Patton’s Guerrillas

Although we don’t think of GEN George S. Patton this way, Patton’s guerrillas in late World War II represented a type of hybrid threat we face today on the 21st Century battlefield. Patton actively used guerrillas in his operations against the Axis forces. Patton’s strategy Patton moved his troops farther and faster than any army before. This strategy saw great success during the drive across France in

1944. When asked about his success in France during a press conference in September 1944, Patton, then commander of Third Army, gave the following response, “We have always gotten to each defensive line, not through my efforts, but through the glory of God, three days before the Germans thought we would.”1 Patton concentrated his units on the battlefield to maintain momentum during the drive across France. The leading historian on American armored warfare, Steven J. Zaloga, explains that Patton also used tens of thousands of French resistance fighters, or French Forces of the Interior, to protect his flanks. The FFIs also cleared out isolated pockets of enemy resistance.2 These guerrilla fighters allowed Patton to concentrate all his combat troops into spearheads, famously giving these armored and infantry divisions orders to continue the attack and not to worry about their flanks. With this assistance, Third Army moved through France, defeating more enemy units than any other Western army in World War II. FFI’s organization The FFI started organizing immediately after the fall of France in June 1940. A month later, the FFI received a huge boost in support with the creation of the British Special Operations Executive. The SOE’s mission was, in the words of Winston Churchill, “to set Europe ablaze,” and they would do this by organizing the FFI into a real resistance, assigning them targets to attack when the time came.3 The SOE began parachuting clandestine agents into France to organize networks of resistance fighters known as “circuits.” By 1942, 90 circuits existed. Fifty circuits would survive Nazi counterinsurgency efforts. By CPT Michael S. Ibrahim

Then, in 1944, the FFI activated to support the Allied invasion. The SOE, later joined by the American Office of Strategic Services, created a special command, Special Forces Headquarters, to support and direct the activated FFI in their resistance efforts. This command was in charge of arming, training and directing the FFI in support of the Allied armies in France. SFHQ created three-man teams called “Jedburghs” to operate as their agents with the FFI in the field. The Jedburghs dropped into France behind enemy lines and linked up with local circuits of resistance fighters created by the SOE agent. In addition, they trained and armed the fighters and served as liaisons between SFHQ and the local FFI commander. The 93 Jed teams began landing in France shortly after D-Day. Weapons and tactics When the SOE organized the FFI into operational circuits, they had limited supplies and training ability. The fighters and SOE agents occupied themselves with gathering intelligence on the enemy. As D-Day approached, the SOE planned several operations to cut communication to and isolate the Normandy beachhead. For example, plans existed to deny roads, cut telephone wires and disrupt railroads. The FFI lacked adequate weapons and tactical training by the time of the attack; these shortfalls limited the FFI fighters to conducting small-arms harassment attacks rather than larger-scale operations. However, this would change with the coming of the Jedburgh teams.4 Three-man Jedburgh teams consisted of a British or American officer, a French officer and a radioman. They lived undercover, trained resistance fighters and conducted guerrilla operations when necessary. Jed teams landed on predesignated drop zones, where SOE resistance fighters linked up with them. Once they linked up, the FFI would gather up the Jeds and the 40-odd air-droppable canisters that accompanied them, and moved the team and canisters to a safe location. The canisters contained weapons, ammunition, grenades and other explosives, and some other items for surviving in a hostile environment. Among the weapons airdropped was the Sten gun, a durable, compact sub-machine gun, excellent for close-quarter raids and ambushes; the Lee-Enfield Rifle, great for sniping; and the Bren light machine gun, probably the best light machine gun of its day. Once established at the safe location, the Jeds linked up with the regional FFI leader and began training the FFI fighters. Jed teams usually had a month or less to complete the FFIs’ training. The training advanced from individual marksmanship to conducting sabotage missions and squad-or platoon-sized raids. FFI fighters usually operated in groups of about 40 men for small-scale raids and ambushes, but this number would increase if the situation allowed. If time permitted, Jed teams also integrated anti-tank weapons such as U.S. bazookas or British Piats into the training. These weapons gave the FFI a boost in combat power, allowing them to effectively block roads against armored vehicles as well as attack strongpoint defenses. Team Aubrey FFI combat effectiveness required more than a month of training with a Jedburgh team. The strategic situation, however, didn’t always allow enough training time for the Jedburgh teams and their FFI fighters. For example, Team Aubrey only had two weeks to organize a force of thousands of guerrilla fighters. On Aug. 26, 1944, they fought an action for which they were unprepared. Team Aubrey landed in France in mid-August and linked up with several thousand FFI in the area immediately south of Paris. As Patton’s Third Army approached their area of operations, Team Aubrey prepared to conduct an ambush against the retreating German columns. Twenty FFI vehicles loaded with guerrilla fighters drove from the Paris suburbs to where Team Aubrey wanted to establish the ambush. Most of these fighters had little training with the team. However, the sunken road between a forest and a swamp they selected as their ambush position was excellent. It was the perfect place to destroy a column of German trucks. Unfortunately, it was armored vehicles, not trucks, headed toward Team Aubrey. The team had four Piat anti-tank weapons, but only the members of Team Aubrey, not the FFI, knew how to fire them due to lack of training time.5 A German armored vehicle appeared while the FFI fighters dismounted their trucks and began firing on them. The FFI fighters scattered and later recovered to establish a fighting position in the woods. After an 80-minute firefight, two German tanks assaulted their position. When the FFI tried to use the Piat AT weapons, they held them improperly. This injured two FFI fighters, breaking one fighter’s jaw.6 With no hits on the enemy tanks and the casualties increasing by the minute, the fighters withdrew with a loss of 86 men, including CPT A. Chaigneau of Jed Team Aubrey. Liberating Brittany The first objective assigned to the Jedburghs and Patton’s newly activated Third Army was to seize the ports of Brittany. Brittany – a peninsula jutting out some 150 miles west into the Atlantic from its base in Normandy, France – was ideal terrain for unconventional warfare. It was largely rural, with small, privately owned farms and tiny villages dominating the countryside. Heavy vegetation covered large areas, which provided excellent physical cover.7 When Patton’s Third Army began its assault on the peninsula Aug. 1, 1944, Jedburgh teams had been working in Brittany for more than six weeks, building a guerrilla army of 30,000 men and women to support Patton. The Jed teams, along with a battalion of soldiers, began landing in Brittany in early June, preparing for what would be one of the largest FFI operations of the war. When the British Special Air Service joined the Jeds, Allied headquarters believed the SAS could jump-start the FFI into operation. The plan envisioned that the SAS would establish two secure bases on the Breton Peninsula, one in the north and one in the south with a Jed team assigned to each zone.8 By August, the German forces on the peninsula numbered more than 30,000. Although most armored and mechanized units had already fled the peninsula, and artillery was in limited supply, the Germans were still very capable of putting up an active defense. Their excellent AT weapons, in conjunction with the restrictive terrain, were very effective. The German plan was to delay Patton’s forces as long as possible, putting up delay-French resistance fighters in the Huelgoat region of France. 32 July-August 2011 ing actions all along the peninsula’s interior. By using blocking positions along the major roads and by destroying bridges, the Germans hoped to slow Patton’s forces long enough to establish proper defenses around the port cities. Patton would not allow the Germans to slow his advance through Brittany. He wanted to liberate Brittany quickly. Therefore, he used the FFI to a greater degree than envisaged. Patton used the FFI to support three armored spearheads as they raced for the ports, hoping to capture them before the Germans could establish a strong defense. Patton took command of all FFI forces in Brittany and immediately assigned them missions through SFHQ to support his spearheads. His northern spearhead, Task Force A, was assigned the capture of the most important series of bridges enroute to the city of Brest, the largest port in Brittany. The task force was a provisional unit made up of armored cavalry, tank destroyers and combat engineers. Very fast, but very light on infantry support, Task Force A raced quickly along the northern coast of the peninsula, bypassing pockets of resistance, to seize the important bridges as quickly as possible.9 In addition, Patton assigned Jed Team Fredrick to support Task Force A. Jed Team Fredrick’s 2,000 FFI fighters attacked German blocking positions, guarded important roads and bridges and held them until they linked up with American forces. Task Force A accomplished its mission with lightning speed, reaching Brest in only seven days. Along the route, Jed Team Fredrick’s FFI fighters ambushed enemy convoys, seized important bridges and reduced isolated pockets of resistance. One pocket consisted of 3,000 Germans, but with a few tanks and P-51 Mustangs in support, the FFI fighters forced their surrender. Patton’s middle spearhead, the 6th Armored Division, raced through the middle of the peninsula. The 6th was originally assigned an infantry division in support but would never receive it due to unexpected German resistance in Avranches. Without accompanying infantry, the 6th had to rely on local FFI for infantry support whenever its tanks hit a German blocking position in the road. When the division moved on, the FFI guarded roads and bridges and ensured that supply lines remained open.10 In Brittany, 11 Jed teams and an OSS operational group also supported the 6th Armored Division. Much like the SAS, the operational groups dropped behind enemy lines, operated in small units of about 30-40 men and conducted guerrilla warfare. Group Donald parachuted onto a bridge and secured it a day before the 6th advanced through the area. While patrolling the countryside to round up German stragglers, Group Donald found a force of 100 Germans and managed to bluff them into surrendering.11 Actions like these allowed Patton’s spearheads to speed to their objectives with little thought put to securing their flanks. The 4th Armored Division led the southern spearhead of Patton’s Brittany operation. This division faced the most aggressive German resistance of the entire operation. However, its tactical objectives put the division directly in the path of the largest FFI unit in the peninsula. The 4th, like the other two spearheads, began its attack into Brittany Aug. 1, 1944. The division moved south from Avranches, cutting across the peninsula’s base. The 4th bypassed the city of Rennes on its route south after a quick diversion east. By Aug. 5, the division was halfway across the peninsula. The city of Vannes was its objective. Upon reaching the outskirts of the city, Combat Command A (each armored division had three combat commands: CCA, CCB, CCR) linked up with SAS and FFI units. The SAS and Jed Team Fredrick established the southern SAS base next to the city. After the linking-up, the FFI quickly organized to support the assault on the city. CCA only had a few hundred armored infantry and had to rely on the FFI for the bulk of the infantry support, like the other spearheads in Brittany were doing. The FFI advanced and seized the airport and the high ground north of the city with 5,000 men. With CCA tanks in support and thousands of FFI moving into the city, the Germans quickly retreated. The next day, the FFI reported to CCA 4th Armored Division that the Germans had established two strong blocking positions not far from the city.12 The German blocking positions consisted of AT weapons and several hundred infantry. Receiving forewarning about the enemy’s blocking positions denied the Germans the surprise advantage they desperately needed to stop the CCA’s tanks. Consequently, CCA destroyed German positions without much loss. CCA pushed on to its main objective, the port city of Lorient 30 miles further west. En route, the FFI safely guided the CCA 4th Armored Division through minefields. When CCA came to a downed bridge, the local FFI led them to a smaller bridge not shown on the American 1:100,000 maps.13 Commanders at all levels in Patton’s command gained confidence in the FFI from the Brittany operation. Their courageous, daring actions led to seizing important bridges, ambushing German convoys and destroying German dumps. Their brilliant tactical collaboration with tanks also saved countless lives. The open flank Patton knew he had to use the FFI on an even greater scale if he wanted to maintain his momentum. As Third Army was about to attack eastward, its southern flank rested along the River Loire. Patton believed he could protect that flank without having to keep his tanks back. He used the FFI and the air force to protect the river line. Patton needed his armored units to form the spearheads, which were key to his strategy of speed. Patton directed the FFI to protect the Army’s right flank as it advanced east along the Loire.14 Patton again formed spearheads, but this time he raced for the Rhine. Jed Team George had left Vannes weeks before Patton’s assault began there Aug. 1, 1944; the team felt its mission was complete and left the SAS to lead the guerrillas of southern Brittany. Team George moved to the Loire River basin in early French resistance fighters working with American paratroopers in Normandy, France, June and July 1944. (U.S. Army Signal Corps photo) July-August 2011 33

July. By early August, 6,500 FFI fighters had formed battalions and were standing by waiting for arms. Third Army’s operations officer briefed the Team George commander and local FFI commander Aug. 6 that the FFI was to support Third Army’s attack east by protecting certain bridges along the route of advance; if the bridges were blown, the FFI was charged with finding alternate routes for Third Army’s tanks. The FFI also protected the supply lines, provided scouts and guides to the armored spearheads, and mopped up bypassed German resistance.15 Third Army helped Team George procure weapons and provided captured enemy weapons such as mortars and heavy machine guns.16 The partnership of Patton’s Third Army with the resistance fighters of the Loire proved even more successful than in the Brittany operation. “To an army on the advance, there is all the difference in the world being able to roll through a town after smashing a single road block and having to stop to hunt out the half a hundred enemy who can fight you house-to-house with automatic weapons, and who will swarm in on your supply trains if you bypass them,” said CPT Ralph Ingersoll in 1944. “From St. Lo to the German border, we never had to worry about a town in our rear. Let one American vehicle appear even in a sizable city, and its inhabitants would have the German garrison dead or disarmed a few hours later. … Every scout car making an advanced reconnaissance was not one pair of eyes but a score. ‘There a thousand Germans in those woods’ [the inhabitants would tell us, or] ‘Beyond that hill around that turn is a tank trap.’ … The effect [this had] on morale [for] an army advancing is imponderable.”17 An estimate of more than 100,000 FFI fighters supported Patton by protecting his southern flank along the Loire. The FFI provided everything from scouts to light infantry in support of Patton’s armored spearheads. The teamwork between American tanks and French guerrillas proved unstoppable to the German army in the west. Nothing would stop Patton’s Third Army until its gasoline ration was cut to support the British-run Operation Market Garden, forcing the Third to hold its advance. Lessons for the battlefield today Today, and in the future, our Army faces enemies who, doctrinally, will not fight along conventional means. They use guerrilla fighters in cities, villages and restric-AT – anti-tank CCA – combat command A FFI – French Forces of the Interior OSS – Office of Strategic Services SAS – special air service SFHQ – special forces headquarters SOE – special operations executive tive terrain to bog down our mechanized forces. Then, while our tanks and mechanized infantry fight rocket-propelled grenade teams through city streets, they attack our uncovered soft targets – supply convoys, depots, communication nodes, etc. – with their own smaller conventional forces. Our potential enemies of tomorrow may fight very similarly to the Germans in the late summer of 1944. Fighting without air support, and little to no armor, the Germans tried to stem the tide by using strongpoint defenses, employing the terrain to decrease the mechanized forces’ combat effectiveness. The Germans saved their meager armored units for the right moment to strike, hoping to hit a vulnerable position in the American lines. It was in this situation where the French guerrilla fighter made his or her greatest contribution. The FFI fighters knew the terrain and directed American tanks around obstacles, and if the Germans laid ambush, the FFI gave the Germans a surprise. One only has to look at the battle for Paris to understand that it was simply impossible for the Germans to carry on a guerrilla-type action even in one the biggest cities of the world (naturally due to the FFI). Of course, our potential enemies will be fighting on home ground, but that doesn’t necessarily forfeit the possibility of friendly guerrilla fighters supporting U.S. combat operations. The people of those countries only need the opportunity to rebel. They need the same training, weapons and support the Jedburgh teams gave the French people in 1944. Although our Special Forces are completing these missions, they need to be larger and coordinated with conventional units by the ground commanders of those units. If our brigade and division commanders came to the battlefield with the same daring concept in mind that Patton had for the FFI, we will accomplish great things in future campaigns. CPT Michael Ibrahim is a student in the Military Intelligence Career Course, Company A, 304th Military Intelligence Battalion. He has served in various positions in the United States and Iraq, including intelligence adviser on the Iraq Border Transition Team in 2009-10; squadron S-2, 1st Battalion, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, Fort Irwin, CA; and assistant regimental S-2, 11th ACR, Fort Irwin. His military schooling includes commissioning via Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech)’s ROTC and the Military Intelligence Basic Officers Course. He holds a bachelor’s of arts de-Acronym Quick-Scan gree from Virginia Tech and a master’s of arts from American Military University. Notes 1Blumeson, Martin. The Patton Papers. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974. Page 2:539. 2Zaloga, Steven J. Operation Cobra

1944. Oxford, United Kingdom: Osprey Publishing, 2001. Page 65. 3Crowdy, Terry. French Resistance Fighter. Oxford, United Kingdom: Osprey Publishing, 2007. Page 13. 4Ibid. Page 53. 5Lewis, S. J. Jedburgh Team Operations in Support of the 12th Army Group August 1944. Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute, 1991. Page 24. 6OSS London. Covert Warfare OSS Jedburgh Teams II. London: Garland Publishing, 1989. Page 777. 7Kehoe, Robert. 1944: an Allied Team with the French Resistance. https:// www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/winter98_99/art03.html, accessed Oct. 7, 2010. 8Kehoe. 9Irwin, Will. Jedburghs: The Secret History of Allied Special Forces France

1944. New York: Army Public Affairs,

2005. Page 117. 10Ibid. 11Hogan, David W. Jr. U.S. Army Special Operations in World War II. Washington, DC: Center of Military History, Department of the Army, 1992. Page 55. 12Fox, Don M. Patton’s Vanguard: The United States Army Fourth Armored Division. Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, Incorporated, Publishers, 2003. Page 67. 13Ibid. Pages 71-72. 14Irwin, Page 128. 15Ibid. 16Ibid. Page 129. 17Crowdy. Page 63. 34 July-August 2011