Brigadier Dykes Diary Jan 41

[Tom from Cornwall]

Hi,

I've been looking at the Diaries of Brigadier Vivian Dykes [Establishing the Anglo-American Alliance by Alex Danchev] and thought the following entry during his tour of the Middle East escorting Bill Donovan might be of interest:

p.30

Thursday 9 January 1941
We set off at 9.00 a.m. to look at some of the Base installations and then motored out to Suez, about 80 miles, and looked over the port and quays. The average time for a ship to unload is 10 to 15 days. Port facilities are bad, there being no shore cranes at all; one quay is unpaved, and they have only just managed to finish a transit shed. There were 20-odd ships in harbour, unloading or waiting for berths. A troop train was waiting to move off, containing drafts en route for the Sudan.
I got [Brigadiers] Jock Whiteley and Dudley Clarke [on Wavell’s headquarters staff] to dine with Donovan at the Continental [Hotel], and we had a great discussion on Germany’s probable intentions and what we should do to counter them. We all agreed that Germany should have gone for Spain in the autumn, and will probably occupy at least part of Italy. Jock is all for attacking Romanian oil by air, especially if and when a German invasion attempt on the UK has failed. Dudley Clarke is inclined to expect a fairly rapid crack of German morale, but this Donovan doubts.

Firstly, it adds some context to the seemingly interminable delays and frustrations suffered by British units on arrival in the Middle East - how they unloaded tanks without shore cranes is also perplexing. Floating cranes or ship's derricks I would imagine.

Secondly, the meeting over dinner suggests two things to me - firstly, that some, at least, in the British hierarchy where seriously deluded about German morale, and secondly that I hope the waiters at the Continental Hotel had signed the official secret's act!

I don't understand the reference to Germany occupying part of Italy either...

Regards

Tom

[Urmel]

A lot of ships had their own cranes or derricks.

[Tom from Cornwall]

Hi Urmel,

I was ruminating about the difference between ports that were major commercial import/export centres before the war and those that were improvised during the war?

There is an interesting comparison with the loading of 3 RTR in Alexandria and subsequent unloading in Piraeus in March 1941 (WO169/1411]:

8 March 1941 ALEXANDRIA
0600 First tanks ready to embark on “Clan Macauley” and “Singalese Prince”. HQ & ‘C’ on ‘C.M.’. ‘A’ + ‘B’ on ‘S.P’. All tanks loaded by 1700 hrs.

12 March 1941
0500 Tanks ships arrived Piraeus. Transport unloaded first and moved straight out to Glyphada. Tanks unloaded bivouaced in Dock Area.

13 March 1941
All Tanks disembarked by 1700 hrs. Waited in Dock Area until 2400 hrs.

Does this indicate that Piraeus and Alexandria were serious commercial ports before WW2, whereas Port Suez was not?

Regards

Tom

[Dili]

I think the Brigadier is talking about Suez not Port Said.

[Tom from Cornwall]

Dili,

Doh! Thanks for the correction, he was indeed referring to Port Suez and I have edited my post accordingly.

Regards

Tom

[Tom from Cornwall]

Once in Athens, Dykes and Donovan were briefed on the logistical problems facing the Greeks and, given the wider discussions on other threads of Greek strategic options at this point, I thought a brief excerpt might be of interest [Establishing the Anglo-American Alliance, Alex Danchev, p.36]:

Friday 17 January 1941 Athens
In the morning we heard that Papagos had rather changed his attitude during the night (as a result of his talk with Donovan?) and was now more disposed to favour acceptance of our offer of troops. He had had an interview with Wavell early in the morning before Wavell left.
We went down to see Ranking [British Military Mission] in the morning and he told us something of the administrative difficulties. Mountain artillery with ammunition is one of the chief needs and the War Office can only offer mortars. The Greeks have insufficient shell-making capacity. The clothing situation is bad and new classes cannot be called up owing to the difficulty of fitting them out. The Greeks are prepared to take our battle-dress, but they have not enough transport to get boots and clothes through to the troops in the front line who are in desperate need of them. Their transport maintenance organisation is almost non-existent and they have 40 or 50 different types in use. 200 British lorries have fortunately just arrived in with the convoy that came through on an Operation EXCESS. These may ease the situation a bit and there are more lorries due in from Egypt shortly. 400 more have been promised from the UK. As a result of insufficient transport, rations are only delivered to the front line about once in three days and then in short measure. There is a large accumulation of stuff at the railhead which cannot be got forward. The Greeks want 12,000 mules. 700 are coming from Cyprus, and Palestine is being ‘tapped’ for more. Medical equipment is very short, but equipment for a 1,200 bed general hospital is en route from the UK and a similar quantity has been asked for again by the Greeks. They also asked us for five field ambulances without transport and one with transport (all without personnel). The Greeks have apparently no idea at all of doing any salvage [from the enemy] which they think is rather infra dig...
At 11.00 p.m., after discussion with Palairet and Heywood, Donovan agreed to go straight on to Sofia in the hope that he would be able to put some stiffening into the Bulgars.

Regards

Tom

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Tom,

You quote, "I got [Brigadiers] Jock Whiteley and Dudley Clarke [on Wavell’s headquarters staff] to dine with Donovan at the Continental [Hotel], and we had a great discussion on Germany’s probable intentions and what we should do to counter them. We all agreed that Germany should have gone for Spain in the autumn, and will probably occupy at least part of Italy. Jock is all for attacking Romanian oil by air, especially if and when a German invasion attempt on the UK has failed. Dudley Clarke is inclined to expect a fairly rapid crack of German morale, but this Donovan doubts."

Apart from the last remark, it looks pretty prescient tome. One has to look at this in the context of the time. The British were apparently sweeping the Italians out of Libya and, if this was successful, it might have obliged the Germans to move into Italy. In fact, they went further and sent troops through Italy to North Africa and reversed all the British successes.

Exactly what Clarke was specifically referring to is unclear, but, as reported, he was definitely far wide of the mark as German morale held up pretty well until near the very end of the war. Perhaps he meant Italian morale, which certainly looked on the verge of collapse in North Africa at that time.

Cheers,

Sid.

[Tom from Cornwall]

Hi Sid,

Thanks for the reply. I still don't really understand why even if the British managed to clear the Italians from Africa completely this would have "probably" lead to Germany "occupy" some of Italy - unless the disaster brought down Mussolini?

I've read elsewhere that senior British elements kept trying to persuade themselves that German morale was fragile during the winter of 1940 - 1941. I guess this might have been because there seemed no other route by which Britain could defeat Nazi Germany at this stage.

Regards

Tom

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Tom,

I was thinking that it might be because, if the Italians lost North Africa, then a British landing had to be prepared for in Sicily and/or southern Italy, as actually drew in German troops in 1943.

I think you are right that the British were often grasping at straws for salvation between June 1940 and June 1941. The knew what German bombing had wrought in the UK and probably assumed that RAF raids on Germany were of similar impact. Of course, we now know they weren't. The main British weapon at the time was in practice the sea blockade, which, long term, was partly aimed at German civil morale.

It is also worth pointing out that even Hitler was alarmed that the German populace in Berlin showed little public enthusiasm for the war when first declared, unlike the jingoistic Munich he remembered from 1914. Civilian morale was a constant official German concern through much of the war, though they too seem to have over estimated its frailty. Maintaining civilian morale was Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry's raison d'etre and main concern.

Cheers,

Sid.