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By Dr Paul Winter
PART ONE
PART TWO
PART THREE
‘Mission Creep’ and the Dislocation of Expectation
The dislocation of expectation experienced by the Army and Royal Marines ‘Special Service’ Commandos regarding the intended use of their initial force model stemmed from a variety of reasons. The changing character and course of the war, together with its vicissitudes and exigencies, all conspired against their remaining a niche, specialist raiding force. In particular, the escalation and intensification of hostilities, or what would now be classified as ‘mission creep’, was instrumental in the reconfiguration and re-roling of ‘Special Service’ Commando units into conventional infantry formations.
‘Mission creep’ is defined as a ‘gradual shift in objectives during the course of a military campaign, often resulting in an unplanned long-term commitment’. Simply put, operations, campaigns and even entire wars planned to last for a limited duration of time invariably develop into much larger, complex and drawn-out affairs. Military history is littered with such examples, the most recent being Operations Telic and Herrick waged in Iraq and Afghanistan respectively.[1]
Shockingly, current UK land warfare doctrine is deafeningly silent on the issue of ‘mission creep’ at the tactical and operational levels.[2] A significant clue as to the grounds for this serious omission in current conceptual thinking can be found in Peter Paret’s introductory essay to his edited version of Carl von Clausewitz’s On War. On the issue of ‘mission creep’, Paret stated that, ‘Despite the remarkable invention of the concept of escalation, Clausewitz never sufficiently explored the various ways in which one side influences the other, particularly in the defensive’.[3] As the musings of von Clausewitz still have a powerful influence on the formulation of contemporary doctrine, it is perhaps understandable, though wholly inexcusable, that so little thought has been devoted to such a recurring theme in warfare. That said, current UK land warfare doctrine does echo Clausewitzian thinking on this matter, avowing that, ‘…the character of any given conflict does not remain constant; as a contest of wills, conflicts change over their duration. Adversaries constantly adapt their tactics and strategies to gain advantage’,[4] leading inevitably to an escalation and widening of hostilities.
Unsurprisingly, wartime Commandos were especially vulnerable to ‘mission creep’, for Dewing’s 1940 force design stipulated that they were to fight in light order only; be ‘provided with no more than they could themselves carry and use’;[5] and were not to remain on field operations for more than 24 hours.[6] Later extended to a period of forty-eight hours, Commando operations were, nevertheless, feasible only ‘as long as the role of the Commandos was strictly confined to raiding’,[7] for beyond these means and stipulated time limits the likelihood of operational success for Commando forces greatly diminished. This lesson was not lost on the post-war Royal Marines Commandos, whose amphibious warfare doctrine asserted that, ‘A light amphibious force lacks the punch to sustain a prolonged effort against a defence which has been allowed to harden, and once this has occurred the operation may drag on indefinitely’.[8] As the historiography of the wartime Commandos testifies, this scenario transpired repeatedly during operations in Tunisia, Sicily, Italy and N.W. Europe.
Notably, these limitations had been anticipated by Brigadier Robert Laycock, commander of the Special Service Brigade who, in April 1943, sent Mountbatten a paper entitled, ‘Role of the Special Service Brigade and Desirability of Reorganisation’. Extrapolating from the experiences of Nos. 1 and 6 Commandos during the Tunisian campaign, a theatre of operations which had obliged them to fight as conventional infantry units,[9] Laycock reminded Mountbatten that the Commandos primary role had been to conduct ‘small scale raids’, but that “‘in the new offensive stage of the war the policy of mounting small scale, seaborne raids, with the sole intention of annoying the enemy, is to be abandoned’. ‘Such raids that do take place’, he opined, ‘are likely to be on a large scale, of long duration and immediate strategic importance”’.[10]
Consequently, the ‘Special Service’ Commandos were faced with three options: (i) they could ‘either be retained in their present form for small scale raiding…’; (ii) ‘They could be disbanded…; or (iii) ‘they could be reorganised to enable them to “take the fullest part in the coming battle”, in which they could operate independently or “in conjunction with the Field Force”’.[11] In a determined move to shift ‘Special Service’ Commandos away from their specialist raiding role, and instead re-role them to carry out conventional infantry operations, Laycock urged that the third course of action be taken, a recommendation Mountbatten concurred with, and one which the War Office late approved.
Laycock was indeed farsighted, for he correctly anticipated the likely character and long duration of the fighting that would occur in Sicily and Italy. Yet prior to the launching of Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily, General Sir Bernard Paget, C-in-C Home Forces, did not believe that, ‘the Commandos would be required to take part in operations after the initial amphibious assault’[12]. Having landed on 10 July 1943, Nos. 2 and 3 Army Commandos together with Nos. 40 and 41 Royal Marine Commandos, were still fighting against their German and Italian opponents on 17 August 1943, a month and one week after their initial landings on the island,[13] vindicating Laycock and underscoring once more the hazards posed by ‘mission creep’ to specialist units whose tactical ‘ways’ and ‘means’ are too narrowly defined.
Further examples of ‘mission creep’ are to be found in Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of France, and in the subsequent battle of Normandy. Prior to leading 48 Royal Marine Commando’s assault on ‘Juno’ beach on 6 June 1944, its Commanding Officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Jim Moulton, encountered much fallacious thinking at HQ 4th Special Service Brigade as to the likely extent of Commando participation in the post-landing phase. As Moulton relates in his personal history of 48 RM Commando:
It had been announced before the assault that the Commandos would be withdrawn three or four days after the landing; for such was the intention of the higher command…I had been openly sceptical. Good infantry, I had told 48, is always in short supply in battle. If we behaved ourselves with reasonable credit…the higher command might well be reluctant to spare us, at least until the issue of the early battles had been decided. It was no good. Everyone else, the Brigadier, the other commanding officers, casual visitors from Commando Group, all talked as if our return in a few days was certain, and indeed just a condition of the employment of such superior people as the Commandos and Airborne.[14]
Moulton’s scepticism was well-founded, for once the 1st and 4th Special Service Brigades were drawn-in to the ceaseless cycle of attritional fighting that characterised the Battle of Normandy, ‘It seemed’, in the words of one historian of the Commandos, ‘that the relief originally promised for forty-eight hours [sic] after the landings would never come, and that the Special Service Brigades, their peculiar functions forgotten, would be condemned to share indefinitely the lot of the infantry of the line’.[15] In fact, the 1st Special Service Brigade was compelled to fight in the infantry role for eighty-three days without rest,[16] and only left for the UK on 7 September 1944 once the Battle of Normandy had been won.[17] The 4th Special Service Brigade, however, was not so lucky, and despite having fought for a comparable period of time, was duly ordered to stay in France and fight on under the command of British 1st Corps.[18] This they subsequently did through France, Belgium, Holland and into Germany itself under a succession of higher command formations until VE Day in May 1945.[19]
This dislocation of expectation was not just confined to the ‘Special Service’ Brigades, however. American and British airborne forces specialising in ‘advance force’ and ‘enabling’ operations, were also led to believe that their role would end soon after the completion of the assault phase and the consolidation of the beachhead. The US 82nd ‘All American’ Airborne Division was briefed before D-Day that after twelve days of combat, they would be relieved and subsequently withdrawn from the theatre of operations. Yet such was the ferocity of the subsequent fighting, that Allied commanders were obliged to use the paratroopers of the ‘All American’ Division as normal infantrymen into mid-July 1944. Consequently, the 82nd Airborne fought for thirty-three days without being relieved or reinforced suffering 46% casualties in the process.[20] The US 101st‘Screaming Eagles’ Airborne Division fared little better. Major-General Maxwell Taylor CO of the Division promised his men, ‘“Give me three days and three nights of hard fighting, and you will be relieved”’.[21] As it transpired, the 101st were not relieved until 29 June, twenty-three days after jumping into Normandy.[22]
One last example from Operation Overlord which highlights the dangers of ‘mission creep’, over-specialisation and re-roling mid-operation centres on ‘B’ and ‘D’ Companies of the 2nd Battalion, The Oxs & Bucks Light Infantry, who, as part of British 6th Airborne Division, specialised in glider-borne coup-de-main assaults. Their D-Day objectives were ‘Pegasus’ bridge over the Caen Canal and the road bridge over the River Orne. Led by Major John Howard, these specialist companies had trained hard for months so as to capture these strategically important bridges intact, consequently regarding themselves as something of a corps d’elite. Yet after successfully accomplishing their respective missions, B and D companies were unexpectedly re-roled as normal infantrymen. As Howard was later to concede in his memoirs:
I had been led to believe back in England, that the superbly trained crack-force that we had become, was to be repatriated as soon as possible to be used again to attack bridges. Instead we found ourselves fighting an old-style infantry battle, ditch to hedge, house to barn, under intense fire from an enemy that was highly-trained, motivated and armed to the teeth. We’d been cut off from the Regiment and found ourselves surrounded by the enemy, totally unprepared to fight under these conditions, just a few hours after taking the bridges.[23]
Again, such was the character of the bitter fighting on the eastern flank of the Allied beachhead, which acted as a suction-pump on manpower, that Howard’s specialist glider force was compelled to fight-on until the end of August as conventional ground troops, suffering very high casualties in the process.
The ‘Misuse’ of ‘Special Service’ Commandos
As amply demonstrated, due to the exigencies of war, ‘mission creep’, and a critical shortage of manpower, specialist Commando units were re-roled into ordinary ‘infantry of the line’ formations, so as to participate in ‘formal operations’. Ill-equipped, and lacking, as they did, the requisite manpower and logistics to maintain themselves in the frontline for protracted periods of time, Commando units were invariably obliged to operate under various higher Army commands. Subsequent re-deployments from one order of battle (ORBAT) to the next merely served to dislocate the Commandos still further from their intended purpose and specialist roles, as well as severely curtail their freedom of action. Consequently, leading authorities on the history of the Commandos have repeatedly levelled the serious charge of ‘misuse’ at senior Army officers.[24]
Yet this accusation of misemployment is not confined to historians alone. The newly-promoted Major-General Robert Laycock, Chief of Combined Operations from 1943 to 1945, was one such critic who, ‘knowing…their characteristics and capabilities…was always anxious that they should only be employed for tasks for which they were specially organized and trained to undertake’.[25]Yet as one former wartime Commando lamented, despite Laycock’s voicing of these concerns at the highest levels, ‘the commandos were often mis-employed…’[26] This ‘misuse’ was owned up to in a letter General Sir Kenneth Anderson, Commander of British 1st Army in North-West Africa, sent to Lord Mountbatten in early 1943 concerning the utilization of No. 6 Commando during the period following Operation Torch: ‘“I know I misused them…strained them to the utmost, and kept them far too long…”’, confessed Anderson, ‘[but] the Army was hard-pressed and…every single man was needed’.[27]
Moreover, the sharp deviation away from its intended specialist purpose was referred to by Lieutenant-General Charles Allfrey, Commander of British V Corps in Tunisia, in a speech he delivered to assorted Commando units prior to their departure to the UK and Algiers in early April 1943. ‘“You have done jobs normally done by parachutists, infantry and Commandos”’, he declared, continuing,‘“You have carried out raids, long range patrols, protracted periods of defence – a role for which you were not designed – and have done further [amphibious] landings.”’[28]
It is perhaps unsurprising, therefore, that the CGRM’s current intent and vision for the FCF are largely predicated on avoiding this very fate. Yet it is a widely acknowledged truth within the Corps that if the Royal Marines were to go on operations tomorrow, they would inevitably revert back to the light infantry role and, by implication, serve under a higher level Army headquarters.[29] This type of subordination, however, is utterly in keeping with the Corps’ post-war ‘norm’. Lieutenant-General Sir Steuart Pringle, one-time Commandant General, acknowledged as much when he noted, with evident pride, that ‘there is no doubt that Commando Forces can adapt to any command structure required’.[30] Yet these potential situations would be at odds with the CGRM’s ‘Commando roots’ narrative and the FCF design model, both of which are deafeningly silent on the Corps’ long-established proficiency at grafting sub-units onto higher command structures, and its renowned prowess in utilising its infantry capabilities and skill-sets in conventional war-fighting scenarios.
As already mentioned, the current CGRM’s corporate narrative draws heavily upon a hitherto unknown document entitled the ‘“Affirmation of Royal Marines Commandos”’ which, it was stated, was produced in 1952. Yet a recent trawl through the relevant files at The National Archives, Kew, has revealed that the publication in question was in fact produced in 1951, and was entitled Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos.[31] Erroneously referred to in the ‘definitive’ history of the wartime Commandos as ‘Commando Training Notes, 1953’,[32] this unique and highly-important official aide-memoire, prepared under the direction of the Chief of Amphibious Warfare and the Commandant General Royal Marines, offers its readership a comprehensive, yet detailed, assessment of amphibious Commando operations, as well as a delineation of the characteristics, skills and qualities required of a Royal Marines Commando.
Far from concentrating exclusively on the Corps’ Commando skill-sets, The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, (in stark contrast to the current FCF narrative), actually highlights the central importance of land operations and the concomitant need for first-class infantrymen. According to the handbook’s authors, a Commando must be first and foremost a ‘highly skilled infantryman’, but also, ‘an expert in his own branch of infantry work’.[33] With regards land operations in general, the manual was at pains to emphasise not only the potential range of land warfare orientated tasks, but also the flexibility, versatility and adaptability of Royal Marines Commandos in the infantry role: ‘Commandos…may be employed in: (a) ‘Operations in which the specialised training of commandos is to some extent exploited’; (b) ‘Operations in which commandos are employed purely as normal infantry’; and (c) ‘Internal security duties on peace or cold war conditions’.[34]
Despite reiterating the wartime accusation of ‘misuse’, specifically that, ‘If Commandos become deeply committed as infantry they may not be available for commando type operations when the opportunity for them arises’,[35] the handbook nevertheless insisted that, ‘Although Commandos have distinctive roles and characteristics it is neither to be expected nor desirable that they should be employed in these roles exclusively’.[36] Moreover, the Commandant General’s amphibious warfare manual for 1951 was unequivocal when it affirmed that,
It would be too much to expect that commandos should be able to pick and choose the precise degree to which they are committed. What should however be understood is that commandos neither need to be nor thrive if kept in cotton wool; but, if opportunities arise or are foreseen for their employment in their distinctive roles, or roles which approximate to them, then it is commonsense to have commandos available and ready.[37]
This view accords with that proffered by Major-General Julian Thompson, commander of 3 Commando Brigade during the Falklands conflict, who counselled that, ‘the most suitable employment for fighting men is marching towards the sound of the guns, not picking and choosing where they will fight’.[38] After all, ‘The job of the armed forces’, in the opinion of one UK defence expert, ‘is to be ready to fight war at its most feral: not the war they last fought, or the war they would like to fight, but the war they may have no choice but to fight’.[39] It is axiomatic that a first-rate military organisation should possess the flexibility, adaptability, capability and requisite force levels to handle any tactical, or operational task it is confronted with. As much is confirmed in current land warfare doctrine which stipulates that,
The fighting Power of a Service or force must be adaptable if it is to be effective on operations. A force must be balanced, able to start the operation at the appropriate time and place, able to continue for as long as is necessary, and be large enough for the task. These requirements point to readiness, deployability, and the capacity, if necessary, for endurance. The nature of the task or campaign will indicate the scale of force required, but it may be necessary to generate mass: to expand armed forces for unforeseen circumstances, as the UK did in the world wars and for the Korean War. Beyond the requirements of readiness, deployability, duration and mass, the force must be adapted to the context of each unique operation.[40]
This very much mirrors the philosophy of The Parachute Regiment whose famous motto, Utrinque Paratus, or ‘ready for anything’, captures succinctly its specific mind-set and approach to the ‘physical’, ‘conceptual’ and ‘moral’ components of its ‘fighting power’. The ‘warrior-scholar’ General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley, one-time Colonel-Commandant of the Paras, was quick to affirm that it was ‘a regiment for all seasons or it was nothing’, adding, ‘It must take on whatever task it is given and do its best at it’.[41] As an elite force with an awesome fighting reputation, The Parachute Regiment simply could not afford the luxury of pre-selecting which tactical or operational tasks it would, or would not undertake, or the self-indulgence of placing provisos on the scale of its future employment.
Having had their expectations dislocated by the changing character of the war, the Army and Royal Marines ‘Special Service’ Commandos were acutely conscious from early 1943 onwards that the realities of armed conflict do not conform to such whims. Consequently, the aim of the specialist instruction at the Commando Basic Training Centre, Achnacarry, was ‘simple and unequivocal’, namely ‘to produce an elite force of high morale, dedicated and prepared to carry out any military task asked of it’.[42] While 1951 Commando doctrine admitted that it was ‘on the one hand uneconomical to employ specially trained troops on non-specialist tasks’, it was forced to concede that on the other it was ‘even more uneconomical to keep such troops in idleness during a battle or campaign’.[43] As it is ‘patently not safe to assume’, in the opinion of one commentator on defence matters, ‘that the UK will have the luxury of choice over when and where the armed forces will next fight’,[44] the Future Commando Force’s architects may wish to reflect upon the salutary lessons offered by the experiences of the wartime Commandos, as well as those contained within the covers of The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, 1951.
© Dr Paul R.J.Winter, 2019
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1] ‘Mission creep’ is touched upon by the Chilcot Report into the 2003 Iraq War. See https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20171123123237/http://www.iraqinquiry.org.uk/
[2] See Land Operations, Land Warfare Development Centre, Army Doctrine Publication, AC 71940, 2017.
[3] Carl von Clausewitz, On War, edited and translated by Michael Howard and Peter Paret, (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1989), p. 25.
[4] Chapter 1, ‘Nature and Character of Conflict’, Land Operations, Land Warfare Development Centre, Army Doctrine Publication, AC 71940, 2017, p. 1-5.
[5] Hilary St. George Saunders, The Green Beret: The Story of the Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Michael Joseph Ltd, 1950), p. 202.
[6] James Dunning, It Had to be Tough: The Origins and Training of the Commandos in World War II, (London: Frontline Books, 2012), p. 4.
[7] Hilary St. George Saunders, The Green Beret: The Story of the Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Michael Joseph Ltd, 1950), p. 202.
[8] TNA DEFE 2/1770, ‘Part I – Operations’, in Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, Combined Operations Headquarters, Ministry of Defence, 1951, p. 12.
[9] James Dunning, It Had to be Tough: The Origins and Training of the Commandos in World War II, (London: Frontline Books, 2012), p. 82.
[10] Charles Messenger, Commandos: The Definitive History of Commando Operations in the Second World War, (London: William Collins, 2016), pp. 241-242.
[11] Ibid., p. 242.
[12] Ibid., p. 243.
[13] See James Dunning, When Shall Their Glory Fade? The Stories of the Thirty-Eight Battle Honours of the Army Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Frontline Books, 2011). pp. 116-128.
[14] J.L. Moulton, Haste To The Battle: A Marine Commando At War, (London: Cassell & Company Ltd, 1963), p. 90.
[15] Hilary St. George Saunders, The Green Beret: The Story of the Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Michael Joseph Ltd, 1950), p. 279.
[16] Brigadier John Durnford-Slater, Commando, (London: William Kimber & Co Ltd, 1953), p. 204.
[17] Charles Messenger, Commandos: The Definitive History of Commando Operations in the Second World War, (London: William Collins, 2016), p. 284.
[18] J.L. Moulton, Haste To The Battle: A Marine Commando At War, (London: Cassell & Co Ltd, 1963), p. 117.
[19] Ibid., p. 186.
[20] James M. Gavin, On To Berlin: Battles of an Airborne Commander, 1943-1946, (London: Leo Cooper Ltd, 1979), p. 120.
[21] Stephen E. Ambrose, Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler’s Eagle Nest, (London: Simon & Schuster UK Ltd, 2001), p.65.
[22] Martin Blumenson, United States Army in World War II: The European Theater of Operations: Break Out and Pursuit, (Washington, DC: Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, 1961), p. 81.
[23] John Howard & Penny Bates, The Pegasus Diaries: The Private Papers of Major John Howard, (Barnsley, South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword, 2008), p. 144.
[24] See James Dunning, When Shall Their Glory Fade? The Stories of the Thirty-Eight Battle Honours of the Army Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Frontline Books, 2011), p. 184 & Robin Neillands, By Sea and Land: The Royal Marines Commandos: A History, 1942-1982, (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1987), p. 49.
[25] James Dunning, It Had to be Tough: The Origins and Training of the Commandos in World War II, (London: Frontline Books, 2012), p. 13.
[26] Ibid.
[27] Hilary St. George Saunders, The Green Beret: The Story of the Commandos, 1940-1945, (London: Michael Joseph Ltd, 1950), p. 147.
[28] Ibid.
[29] Private conversations with serving Royal Marines officers.
[30] James D. Ladd, By Sea, By Land: The Authorised History of the Royal Marines Commandos, (London: Harper Collins Publishers, 1998), p. 343.
[31] TNA DEFE 2/1770, Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, Combined Operations Headquarters, Ministry of Defence, 1951.
[32] Charles Messenger, Commandos: The Definitive History of Commando Operations in the Second World War, (London: William Collins, 2016), p. 424n.
[33] TNA DEFE 2/1770, Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, Combined Operations Headquarters, Ministry of Defence, 1951, p.14.
[34] TNA DEFE 2/1770, ‘Part I – Operations’, in Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, Combined Operations Headquarters, Ministry of Defence, 1951, p. 12.
[35]Ibid., p. 2.
[36] Ibid., p.1.
[37] Ibid., p. 2.
[38] Julian Thompson, The Royal Marines: From Sea Soldier to a Special Force, (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 2000), pp. 251-252.
[39] Michael Ashcroft and Isabel Oakeshott, White Flag: An Examination of the UK’s Defence Capability, (London: Biteback Publishing, 2018), p. 386.
[40] Chapter 3, ‘Fighting Power’, Land Operations, Land Warfare Development Centre, Army Doctrine Publication, AC 71940, 2017, p. 3-2
[41] Interview with General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley, ‘The Paras’, Episode 7: ‘Down to Earth’, BBC 1, 1984.
[42] James Dunning, It Had to be Tough: The Origins and Training of the Commandos in World War II, (London: Frontline Books, 2012), p. 198.
[43] TNA DEFE 2/1770, ‘Part I – Operations’, in Amphibious Warfare Handbook No. 10a: The Organisation, Employment and Training of Commandos, Combined Operations Headquarters, Ministry of Defence, 1951, p. 2.
[44] Michael Ashcroft, and Isabel Oakeshott, White Flag? An Examination of the UK’s Defence Capability, (London: Biteback Publishing, 2018), p. 379.
