chiefs of staff acquitted himself of any responsibility and placed the primary blame on Montgomery.