Tragedy at Dieppe Read online

As if flawed planning was not enough, there was also spectacularly bad luck. The intelligence failure that reported 302nd Infantry Division being replaced by the much weaker 110th Infantry Division led to gross underestimation of enemy strength. Then came the run-in with the German coastal convoy. While this did not alert the Germans to the actual raid, it critically disrupted No. 3 Commando’s part in it and woke up the Germans guarding the beach at Puys. Bad luck and poor judgement then combined to send the Royal Regiment to its doom. Naval lieutenant commander Harold Goulding then landed the Royals late, in daylight, and under the guns of a fully aware enemy. The battle at Blue Beach was lost before the troops stepped onto the baseball-sized chert. On the other beaches, the situation differed only by degrees. Even on Green Beach, the slight advances inland achieved nothing of import.

  Throughout, the raid was further undermined by a string of wireless malfunctions and inept handling of communications. Hardly a signal was wholly received or correctly interpreted by the officers on Calpe and Fernie. A handful of Essex Scottish gaining the town was reported as a breakthrough by the battalion; minor success around the casino became a sign of near victory. Like dominoes falling, these mistakes led to more fatal ones, the most glaring being Major General Ham Roberts’s decision to send Les Fusiliers Mont-Royal and the Royal Marines in to reinforce the troops at Dieppe when evidence was pouring in of a catastrophe ashore. Finally, mangled communication prompted Commander H.V.P. McClintock to direct a major share of the landing craft away from the beaches just when they were desperately required for the evacuation. How many troops ashore died or were taken prisoner as a result of one man’s mistake will never be known.

  No battle in Canadian history has undergone such intense scrutiny, much of it focused on whom to blame. Major General Ham Roberts became the traditional scapegoat. Removed from 2nd Division’s command in the spring of 1943, he ran a recruiting depot until the war ended. Still a major general, he retired to Jersey in the Channel Islands. Each year, until his death in 1962, the August 19 mail brought a small box containing a piece of cake—an anonymous, bitter reminder of his alleged prediction of an easy victory. Roberts never attempted to exonerate himself for his part in the raid’s failure, except to say that history would do so.

  Whether Roberts even made the “piece of cake” statement is disputed. It was a fairly common remark. Uncountable the number of times a Canadian regiment’s war diary or report on an Orders Group recorded a commander calling a forthcoming action a piece of cake—when it proved anything but. The phrase came to be often used sardonically.

  Roberts’s agreement to proceed without major pre-raid bombing and his decision to reinforce the Dieppe beaches were mistakes. Regarding the first point, however, I think Roberts was correct in his belief that had he refused to commit Canadian troops without large-scale bombing, Lieutenant General Harry Crerar would have appointed someone else to command, and the raid would have continued. Reinforcing failure, which was what Roberts did when he sent more troops to Dieppe, is harder to excuse. Yet Roberts had no notion of what was transpiring on any of the beaches. What intelligence he possessed was largely faulty. Hughes-Hallett, who from the deck of Calpe saw the boatfuls of wounded washing up and might have suspected a likely disaster, did not protest this reinforcement. If there is blame here, it must be shared by both force commanders.

  But ultimately it was not Roberts who decided to remount the raid, the original fatal error. Who made this decision also remains debatable. Some analysts consider Prime Minister Winston Churchill the final culprit—insisting on the raid to satisfy Stalin’s Second Front demands. It is true Churchill desired the raid, but he wanted it only if there was a good prospect of success. The last thing Churchill needed was another bloody defeat, which was what he was given.

  A great many Dieppe veterans blamed Mountbatten, and a theory developed that relaunching Operation Rutter as Operation Jubilee was in fact never authorized by Churchill or his Chiefs of Staff. Mountbatten is said to have gone behind their backs, independently steamrolling the renewal and execution of the raid without their knowledge. This claim rests less on evidence for guilt than on lack of evidence against it. No Chiefs of Staff minutes mention Operation Jubilee. Assertions made by Mountbatten and Hughes-Hallett and contained in Combined Operations records provide the only indications that restaging the raid had Chiefs of Staff approval. So the reasoning goes that the raid was remounted on the sly by a vainglorious Mountbatten, with the cunning complicity of his Combined Operations staff. I think this theory, which has gained significant momentum and acceptance, improbable and bordering on the fantastic.

  The Dieppe raid was too large, too complex, and involved too many chains of command for proper channels not to have been followed. Churchill and Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Sir Alan Brooke were extremely hands-on superiors. That either they or their sprawling staffs would not have got wind of an unauthorized action mounted literally under their noses is simply not possible.

  But if Mountbatten did not mastermind a grand conspiracy, certainly the raid would never have been remounted as Jubilee without him. Mountbatten sold the idea, just as he had previously secured authorization to stage Operation Rutter. He did so despite his grave reservations about the plan as rejigged, principally by Montgomery, and about the decision not to provide major supporting firepower. Montgomery ultimately denied any definite role in the debacle. Despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, he refused responsibility for the fatal decision to attack Dieppe frontally and concentrate the tanks there. Even his official biographer doubted him. In the aftermath, virtually everyone involved in mounting the raid either denied responsibility or reframed the tragedy as a partial success that provided valuable lessons in warfare—an argument widely embraced by veterans and some veteran organizations. Nobody argued this more ardently than Mountbatten. “From the lessons we learnt at Dieppe all subsequent landings in the Mediterranean and elsewhere benefitted directly,” he declared, along with the immortal line, “The successful landing in Normandy was won on the beaches of Dieppe.”1

  Primary among these supposed lessons: capturing a port intact and without exceptional casualties was unlikely; specialized armour was needed to support any landing; troops required close and extensive fire support during the landing phase. The Canadian Army’s official historian exhaustively examined the so-called lessons. Most were already known or suspected. He concluded that for the few new lessons, “it had not been necessary to attack Dieppe in order to learn them.”2

  Even the claim that Dieppe led to development of the artificial harbours used in Normandy is untrue. Hughes-Hallett is often credited with proposing these “mulberries” after the raid, but he himself said they were Churchill’s idea, posed months before Dieppe. Already, initial planning for a major amphibious invasion of occupied Europe had concluded that the invasion must not occur at a port but fall on open beaches, with the buildup of supplies and reinforcements passed over them. As Mountbatten had argued, Dieppe could not be a test for supplying and building up an invasion force—the raiders would not be ashore long enough.

  Those contending that the Normandy invasion succeeded because of lessons learned at Dieppe generally ignore that between these two attacks, the western Allies carried out several amphibious operations that were much more instructive than Dieppe for the landings on June 6, 1944. The true dress rehearsal for D-Day happened on July 10, 1943, when Canadian, British, and American troops stormed onto the beaches of Sicily as the opening move of Operation Husky. This was the largest amphibious invasion of the war, putting eight divisions ashore across a broad front.

  Another claim to justify the raid was that it gathered vital intelligence. There are two theories. First, that Flight Sergeant Jack Nissenthall’s severing of the radar station’s communications lines gave the Allies highly classified intelligence when the operators were forced to fall back on sending data via wireless. But that result, though usef
ul, hardly justifies the raid. A second, more current theory is that the sole reason for the raid was to enable No. 30 Assault Unit to capture Ultra-sensitive intelligence, such as codebooks and a four-rotor Enigma machine, from a Dieppe hotel. This more sensational theory has many factual and logical holes and is also not credible. For one thing, the idea that thousands of soldiers and resources would be committed for the sole purpose of looting a hotel—and that total secrecy could be maintained to hide that purpose—is ludicrous. For another, No. 30 Assault Unit did not carry out any mission, so the raid was in vain. Nissenthall and the No. 30 specialists were along because the raid presented an opportunity for intelligence gathering. These claims are two of the many in which unforeseen outcomes are used as after-the-fact justification.

  Among the unforeseen outcomes, one that much pleased Churchill was that although a tactical defeat, Dieppe represented a strategic victory because it panicked the German high command. Germany’s premier super-unit, the Leibstandarte SS Panzer Division, was transferred from Russia to France in direct response. In the face of increasingly powerful Russian offensives, this loss constituted a serious blow.3

  A further justification for Dieppe was that it fostered fears of an imminent Allied invasion. For a while, it did. But by November, the German high command belatedly recognized that the raid had preluded nothing. Attention returned dramatically to the eastern theatre. In any case, as South Saskatchewan Lieutenant John Edmondson later wrote, “a strategic success remains a cold comfort when measured against the suffering of the men at Dieppe, and the suffering of their families.” I agree, and I believe the strategic-success argument is hollow. Inevitably, further justifications or explanations for the raid will emerge as more classified documents are released or facts unearthed. Even the most convincing raison d’être, however, does not excuse the colossal futility of the plan and its execution.

  Immediately after the raid and in the years following, discussion arose over whether its failure could at least partly be attributed to the inexperience of the Canadian troops. Proponents inevitably pointed to the successful assault by Lord Lovat’s N0. 4 Commando on the Varengeville Battery. If Mountbatten’s original desire to use the Royal Marine Division and select commando forces had been followed, the argument went, the raid would have had better odds. This argument ignores the fact that No. 4 Commando’s success stemmed as much from luck as skill. Lord Lovat acknowledged that at a decisive moment, had the mortar on Orange II Beach not switched its aim towards the withdrawing LCAs, the commandos there would likely have been slaughtered. The Canadians enjoyed no such luck—the Germans defending their beaches made no mistakes. Wherever the Germans were ready and responded correctly, nobody stood a chance, whether they were Canadians, commandos, or Royal Marines. At Green Beach, where Canadian troops had the benefit of some surprise, they succeeded in crossing the beach, seized Pourville, and largely secured the western headland. Although the Sasks could not defeat the eastern headland defences or fight through to Quatre Vents Farm, this was due to lack of fire support rather than fighting skill. A single tank might have made the difference. The same holds true for the Camerons’ advance towards the airfield. They were stymied by superior weaponry. Finally, there is the impartial assessment of Generalleutnant Konrad Haase, who immediately after the raid acknowledged the gallantry and skill of all the troops engaged in the raid while pointing out the hopelessness of their assignment.

  Honouring the sacrifice of those who fought at Dieppe requires no justification for the raid. While Dieppe was the worst military disaster for Canadians in World War II, there were other defeats. Hong Kong, of course, stands out. Other examples are the 2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade’s virtual destruction before the Hitler Line during the Liri Valley campaign of May 1944 and the shattering of the South Saskatchewan Regiment, Essex Scottish Regiment, and Black Watch at Verrières Ridge in July 1944. We do not bestow less honour on those killed at Dieppe just because their generals failed by sending them into a battle doomed from the outset by a poor plan.

  Thankfully, those who fought at Dieppe are remembered and honoured, particularly in France. Commemorative monuments dedicated to the units that fought there are to be found on or near every beach. Because of the compact battleground, all can be visited in a single day’s drive. Some date back to shortly after the war’s end; others have been recently erected. All are worth seeing, as are the beaches themselves. It is easy enough to stand on the beach at Dieppe or on Green Beach at Pourville and imagine the soldiers’ experience. Scramble across the chert to gain the distant seawall at Dieppe. You will be amazed that as many men gained the wall as did. Or that, despite the chert, at least half the tanks managed to reach the promenade.

  At Pourville, the bridge over the Scie is today named Lieutenant Colonel Merritt’s Bridge. As you look up to the looming eastern headland, it seems a miracle he managed to go back and forth across it unscathed at least four times, taking many men with him. In the end, it is what the soldiers achieved despite the near-insurmountable obstacles that impresses.

  Most of those who died lie in Dieppe Canadian War Cemetery. You find it by driving out of Dieppe onto the Avenue des Canadiens and then turning right onto Rue des Canadiens. A total of 948 Commonwealth servicemen are buried or commemorated here, 187 of them unidentified. Those from the raid tally 783, the rest falling during other operations. Some Dieppe casualties are buried at Rouen, having died of wounds in hospital there. Surrounded by farmland, the cemetery’s long rows of well-spaced marble headstones stretch from one bordering hedge to another. When I visited on a sunny day in May, I saw that somebody had recently placed small Canadian flags at the base of many headstones. They are likely remnants of one of the increasingly common tours of Canadians visiting Normandy’s battlefields and participating in acts of remembrance.

  One of the most recent and unusual memorials I have encountered stands on the promenade facing Red Beach. It is dedicated to the Essex Scottish. The almost eight-foot-high, thin black-granite monument was designed by Rory O’Connor. In 2006, the year the monument was erected in Dieppe, she was an eighteen-year-old art student at the University of Windsor. At the centre of the monument is a stylized cutaway maple leaf. The monument is designed so that every August 19 at precisely 1:00 PM local time, in commemoration of the raid’s end, the sun aligns with the cut-out and illuminates a metal maple leaf inlaid in the monument’s rock base.

  O’Connor had the idea while driving on a sunny day. “I saw some sunshine on the dashboard,” she said later, “and I thought, ‘wouldn’t it be great to use the sundial idea to tell about the time and retreat of these soldiers.’” On August 20, 2010, an identical monument was unveiled in Windsor’s Dieppe Park, with about a thousand people in attendance—including Rory and her grandfather, Jack Baker, a World War II veteran.

  The Essex Scottish wanted the replica monument to give residents unable to travel to Dieppe the opportunity “to experience this beautiful, solemn tribute to our fallen.” City officials embraced the idea, hoping it would “reignite the spirit of remembrance.” It is a sound hope, for the spirit of remembrance appears to be growing across Canada. Looking at photographs of the unveiling in Windsor, I am particularly struck by the number of children present. It is a point I have made before but which deserves restating. Our nation’s children are remembrance’s hope. But they need parents and teachers to instill the reasons for it. If they do not learn why a generation of young people with hopes and dreams of their own set those aside to fight a noble war in faraway lands, then an essential national memory will fade and die away. And Canada will be poorer for it. So it behooves us all to keep that memory alive. In Windsor and in Dieppe, twin monuments designed by a young art student play their vital part in sustaining that remembrance.

  Appendix A: Principal Politicians, Commanders, and Units Involved in the Dieppe Raid

  American

  President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt

 
Chair American Chiefs of Staff, Gen. George C. Marshall

  War Department General Staff Chief of the Operations Division, then American European Theatre of Operations Commander, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower

  U.S. Rangers commander and Dieppe raid observer, Brig. Lucien Truscott

  British

  Prime Minister, Winston Churchill

  Chief of Imperial General Staff, Gen. Sir Alan Brooke

  Chief of Combined Operations, Vice-Adm. Lord Louis Mountbatten

  Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces, Gen. Bernard Paget

  South-Eastern Command, Maj. Gen. Bernard Law Montgomery

  Operation Rutter and Jubilee Air Force Commander, Vice-Air Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory

  Operation Rutter Naval Force Commander, Rear-Adm. Tom Baillie-Grohman

  Operation Jubilee Naval Force Commander, Capt. John Hughes-Hallett

  No. 3 Commando, Lt. Col. John Durnford-Slater

  No. 4 Commando, Lt. Col. Lord Lovat

  No. 40 Royal Marines, Lt. Col. Joseph Picton-Phillips

  Canadian

  Prime Minister, Mackenzie King

  First Army, Lt. Gen. Andrew McNaughton

  I Canadian Corps, Lt. Gen. Harry Crerar

  2nd Infantry Division and Military Force Commander, Operations Rutter and Jubilee, Maj. Gen. John Hamilton “Ham” Roberts

  2nd Infantry Division Chief Operations, Brig. C.C. “Church” Mann

  4th Brigade, Brig. Sherwood Lett

  6th Brigade, Brig. William Southam

  Calgary Tank Regiment, Lt. Col. John Gilby “Johnny” Andrews

  Essex Scottish Regiment, Lt. Col. Fred Jasperson

  Les Fusiliers Mont-Royal, Lt. Col. Dollard “Joe” Ménard

  Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders, Lt. Col. Alfred “Al” Gostling