History of the Second World War (56 page)

Meanwhile, the American landings at Oran had met somewhat stiffer opposition than those of the Western Naval Task Force in the Casablanca area. Yet there was remarkably good joint planning and co-operation between the American military task force and the British naval force which brought it to the scene and delivered it ashore. Moreover its spearhead, the U.S. 1st Infantry Division, commanded by Major-General Terry Allen, was a highly trained formation, and it was backed up by half the 1st Armored Division.

The plan was to capture the port and city of Oran by a double envelopment — two of Terry Allen’s regimental combat teams landing on beaches in the Gulf of Arzeu, twenty-four miles to the cast, while the third (under Brigadier-General Theodore Roosevelt) landed on beaches at Les Andalouses, fourteen miles to the west of the city. Then a light armoured column was to drive inland from the beachhead at Arzeu, and a smaller one from a further landing point at Mersa Bou Zedjar, thirty miles west of Oran, to capture the airfields south of Oran and close on the city to the rear. To shut it off quickly was the more important because, as estimated, its garrison of 10,000 troops could be almost doubled within twenty-four hours by re-inforcement from inland stations.

The operation started well. At nightfall on November 7 the convoy had deceptively passed Oran, heading east, but then doubled back in the dark. The landings began promptly to time (1 a.m.) at Arzeu and only half an hour late at Les Andalouses and Mersa Bou Zedjar. Surprise was complete and no opposition was met on the beaches. Although thirteen coast defence batteries covered this stretch, there was no harassing fire until after daylight, and even then it caused very little damage, thanks to effective naval support and the cloak it provided with smoke-screens. Disembarkation and unloading went smoothly on the whole, although slowed down by the overloading of the troops, who were carrying nearly ninety pounds of equipment apiece. The medium tanks were carried in transports and unloaded on the quay after the harbour at Arzeu was captured.

The only serious reverse was suffered in an attempt to take Oran harbour by direct assault, to forestall sabotage of its apparatus and the ships lying there. Two small British cutters, H.M.S.
Walney
and
Hartland,
carrying 400 American troops, and accompanied by two motor launches, were employed to carry out this daring plan — which the American naval authorities had deprecated as rash. The outcome confirmed their view that it was a ‘suicide mission’. Unwisely, it was timed to start two hours after H-hour, just when the French had been aroused by the landings elsewhere. The precaution of displaying a large American flag failed to deter the French from replying with sustained blasts of fire which crippled both cutters, killed half of their crews and troops, while the remainder, mostly wounded, were taken prisoner.

The advance from the beachheads got going by 9 a.m. or earlier, and soon after 11 a.m. Colonel Waters’s light armoured column from Arzeu reached Tafaraoui airfield, which was reported an hour later as ready to receive aircraft from Gibraltar. But when the column turned north it was checked short of La Senia airfield, and so was Colonel Robinett’s column from Mersa Bou Zedjar. The converging infantry advances from Arzeu and Les Andalouses also became hung up when they met resistance as they approached Oran.

On the second day little progress was made, as French resistance stiffened and a counterattack on the flank of the Arzeu beachhead dislocated the whole plan of operations through the threat being magnified by lurid reports — which led General Fredenhall to divert forces from other missions. While La Senia airfield was captured in the afternoon, most of the French aircraft had already flown off, and it could not be used because of persistent shellfire. A concentric attack towards Oran was mounted on the third morning, after some of the islands of resistance on the approach roads had been bypassed during the night. The infantry attacks from east and west again met checks, but helped to fix the attention of the defenders, while advance parties of the two light armoured columns drove into the city from the south without being opposed, apart from occasional sniping, and reached the French military headquarters before midday. The French commanders then agreed to surrender. The American casualties in the three days’ fighting on land were under four hundred, and the French even less. These light losses, and particularly the diminishing resistance on the final day, were influenced by the French commanders’ awareness that negotiations were proceeding at Algiers.

The landings at Algiers had run a smoother and shorter course, thanks largely to the local commander, General Mast, and his collaborating associates. No serious resistance was met anywhere, except in trying to force an early entry into the harbour, as at Oran.

One transport, U.S.S.
Thomas Stone,
was temporarily disabled at daybreak on the 7th by a torpedo fired by a U-boat when 150 miles short of Algiers, but after that the seaborne approach deeper into the Mediterranean met no further trouble. Although sighted by a few enemy observation planes, no air attack came before the convoy made its southward turn after dark to the landing beaches. One group landed near Cap Matifou, some fifteen miles east of Algiers, another near Cap Sidi Ferruch, ten miles west of the city, and the third group ten miles further west near Castiglione. For political camouflage the landings nearest Algiers were made by the Americans, with an admixture of British Commandos, and the main British one was on the more westerly beaches near Castiglione.

Here the landings began promptly at 1 a.m., and proceeded without mishap despite rough and dangerous beaches. French troops met a short way inland said that they had been instructed to offer no resistance. Blida airfield was reached about 9 a.m. On the eastern side of Algiers the landings were a little late and suffered some confusion, but in the absence of resistance it was possible to straighten out the situation quickly.

The important Maison Blanche airfield was reached soon after 6 a.m. and occupied after a few shots had been fired as token resistance. The advance on Algiers itself, however, met a village strong-point that refused passage and was then brought to a stop by a threat of attack from three French tanks. The coast battery on Cap Matifou also rejected calls to surrender, and only yielded after being twice bombarded by warships and dive-bombed in the afternoon.

The attempt to rush the port of Algiers fared worse. The British destroyers,
Broke
and
Malcolm,
flying large American flags and carrying an American infantry battalion, were used for this venture — which was planned to enter the harbour three hours after the landings, in the hope that the defenders would have been drawn off, even if their acquiescence had not been secured. Instead, the destroyers came under heavy fire as soon as they approached the entrance.
Malcolm
was badly hit and withdrew.
Broke
, at the fourth try, succeeded in running the gauntlet, and berthed alongside a quay, where her troops disembarked. At first they were allowed to occupy installations unopposed, but about 8 a.m. guns started to shell
Broke,
forcing her to cast off and withdraw. The landing party was hemmed in by French African troops, and surrendered soon after midday, as its ammunition was running low and there were no signs of relief by the main force. The French fire, however, had been directed to keep the landing party in check rather than to destroy it.

In the landings west of Algiers near Cap Sidi Ferruch there was much more delay and confusion, while a number of the landing craft went astray and arrived on the British beaches further west. Components of each battalion were scattered over fifteen miles of coast, while many of the landing craft were wrecked in the surf or delayed by engine trouble. Fortunately, the troops had a friendly or passive reception at first, Mast and some of his officers coming to meet them and clear the way — otherwise these landings would have turned into a costly fiasco. But when, after hasty reorganisation, columns pushed on towards Algiers they encountered resistance in several places. For Mast had by now been relieved of command, his orders for co-operation cancelled, and his troops bidden to oppose the Allied advance.

The Allies’ collaborators in Algiers had played their part remarkably well under the difficulties caused by the very short notice they had been given of the landing, and the little they had been told about its objectives. Their own plans to aid such a landing were promptly put into action. Officers were posted along the coast to welcome and guide the Americans, control points seized by organised parties, the telephone service largely blocked, police headquarters and outlying stations occupied, unsympathetic higher officials locked up, and the radio station taken over in readiness for a broadcast by Giraud or on his behalf which it was hoped would be of decisive effect. In sum, the collaborators achieved enough to paralyse opposition by the time that the landings took place, and they kept control of the city until about 7 a.m. — longer than they had reckoned on doing or had regarded as necessary. But the advance from the landing beaches was too slow to match the need.

When the Americans failed to appear by 7 a.m., the limitations of the collaborators’ influence on their countrymen became manifest. Moreover, when they broadcast an appeal in the name of Giraud, who had also failed to arrive as expected, this fell so flat as to show that the weight of his name had been overestimated by them. They soon began to lose control of the situation, and were brushed aside or put under arrest.

Meanwhile fateful discussions were proceeding on a higher level. Half an hour after midnight Robert Murphy had gone to see General Juin, broken the news to him that overwhelmingly strong forces were about to land, and urged him to co-operate by prompt instructions that they were not to be resisted. Murphy said that they had come on the invitation of Giraud, to help France in liberating herself. Juin showed no readiness to accept Giraud’s leadership or regard his authority as sufficient, and said that the appeal must be submitted to Admiral Darlan — who was, by chance, in Algiers at that moment, having flown there to see his son, who had fallen dangerously ill. Darlan was awakened by a telephone call and asked to come to Juin’s villa to receive an urgent message from Murphy. On arrival, when told of the impending stroke, his first reaction was to exclaim angrily: ‘I have known for a long time that the British were stupid, but I always believed that the Americans were more intelligent. I begin to believe that you make as many mistakes as they do.’

After some discussion he eventually agreed to send a radio message to Marshal Petain reporting the situation and asking for authorisation to deal with it freely on the Marshal’s behalf. Meanwhile the villa had been surrounded by an armed band of anti-Vichy French, so that Darlan was virtually under guard. But a little later they were driven off by a detachment of
gardes mobiles,
who put Murphy under arrest. Then Darlan and Juin, eyeing one another like suspicious cats, went off to the headquarters in Algiers. From here Juin took steps to regain control, releasing General Koeltz and other officers who had been arrested by Mast and his associates, while putting the latter under arrest in their turn. Darlan, however, sent a further telegram to Marshal Petain, just before 8 a.m., in which he emphasised that: ‘The situation is getting worse and the defences will soon be overwhelmed’ — a palpable hint that it would be wise to bow
to force majeure.
Petain’s reply gave the authorisation requested.

Just after 9 a.m. the American charge d’affaires in Vichy, Pinkney Tuck, had gone to see Petain and deliver Roosevelt’s letter requesting his co-operation. Petain handed him a reply, already prepared by then, expressing ‘bewilderment and sadness’ at American ‘aggression’, and declaring that France would resist attack on her empire even by old friends — ‘This is the order I give.’ But his attitude to Tuck was very pleasant, and he seemed to be far from sad. Indeed, his behaviour conveyed the impression that his formal reply was really meant to allay German suspicions and intervention. But a few hours later Pierre Laval, the Prime Minister, accepted under Hitler’s pressure an offer of German air support — and by evening the Axis powers were preparing forces for despatch to Tunisia.

Meanwhile Darlan, on his own responsibility, had issued orders to the French troops and ships in the Algiers area to cease firing. Although this order did not apply to the Oran and Casablanca areas, Darlan authorised Juin to arrange a settlement for the whole of North Africa. Moreover it was agreed early in the evening that control of Algiers should be transferred to the Americans at 8 p.m. and that the Allies should have the use of the harbour from first light the next morning, the 9th.

The afternoon of the 9th saw the arrival of Mark Clark to conduct the fuller negotiations necessary, and of Kenneth Anderson to assume command of the Allied troops for the advance to Tunisia. Giraud also arrived, a little earlier, but found that he was far from welcome among his chief compatriots there, and took refuge with a family who lived in an out of the way place. Mark Clark remarks ‘he practically went underground’ — although he emerged next morning for Clark’s first conference with Darlan, Juin, and their chief subordinates.

Here Clark pressed Darlan to order an immediate cease-fire everywhere in French North Africa, and when he hesitated, arguing that he had sent a summary of the terms to Vichy and must await word from there, Clark began pounding the table and said that he would get Giraud to issue the order in his place. At that, Darlan pointed out Giraud’s lack of legal authority or sufficient personal weight. He also declared that such an order would result in the immediate occupation of southern France by the Germans’ — a forecast that was soon borne out. After some more argument, with an accompaniment of table-pounding, Clark pungently told Darlan that unless he issued the order immediately he would be taken into custody — Clark having taken the precaution of posting an armed guard around the building. Darlan then, after a brief discussion with his staff, accepted this ultimatum — and his order was sent out at 11.20 a.m.