Funnily enough, Spain could've fought against Japan at the end of the war, when Franco noticed Japan's atrocities towards catholics and spanish inhabitants in the Philippines, as many still lived there by the time
Spain could have _declared_ war on Japan for that reason, maybe. We would have never actually _fought_ them because Franco simply had no way of taking the fight all the way to Japan. Spain's economy and military were in shambles after the civil war, and would still be for many decades to come.
ATROCITY PROPAGANDA - " Atrocity propaganda is how we won the war. And we're only really beginning with it now ! We will continue this atrocity propaganda, we will escalate it until nobody will accept even a good word from the Germans, until all the sympathy they may still have abroad will have been destroyed and they themselves will be so confused that they will no longer know what they are doing. Once that has been achieved, once they begin to run down their own country and their own people, not reluctantly but with eagerness to please the victors, only then will our victory be complete. IT WILL NEVER BE FINAL. Re-education needs careful tending, like an English lawn. Even one moment of negligence, and the weeds crop up again - those indestructible weeds of historical TRUTH. " - SeftonDalmer (1904-1979), former British Chief of ' Black Propaganda ': Said after the German surrender in 1945 in a conversation with the German Professor of lnternation Law Dr.FriedrichGrimm. christiansfortruth.com/post-war-u-s-occupying-forces-believed-germany-justified-in-war-and-hitler-served-his-country-constructively/
If you want some good detailed tales like this go find the book "Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare: How Churchill's Secret Warriors Set Europe Ablaze and Gave Birth to Modern Black Ops" It goes into detail on this operation as well as many others that the group of postmaster did and honestly they should make a movie of it. Though I think people would struggle to believe it in many places. Things like a small bunch of SOE/SBS guys pushing further into Greece than the rest of the allied forces had and convincing the Germans to pull back further by borrowing as many large vehicles like fire engines from the local town as they could and revving their engines as much as they could as they drove through the streets. Then convincing the local German commander there's divisions of allied tanks coming through the town so he retreats. Why push ahead of the main force and risk being outnumbered? Well just so when the allied main force caught up they were sat there smugly grinning that they took the town and pushed the Germans back all by them little old selves. Because many older commanders saw these special forces types as brigands and scoundrels and a waste of time, so the SF guys liked to annoy them any chance they could. Personally my favourite is Anders Lassen stealing a Willies Jeep from the Americans and being so worried it would get stolen back now that him and his men were currently idle that while drunk he managed to stuff it into the elevator of the casino they were stationed in and took it to his room so he'd know if American MP's were trying to take it off him. Just a different breed of soldier all together.
It was worth it, note the man leading the negotiations for Spain to join the AXIS was a member of the resistance. Admiral Wilhelm Canaris actively dissuades Franco from joining the AXIS powers.
Canaris was a strange and interesting man. I don't think we will ever know the full truth about him. Spain, of course, was exhausted after its civil war but useful as a non-belliegernt to the Germans for many reasons.
@@jugbywellington1134 Unlike Stalin (initially) Franco didn't trust Hitler, who had a insatiable habit of 'occupying' other countries. But, franco did send 50,000 troops to help Hitler fight the Russian's on the eastern front.
@@mauriciomorais7818 it's true he did, he turned down his generals wishes to redeploy troops and convinced himself the intelligence warnings of the British was a plot to detach him from the Nazis. Even the Soviet spy in Japan who transmitted corroboration of the planned German attack was ignored. Everything was done to avoid friction with the Germans including restrictions on ammunition. His miscalculation was that Hitler would avoid a 2 front war at all costs, not understanding how Stalin's own decisions (eg Finland Winter war) had exposed Soviet weakness.
@@MrDaiseymay I'm not sure if distrust is the right word, just that Franco understood that allowing German access to Spain to capture Gibraltar would inevitably make him a client of Hitler. By 1942 the Germans were busy in the east and at war with the USA to boot, so stalling would be simple prudence. Suppose Spain had become an alternative Allied objective to Italy? A huge area would have welcomed liberation if there'd been allied landings.
The Spanish were far more vulnerable to allied economic pressures and military response than Germany or Italy. Franco was well aware of this and that his nation was in no shape to become a belligerent.
Interesting, were they dependent on particular resources? Operation Mincemeat shows British intelligence relied on Spanish fascists Nazi sympathies but I've never read of Franco depending on say Atlantic oil trade. Disturbingly I've seen a native neo-Nazi in Spain in recent years as a result of speaking good German a restauranteur proudly showed me his Swastika signet ring.
Spain was not self sufficient in basic food supplies for its population post civil war. The USA was the only secure source available to cover its food shortages at a reasonable price in WW2, provided that Franco kept out of Washington's bad books. That accounted for its split, half allied, half axis, favorable foreign policy actions.
@@t5ruxlee210 VERY TRUE - Spain simply COULD NOT FEED ITS PEOPLE if it came into WW2 on the German side - thus TO AVOID STARVATION - Franco remained NEUTRAL in order to AVOID a British naval blockade that would have caused wide spread hunger in Spain!!!!!!!!!!!
Also Spain was specially poor because the "republicans" who allegated that had nothing to do with the soviets handed them all the spanish gold to safeguard it of the falangists wich again... why would you do that if you had nothing to do with the soviets? Wich was, by a great margin, part of the reason why the falangists rose up in first place. Well, Stalin decided to keep the gold reserves so when the civil war ended, Spain was practically bankrupt, and it was like that during decades but never recovering
Franco was very good friends of Wilhelm Franz Canaris. In fact, Canaris had a picture of Franco on his desk. Franco was well informed about all of the inside information of the Nazis. He knew they were going to lose and would never join them, even if there were "incidents."
Gen.Franco did not join the Axis, not because he knew that they were going to lose, but because he was not confident that they were going to win, specially after the German failure in the 'Battle of Britain' & their abandonment of 'Operation Sealion', the invasion of Britain.
@@myhonorwasloyalty The Axis never had a chance. The allies had inexhaustible resources. For example, South America could have donated hundreds of thousands of troops and many more supplies. This resource was hardly tapped. Only the Aztec squadron and the Brazilians troops in Italy were used.
Since Franco was more concerned with rebuilding from the Spanish Civil War, I doubt he would have joined the Axis. Spain was devastated from that war, and repercussions from it lasted until Franco's death.
I completely agree. Spain’s economy was wrecked after the civil war and Germany was in no position to bankroll Spain joining the Axis. Economics isn’t as exciting as an SOE raid, but it’s much closer to reality.
That didn't stop the Spanish authorities from handing over the fake documents briefcase of 'The Man Who Never Was' to the Krauts, and dressing it up as a burglary. The Spanish were at best keeping their options open, at worst complicit. I believe the latter and, frankly, wouldn't wish to holiday there, as their casual attitude towards animal cruelty is as nauseating as their WW2 conduct and auto da fe antics centuries before. No offence, but I hope you're getting the impression that I'd not piss on them if they themselves were on fire.
The Soviet Union was a big stumbling block for Franco. During the Spanish Civil War Nazi Germany and Facist Italy supported Franco’s Right Wing Faction. After watching the American Republic, the British Empire and the French Republic do absolutely nothing to help the Left Wing/Socialist Faction in Spain, Stalin announced the Soviet Union would support them. Franco was furious, the civil war was now going to last much longer. He would never, ever, forgive Stalin. Then in 1939 it was announced that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union had signed a “Non-Aggression” Pact for the purpose of dividing up Poland. Franco seethed with raged, he felt that Hitler had betrayed him. He never would forgive Hitler for this and promptly declared Neutrality. Nothing Hitler said or did would ever change this.
Similar action in Goa India. I believe it was the book the last charge of the Calcutta light horse, and was the inspiration for the movie sea wolves, starring Roger Moore and Gregory Peck, and David Niven. Good movie and good story.
@@LeftToWrite006 Yes about the sixties, but around 1948, the CIA used the phrase "plausibly disclaim". About the only difference between the word disclaim and deniability, is that they took the definition of disclaim and added in a part about not having been officially informed. Which is a more than useless edition. If you have been officially informed you couldn't disclaim it either.
The main reason that Franco (& Spain) were not convinced to join the Axis powers in WW2 was the failure of the Gemans in 'Battle of Britain', which demonstrated that they were not as good as they made out to be. But instead of outright refusing the Germans, Franco put up so many impossible conditions & demands for goods & weapons in his only meeting with Hitler that the Germans could not possibly agree to. Hitler got so fed up with Franco's stubborness that he said that he would rather prefer to have all his teeth pulled out than negotiate with Franco again.
If you read Gordon Olive's "Spitfire Ace", you will see that the Spanish sent an "observer" to England in 1940 to see how the RAF was getting on in the Battle of Britain. He was going to report everything back to the Germans, but as you'll doubtless have twigged, the British knew that; they made sure he saw "hundreds" of spitfires - actually the same few - and was met by "unconcerned" RAF airmen who'd been primed wherever he went. Stunned, this fellow returned to Spain and reported back to Berlin (the British intercepted this communication). Naturally, he told the Germans what he'd seen and told them their intelligence was faulty, the British were far from beaten and had many more planes than the Germans had said. This caused a good bit of consternation in Berlin at the time. This is a much less well-known operation but very successful. Olive was an Australian and an excellent and skilled fighter pilot.
Although Spain under Franco helped the Germans covertly, they did not join the Axis. Otherwise, the Germans with Spain could have easily taken Gibraltar & thus prevented Britain from entering the Mediterranean, resulting in North Africa & Arabia (& its oil) coming under German control, with disasterous consequences for the Allies. Gen.Franco was duly rewarded by the Allies after the war by being left alone to rule as the dictator of Spain till he died in 1975.
Franco and his generals were not that stupid. They knew that the romp thru France was a lucky break. It could easily have been a huge defeat for the Germans. More allied incompetence than anything the Germans did. They saw the British had wiped out most of the German surface fleet and had the largest navy by a mile than any other. They saw that the RAF defeated the Luftwaffe over Dunkirk and England.
@@johnburns4017 Yes, good points.. The Royal Navy hammered the Kriegsmarine in Norway, but the British army was very, very badly led. Then there was the Fench leadership. It's painful to think of it all.
@@jugbywellington1134 The British army was only *9%* of allied forces. The Germans did not roll over it. No British general at Dunkirk surrendered to the Germans. The British won the Battle of Dunkirk. Hitler's Directive 13 was to annihilate the forces in the Dunkirk pocket. They tried for a week and failed. The French were led by donkeys for sure. They had on paper a superior army to the Germans. Incompetence on their part gave victory to the Germans. The Spanish were not so stupid as not to fully analyse the German victory.
Whether it was worth it or not is entirely dependent on the Spanish reaction to it. If it caused Spain to give more tacit cooperation with the axis, then it was a failure. If on the other hand it sent a strong messsage that Great Britain was willing to risk an escalation, potentially to war, with Spain and that deterred Spanish-axis cooperation, then it was a terrific success.
It's nice that the Brits got away with it. But otherwise, what was the purpose of it all? Took big risks with men and international relations for something that didn't change anything.
@@xfhghe it wasn't the $ value of the ships, it was that the axis were using the cover of a "neutral" to run a communications operation. So the success of the operation is dependent on Spain's future policy actions.
By January 1942, joining the Axis powers would have meant being at war with the USA, and that was a very big thing. Unlike Mussolini, Franco's ambitions were much less. He was interested in maintaining power over what he already had, not territorial expansion. A war with USA might well have meant Spain losing its African colonies as well as Franco being deposed if the Axis powers lost the war, which was much more likely after Germany and France declared war on the USA. Franco went on to die in bed, which is more than Hitler or Mussolini managed.
the map at 6:25 is santa isabel in the solomon island in the pacific ocean. And then at 6:41 there is a map of Bioko island the correct one. And again at 7:01 back in the pacific with a map of Northwest Solomonic languages. Finally at 10:31 a point maybe 30 Kms off Santa Isabel in the pacific to support the comment "370 Kms offshore". Geography is always more boring than history, right ?
The only thing disconcerting to me about this otherwise excellent video were the repeated clips showing Santa Isabel Island in the Pacific instead of the port of Santa Isabel (now Malabo) on the former Spanish island of Fernando Po (now part of Equatorial Guinea) in the Atlantic (off the coast of Africa), where this operation actually took place.
In 9 March 1943 SOE launched a similar op called"Operation Creek" (also known as "Operation Longshanks") which involved a nighttime attack by members of the Calcutta Light Horse and the Calcutta Scottish against a German merchant ship, the Ehrenfels, which had been transmitting information to U-boats from Mormugao Harbour in neutral Portugal's territory of Goa. The attack was successfully carried out, and the Ehrenfels and three other Axis merchant ships were sunk, stopping the transmissions to the U-boats.
That raid being particularly noteworthy because Calcutta Light Horse was basically a glorified retired gentlemen's club, and all of its volunteers were old geezers who had no business conducting covert operations. It really shouldn't have worked-and yet.
@@TheFront Sweet as sir. I am a guy who Comments when I see work thats obv taken a ton of effort and hours and hours work to prepare for their Subbers, so its the least I can do in thanking you and your team of dedicated ones. team, for your committment, as i am sure that the same feeling is happening with most all your followers here. Keep up the good work.
A member of the SSRF hung a Jolly Roger off one of the masts. A RN officer that was attached to the raid managed to get them to take it down. The crew of both ships that were aboard when they were captured, spent the rest of the war interred in a remote corner of Nigeria. This was in order to prevent any details about the raid leaking out.
It is easy, after the fact, to decide someone should or shouldn't have done this or that. I appreciate that the video just covered the incident without attempting to do any Monday-morning quarterbacking.
At 6.18, there is a glitch. The map shown is of Santa Isabel Island in the Solomon Islands in the Pacific and not Santa Isabel Harbour on Bioko in the Atlantic, which is around 10,000 miles away.
This isn't the only geographic anomaly; There is a photo of the "Ohio" entering Malta, with no connection to the narrative. At another point there is a photo of the SAS / LRDG somewhere in the North African desert. The commentary in this item is quite good but whoever put the pictures together needs lessons in history and geography. Although I enjoyed the piece, I could not "like" it
I confirm this indeed - it is unfortunately frequent that on this type of channel the illustration have nothing to do with the narration which itself can be found in wikipedia most of the time with more details ... :-)
A little known story that there were secret radio stations in Spain . That were aiding U-boats with navigation . It worked by sending out two radio signals that would show their position using special charts . The British knew about them , but instead of insisting that the Spanish close them down used them for their own use. Another was a nightclub owner in the Argentine South America , that owned a schooner who would go out to U-boats with supplies and fuel. Who's life was like something out of a second feature movie from the 1940's !
@Knight_Horus Yeah there was probably a lot of people who saw the war as a chance to fuck with the colonial powers not realising until later that the Nazis would've been far worse had they won and as such they were helping the bad guys.
I was fascinated that when France fell, the British attempted to seize French naval vessels in Tangier and other African ports to avoid falling into the hands of Vichy France. At the time France had a large navy. The commander at Tangier refused to stand down and was fired upon sinking some of the fleet, the other vessels in the smaller African ports like Mauritania surrendered. I’m typing this from memory, sorry for any inaccuracies.
There may have been some in Tangier, but the big showdown was at Mers El Kbir, Oran, Algeria. An absolutely pointless sacrifice of French sailors by their own commanders.
@@hekatoncheiros208 What still amazes me is that some Frenchmen still fully support the (in)actions of the French commanders and insist that the British were in the wrong for refusing to trust the good will/promises of Adolf Hitler.
@@Neion8 I only recently became aware of this ua-cam.com/video/_inz8DB7SYo/v-deo.html&lc=Ugze2cnSmCmpQqIj0Gh4AaABAg.AA0Z0OwpM80AA0fjZEvu7S At least the British gave the French a chance, which they refused to take. The Germans just bombed the Italians without warning.
I seriously doubt that Franco would have entered the war on the Axis side just because of a botched seizure operation. Franco was savvy enough to wait and see if Germany was going to defeat Great Britain and Russia and certainly would not have entered the war against the U.S. Spain was actively engaged in aiding German, Italian and Japanese agents in Portugal, Spain, Spanish colonies and in the U.S.. It could hardly complain about espionage on its soil considering its own activities. By the time of this operation, Germany was bogging down in Russia and Spain had not recovered from its lengthy civil war.
You are correct. That the operation didn't get full approval until the 6th January, by which time the Axis power had declared war on the USA, is surely key. Whatever the injury to Franco's pride, he was determined to remain in power. Unlike Mussolini and Hitler, he was to die in his bed. I don't think Spain's soft assistance to the Axis powers in the way of intelligence operations would have stopped Spain complaining. However, complaining is one thing, doing something about it quite another. Also, the British found the espionage system run in Spain to be useful at times and exploited it to spread disinformation, most obviously in Operation Mincemeat. It also had the useful side effect of making Hitler doubt some of the real intelligence he got from Franco's Spain.
In 1990, I spoke with an old Danish merchant navy seaman who told his story of being on a Danish merchant navy ship in Aden around 1940. British special forces entered and took over the ship, and the ship with its crew was used/forced to transport troops and equipment from Australia to North Africa during the whole war.
I can't imagine that highly trained British special forces controlled the ship and crew from 1940 to 1945, surely they were to valuable for that. Did the crew just decide that working for the allies was a better bet than working for the axis? It looks like they chose the winning side!
There is a word - Angary where a ship from a neutral country is seized by a combatant power for the duration of hostilities. Theoretically the neutral country is entitled to compensation.
At 12:22 “Are there any other SOE missions you’d like us to cover?” Yeah. Top Secret SOE missions that are no longer covered by the Official Secrets Act.
Former head of MI6 when answering questions on Ukraine (I forget what it was for. Kinda a presentation. Uni and business guys there. Q&A at the end of it) said they had to be careful at the time in regard in assistance they provided and operations against Russia by MI6 or other English groups were not feasible as even tho it would be top secret, as we have seen many times before, everything comes out in the wash eventually.
The son of the translator, who attended the meeting between Franco and Hitler in Hendaya, is a personal friend of mine. He is already 83 years old, but when asked what did they say? He replied: "Franco told my father to reject any proposal from Hitler" for, and I quote, "This man is going to loose the war"
Seems like a heck of a risk for 3 boats. Possibly explains the tension between Churchill and Gifford, and the fact that they got away with it can only have undermined Gifford's standing. I think he was dead right to keep local civilians out of it.
The purpose of the raid wasn't to just seize three boats. There was a suspicion that the boats were supplying both arms and information to German submarines operating in that part of the Atlantic...which, obviously, they shouldn't have been doing in a neutral port.
@@Loehengrin "I know what the boats were doing." Then you would realise that your reference to "a risk for 3 boats" is incorrect. The stakes were a lot higher than just those 3 boats - it was the protection of the dozens of Allied merchant ships transporting material through the south and central Atlantic every day.
@@maxfan1591 ...and on one of those merchant ships was my grandfather. The ships didn't have to be taken/sunk in port. Especially not in some half-cocked scheme using local civies. It was a British military operation for British military personnel. I think you underestimate the the danger that Spain posed. They were battle-weary, but they were also seasoned.
Then ALL Spanish Merchant Ships were free to be sunk anywhere. Also because of the Treaty of Montreaux, technically, Spain would become the property of GB Forever. That is why Gibraltar can NEVER be part of Spain UNLESS Spain is a Province of the UK.
Franco knew that if he let it happen, he would die and his country would starve and fall to the allies in due course. He made a sensible decision in the circumstances . . .
Gilbralta is impossible to take from Spain because of the terrain. Any force would have to be chanelled through a narrow crossing from Spain, and would easily be picked off by the British artillary on the rock. It's why the Spanish have never eaven thought of trying to take Gib by force. It's impossible.
Reminds me of the raid in Goa by SOE and the Calcutta Light Horse featured in the movie The Sea Wolves which was a success too. I believe a book called The Boarding Party was written about the raid.
I'm sure you could find operations to cover from the other book cover you showed about the Small Scale Raiding Force, which is an excellent book! Even an episode on Anders Lassen would be good topic too (if you haven't already done on on him, that is)
THe SSRF planned a raid on the French coast with a prepared ML Motor Launch which was cancelled and the ML returned to coastal duties after the war it was used at Great Yarmouth/Gorleston on Sea as a pleasure cruiser called "The Eastern Princess" there is a website which features it.
I highly recommend Damien Lewis' book. This video covers the Fernando raid very well, so I would love to see videos of the other raids in the book - the Channel Island raids, Kastelli airbase on Crete, Leros, Santorini, and the other Greek island raids, and Salonika, for example. They beggar belief.
I saw "The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare" a Guy Ritchie movie. Looks like he's learned something from Quentin Tarantino. It's based on this raid but embellished for the big screen. A fun movie to watch.
The maps in this video show the island of Santa Isabel, one of the Solomon Island in the Pacific Ocean. The city of Santa Isabel, where the action took place, is in the Atlantic Ocean, near Nigeria, and it is now called Bioko.
Franco never wanted to join Adolf Hitler or the Axis, this was not due to Churchill skills but to Franco's knowledge of the human soul and his will to avoid further sacrifices to a population just out of a fierce war between brothers that lasted for 3 years. The interview between Franco and Hitler in Hendaya ended with a comment of Adolf Hitler to his secretary "I prefer to go to the dentist rather than interview with Franco again". Churchill just found that Franco's policy didn't go against the allied interests.
How about covering Operation Seahorse in the Portuguese colony of Goa (now India) during which men of the Calcutta Light Horse conducted a similar raid against three other interned German and Italian vessels?
Very brilliant & skillful operation. As for my totally amateurish opinion. It sounds like an extremely small material gain for the British, at the risk of provoking Spain into joining the Axis.
Spain was NOT coming into the War. Admiral Canaris, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Canaris the German who was supposed to be talking him into it - told him that the Germans were going to lose and he should stay out of it. Cararis worked against Hitler until he was caught and killed in 1945. .
@@BobSmith-dk8nw Yes. Also, Churchill & Franco were both foxy beasts. By January 42, the U.S. was declared into the War. Churchill probably sensed that Franco could see the writing on the wall. Franco on the other hand, didn't want to end up hanging upside down like Il Duce did. Thanks for your comment.
@@robertsansone1680 I think Franco was was more worried about holding his country together after the civil war. Almost half of Spain did not want to be in Franco's Spain, plus an awful lot of the International brigade fought for the republican side, not many of these were from the axis countries. Perhaps Franco could see the writing on the wall, in a prophetic sense at least, as Mussolini's demise was in 1945. I just don't think Franco could have led Spain into another war at this time. A bigger worry for him may have been potential annexing by Germany?
Everyone keeps talking about Franco joining the Axis. Was never going to happen, except if the brits invaded spain. Franco was a hairsbreath from a renewed civil war, he had guerrilla warfare taking place all over Spain. He continually stalled any agreement with Hitler, even to the point of iron ore shipments being on the lower scale, even though this would have given Spain the money needed for reconstuction. Franco knew several things, Britain had accepted their neutrality, don't poke the hornets nest, Germany had failed to breach Britains defences, if he joined the Axis, he would be a junior partner overshadowed by the rest and from his talks with Hitler knew he was going to attack Russia and did not want to be involved with that. The fact that the vessels attacked were not his, no Spaniard got hurt, who cares about the crews who were at war with Britain. NOT HIS PROBLEM.
I was surprised that the book was written by Damien Lewis. I, of course, thought it might be the actor, but it was a different man. I do think the operation would make a great movie, maybe starring Damien Lewis the actor, just for fun.
Sometimes an 'Ally' can also be a liability. Spain was more use to the Axis neutral. The Spanish army was worse than the Italian, and if Spain was invaded, it would have required German troops to defend it. Imagine Germany trying to hold Greece, Italy, Balkans AND Spain? Spain might have actually been an easier invasion route than Italy for the Allies.
Franco agreed to join the Axis war effort in May 1940 but his demands for some of Frances North African territory was ignored by Hitler ….the British immediately on finding this out told diplomats that the day the Spanish took Gibraltar the Royal Navy would take the Canary Islands …this put doubts in Franco mind …certainly if Gibraltar had fallen then no Malta or El Alamein (Montgomery and Rommel) and the Germans would of had very little to stop them getting the oil they desperately needed from the Middle East …no need for a rushed invasion of Russia ..they could of waited till 1944or 1945 …
Wilhelm Canaris, head of the Abwehr developed a friendship with Franco. He warned Franco to not accede to any plea by Hitler to get involved in the coming war. Franco took that warning seriously and only allowed some Spanish soldier volunteers to go join in the invasion of Russia.
Excellent post, T.F.. Merry Christmas. This successful operation as with any, boosts morale. And we know the value of morale in warfare. Knowing that Spain was being lured to (S)hitler's 'kingdom,' this OP had to give them pause. The moral of the story: Don't F.U.C.K. with the Brits.
The Sea Wolves is a 1980 war film starring Gregory Peck, Roger Moore and David Niven. The film, which is based on the 1978 book Boarding Party by James Leasor, is a fictionalised account of Operation Creek during the Second World War. In the covert mission, the Calcutta Light Horse successfully sank a German merchant ship in Mormugão Harbour in neutral Portugal's territory of Goa, India on 9 March 1943. The ship had a secret radio which was transmitting information about Allied shipping to U-boats operating in the Indian Ocean.
Hitler did not want Spain to join the Axis. Spain had just gone through a civil war. Spain could not feed its own people. Hitler remembered WWI when Germany had foot shortage.
05:45 Nice work if you can get it. This operation reminds me of a similar mission on the other dmside if the world - in similarly, neutral Goa. It was the subject of a book "The Boarding Party," by James Leasor. The heroes of this mission were not fit, young, SAS prototypes, but locally recruited, middle-aged businessmen and office workers.
Spain in WW2 is like Belarus in the current war. Constantly sabre rattling, but would never actually make good on their threats because they're too weak.
Excellent presentation, thanks. How about a feature on the mission in Brittany prior to D-Day? A lot of very brave men died, and the monument is quite humbling.
It was very risky and could have altered the outcome of the war. If Franco had been provoked into joining the Axis it would likely have resulted in Gibraltar falling into Axis hands which would have imperiled the North Africa and Italian campaigns. The Suez canal would likely have been captured by the Germans.
Spaid actually did join the Axis during WWII and at the same time claimed neutrality, they also gave Nazi War Criminals sanctuary and aid in escaping to Argentine. Spain sent troops to fight along side Germany against Russia. Franklin Roosevelt told Spain to withdraw their troops or lose their neutrality status, so Spain did withdraw their troops.
An eclectic range of unconnected photographs including the Far East (with Mountbatten), Greece and Malta (Grand Harbour). The limit of Franco's wartime succour for Hitler was to switch Spain to Berlin time in a show of support. And Spain has remained on Central European Time ever since.
What's really amazing about this is how they managed to teleport themselves from Africa to the Pacific.. That map at. 7:00 and 10:35 is of Santa Isabel in the Solomon Islands off Australia.
One of the maps you keep showing is of Santa Isabel Island in the Solomon Islands. Santa Isabel is NOT an island, but the Bahia de Santa Isabel of the city of Malabo on San Carlos near Cameroon.
The narration is the same as on Wikipedia. That page omits any involvement by Churchill. Yes, I'd like to hear about more secret missions. It seems the British needed to find ways to take the war to the enemy and their potential allies such as Spain and Vichy France. Small missions like this sent the message that we can strike where you're vulnerable.
People who say that Spain could have joined the Axis are plain ignorant. Franco didn't need Canaris or other foreign interventions to convince him to stay out of the Axis. In 1939 Spain was unable to join an alliance. After the civil war, the country needed a full reconstruction, not a war. They had no navy, no significant air force. Geographically they were in no position to do anything. Franco was a criminal fascist but not an idiot. He knew perfectly well that the fascist regime would collapse if it was involved in a war.
Worth every bit. Spain was in no economic or political position to make a meaningful contribution to the Axis at that point in history even if they wanted todo so.
What I would say is the raid only took place once America had joined, they were going to do it late ‘41 but the bureaucrats stopped them. By January ‘42 Churchill was not bothered about provoking a war with Franco who transpired to be the only Fascist European regime to survive.
I worked on Fernando Po island (now Bioko, Equatorial Guinea) for many years. The old harbour at Santa Isabel (now Malabo) was basically a ~1km diameter submerged volcanic crater, with a thin finger of land extending just over halfway round. If the Spanish had any AA or other heavy weapons located on the quayside or around the edge of the harbour (I presume they would have), then this was a potentially very risky operation. I don't know whether it is connected to Op Postmaster, but a British Short Sunderland flying boat crashed on or near Fernando Po during the war, killing the whole crew. They are buried in the main cemetery in Malabo, & the British Warden (a sort of Consul) holds a small ceremony on Remembrance day, by the graves.
Your photo of "SOE" at 1:06 shows Mountbatten and his staff in Burma (or perhaps India). A bad start. 🤣🤣🤣 Good episode script-wise. It must be difficult finding visuals for secret operations +1. 👍
I cannot say for sure, but as Spain had suffered badly under German dive bombers assisting Franco, joining the Axis may have reignited the civil war? Just a thought.
Yes. Spain at the time was a simmering pot of resentment. Which is probably why Franco declined to get into bed with the axis . And keeping an eye on history, and Napoleons campaign in Spain , which ended disastrously for him .....with help from the British.
Franco cannily sent thousands of Spanish "volunteers" popularly known as the "Blue Division " to the Eastern Front against the Red Army amongst the other contingents of "anti-Communist" foreign fighters. This was when the Germans were "winning" the war in the East. However he withdrew them soon after Stalingrad all the while successfully maintaining his "neutral" status throughout WWII. This must have been a relief to the Western Allies who did not relish the idea of having to expand the Western Front vs Spain. Evidently, the Generalissimo did not need a Weatherman to know which way the wind was blowing.
all credit to the guys who carried out this daring mission but Churchill once again was behaving very recklessly by sanctioning it. more often than not Churchill's gambles ended in disaster!
I heard a few years ago there was a planned movie about his life story, but i've not heard anything more about it. Now that would be a film i'd love to see as long as they didn't go full 'hollywood' and glamourise it too much etc.
@@dave_h_8742 at 11:23 he is the one on the far left photo. Amazing doing a video on Postmaster and not mentioning the only SF soldier in british service ever to have been awarded a VC.
The important point for the Spanish is that in January 1942 the USA was in the war and I suspect that would have weighed very heavily on Franco's mind before taking such a momentous step as to join he Axis powers. It would inevitably have bought Spain into conflict with the USA as well. That might well have been the reason that the British changed their minds and approval was given on the 6th January. Prior to Pearl Harbor, there would not have been that threat of war with the USA if Spain joined the Axis powers, afterwards it was a certainty. The British would have known that, and I'm surprised the point wasn't mentioned in the video. Also, I have no doubt the British carried this out to impress their new allies on the capabilities of their special forces.
Spain relied on US oil imports, the major reason they didn't join the Axis. Spain's contribution to the Axis cause was the Spanish Blue Division which fought well on the Eastern Front, suffering some 44,000 casualties. Also the Spanish port of Vigo was used as a base for refueling and rearming U boats.
Spain couldn't afford to join the Axis as the British and Americans were supporting their economy. The Americans were supplying nearly all if Spain's petrol.
Franco refused to join the Axis because Spain was impoverished by years of corruption and civil war, and had no heavy industries or resources. Nor did he want Spain to become a puppet, entirely dependent on Germany and Italy. Portugal, long allied to Britain, would have been a fortress and staging area for Allied attacks into Spain.
@6:15 ... why the map of the British Solomon Islands ? oh, two "santa isabel"s ... the island of Bioko is near Africa ... personally I see this action as more "mad-man Churchill". For the British to be pleased with their disregard of the legal niceties (in a time of war) is quite telling of the modern era. Spain could have flipped to willing participant in the Axis with obvious changes to the political environment of the Mediterranean. Maybe Malta would not have been relieved ? That would have thrown off the entire West Africa campaign, and Sicily, and Italy, and ... This is an operation to be remembered, but for few of the "right" reasons. But scarcely Churchill's greatest gamble (IMHO) ... Why capture these three ships ? What was important about them ? Perhaps credit wikipedia ?
SOE, LRDG, SAS, SIS, Combined ops, Commandos ... The Brits were everywhere!
You damn righy we are everywhere 😁😁😁
@@rumdrinkinpirate6107 😅
Yes we were everywhere.
Funnily enough, Spain could've fought against Japan at the end of the war, when Franco noticed Japan's atrocities towards catholics and spanish inhabitants in the Philippines, as many still lived there by the time
Some opted to stay in the Philippines like my grandparents after the war then intermarried with the populace.
Spain could have _declared_ war on Japan for that reason, maybe. We would have never actually _fought_ them because Franco simply had no way of taking the fight all the way to Japan. Spain's economy and military were in shambles after the civil war, and would still be for many decades to come.
ATROCITY PROPAGANDA - " Atrocity propaganda is how we won the war. And we're only really beginning with it now ! We will continue this atrocity propaganda, we will escalate it until nobody will accept even a good word from the Germans, until all the sympathy they may still have abroad will have been destroyed and they themselves will be so confused that they will no longer know what they are doing. Once that has been achieved, once they begin to run down their own country and their own people, not reluctantly but with eagerness to please the victors, only then will our victory be complete. IT WILL NEVER BE FINAL. Re-education needs careful tending, like an English lawn. Even one moment of negligence, and the weeds crop up again - those indestructible weeds of historical TRUTH. " - SeftonDalmer (1904-1979), former British Chief of ' Black Propaganda ': Said after the German surrender in 1945 in a conversation with the German Professor of lnternation Law Dr.FriedrichGrimm. christiansfortruth.com/post-war-u-s-occupying-forces-believed-germany-justified-in-war-and-hitler-served-his-country-constructively/
@@ArkadiBolschek they could've declared symbolically, would've shown Spain was not a threat to the Allies maybe
@@ArkadiBolschek that's more correcto, but cannot change It, they've already given me a heart 😂
One more proof that all the tales of WW2 will never all be told.
With so many people involved in so many things, for so many years, even if everything got told, no one would live long enough to hear it all.
@@lordgarion514 Now in my 80th year and hearing tales of WW2 since childhood, do not pretend to believe I will live so long. David
Ya especially when people die of old age. Take their story to the grave
If you want some good detailed tales like this go find the book "Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare: How Churchill's Secret Warriors Set Europe Ablaze and Gave Birth to Modern Black Ops" It goes into detail on this operation as well as many others that the group of postmaster did and honestly they should make a movie of it.
Though I think people would struggle to believe it in many places. Things like a small bunch of SOE/SBS guys pushing further into Greece than the rest of the allied forces had and convincing the Germans to pull back further by borrowing as many large vehicles like fire engines from the local town as they could and revving their engines as much as they could as they drove through the streets. Then convincing the local German commander there's divisions of allied tanks coming through the town so he retreats. Why push ahead of the main force and risk being outnumbered? Well just so when the allied main force caught up they were sat there smugly grinning that they took the town and pushed the Germans back all by them little old selves. Because many older commanders saw these special forces types as brigands and scoundrels and a waste of time, so the SF guys liked to annoy them any chance they could.
Personally my favourite is Anders Lassen stealing a Willies Jeep from the Americans and being so worried it would get stolen back now that him and his men were currently idle that while drunk he managed to stuff it into the elevator of the casino they were stationed in and took it to his room so he'd know if American MP's were trying to take it off him. Just a different breed of soldier all together.
If all the tales are told there'd be nuance. Which is the nemesis of political rhetoric.
It was worth it, note the man leading the negotiations for Spain to join the AXIS was a member of the resistance. Admiral Wilhelm Canaris actively dissuades Franco from joining the AXIS powers.
Canaris was a strange and interesting man. I don't think we will ever know the full truth about him. Spain, of course, was exhausted after its civil war but useful as a non-belliegernt to the Germans for many reasons.
@@jugbywellington1134 Unlike Stalin (initially) Franco didn't trust Hitler, who had a insatiable habit of 'occupying' other countries. But, franco did send 50,000 troops to help Hitler fight the Russian's on the eastern front.
@@MrDaiseymay Stalin trusted Hitler?
LOL.
@@mauriciomorais7818 it's true he did, he turned down his generals wishes to redeploy troops and convinced himself the intelligence warnings of the British was a plot to detach him from the Nazis. Even the Soviet spy in Japan who transmitted corroboration of the planned German attack was ignored.
Everything was done to avoid friction with the Germans including restrictions on ammunition.
His miscalculation was that Hitler would avoid a 2 front war at all costs, not understanding how Stalin's own decisions (eg Finland Winter war) had exposed Soviet weakness.
@@MrDaiseymay I'm not sure if distrust is the right word, just that Franco understood that allowing German access to Spain to capture Gibraltar would inevitably make him a client of Hitler.
By 1942 the Germans were busy in the east and at war with the USA to boot, so stalling would be simple prudence.
Suppose Spain had become an alternative Allied objective to Italy? A huge area would have welcomed liberation if there'd been allied landings.
The Spanish were far more vulnerable to allied economic pressures and military response than Germany or Italy. Franco was well aware of this and that his nation was in no shape to become a belligerent.
Interesting, were they dependent on particular resources?
Operation Mincemeat shows British intelligence relied on Spanish fascists Nazi sympathies but I've never read of Franco depending on say Atlantic oil trade.
Disturbingly I've seen a native neo-Nazi in Spain in recent years as a result of speaking good German a restauranteur proudly showed me his Swastika signet ring.
Spain was not self sufficient in basic food supplies for its population post civil war. The USA was the only secure source available to cover its food shortages at a reasonable price in WW2, provided that Franco kept out of Washington's bad books. That accounted for its split, half allied, half axis, favorable foreign policy actions.
@@t5ruxlee210 VERY TRUE - Spain simply COULD NOT FEED ITS PEOPLE if it came into WW2 on the German side - thus TO AVOID STARVATION - Franco remained NEUTRAL in order to AVOID a British naval blockade that would have caused wide spread hunger in Spain!!!!!!!!!!!
Italy was in no economic state to start hostilities against Britain on 10th June 1940, and yet still did. You cannot cure stupid!
Also Spain was specially poor because the "republicans" who allegated that had nothing to do with the soviets handed them all the spanish gold to safeguard it of the falangists wich again... why would you do that if you had nothing to do with the soviets? Wich was, by a great margin, part of the reason why the falangists rose up in first place.
Well, Stalin decided to keep the gold reserves so when the civil war ended, Spain was practically bankrupt, and it was like that during decades but never recovering
Franco was very good friends of Wilhelm Franz Canaris. In fact, Canaris had a picture of Franco on his desk. Franco was well informed about all of the inside information of the Nazis. He knew they were going to lose and would never join them, even if there were "incidents."
They didn't know they would loose. They lost because the delay of operation barbarossa and winter. And lendlease is what saved ussr.
@@myhonorwasloyaltywasn’t just the lend lease programme. Many other factors played a part in the USSR winning the war in the east.
Gen.Franco did not join the Axis, not because he knew that they were going to lose, but because he was not confident that they were going to win, specially after the German failure in the 'Battle of Britain' & their abandonment of 'Operation Sealion', the invasion of Britain.
@@myhonorwasloyalty The Axis never had a chance. The allies had inexhaustible resources. For example, South America could have donated hundreds of thousands of troops and many more supplies. This resource was hardly tapped. Only the Aztec squadron and the Brazilians troops in Italy were used.
and of course---he was the only european dictator to survive the war
Since Franco was more concerned with rebuilding from the Spanish Civil War, I doubt he would have joined the Axis. Spain was devastated from that war, and repercussions from it lasted until Franco's death.
I completely agree. Spain’s economy was wrecked after the civil war and Germany was in no position to bankroll Spain joining the Axis. Economics isn’t as exciting as an SOE raid, but it’s much closer to reality.
That didn't stop the Spanish authorities from handing over the fake documents briefcase of 'The Man Who Never Was' to the Krauts, and dressing it up as a burglary. The Spanish were at best keeping their options open, at worst complicit. I believe the latter and, frankly, wouldn't wish to holiday there, as their casual attitude towards animal cruelty is as nauseating as their WW2 conduct and auto da fe antics centuries before. No offence, but I hope you're getting the impression that I'd not piss on them if they themselves were on fire.
It was Franco who suggested to Hitler that he join the war, but Canaris persuaded him not to.
The Americans and British to a lesser extent were economically supporting Spain, the Amerixans were supplying the Spanish with most of their petrol.
The Soviet Union was a big stumbling block for Franco. During the Spanish Civil War Nazi Germany and Facist Italy supported Franco’s Right Wing Faction. After watching the American Republic, the British Empire and the French Republic do absolutely nothing to help the Left Wing/Socialist Faction in Spain, Stalin announced the Soviet Union would support them. Franco was furious, the civil war was now going to last much longer. He would never, ever, forgive Stalin. Then in 1939 it was announced that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union had signed a “Non-Aggression” Pact for the purpose of dividing up Poland. Franco seethed with raged, he felt that Hitler had betrayed him. He never would forgive Hitler for this and promptly declared Neutrality. Nothing Hitler said or did would ever change this.
Similar action in Goa India. I believe it was the book the last charge of the Calcutta light horse, and was the inspiration for the movie sea wolves, starring Roger Moore and Gregory Peck, and David Niven. Good movie and good story.
Found it on utube free movies, if anyone cares to watch it. Eventually I will
Who’s here after watching the movie?
The book is way better and way more accurate
Not me.
What movie? What book? Thanks.
@@HighlanderNorth1 The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
Me
"Plausible deniability"
Politics never changes.
Yes, but the term came into use long after WW II.
@@LeftToWrite006
Yes about the sixties, but around 1948, the CIA used the phrase "plausibly disclaim".
About the only difference between the word disclaim and deniability, is that they took the definition of disclaim and added in a part about not having been officially informed.
Which is a more than useless edition.
If you have been officially informed you couldn't disclaim it either.
The main reason that Franco (& Spain) were not convinced to join the Axis powers in WW2 was the failure of the Gemans in 'Battle of Britain', which demonstrated that they were not as good as they made out to be. But instead of outright refusing the Germans, Franco put up so many impossible conditions & demands for goods & weapons in his only meeting with Hitler that the Germans could not possibly agree to. Hitler got so fed up with Franco's stubborness that he said that he would rather prefer to have all his teeth pulled out than negotiate with Franco again.
If you read Gordon Olive's "Spitfire Ace", you will see that the Spanish sent an "observer" to England in 1940 to see how the RAF was getting on in the Battle of Britain. He was going to report everything back to the Germans, but as you'll doubtless have twigged, the British knew that; they made sure he saw "hundreds" of spitfires - actually the same few - and was met by "unconcerned" RAF airmen who'd been primed wherever he went. Stunned, this fellow returned to Spain and reported back to Berlin (the British intercepted this communication). Naturally, he told the Germans what he'd seen and told them their intelligence was faulty, the British were far from beaten and had many more planes than the Germans had said. This caused a good bit of consternation in Berlin at the time. This is a much less well-known operation but very successful. Olive was an Australian and an excellent and skilled fighter pilot.
Although Spain under Franco helped the Germans covertly, they did not join the Axis. Otherwise, the Germans with Spain could have easily taken Gibraltar & thus prevented Britain from entering the Mediterranean, resulting in North Africa & Arabia (& its oil) coming under German control, with disasterous consequences for the Allies. Gen.Franco was duly rewarded by the Allies after the war by being left alone to rule as the dictator of Spain till he died in 1975.
Franco and his generals were not that stupid. They knew that the romp thru France was a lucky break. It could easily have been a huge defeat for the Germans. More allied incompetence than anything the Germans did. They saw the British had wiped out most of the German surface fleet and had the largest navy by a mile than any other. They saw that the RAF defeated the Luftwaffe over Dunkirk and England.
@@johnburns4017 Yes, good points.. The Royal Navy hammered the Kriegsmarine in Norway, but the British army was very, very badly led. Then there was the Fench leadership. It's painful to think of it all.
@@jugbywellington1134
The British army was only *9%* of allied forces. The Germans did not roll over it. No British general at Dunkirk surrendered to the Germans. The British won the Battle of Dunkirk. Hitler's Directive 13 was to annihilate the forces in the Dunkirk pocket. They tried for a week and failed.
The French were led by donkeys for sure. They had on paper a superior army to the Germans. Incompetence on their part gave victory to the Germans.
The Spanish were not so stupid as not to fully analyse the German victory.
Whether it was worth it or not is entirely dependent on the Spanish reaction to it. If it caused Spain to give more tacit cooperation with the axis, then it was a failure. If on the other hand it sent a strong messsage that Great Britain was willing to risk an escalation, potentially to war, with Spain and that deterred Spanish-axis cooperation, then it was a terrific success.
IF is a big word
It helps the fact that the Nationals recieved money from the Brits and manpower from Germany and Italy. Owed favours to all sides...
It's nice that the Brits got away with it. But otherwise, what was the purpose of it all? Took big risks with men and international relations for something that didn't change anything.
@@xfhghe it wasn't the $ value of the ships, it was that the axis were using the cover of a "neutral" to run a communications operation. So the success of the operation is dependent on Spain's future policy actions.
By January 1942, joining the Axis powers would have meant being at war with the USA, and that was a very big thing. Unlike Mussolini, Franco's ambitions were much less. He was interested in maintaining power over what he already had, not territorial expansion. A war with USA might well have meant Spain losing its African colonies as well as Franco being deposed if the Axis powers lost the war, which was much more likely after Germany and France declared war on the USA. Franco went on to die in bed, which is more than Hitler or Mussolini managed.
the map at 6:25 is santa isabel in the solomon island in the pacific ocean. And then at 6:41 there is a map of Bioko island the correct one. And again at 7:01 back in the pacific with a map of Northwest Solomonic languages. Finally at 10:31 a point maybe 30 Kms off Santa Isabel in the pacific to support the comment "370 Kms offshore". Geography is always more boring than history, right ?
Also, for some reason, there’s a picture of ‘Ohio’ entering Grand Harbour, Malta at around 5.44
Thanks for picking this up. It was really confusing me.
@@mikepowell2776 Indeed that's Malta. At least 3 differents islands in this video. It certainly can be confusing.
Yes and the long shot of beardies in cars at the end are the SAS in North Africa. SOE different organisation
Crazy mistake
This was easily one of your best videos so far! Extremely engaging, and i was sitting at the edge of my seat! Awesome stuff
The only thing disconcerting to me about this otherwise excellent video were the repeated clips showing Santa Isabel Island in the Pacific instead of the port of Santa Isabel (now Malabo) on the former Spanish island of Fernando Po (now part of Equatorial Guinea) in the Atlantic (off the coast of Africa), where this operation actually took place.
Thank you, you guys. I’ve been waiting for what feels like years for this one.
In 9 March 1943 SOE launched a similar op called"Operation Creek" (also known as "Operation Longshanks") which involved a nighttime attack by members of the Calcutta Light Horse and the Calcutta Scottish against a German merchant ship, the Ehrenfels, which had been transmitting information to U-boats from Mormugao Harbour in neutral Portugal's territory of Goa. The attack was successfully carried out, and the Ehrenfels and three other Axis merchant ships were sunk, stopping the transmissions to the U-boats.
That raid being particularly noteworthy because Calcutta Light Horse was basically a glorified retired gentlemen's club, and all of its volunteers were old geezers who had no business conducting covert operations. It really shouldn't have worked-and yet.
Have tou seen the Lindybeige video?
It was made into a movie, the sea wolves, starring David Niven and Roger Moore
@@RobertStewart-i3mI was going to mention the same movie.
Compliments of the season to the team at The Front. Really like your channel and all the best for new subbers in 23. New Zealand follower here.
Many thanks Craig, we greatly appreciate the support and hope we can continue bringing you quality history content into next year :)
@@TheFront Sweet as sir. I am a guy who Comments when I see work thats obv taken a ton of effort and hours and hours work to prepare for their Subbers, so its the least I can do in thanking you and your team of dedicated ones. team, for your committment, as i am sure that the same feeling is happening with most all your followers here. Keep up the good work.
A member of the SSRF hung a Jolly Roger off one of the masts. A RN officer that was attached to the raid managed to get them to take it down.
The crew of both ships that were aboard when they were captured, spent the rest of the war interred in a remote corner of Nigeria. This was in order to prevent any details about the raid leaking out.
wasnt it anders lassen
Great piece of work mate
Very interesting story that I’d not heard of before.
Yeah. I do think that it is strange that this is not a well known story because it is simply spectacular.
It is easy, after the fact, to decide someone should or shouldn't have done this or that. I appreciate that the video just covered the incident without attempting to do any Monday-morning quarterbacking.
It's what the Brits do. Quarterback indeed! 🤣🤣🤣
At 6.18, there is a glitch. The map shown is of Santa Isabel Island in the Solomon Islands in the Pacific and not Santa Isabel Harbour on Bioko in the Atlantic, which is around 10,000 miles away.
This isn't the only geographic anomaly; There is a photo of the "Ohio" entering Malta, with no connection to the narrative. At another point there is a photo of the SAS / LRDG somewhere in the North African desert. The commentary in this item is quite good but whoever put the pictures together needs lessons in history and geography. Although I enjoyed the piece, I could not "like" it
I confirm this indeed - it is unfortunately frequent that on this type of channel the illustration have nothing to do with the narration which itself can be found in wikipedia most of the time with more details ... :-)
A little known story that there were secret radio stations in Spain . That were aiding U-boats with navigation . It worked by sending out two radio signals that would show their position using special charts . The British knew about them , but instead of insisting that the Spanish close them down used them for their own use.
Another was a nightclub owner in the Argentine South America , that owned a schooner who would go out to U-boats with supplies and fuel. Who's life was like something out of a second feature movie from the 1940's !
whose*
@Knight_Horus Yeah there was probably a lot of people who saw the war as a chance to fuck with the colonial powers not realising until later that the Nazis would've been far worse had they won and as such they were helping the bad guys.
I was fascinated that when France fell, the British attempted to seize French naval vessels in Tangier and other African ports to avoid falling into the hands of Vichy France. At the time France had a large navy. The commander at Tangier refused to stand down and was fired upon sinking some of the fleet, the other vessels in the smaller African ports like Mauritania surrendered. I’m typing this from memory, sorry for any inaccuracies.
There may have been some in Tangier, but the big showdown was at Mers El Kbir, Oran, Algeria. An absolutely pointless sacrifice of French sailors by their own commanders.
@@hekatoncheiros208 What still amazes me is that some Frenchmen still fully support the (in)actions of the French commanders and insist that the British were in the wrong for refusing to trust the good will/promises of Adolf Hitler.
@@Neion8 It was a major betrayal by the british, paint it however you like.
@@Neion8 I only recently became aware of this
ua-cam.com/video/_inz8DB7SYo/v-deo.html&lc=Ugze2cnSmCmpQqIj0Gh4AaABAg.AA0Z0OwpM80AA0fjZEvu7S
At least the British gave the French a chance, which they refused to take. The Germans just bombed the Italians without warning.
I seriously doubt that Franco would have entered the war on the Axis side just because of a botched seizure operation. Franco was savvy enough to wait and see if Germany was going to defeat Great Britain and Russia and certainly would not have entered the war against the U.S. Spain was actively engaged in aiding German, Italian and Japanese agents in Portugal, Spain, Spanish colonies and in the U.S.. It could hardly complain about espionage on its soil considering its own activities. By the time of this operation, Germany was bogging down in Russia and Spain had not recovered from its lengthy civil war.
The operation was a success. Did you look at the vid?
You are correct. That the operation didn't get full approval until the 6th January, by which time the Axis power had declared war on the USA, is surely key. Whatever the injury to Franco's pride, he was determined to remain in power. Unlike Mussolini and Hitler, he was to die in his bed. I don't think Spain's soft assistance to the Axis powers in the way of intelligence operations would have stopped Spain complaining. However, complaining is one thing, doing something about it quite another. Also, the British found the espionage system run in Spain to be useful at times and exploited it to spread disinformation, most obviously in Operation Mincemeat. It also had the useful side effect of making Hitler doubt some of the real intelligence he got from Franco's Spain.
In 1990, I spoke with an old Danish merchant navy seaman who told his story of being on a Danish merchant navy ship in Aden around 1940.
British special forces entered and took over the ship, and the ship with its crew was used/forced to transport troops and equipment from Australia to North Africa during the whole war.
The Danish merchant shis was ordered to surrender at the nearest allied port by their goverment when Hitler broke his promiss and invaded Denmark
I can't imagine that highly trained British special forces controlled the ship and crew from 1940 to 1945, surely they were to valuable for that.
Did the crew just decide that working for the allies was a better bet than working for the axis? It looks like they chose the winning side!
The ship was not forced. It was ordered to go over to the British side. It was now in the British merchant marine.
There is a word - Angary where a ship from a neutral country is seized by a combatant power for the duration of hostilities. Theoretically the neutral country is entitled to compensation.
I love sum state sponsored terrorism
At 12:22 “Are there any other SOE missions you’d like us to cover?”
Yeah. Top Secret SOE missions that are no longer covered by the Official Secrets Act.
Former head of MI6 when answering questions on Ukraine (I forget what it was for. Kinda a presentation. Uni and business guys there. Q&A at the end of it) said they had to be careful at the time in regard in assistance they provided and operations against Russia by MI6 or other English groups were not feasible as even tho it would be top secret, as we have seen many times before, everything comes out in the wash eventually.
@@idealicfool how is that relevant in regards to 80 year old WWII SOE missions that were aimed at Axis Power combatants?
@@HollywoodMarine0351 how isn't it. There is a lot to pick from. As I said, it all comes out in the wash eventually.
@@idealicfool are you aware S.O.E. disbanded January 1946?
@@0300SSgtOrange no shit. It is the org that paved the way for MI6 to do their thing.
The son of the translator, who attended the meeting between Franco and Hitler in Hendaya, is a personal friend of mine. He is already 83 years old, but when asked what did they say? He replied: "Franco told my father to reject any proposal from Hitler" for, and I quote, "This man is going to loose the war"
Franco told his translator to reject any proposal from Hitler? btw almost no one in late 1940. believed that HitIer was going to lose the war.
Seems like a heck of a risk for 3 boats. Possibly explains the tension between Churchill and Gifford, and the fact that they got away with it can only have undermined Gifford's standing. I think he was dead right to keep local civilians out of it.
The purpose of the raid wasn't to just seize three boats. There was a suspicion that the boats were supplying both arms and information to German submarines operating in that part of the Atlantic...which, obviously, they shouldn't have been doing in a neutral port.
Simple.....
DEAR GIFFORD
PIPE DOWN GIFFORD , FOLLOW ORDERS , WE ARE AT WAR....... OR YOU WILL BE ENTURNED. THERES A GOOD CHAP.
YOURS WINNIE.
@@maxfan1591 I know what the boats were doing.
@@Loehengrin "I know what the boats were doing."
Then you would realise that your reference to "a risk for 3 boats" is incorrect. The stakes were a lot higher than just those 3 boats - it was the protection of the dozens of Allied merchant ships transporting material through the south and central Atlantic every day.
@@maxfan1591 ...and on one of those merchant ships was my grandfather.
The ships didn't have to be taken/sunk in port. Especially not in some half-cocked scheme using local civies. It was a British military operation for British military personnel.
I think you underestimate the the danger that Spain posed. They were battle-weary, but they were also seasoned.
“While the difficult takes time, the impossible just takes a little longer.”
Read about this in the book "Churchill's ministry of Ungentlemanly warfare"
There's something to be proud of; thanks for the well researched and presented documentary
One of my 'what if' scenarios is if Franco had let a German column through to occupy Gibraltar in Autumn 1940.
Then ALL Spanish Merchant Ships were free to be sunk anywhere. Also because of the Treaty of Montreaux, technically, Spain would become the property of GB Forever. That is why Gibraltar can NEVER be part of Spain UNLESS Spain is a Province of the UK.
Definitely. It would have been a disaster for the allies. Have a look at the GBC Operation Felix video here on UA-cam. In four parts.
For that 'what if' to have any chance to happen, what Napoleon did to it's ally Spain should not have happened in the first place.
Franco knew that if he let it happen, he would die and his country would starve and fall to the allies in due course. He made a sensible decision in the circumstances . . .
Gilbralta is impossible to take from Spain because of the terrain. Any force would have to be chanelled through a narrow crossing from Spain, and would easily be picked off by the British artillary on the rock. It's why the Spanish have never eaven thought of trying to take Gib by force. It's impossible.
You absolutely have to cover Operation Creek now! Quite similar to Postmaster in a number of ways.
If I remember correctly, luring German officers to a party?
Reminds me of the raid in Goa by SOE and the Calcutta Light Horse featured in the movie The Sea Wolves which was a success too. I believe a book called The Boarding Party was written about the raid.
I was thinking the same thing. Have it on DVD
@@mikeholland1031 Nice one, happy New Year
I'm sure you could find operations to cover from the other book cover you showed about the Small Scale Raiding Force, which is an excellent book! Even an episode on Anders Lassen would be good topic too (if you haven't already done on on him, that is)
As far as I know: Ander Lassen is the only foreigner receiving a VC in ww2
@@erikwirring9446 he was also the only British special forces soldier to earn the VC.
Here after watching "the ministry of ungentlemanly warfare"
It would have taken a lot more than this to get Franco to join the Axis and enter the war, and I think the British knew that.
Happy Christmas all at the Front, any chance of a vid on captured allied, and occupied countries weapons in Axis hands and vice versa please?
THe SSRF planned a raid on the French coast with a prepared ML Motor Launch which was cancelled and the ML returned to coastal duties after the war it was used at Great Yarmouth/Gorleston on Sea as a pleasure cruiser called "The Eastern Princess" there is a website which features it.
I highly recommend Damien Lewis' book. This video covers the Fernando raid very well, so I would love to see videos of the other raids in the book - the Channel Island raids, Kastelli airbase on Crete, Leros, Santorini, and the other Greek island raids, and Salonika, for example. They beggar belief.
Great video man
I saw "The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare" a Guy Ritchie movie. Looks like he's learned something from Quentin Tarantino. It's based on this raid but embellished for the big screen. A fun movie to watch.
Watching it now
That would make a good movie.
Merry Christmas!
It did
The maps in this video show the island of Santa Isabel, one of the Solomon Island in the Pacific Ocean. The city of Santa Isabel, where the action took place, is in the Atlantic Ocean, near Nigeria, and it is now called Bioko.
Franco never wanted to join Adolf Hitler or the Axis, this was not due to Churchill skills but to Franco's knowledge of the human soul and his will to avoid further sacrifices to a population just out of a fierce war between brothers that lasted for 3 years.
The interview between Franco and Hitler in Hendaya ended with a comment of Adolf Hitler to his secretary "I prefer to go to the dentist rather than interview with Franco again".
Churchill just found that Franco's policy didn't go against the allied interests.
Interesting video. Never had heard of / read of the SSRF men. It seems like every other month I learn something new about WW Two.
I see your covering SBS exploits during WW2.
Check out a book on Anders Lassen VC and his part in this mission and daring exploits in the SBS.
How about covering Operation Seahorse in the Portuguese colony of Goa (now India) during which men of the Calcutta Light Horse conducted a similar raid against three other interned German and Italian vessels?
Very brilliant & skillful operation. As for my totally amateurish opinion. It sounds like an extremely small material gain for the British, at the risk of provoking Spain into joining the Axis.
Spain was NOT coming into the War. Admiral Canaris,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Canaris
the German who was supposed to be talking him into it - told him that the Germans were going to lose and he should stay out of it.
Cararis worked against Hitler until he was caught and killed in 1945.
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@@BobSmith-dk8nw Yes. Also, Churchill & Franco were both foxy beasts. By January 42, the U.S. was declared into the War. Churchill probably sensed that Franco could see the writing on the wall. Franco on the other hand, didn't want to end up hanging upside down like Il Duce did. Thanks for your comment.
Stops information going to the U boats so no not a small gain at all !
@@robertsansone1680 I think Franco was was more worried about holding his country together after the civil war. Almost half of Spain did not want to be in Franco's Spain, plus an awful lot of the International brigade fought for the republican side, not many of these were from the axis countries. Perhaps Franco could see the writing on the wall, in a prophetic sense at least, as Mussolini's demise was in 1945. I just don't think Franco could have led Spain into another war at this time. A bigger worry for him may have been potential annexing by Germany?
@@brok328 Excellent points. He was as slippery as a snake. A very Machiavellian creature.
Everyone keeps talking about Franco joining the Axis. Was never going to happen, except if the brits invaded spain. Franco was a hairsbreath from a renewed civil war, he had guerrilla warfare taking place all over Spain. He continually stalled any agreement with Hitler, even to the point of iron ore shipments being on the lower scale, even though this would have given Spain the money needed for reconstuction. Franco knew several things, Britain had accepted their neutrality, don't poke the hornets nest, Germany had failed to breach Britains defences, if he joined the Axis, he would be a junior partner overshadowed by the rest and from his talks with Hitler knew he was going to attack Russia and did not want to be involved with that. The fact that the vessels attacked were not his, no Spaniard got hurt, who cares about the crews who were at war with Britain. NOT HIS PROBLEM.
I was surprised that the book was written by Damien Lewis. I, of course, thought it might be the actor, but it was a different man. I do think the operation would make a great movie, maybe starring Damien Lewis the actor, just for fun.
YES, love the Irony BUT the actor is very good!
Sometimes an 'Ally' can also be a liability. Spain was more use to the Axis neutral. The Spanish army was worse than the Italian, and if Spain was invaded, it would have required German troops to defend it. Imagine Germany trying to hold Greece, Italy, Balkans AND Spain? Spain might have actually been an easier invasion route than Italy for the Allies.
'What's the difference between a neutral country and a highway to France? Nothing.'
Well done!
Thank you.
Franco agreed to join the Axis war effort in May 1940 but his demands for some of Frances North African territory was ignored by Hitler ….the British immediately on finding this out told diplomats that the day the Spanish took Gibraltar the Royal Navy would take the Canary Islands …this put doubts in Franco mind …certainly if Gibraltar had fallen then no Malta or El Alamein (Montgomery and Rommel) and the Germans would of had very little to stop them getting the oil they desperately needed from the Middle East …no need for a rushed invasion of Russia ..they could of waited till 1944or 1945 …
Wilhelm Canaris, head of the Abwehr developed a friendship with Franco. He warned Franco to not accede to any plea by Hitler to get involved in the coming war. Franco took that warning seriously and only allowed some Spanish soldier volunteers to go join in the invasion of Russia.
Excellent post, T.F.. Merry Christmas.
This successful operation as with any, boosts morale. And we know the value of morale in warfare. Knowing that Spain was being lured to (S)hitler's 'kingdom,' this OP had to give them pause. The moral of the story: Don't F.U.C.K. with the Brits.
Piracy against the Spanish was more of a reflex by this point than a conscious decision.
It's not as though Britain did not have centuries of experience at it . . .
I think a movie was made about this raid called "Sea Wolves" which starred some pretty big names.
The Sea Wolves is a 1980 war film starring Gregory Peck, Roger Moore and David Niven. The film, which is based on the 1978 book Boarding Party by James Leasor, is a fictionalised account of Operation Creek during the Second World War. In the covert mission, the Calcutta Light Horse successfully sank a German merchant ship in Mormugão Harbour in neutral Portugal's territory of Goa, India on 9 March 1943. The ship had a secret radio which was transmitting information about Allied shipping to U-boats operating in the Indian Ocean.
@@dukeemzworth3005---Oh well. Sorry I got it wrong.
@@dukeemzworth3005 Lindybiege has a fantastic account of this on his UA-cam channel...
Hitler did not want Spain to join the Axis. Spain had just gone through a civil war. Spain could not feed its own people. Hitler remembered WWI when Germany had foot shortage.
05:45 Nice work if you can get it.
This operation reminds me of a similar mission on the other dmside if the world - in similarly, neutral Goa.
It was the subject of a book "The Boarding Party," by James Leasor.
The heroes of this mission were not fit, young, SAS prototypes, but locally recruited, middle-aged businessmen and office workers.
Spain in WW2 is like Belarus in the current war. Constantly sabre rattling, but would never actually make good on their threats because they're too weak.
You should also give credit to Canaris for talking Franco into not joining Hitler
Excellent presentation, thanks. How about a feature on the mission in Brittany prior to D-Day? A lot of very brave men died, and the monument is quite humbling.
It was very risky and could have altered the outcome of the war. If Franco had been provoked into joining the Axis it would likely have resulted in Gibraltar falling into Axis hands which would have imperiled the North Africa and Italian campaigns. The Suez canal would likely have been captured by the Germans.
Either way it would bring more troops into the African front.
That alone would allow Germany to focus more so on the Soviets.
Spaid actually did join the Axis during WWII and at the same time claimed neutrality, they also gave Nazi War Criminals sanctuary and aid in escaping to Argentine. Spain sent troops to fight along side Germany against Russia. Franklin Roosevelt told Spain to withdraw their troops or lose their neutrality status, so Spain did withdraw their troops.
An eclectic range of unconnected photographs including the Far East (with Mountbatten), Greece and Malta (Grand Harbour). The limit of Franco's wartime succour for Hitler was to switch Spain to Berlin time in a show of support. And Spain has remained on Central European Time ever since.
What's really amazing about this is how they managed to teleport themselves from Africa to the Pacific..
That map at. 7:00 and 10:35 is of Santa Isabel in the Solomon Islands off Australia.
Yep I just noticed that as well, really not good.
One of the maps you keep showing is of Santa Isabel Island in the Solomon Islands.
Santa Isabel is NOT an island, but the Bahia de Santa Isabel of the city of Malabo on San Carlos near Cameroon.
And fotos of Valetta harbour? Malta
The narration is the same as on Wikipedia. That page omits any involvement by Churchill.
Yes, I'd like to hear about more secret missions. It seems the British needed to find ways to take the war to the enemy and their potential allies such as Spain and Vichy France. Small missions like this sent the message that we can strike where you're vulnerable.
Yes cover all soe missions excellent thanks
Read the book including this, incredible lengths they went to minimise things going wrong as it does.
People who say that Spain could have joined the Axis are plain ignorant. Franco didn't need Canaris or other foreign interventions to convince him to stay out of the Axis. In 1939 Spain was unable to join an alliance. After the civil war, the country needed a full reconstruction, not a war. They had no navy, no significant air force. Geographically they were in no position to do anything. Franco was a criminal fascist but not an idiot. He knew perfectly well that the fascist regime would collapse if it was involved in a war.
Worth every bit. Spain was in no economic or political position to make a meaningful contribution to the Axis at that point in history even if they wanted todo so.
What I would say is the raid only took place once America had joined, they were going to do it late ‘41 but the bureaucrats stopped them. By January ‘42 Churchill was not bothered about provoking a war with Franco who transpired to be the only Fascist European regime to survive.
I worked on Fernando Po island (now Bioko, Equatorial Guinea) for many years. The old harbour at Santa Isabel (now Malabo) was basically a ~1km diameter submerged volcanic crater, with a thin finger of land extending just over halfway round. If the Spanish had any AA or other heavy weapons located on the quayside or around the edge of the harbour (I presume they would have), then this was a potentially very risky operation. I don't know whether it is connected to Op Postmaster, but a British Short Sunderland flying boat crashed on or near Fernando Po during the war, killing the whole crew. They are buried in the main cemetery in Malabo, & the British Warden (a sort of Consul) holds a small ceremony on Remembrance day, by the graves.
Jolly Good Show. Franco was all talk and no action
Your photo of "SOE" at 1:06 shows Mountbatten and his staff in Burma (or perhaps India). A bad start. 🤣🤣🤣
Good episode script-wise. It must be difficult finding visuals for secret operations +1. 👍
This would make a good movie.
It did I have just watched it
Excellent... but if ever a vid ..needed some animation..this is it...I got well confused in the description of attack 🤔 🎅
I cannot say for sure, but as Spain had suffered badly under German dive bombers assisting Franco, joining the Axis may have reignited the civil war? Just a thought.
Yes. Spain at the time was a simmering pot of resentment.
Which is probably why Franco declined to get into bed with the axis . And keeping an eye on history, and Napoleons campaign in Spain , which ended disastrously for him .....with help from the British.
Franco cannily sent thousands of Spanish "volunteers" popularly known as the "Blue Division " to the Eastern Front against the Red Army
amongst the other contingents of "anti-Communist" foreign fighters. This was when the Germans were "winning" the war in the East.
However he withdrew them soon after Stalingrad all the while successfully maintaining his "neutral" status throughout WWII.
This must have been a relief to the Western Allies who did not relish the idea of having to expand the Western Front vs Spain.
Evidently, the Generalissimo did not need a Weatherman to know which way the wind was blowing.
Interesting. Thank you.
all credit to the guys who carried out this daring mission but Churchill once again was behaving very recklessly by sanctioning it. more often than not Churchill's gambles ended in disaster!
Anders Lassen VC was a part of this mission and his book is a very interesting look at a very dangerous SF operator.
I heard a few years ago there was a planned movie about his life story, but i've not heard anything more about it. Now that would be a film i'd love to see as long as they didn't go full 'hollywood' and glamourise it too much etc.
@@anthonywatson7735 Agreed. He was a great soldier.
Thought he died in a strafing run on an MTB in the Aegean. Have to Google him for when he died.
9th April, 1945, lake commachio, Italy.
The only none commonwealth soldier to be awarded the VC. posthumously.
@@dave_h_8742 at 11:23 he is the one on the far left photo.
Amazing doing a video on Postmaster and not mentioning the only SF soldier in british service ever to have been awarded a VC.
It was a calculated risk and, happily, it worked.
The important point for the Spanish is that in January 1942 the USA was in the war and I suspect that would have weighed very heavily on Franco's mind before taking such a momentous step as to join he Axis powers. It would inevitably have bought Spain into conflict with the USA as well. That might well have been the reason that the British changed their minds and approval was given on the 6th January. Prior to Pearl Harbor, there would not have been that threat of war with the USA if Spain joined the Axis powers, afterwards it was a certainty. The British would have known that, and I'm surprised the point wasn't mentioned in the video.
Also, I have no doubt the British carried this out to impress their new allies on the capabilities of their special forces.
Have u done the one where they go up the river on kayaks to blowup some ships? Don't think its SOE. It was one of the precursors to the SBS
See movie, 'The Cockleshell Heroes.'
yes. hes done that. i think it may have been on the braved
Spain didn't want a war on any side so soon after their civil war which left them in an understandable mess and whole lot of hurt.
Spain relied on US oil imports, the major reason they didn't join the Axis. Spain's contribution to the Axis cause was the Spanish Blue Division which fought well on the Eastern Front, suffering some 44,000 casualties. Also the Spanish port of Vigo was used as a base for refueling and rearming U boats.
And US grain to feed the population.
Spain couldn't afford to join the Axis as the British and Americans were supporting their economy. The Americans were supplying nearly all if Spain's petrol.
Learn something new any day... Had no idea this incident took place...
I liked this very much it reminded me of the inglorious bastards story
Franco was smart enough to stay out of WW2.
Santa Isabel Island is located in the Pacific Ocean, not the Atlantic.
Super cool, never heard of this.
Great movie ideas there
I had never heard of the Small Scale Raiding Force. That was interesting.
Franco refused to join the Axis because Spain was impoverished by years of corruption and civil war, and had no heavy industries or resources. Nor did he want Spain to become a puppet, entirely dependent on Germany and Italy. Portugal, long allied to Britain, would have been a fortress and staging area for Allied attacks into Spain.
@6:15 ... why the map of the British Solomon Islands ? oh, two "santa isabel"s ... the island of Bioko is near Africa ...
personally I see this action as more "mad-man Churchill". For the British to be pleased with their disregard of the legal niceties (in a time of war) is quite telling of the modern era.
Spain could have flipped to willing participant in the Axis with obvious changes to the political environment of the Mediterranean. Maybe Malta would not have been relieved ? That would have thrown off the entire West Africa campaign, and Sicily, and Italy, and ...
This is an operation to be remembered, but for few of the "right" reasons. But scarcely Churchill's greatest gamble (IMHO) ...
Why capture these three ships ? What was important about them ?
Perhaps credit wikipedia ?
I would love to see a piece on your channel regarding operation Creek involving the Calcutta light horse.