Just Finished Reading: Steel From the Sky – Behind Enemy Lines in German-Occupied France (The Jedburgh Raiders, France 1944) by Roger Ford (FP: 2004)

With the planned Invasion of Europe almost upon them the senior leaders within the Allied Powers conceived of a bold plan. For years, not long after the fall of France, both British and French operatives had been working in the occupied territories gather intelligence, forming relationships with various resistance cells and offering help with training and weapons were possible. Now, with the end in sight they needed something more proactive, something more robust, and something more recognisable as military intervention. So the Jedburgh Raiders were born.

Picked from volunteers with a knowledge of French and a taste for adventure each 3 man team was made up (with a few exceptions) of one Britain, one American and one Frenchman who dropped behind enemy lines in the months following D-Day with orders to harass the (often retreating) enemy, prevent Axis demolition efforts, distribute arms to all those willing and able to carry them and aid the Allied forces on the ground once they reached them. Around 100 teams embarked from Britain or Algeria over several months and operated in France to varying effect from a period of days to months. Surprisingly, given the nature of their mission, most Jedburgh’s survived the war and one of which was instrumental in the foundation of the CIA.

Although the quality of the men (and their equipment) was generally very high this could not be said about some of the planning, logistics or delivery of the teams themselves. A number of raiders were injured or killed during the drops often to avoidable accidents. In some cases the reception committee in France itself had no idea they were coming. Messages for supply drops – especially of weapons – were too often ignored either because of code errors, faulty radio equipment or for purely political reasons when it was decided that too many weapons in the hands of the resistance only meant future headaches for whatever government took charge post-occupation. Despite all of this some sterling work was done by the teams – often with huge obstacles to overcome – resulting in an impressive number of Axis troops killed or captured, ammo dumps destroyed, communications rendered useless and possible invasion counter moves delayed or (often literally) derailed.

This was definitely as aspect of the liberation of France that I had not come across before. I obviously knew about D-Day and the Allied forces push across France, I knew about co-ordinated resistance efforts to assist in their own liberation but I didn’t know anything about this aspect of the fight involving both SOE and OSS (plus French secret service and SAS units) as part of the fight. I also didn’t realise, until reading this book, just how long the fighting went on and how intense some of it was. I previously had the impression that Allies invade, Axis fall back and just like that France was free. Nothing could be further from the truth. In some places the Germans and their allies melted away in the face of Allied advances but in other locations they only surrendered after the fall of Germany itself.

Whilst generally interesting the book did, I feel, have one serious flaw. For understandable reasons the author selected to tell the story of the Jedburgh’s region by region and team by team. This meant much repetition of Team X, leaving airfield Y, landing at zone Z and completing missions A, B and C. As a resource book (very little had been written about this aspect of the war prior to its publication) it’s important if not invaluable to get this information in print for those who follow the authors lead. However, coming into the topic cold as I did, the format undermined any idea or possibility of a compelling narrative to the Jedburgh story. Certainly interesting (and important) but not exactly a page-turner. (R)