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Hello and welcome to the latest episode of the Battleground 44 podcast with me, Saul David. Today I'm talking to Tom Petsch, who, since leaving the British Army in 1997, has forged a highly successful career as a writer, director and producer.
Before doing so, Tom was a member of the Special Air Service or SAS and among other things, led small teams gathering intelligence on the Khmer Rouge in the jungles of Cambodia and persuaded the Bosnian Serbs to accept peace, no easy task, I suspect. In 2022, Tom published Speed, Aggression and Surprise, the untold origin story of the SAS. And today we're discussing the role of the SAS in D-Day or the Normandy campaign more generally.
Tom, welcome to the podcast. Thanks, Saul. I don't think I can credit myself individually as swaying that the Bosnian serves to accept peace. That might be beyond my pay grade. I think there was a lot of people involved in that. Yeah, I took that straight from your website, Tom. I thought that was a rather grand claim, but I was going to include it anyway. Yeah, good quote.
Okay, let's set the scene, shall we? Most listeners will know, of course, that the SAS was founded by, amongst others, there's a lot of current debate about who actually founded the SAS, but amongst others, of course, David Sterling, the first commanding officer in Egypt in the summer of 1941.
Just to get us up to speed, Tom, could you give us a quick summary of what's happened since then? How big the SAS has become and how its role has changed from those early days? Yes, as you alluded to there, it has a very mixed heritage. It comes from a lot of different places and I've actually probably...
suggest, and you featured in your excellent book Skywarriors, the Operation Colossus operation, which is the two-commando operation that predates Stirling and Egypt. And that really is the joint genesis, I think, of both the Special Air Service and the Parachute Regiment, in that they both come from that common source.
The strange sort of thing that happened was that operation in North Africa was used by a man called Dudley Clark to deceive the Italians and Germans that we had a parachute brigade called the Special Air Service in North Africa. That was completely fictitious. However, when Stirling turned up with the commandos who found themselves redundant in North Africa, that segued into a real unit. So then you cut to November 1941 and you have the first real parachute operation
Operation by the Special Air Service in an operation called Operation Crusader to take out German airfields. And then to take us to D-Day, that then evolved into a fully fledged regiment, got to nearly four squadrons, nearly four full squadrons in 1943. And really that initiative slightly came apart with the capture of David Sterling. He was a sort of one man maverick and he was really the driving force behind the unit.
And it also opened the door on quite a lot of people who weren't so keen on the Special Air Service to basically break it up. And then there was a period of Italy where we had the SRS, Special Raiding Squadron, which is effectively a commando unit, and 2 SAS, which was Bill Sterling, that's David's brother. And then we get to D-Day. Those are all regrouped back in Britain in anticipation of Operation Overland, which takes up to speed to June 6th.
Okay, and give us a sense of the size now, because obviously they started out, you know, with relatively modest numbers, just a few hundred. How big is it now? Yeah, I mean, they ended up, first of all, there were 23 of them. I mean, that was the first after the disastrous initial raid. But now we've got two British battalions, so that's one and two SAS. We've then got the two French battalions, which are three and four SAS. They have different numbers under the French name.
parachute unit heritage, but let's just call them three and four. And then we have the Belgian SAS being formed, which is five SAS. So you have effectively a brigade of special forces operators grouped in training for airborne operations as part of Overlord.
Okay, and tell us a little bit about the characters of the two key men. Now, only one of them is still involved, of course, and that's Blair Paddy Main. You mentioned David Sterling was captured at the beginning of 1943. So it's been quite a while, really, since he personally has had any influence on the SAS, which is interesting when you consider how large he looms, even in the sort of current perception of
the origin story of the SAS. But tell me a little bit about the differing characters of those two men, because obviously the ethos of the unit is affected very much, I suppose, by the characters of these early leaders. It is. And I mean, the difference, I think, interestingly, there's a third character who doesn't get much mention, though I did feature him quite heavily in my book, who's a guy called William Fraser, who is still part of the 1SAS, and he's commanding A Squadron.
You've got Blair Paddy Main, who everyone will be familiar with, particularly from the SS Rogue Heroes series, as a hard-drinking Irishman. His portrayal may not be entirely accurate. I'd encourage people to read the history before they just delve in the BBC version. But the BBC is very entertaining and completely inaccurate. But
He is, there are elements of truth in there. He was a tough, no-nonsense Irishman. He did like a drink. That was undoubtedly true. And he was a very good leader.
The thing that had happened after Stoney's capture is Maine had ended up commanding essentially a commando unit. So Special Raiding Squadron is what I'd call a commando unit. And I think it's worth explaining to your audience the difference between commandos and SAS. Commandos are shock troops. They're battalions that go ashore and carry out shock action. The SAS are special forces troops, strategic troops that are parachuted behind the lines. So if you like, for the whole period of the Italian Act,
campaign, one SAS which had been called the Special Raiders Squadron, had really been misemployed and had suffered terrible casualties in operations that it could have been spared. These are men who'd been behind enemy lines for a long time, operated for months, very experienced operators, and they're really wasted in Italy, I would say.
The good thing is when they get back to the UK, that is all put behind them and they're regrouped and trained to do what they're really good at, which is parachute behind enemy lines and carry out special forces operations. So that's one FCS, which is commanded by Maine with Bill Fraser's commanding pay squadron.
who's another one of the founders. He really should be credited with the first successful SAS operation, which was carried out in Agamadir in North Africa, where he destroyed 37 aircraft. And a little interesting bit of history there is that that operation is often credited to Blair Paddy Main. But actually, if you look at the history, it was Blair Paddy Main's
where he kicks in the duels at Tam Airfield. And Bill Fraser's raid. Those two are conflated, which has continued actually with the BBC series. They combine the two, but it's the 37 aircraft that really kicked this whole thing off. So that's one SES. And then you've got two SES, which is a bit of an anomaly because that was Bill Sterling's outfit. That was originally formed as part of Torch. So it was supporting American operations.
And then that was deployed in Italy, really in more of a special forces role. But all of these are now being brought back together. And really, this is the key to this D-Day story is they're brought back together under command of Boyd Browning, who you will know from Sky Warriors as the airborne divisional commander. And that causes the confusion about how the SS might be used at D-Day because they're
The SAS and Parachute Regiment, as I've alluded to, they've got the same origin, which is two. And now they're grouped within airborne forces in Antispacient Overlord. And that essentially then segues into the fact that they are going to be misemployed on D-Day, to quote them directly, scattered like confetti between Brussels and the Normandy beachheads in an effort to prevent German panzers reinforcing, which would have been a suicide job.
Okay. And, you know, one of the key characters you've mentioned, and that's Bill Sterling, kicks up a lot of fuss about this. And no doubt he wasn't the only one. And he eventually falls on his sword, which is rather unfortunate, isn't it? Because the changes were then made. So explain what actually happened, Tom. That was the original plan. They were going to use them in a semi-suicidal way. What actually happened in terms of how they were used on D-Day?
Yeah, I mean, I think it's worth delving into the argument itself, because that really goes to the heart of what the SAS is versus what the parachute regiment is. Quickly talk about Bill Sterling. Bill Sterling had a bit of a problem in that two SAS actually mutinied against him on the ship back from Italy.
I don't think Bill Stoney was a coward, but unfortunately he left them in Italy to return to his wife and young child. And as Evelyn Ward said, when he saw him walking into White's, he was rather surprised to see him, given that his unit was in Italy in combat. Anyway, that went down very badly with some of the...
more kinetic members of his unit, particularly a war hero, who then decided he wanted to get rid of him. And there was a bit of a mess, mutiny, which he put down by sacking, unfortunately, Milbank, who was a former Tsar officer who'd got an MC around the time of Dunkerque. So he had a problem with his own mess. But he was right, Bill Stone was right, that they were going to be misemployed. And he went to see Boy Browning.
did not miss his words. I mean, he really, you know, went for it. And whether he resigned or sacked is a mute point, but he came out saying, you know, I needed to find my bowler hat because it was clear that he'd become a civilian after that row.
But what that route did was it flagged to the Americans, to Eisenhower's command, that 21st Army Group and Boyd Browning had a different concept for the SAS than perhaps Eisenhower had got. Now, Eisenhower and the Americans had created something called the Office of Strategic Services, and this was the nation's CIA.
And their plan for D-Day, for this outfit, along with the SOE, that's the Special Operations Executive, it's the British equivalent, is they would parachute behind enemy lines.
and they would increase the effectiveness of the Maquis. Probably saying that wrong, Maquis, Maquis. I'll just call them the French Resistance, shall I? Because I'm not going to... My French is appalling and my pronunciation is appalling. So I think, Patrick, if you're listening, I'm really sorry. I'm just going to call them the French Resistance, okay? So yeah, the essential concept of operations for Eisenhower was he realized he had an asset
in the French resistance that could really mess with the Germans' lines of communication. And again, alluding to your Sky Warriors and the airborne operations, it was all about trying to stop the Panzers reaching the Normandy beachheads. The more they could do to delay Rommel reinforcing, the more effective and the bigger the beachhead would be. So, ISAF thought the OSS SOE could be parachuted into the forests of France to support the French resistance.
However, neither the OSS or SOE are teeth arms. They're not special forces. They're small agents, and they would have radios through the strategic phantom radio net, but they wouldn't actually be able to do any fighting. So the Americans were very keen to use the SAS to augment that effectiveness, to use SAS squadrons. And then they discovered, as a result of Bill Sterling and Browning's row, that the SAS might cease to exist on D-plus-1.
As the operational order from 21st Army Group said in this is the SAS operational order in May, you know, we're not sure when we're going to get the SAS back, which I'd add, because they'll have ceased to exist. As you and I both know from writing about parachute operations, dispersed lightly armed groups of men in front of panzers last a very short amount of time and they would have been dead or captured.
And so that resulted in Eisenhower sending General Bull, who is his operations officer, to see Freddie de Guigand, who's Monty's right-hand man, and spell it out to him that he wasn't going to use the SAS in this way. And actually, I've got the order here because it's quite full on, because he then put it in writing to Monty, because I think Monty was a man you had to put things in writing to, because sometimes he...
interpreted his orders differently. And this is Eisenhower. He says, nominal command of his SAS troops as part of the Airborne Corps remains vested in 21st Army Group. However, since SAS troops are likely to be used mainly in strategic roles and in conjunction with effective resistance groups, their use will be subject to shape control. So that's his control. And then basically the SAS became under command strategic command by Eisenhower.
Yeah, I mean, it's fascinating, isn't it? Because, as you say, they're being reserved for a role for which they are ideally suited, which is in the strategic role. And we'll come on to the sort of link between this and what happens now with the modern SAS without giving too many secrets away, Tom.
at the end of this discussion. But let's talk about these specific operations that were actually carried out. One of them, I think, was a kind of halfway house, wasn't it? The so-called Operation Titanic, which did mean that a small number of SAS troops were dropped in quite close to the beachhead. So can you explain what that was and how it went down? Yeah. So as you and your audience probably be aware, there was a massive diversion operation to essentially draw the Germans into the idea that we were going to cross Pas-de-Calais.
based around a fake army group, which was going to be commanded by Patton. This was all nonsense. Patton was going to go ashore behind Monty on the Normandy beaches. So you'd imagine the original operation would have been good to encourage that deception because the SS would have ended up parachuting near Brussels and that would have looked good. So to placate Monty and the original plan, a troop of the SS were sent
tasked to parachute into northern France and create a diversion along with paragons which are exploding SAS paratroopers. So these are dummies that are parachuted out and explode on landing. The unit pinged for that was one SAS. So Michael Foote, that's Professor Michael Foote, not the Labour leader, former Labour leader, was sent down by SAS command, Brigade Command, to see Paddy May who told him to bugger off. I'm not going to send my men on this suicide mission.
So, because of a return with his tail beneath his legs going, "Ah, one SS won't do that job." So they sent him out to go to two SS where he met up with Brian Franks, who'd just taken over from Bill Sterling, who'd now been sacked to become a civilian.
And Brian Sank said, okay, I'll give you some of my guys. And the guys he gave him were some of his new boys who were then, the old sweats realized this was a suicide mission. And it's one of those operations that was on and off. And when it was called off, they all think, oh, thank the Lord for that, guys. That was a right suicide job. Of course, then when it was pushed back on, the troop commander and everyone realized they really were going to be, you know, dropped. And it was a suicide job.
So they would drop near St. Valerie and along that stretch of coast. So encouraging the idea that we were actually going to cross further up the coast. And actually they did survive. Someone got captured. They were eventually recaptured by the Americans. So they did survive the operation, but it was a horrendous shot. Yeah. And we'll also come on to the issue of recapture because ever since the so-called commando order issued by NATO,
uh hitler towards the end of 1942 there's been a great danger for anyone going in behind the lines captured in uniform or out of uniform there's a moment i remember in my sbs story where uh some of the guys were thinking the cockle shell heroes for example well you know as long as we go with military insignia we'll be all right won't we um well the answer is no so it's interesting you say that actually these guys were actually recaptured that is they weren't executed uh uh
upon their initial capture, maybe not enough time for them to do that, the Germans to do that. But as we're going to discover that the fate of some of the SAS was pretty grisly. So incredibly dangerous work, Tom. And before we talk about the actual strategic operations, let me for a second into the mindset of the sort of people who would have joined the SAS then and now and the risks they're prepared to take. Yeah, I mean...
Going back to the original commando, the advert that went out, it was for men who wanted dangerous and special duties. I mean, these were not going to be your average soldiers. And if you look at all of the number, I mean, you know, you talked about Maine, there were people like Reg Seekings. These were all people who were looking, I don't want to say looking for trouble, but they were looking to get out of regular soldiery. Um,
And in many ways, the SAS, this is the thing about the SAS then and now, it provides freedom from regular soldiering. You know, you are very much your own boss. You'll often be operating on your own or in small teams, a long way from any command, which suits some individuals. And it's a mindset that's different. Not wishing to get into trouble with paratroopers. Here I go, right.
but if you're a para which is not a dissimilar role so the paras again as you've covered in depth their job is airborne infantry they are supposed to form up after the rendezvous form you know platoon size groupings up to town size groupings and carry out those jobs in large formations the SS just doesn't do that that's not how it works they're often on their own or like I say small groups often working with locals as we discovered with the French resistance
a long way behind the lines with virtually no instruction and often no communications.
Yeah, and they are sort of temperamentally, I suppose, suited to that, aren't they? Which a lot, you know, clearly a lot of soldiers aren't, you know, but even the regular soldier, someone who's joined up deliberately to be a professional soldier, still probably gets a sort of psychological sense of safety in numbers, doesn't he? Whereas it's almost the opposite. The operators of the SAS, they're now, and of course, the current SBS,
are brilliant at operating in these small groups. It's almost better, as it were, for them to do that, as you say, because it's not regular soldiering. But it's not for everyone, is it? Which is what I'm trying to get at. We wouldn't go so far, though, Tom, would we, to say some of these guys have literally got a death wish? I mean, that's going too far, is it?
No, no, I mean, absolutely not. And I think that the idea, I mean, people who had that sort of attitude were very quickly weeded out. You did have individuals like Roy Ferran, who I would say was on the spectrum of
quite dangerous and then obviously Anders Lassen was an incredibly violent individual. But alluded to an earlier point, there was a contemporary of Paddy Mains, one of his troopers, who said the only time he saw him scared was in Augusta in Italy when they were on board a ship and there was a German air raid and it hit the neighbouring commando vessel killing several soldiers and what Mains couldn't cope with was being trapped on board a ship helpless while bombs were landing around him because that was his mindset. He was fine if he was running around in the desert but
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Okay, well, let's talk at least about a couple of the major missions carried out. I think by one SAS, you'll correct me, I know, if I get this wrong. These are the strategic operations that we've been speaking about that ICA has demanded. They're going to drop them well behind enemy lines to destroy communications.
impede the movement of reinforcements, train up resistance fighters, spot targets for allied bombers. I mean, this is really crucial work, isn't it? And there are two main operations, as far as I can see, that involve this work, Houndsworth and Bullbasket.
Bull basket, not the best name. I mean, some of the titles. I mean, I always think Operation Titanic. Yes, it's going to go down with the ship. The names of the title, isn't it? If I'd been given that job, I'd be going, well, you could have changed the name, chaps, because Titanic doesn't sound like a good name for an operation.
But anyway, yeah, bull basket and houses. So I think that the way to start this is if you look at a railway map of France of the day, and you look at where the railways run specifically from Bordeaux to Paris. So all the railways run through Paris and then up to Normandy. So if you look at the railways from Marseille to Paris, and then you look at the railway from Bordeaux to Paris, bull basket, they're dropping near Poitiers. So that's straight across that railway and road link that would take the German troops who are defending the Atlantic coast up to
up to Paris and then allow them to redeploy to Normandy. And if you look at Hounsworth, they're dropping in the Morven Forest. Now that's a very long range operation. Ike sends a message to the airborne component of the SES saying, can you get your aircraft to Morven? Which they reply, we can get that far. It's the furthest limit of anybody on D-Day, you know, penetrating to France. And
And the reason for that is Morvan, which is a bit west of Dijon, lies across all the route national, the road and the rail links run from Marseille to Paris. So you can imagine, and these aren't dropping. I mean, the advanced parties drop in on D-Day. So they're going from the 6th of June.
really their main role is going to be to build up strength with the Maquis, the French resistance, and build up strength after D-Day. So when the Germans realise that that is the main event, Normandy is the main event, they're going to try and pull their troops off the Atlantic coast and they're going to
try and pull their troops off the French Riviera and the South Coast and redeploy all those forces to Normandy. It's going to be SAS's job to stop them doing that. Okay, so let's take them one at a time, shall we? Shall we begin with Hounsworth? That's Major Bill Fraser. So presumably that's involving a squadron of one SAS,
What happened and how successful were they? Yeah, it is. They never really get above 40 men in terms of strength, but it is nominally a squadron of the SAS. Yeah, so the advance party, it goes... I mean, that is the very successful operation. They're a bit stuffed by the weather. So the advance team goes in. Bill Fraser actually drops on the 10th of June. As with your book about airborne forces...
He drops into the Stirling, circling and circling and circling, completely lost, which pretty much is buggering. We're jumping anyway. And jumping with him is his Eureka man, who's the man who carries a radio that is the recognition signal from ground to air to allow them to draw. So it will allow them to signal to the aircraft above them their friendly forces. And also his Phantom team. And the Phantom team are absolutely crucial because they have strategic communications. So they'll be able to communicate from Morven straight back to the War Office.
And this is the crucial development, really, in special forces at this point, that they're going to be able to do that. But anyway, Fraser jumps and realizes immediately he's dropping into a forest, which he shouldn't be. He gets hung up in a tree, and it's so dark, he can't see whether he's hit the ground. And I've never been hung up in a tree in a parachute, but it's not a good situation because he can't see up and he can't see down. He's crashed through the canopy, and he doesn't know what to do. So in typical sort of World War II style, he decides he's going to light a cigarette
So he lights it with a zipper and then realises he's two foot off the forest floor and drops to the ground.
At this point, he realizes he's got no one else with him. They're in the wrong place. He eventually links up with his Eureka man to discover the Eureka set's lost. And then, like all airborne operations, discovers they're two days march from where they should be. So he sets out to join the French resistance and make the RV. But they do get themselves together. He gets together. They find the French resistance, about 200 French resistance in the forest. They start to build up strength.
And then quite quickly, the Germans realize they've got to do something about this unit in the forest. And they mount quite a big operation to remove them.
I'd say these are not crap troops. They're a long way in the middle of nowhere. They're local garrison troops. Some of them are not actually German. They're from places like, they're from captured territories. So they're second rate troops, but there's still quite a lot of them. And they attempt to take out Fraser's unit and Fraser wipes them out. They get into a battle with the French resistance and Fraser gets five of them with two Bren guns and punishes them for that, kills about 50 in an ambush.
And unfortunately, and this is the story all over France, the Germans then carry out reprisal raids on the local village and they kill 17 men, hang the padre, rape a young girl, all the dreadful stuff that's going on probably all over France.
Yeah, okay. And in terms of their success, you know, they've gone there to stem the flow of reinforcements to basically cause a lot of havoc and dislocate the German effort to reinforce Normandy. You said it was successful. How do we know that? I mean, to what extent does the record show that they made a real difference? Well, I mean, the biggest thing probably to say that they are successful with is they're constantly...
calling in targets every day via their phantom team. So every night, the Halifax's and Sterling's are visiting railway sidings. Now there's a difference between observed strategic air and unobserved strategic air. So the fact that the RAF are raiding these sidings, the Americans are raiding these sidings night after night, and they're
They're raiding the synthetic oil plants. Because Fraser's men are on the ground telling them that's where the Germans have got stuff, it's much more effective than the whole Allied strategic bombing thing, which is just throwing bombs around. This is pinpoint accurate. Physically, they're also very successful because they get parachuted in their jeeps. They get six-pounder guns parachuted in. Fraser actually tows this round. They form little convoys that go out and raid the roads. They cut the railway something like 20 times in various bases. I mean, the Germans are in a total mess.
And they're completely mobile. Population are loyal to them. And this is the amazing thing. You know, Fraser's unit are protected by the population all the time. No one betrays them. And yeah, they are incredibly effective.
at cutting those supply lines. Yeah, it's an amazing story, isn't it? And absolutely underlines the value, because there is still a debate to this day, Tom, as you know, as to whether or not special forces are actually worth the time and effort. But, you know, clearly in this case, they were. The other operation doesn't go quite so well. Bullbasket, led by Captain John Tonkin, also won SAS. What happens there and why was that not as successful?
The why is tricky to identify. Fraser was a very, I mean, this is not to be down on John Tonkin. Fraser was an extremely experienced operator. He was a former corporal. He was a Queensland Highlander. He'd been a regular before the war. As I said, he alluded to, he carried out their first successful raid. He was the most decorated aircraft.
SAS of the original SS officers of the war. He got two MCs at the Quartet. He was a very, very experienced operator. He knew to do things, for example, like move from the French resistance camp when he thought they had a security problem, you know, and keep his unit moving. So he did all the stuff
that, unfortunately, Tonkin's outfit did not do. They stayed too long in one place. They went back to a camp they'd been before, and they were betrayed. It's essentially the long story short of what happened to that unit. And then, of course, we get to the commando order. So just for your audience, the commando order dates really back to October 1942 and an operational SAR called Operation Bassel, which was carried out by a unit called the Small Scale Raiding Force and 12th Commando.
During which five, this raid included Anders Lassen and five Germans were captured. They were bound and gagged and two of them ended up killed. And when the Germans then found those bodies, Hitler went, you know, they're breaking the Geneva Convention. I'm not having this. Anyone behind lines is now going to get killed. And this applied to pilots.
So the tragedy of Bull Basket and B Squadron 1 SAS was they were overrun. 33 were captured and a US pilot forced to dig their own graves and shot. Three that were wounded were given lethal injection in hospital. So it was an absolute tragedy.
I mean, it's interesting you mentioned the American pilot. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time, wasn't he? I mean, he sounds like quite a character, I have to say, from the little bit I've read about him. Lincoln Bundy from Arizona. I mean, described in some accounts as, you know, inevitably as a cowboy, but very brave nonetheless. And he sort of happens a
upon the SAS doesn't he uh in the sense that he meets up with the French resistance and they they team him up with the SAS he's in the wrong place at the wrong time but this is utterly ruthless the murder yeah what did you say all 32 of them are all 32 captured are murdered Tonkin survives doesn't he and actually goes on to to cause a bit of havoc himself so there is a sort of you know chink of light in this story too isn't yeah I mean they had been effective I I
think they had been affected. As you say, John Tongan gets out, I think, with 11. I mean, they go on operating. So yes, and quite quickly, or very quickly, they realise this has happened and there's an attempt by the RAF to punish the Germans immediately. There's a, I think it's a mosquito raid mounted from Thorny Island.
to try and physically blow the Germans up who'd carried this out. But they're not really brought to justice. A couple were tried. They were released in 1953. The main protagonist was never tried. So it was an absolute tragedy. But it was happening all over the place.
the place. But it's interesting you're talking about, I think behind the lines there were all sorts of people ending up in the SAS hands. And one of the most interesting stories is a bit of a what-it, is as the Normandy beachheads expanded, a lot of French were fleeing south. A lot of them fled into Fraser's area, because that's a long way south, heading for safety in the south of France. And then that brought to him a man who had seen Rommel in his headquarters outside Paris.
So, Fraser realised he could assassinate Rommel. And he came up on the Phantom net and said, "I know where Rommel is. I want him around to mission to hit his headquarters." And he had a plan because the man, Rommel was very keen on hunting, and he crossed the Seine and hunted on the other side. And Fraser realised he could hit him while he was out hunting and take out the main German commander. Unfortunately, he was never given authority to do it, and the operation was passed to SAS.
who landed far too late and never got to him before he was actually hit by the RAF. But the interesting thing I think about that is that was just prior to Operation Goodwood, which was the attempt I wanted to break out of the bridgehead.
and had Fraser taken out Rommel that might have been a game changer you never know it's a bit of a what's it yeah I mean he gets badly wounded doesn't he actually not long after this Rommel so he's sort of taken out of the game and then of course you have the bomb plot on the 20th of July which is only a few days if I'm right after Rommel's wounded and of course he's implicated in that and then encouraged to take his own life so Rommel does
get taken off the chessboard, so to speak. Probably much to the Germans' detriment, although there is still a debate to this day, Tom, as to how effective he really was in the desert. I'm currently writing about Tunisia, so I'm having to make up my mind a little bit about that. Well, that's interesting. You're going to have to make a decision on that. Yeah.
Yeah, I know. It's interesting. There's still a lot of supporters, shall we say, a lot of British historians and readers of military history who still have a very, very high opinion of Rommel. But he had his weaknesses like all military commanders do. Oh, undoubtedly. We're segueing a little bit here, but having recently had...
a lecture on Slim. It's really hard to see the weakness in Slim as a military commander. And of course, you know, you play the parlor game. What if he'd been brought over to Europe and Monty had gone the other way? I think there's no doubt Slim would have performed far more effectively there.
than Monty would have done in the Far East. But we're getting off the beaten track here. I mean, let's come back to a final couple of questions about the SAS. Was everyone, do you think, Tom, acutely aware, everyone who went on these operations? Because it still amazes me. I mean, it amazed me when I was writing about the paras and the glider-borne infantry, the risks they were prepared to take. Just
getting into the location in the first place, as you say, is unbelievably chaotic. And only really do they solve the problem, I think, when gliders and parachutes to a certain extent were replaced by helicopters, which is presumably how you went to war in the 1990s. But was everyone, do you think, aware of the risks? It's extraordinary the risks everyone was prepared to take, not just
inserting themselves into these locations behind enemy lines, but also the danger they faced when they were there. Yeah, they were very aware, particularly the old sweats, as I've alluded to. You've got Bill Fraser, people like Seekings in his time,
A squadron and actually there was a Padre parachuted in called McCluskey with A squadron and he made a very interesting in his record there's a very interesting observation in which he says essentially you've left these men behind enemy lines for too long he says they're still operating well
But he could see both with Fraser and later with Maine when Maine parachuted in. These were men who, and we know that now, we know about PTSD, but they'd been operating behind enemy lines for years. I mean, they had been doing this, the constant alertness, the fact you might be betrayed at any minute, knowing full well that if you were betrayed, you would be executed. Often, you know, captives were just beaten to death and stuff. The treatment by the Germans was appalling. Must have been incredibly stressful.
But they were completely aware of that, and they were prepared to do it. And they wanted to do that more than, for example, get in a landing craft and go on shore, which is their other option. Now, the other thing that interests me is having written about the SBS, which was, as you know, in the Second World War, kind of...
multitude of different units that have actually came to form what we would call the current SBS in terms of their forefathers. What's interesting about you telling the story of or us discussing the story of the SAS and the very important role they played in the Normandy campaign and thereafter, of course, is that that option wasn't really open to the amphibious special operators and
Because, of course, you needed a major amphibious operation and D-Day was the last big one. Yes, you had to cross the Rhine. I think some of the coppice were used in reconnaissance for that. But really, their role has now got to shift to the Far East, which is where they all go. But the SAS plays a very real role to the end of the Second World War, doesn't it? So my question before we come on to the relevance of what they did then and what they did now is...
Do the current operators still hold their forefathers in high esteem because of what they did in the Second World War?
No, absolutely. I mean, I think there's, you know, within the SS regiment, obviously, all of the original founders are celebrated. Sterling, Maine, Lewis, Fraser Lessor, actually, though I've tried to raise his profile a bit recently. And in fact, he is having down in more than they're doing. They're doing a sort of celebration down there. And I think there will be a statue for him eventually.
But to answer your question, the bit like the SPS had so many different fathers. I mean, I, in my book, covered Dudley Clark, who's a staff officer. Without him, there would have never been an SPS. Neil Ritchie was a general. And that's before you start talking about the Far East, where you've got people like Matt Calvert and people like that who are absolute instrumental after the war to what then becomes 22 SPS, which is the modern SPS.
I mean, I think Sterling gave a speech in 1982 where he just rolled off a list. And lots of historians won't know the people on that list because their work's still classified and hasn't been declassified. Yeah. Okay, so finally, Tom, with a bit of your own personal knowledge, what does the current SAS owe to its forefathers in the Second World War in terms of the way it operates? I think the two major things that came out of the war, and this may sound odd,
odd. If you go back to 1940, you probably know this from the pageant, the idea that you selected people for these operations just wasn't there. I mean, if we go back to Norway, they sent the TA, the Territorial Army, so these were civilians out there to perform special forces duties. That's ridiculous. I think the thing that came out of the Second World War was the real understanding that you need to select and then train for these roles. You can't just put regular soldiers out there.
I think the second thing, there were a lot of operations. I think what we talked about with D-Day was the pinnacle of SAS operations in the Second World War, where it had really come together. If you think they're using strategic communications to call in strategic air on targets by enemy lines, they're working with civilian forces to make them more effective in a covert role and using their mobility and stealth.
that would be something that Delta Force in Afghanistan would understand. You know, they'd look at that operation and go, yeah, I get that. And actually, if you took Fraser and stuck him in Afghanistan, a little bit of tactical training, he'd probably be fine. He'd be doing the same job and he would get it. Yeah. And finally, and you don't have to answer this question, Tom,
What are the SAS doing in Ukraine? Because it's pretty clear that the special forces are operating there, both British and American. So what possible role could they be occupying?
absolutely love that. I could just say, I signed the official secret. Even if I left so long ago, I have no understanding of anything. And also, I couldn't tell you if I did know. So there you go. I think you and Patrick are much better informed on this subject than I am. So you could go and ask one of your journalist mates about questions. Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Tom. Great, great discussion, by the way. They're really, really fascinating. It's a story I wish I'd written about. Unfortunately, it's been done by too many people, including
Including you, who knows? But as I write bigger stories of the Second World War, I think it's important that you acknowledge the role that some of these smaller outfits play. In my Tunisia book, for example, I've got a wonderful quote from Bill Williams, who was the chief of intelligence for Monty, as you know, who's basically saying,
People don't understand the psychological effects that the role that these smaller units, and he cites, of course, the SAS, the LR, DG, Popsky's army, played in terms of morale for the rest of the soldiers. Quite apart from the actual material effect, this moral effect that special forces have is often underestimated when you're looking at the kind of, you know, you're totting up where
were they worth it or not. And Slim, one of the only things I'll say against Slim actually is that he never really understood the true worth of special forces. He threw a bone to a certain extent and said there was a little bit of a role, but he didn't really believe it like a lot of regular generals didn't.
but that's about the only demerit I can think of with it. Well, that's interesting. We've got a mutual friend who's a big fan of Slim, probably get angry, but I'd say the same thing. And Slim obviously famously didn't reinforce the Chindits with the last battalion, which caused them a lot of problems when they're behind the lines, when this is around Kahima and stuff, when the Japanese were attacking. He went for a more conventional option and he
did have a unit already across the Japanese lines of communication that could effectively block them off, and that was the Jindis. So you're right. But I think he was not alone. I think that the, and you cover this in Skyward Warriors, this is all evolution. And you've always got the two sides, haven't you? You've got the side that kind of gets it, and then you've got a lot of generals who don't really understand what they're doing out there and don't understand how they could be used. And that has continued to the present day. So, you know, there's nothing new on that.
Yeah, great stuff, Tom. Thanks so much for coming on. Thank you very much.