Too many British special forces in WWII

[magicdragon]

In his book "Browned Off and Bloody-Minded: The British Soldier Goes to War 1939-1945" the author Alan Allport suggest that British Army in WWII had the largest ratio of special forces troops of any major combatant nation (citing the 2 parachute divisions, 1 independent parachute brigade, the various Commandos, SAS/SBS and The Chindits as evidence)? Consequently that this concentration of better quality soldiers within these formations had a detrimental impact on the quality of NCO and junior officers in the remaining divisions? This was ofcourse a byproduct Churchill's own bias in favour of such formations and the "indirect war" he favoured but did this approach merit the proliferation of units and was it an efficient use of limited resources?

[Sheldrake]

In his book "Browned Off and Bloody-Minded: The British Soldier Goes to War 1939-1945" the author Alan Allport suggest that British Army in WWII had the largest ratio of special forces troops of any major combatant nation (citing the 2 parachute divisions, 1 independent parachute brigade, the various Commandos, SAS/SBS and The Chindits as evidence)? Consequently that this concentration of better quality soldiers within these formations had a detrimental impact on the quality of NCO and junior officers in the remaining divisions? This was of course a byproduct Churchill's own bias in favour of such formations and the "indirect war" he favoured but did this approach merit the proliferation of units and was it an efficient use of limited resources?

Short answer is

1. Yes the British army had a lot more special forces than it needed.
2. The gravitation of so many independently minded warriors to special forces weakened the line troops
3. The proliferation of special forces wasn't a top down approach, but a bottom up phenomena, encouraged by the PM and tolerated by the Army, It masks a truth about the British Army that revisionists don't like admitting. For all the guff about Dunkirk, the British Army was regarded by many of its junior leaders as hide bound, full of blimps and covered in red tape. Prewar doctrine and training was amateurish and no preparation for facing the Germans. Read Eastern Approaches by Fitzeoy Mclean, (private to Major General in four years) or To Reason Why by Dennis Foreman-a pean to Lionel Wigram the first Chief Instructor of the school of Infantry.

[magicdragon]

3. The proliferation of special forces wasn't a top down approach, but a bottom up phenomena

Thank you for the reply but I have my reservations that the British Army has ever been responsive to "a bottom up phenomena"? Yes lots of junior officers were disgruntled with Army's approach but apart from the SAS (Stirling) and Chindits (Wingate) developed by charismatic junior leaders the other units where top down formations, indeed the SAS (battalion sized) and Chindits (brigade sized) could not have developed into size they became without significant intervention from senior officers?

[Gary Kennedy]

I'm not sure it's correct to count the two Airborne Divs in that calculation. There were significant airborne formations in the US, German and Soviet forces, and to a lesser extent in the Japanese and Italian as well. I can only imagine the scorn and abuse that post-war analysts would have poured on the hidebound British staffs if they had opted not to field Airborne Divs in line with all the other major combatant nations. Even then Air Landing Bns within the Abn Divs were converted Inf Bns, though they were subject to a combing out of men deemed not suitable for airborne ops in the eyes of the Bn officers.

More obviously special forces would be the Army and RM Commandos. The Royal Marines were already in existence before they adopted the Commando role, which the Army Commandos had been formed for in 1940. It seems unlikely that coastal raiding was a role that the normal Inf Bns of the day could have undertaken without undergoing significant reorganisation, re-equipment and retraining. The Commando Bdes like the Airborne Divs were capable of specialised ops or more routine ones that Inf Divs or Bdes would be tasked with. The argument then was whether it was worthwhile keeping effectively light infantry units in the line for extended periods and thus suffering a gradual accumulation of casualties that would impact on their later ability to perform the specialised ops they were intended for.

Then there was the wealth of small scale units, particularly in North Africa and later the Med theatres, some only short-lived, including SAS,SBS, SRS, LRDG, RSR and the 'PPA'. All told they might have consumed the personnel requirements of a normal Inf Bde. Given the wide range of units created I do wonder if a rationalisation programme would have been beneficial.

Regarding the argument of such types of units bleeding off the better quality men, I'm not sure whether that is firmly based. It's sometimes said that an ordinary rifleman in a Para Bn (and presumably an A/L Bn, who never seem to get the same plaudits despite being in the Abn Divs) would be capable of leading a Rifle Sec in a standard Inf Bn, presumably just because he is in a Para Bn? Why would they be content to take orders as a rifleman in a Para Pl if they could lead a Rifle Sec in the Loamshires? I think it's a bit more complicated than that. Is there any guarantee that these personnel would have been distributed around existing Inf and Armd Divs to better their subunit leadership if the Abn or Cdo forces were never formed, or at least scaled back significantly?

The Chindits I would argue are an entirely different matter. The 3rd Indian Div had, I think, five Brigades in its order of battle at the end of 1943, which constituted a decent portion of the infantrymen in theatre, and a theatre that rightly felt itself to be an afterthought in terms of receiving adequate resources and replacements. It is a standalone debate as to whether the investment in the Chindits delivered the argued for results, or whether there would have been greater benefit in using it to better the capabilities of the standard formations.

Gary

[magicdragon]

It is a fair point about 2 Airborne Div, I more repeat Alan Allport views rather agree with them! Are WWII paras special forces probably not in categorisation of today but given the innovative nature of the potential deployment, maybe? Does the US marine and Airborne Divs (13th Airborne Div, 11th Abn Div, 13th Abn Division, 17th Abn Division, 82nd Abn Division and 101st Abn Div) mean they had more special forces as a proportion? I also agree with your the view that just because you are soldier in an elite unit does not mean you would be automatically a good junior leader in a line regiment. My limited readings of the histories of SAS etc has thrown up lots of examples of top-level warriors who would have been horribly exposed leading not so elite troops.

[Andy H]

Hi

Just a small quibble, but the thread title of 'Too many' doesn't equate with Allports observation of 'largest ratio'
Unless the thread other has omitted the part where Allport says there were to many, then the two statements have no relevance that I can see!

For there to be 'too many' then we'd have to establish what was normal and too little! I understand the ratio aspect, but thats not the same.

Regards

Andy H

[Urmel]

Well if you look at 'largest ratio' and 'detrimental impact', then together this comes to 'too many' in my mind (i.e. a too large ratio that removed good NCO material from the line formation that after all did all the hard fighting), and may well have been intended to be read as such.

I'm also reminded of the writeup on the Commandos in 'No Triumphant Procession', when they were hard hit at the Weser bridgehead at Leese, because their infantry survival skills were so weak.

[magicdragon]

Just a small quibble, but the thread title of 'Too many' doesn't equate with Allports observation of 'largest ratio'

Andy H you are right I was going to make same point as Urmel (but he made it better) in the original message!