The Art of Manliness - #645： The Forgotten Story of the Lumberjack Commandos of WWII

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast today it's hard

00:00:11.720 to go very long without hearing about special operations forces like the army's green berets

00:00:15.840 and the navy's seal teams before special operators became an ingrained part of the military strategy

00:00:20.940 and established a prominent presence of the public eye they existed as experimental now largely

00:00:25.460 forgotten units that were launched during the second world war one of the primary predecessors

00:00:29.600 of today's commandos was the first special service force which was known simply as the force

00:00:34.060 and is described in a book by the same name by military historian saul david today on the show

00:00:38.400 saul explains how he came across this little-known story of the force and traces its origins to an

00:00:43.000 idea formulated by an eccentric british civilian scientist and championed by winston churchill

00:00:47.740 which envisioned a unit that could accompany a fleet of snow tanks into enemy territory saul details how

00:00:53.140 the force was composed of men from both america and canada how members were recruited from the rough

00:00:57.620 and ready ranks of explorers miners lumberjacks and hunters who were physically strong and used

00:01:02.220 to cold temperatures and rugged terrain and he also talks about the rigorous training that turned

00:01:06.020 these recruits into what was arguably the military's fittest and best disciplined fighting force a unit

00:01:10.660 which became known as the devil's brigade we turn to the action these elite commandos saw during the

00:01:15.140 war which included scaling the sheer cliffs and mountain to secure a nazi stronghold and we enter a 0.70

00:01:19.420 conversation with why the unit was disbanded before the war was even over and how its legacy continues to

00:01:24.200 live on in the special forces of today after the show is over check out our show notes at aom.is

00:01:29.360 slash the force

00:01:30.460 all right saul david welcome to the show thank you very nice to be here so you got a book out called

00:01:45.640 the force the legendary special ops unit in world war ii's mission impossible and it's about this

00:01:51.400 military unit that was combined american and canadian troops and they were basically sort of

00:01:56.940 the precursor green berets navy seals and i never heard of the story and i'm sure a lot of people

00:02:02.540 haven't heard about this story how did you come across the story of the force well believe it or not

00:02:07.520 brett given that i'm a military historian and i've studied a lot of stories of this type i hadn't heard

00:02:12.880 about it either and that that really sums up how it's sort of slipped between the cracks of history a

00:02:17.180 little bit i was uh you know as i've already pointed out i've written about war from the romans

00:02:23.920 onwards but one thing that doesn't change in military history is the the basic principles of

00:02:29.180 war the the methods change but the way you fight wars don't and so i felt at liberty to range long

00:02:36.160 and wide but i hadn't really written much on the second world war since my first couple of books and

00:02:41.820 there are another 10 or 10 or 12 in between so i was very keen to find a second world war story i was

00:02:47.260 keen to find a story that would allow me to concentrate on a relatively small group of people

00:02:51.140 and i was also keen to find a story if possible that that you know had a certain amount of daring

00:02:56.900 doing it behind the lines sort of stuff elite soldiers so putting all those things together i did

00:03:02.900 a quick search basically an online search believe it or not to find that sort of force and i came up

00:03:09.100 very quickly with these entries to the first special service force which i'd never heard of before

00:03:14.520 uh it talked about the nature of the force where it had fought and i i was intrigued i was i was

00:03:21.040 fascinated and i was also surprised i hadn't heard about it and if i hadn't heard about it brett i knew an

00:03:26.380 awful lot of other people wouldn't have done to understand the the origins of the force we have to

00:03:31.120 look at the the high level strategic thinking that roosevelt churchill and the other military's

00:03:36.720 leaders involved in the war in europe were thinking so what was the strategic thinking

00:03:41.600 high level strategic thinking that eventually led to the creation of the force well the the time is

00:03:47.640 important the the context of the date we're talking about the spring of 1942 where pretty much everything

00:03:52.920 that could have gone wrong had gone wrong certainly for the british up until this point in the war and

00:03:58.500 also for the americans they'd come in after pearl harbor in december 1941 and really had been pushed back

00:04:04.160 all the way through the pacific it was a litany of disaster really and so that when the americans

00:04:09.800 came over to britain to discuss strategy in april 1942 all sides were looking for a way to strike back

00:04:17.880 but particularly churchill and the british mainly because resources were always difficult to get hold

00:04:23.800 of and they were looking for a way to create a force that could actually do a lot more damage in terms of

00:04:29.580 its size and therefore its cost than you would normally get in a military scenario and in part

00:04:35.420 of the strategy they were thinking that one thing that one one of the fronts they could open up was

00:04:40.260 in norway what were they thinking why norway yeah they're looking for strategic targets they're looking

00:04:46.860 for targets particularly that were in snowy areas and mountainous areas and the reason for that is

00:04:52.880 because those areas particularly when in in winter time military operations operations can't take

00:04:59.560 place but there were strategic targets in those locations both in the carpathian mountains in

00:05:05.040 romania one of the areas they were looking at where you had a lot of oil fields that the axis powers were

00:05:09.940 using but but crucially in norway there was hydroelectric power and there was also although they didn't

00:05:15.460 know it at the time the development of hard water which would be used for nuclear weapons so there's

00:05:20.120 very much a sense that they could really disable that that hydroelectric effort that the germans were 0.89

00:05:26.000 really moving into you know into top gear with by using a force in norway that would fight behind

00:05:32.420 the lines and that would be able to fight in winter warfare so yeah they thought okay winter warfare so

00:05:37.500 they had to develop a winter warfare unit because at the time both the british and the americans didn't

00:05:43.120 really they weren't they didn't have units that were trained just for mountaineering or training the in winter

00:05:48.060 conditions and so they had this idea or someone had this idea it was actually this guy jeffrey pike

00:05:54.040 who had this idea of creating sort of like a snow tank basically and that you would train these forces

00:05:59.960 that would be able to work with these snow tanks and it got called this whole idea got called project

00:06:04.980 plow can you walk us through project plow and this guy jeffrey pike who came up with the idea

00:06:10.200 i mean pike is one of the great characters of the second world war and although interestingly enough 1.00

00:06:15.640 from from the british perspective he wasn't alone there were quite a few of these odd eccentric

00:06:19.760 characters who really made a vital contribution to the war effort pike himself actually wasn't even a 0.98

00:06:26.460 scientist the british and churchill in particular were very keen to use scientists to you know to

00:06:31.100 develop ways to fight warfare develop ways to get one over the enemy but pike wasn't a scientist he

00:06:37.360 certainly wasn't scientifically trained he's actually originally an educationalist but also a civilian

00:06:42.740 inventor and he came out with all kinds of nutty ideas throughout the second world war now this was

00:06:49.440 probably one of his least nutty ideas he thought that if you could create this elite force this

00:06:55.020 commando force that could fight in winter warfare the other really key element of it being able to strike

00:07:00.140 hard and fast and then be able to get away was by creating a snow vehicle as you as you point out a snow

00:07:06.040 plow as it was known i mean that was its code name what you're really talking about is creating a

00:07:10.720 tracked vehicle that can move anywhere on snow particularly up and down quite steep gradients

00:07:15.040 and pike reckoned that if a force was equipped with this vehicle it could get away from the enemy

00:07:20.080 really it could strike hard and then get away so that was the plan you create the force you develop

00:07:24.720 the vehicle and you've got something that you can use against strategic targets well we got to talk

00:07:29.960 about more about pike's of his crazy inventions because one of them that almost like churchill really

00:07:33.900 liked this idea but it never came to fruition like he came with this thing called uh

00:07:37.480 pikerete was basically it made ice like almost like concrete and he had this idea of creating 0.99

00:07:43.620 aircraft carriers out of this stuff you couldn't make it up i mean his idea was you're gonna you're

00:07:48.460 gonna drag icebergs from the arctic you're gonna tow them to the theater of war you're gonna coat them

00:07:54.360 in this pikerete which was a sort of combination of of snow ice and wood pulp and you know various other

00:08:00.600 things which he had patented and presumably was going to make a lot of money out of if they'd actually

00:08:05.300 use this and of course it's called pikerete after him it all sounds completely nutty doesn't it but 0.84

00:08:10.140 actually it was taken very seriously to the extent that mount baton who was a great supporter of

00:08:16.140 jeffrey pike mount baton being the chief of combined operations which was really the force set up to

00:08:21.080 strike back at the germans using commandos in the early stages of the war mount baton was convinced 0.87

00:08:27.500 that pikerete would work and he was given permission by churchill to demonstrate it at a meeting 1.00

00:08:32.620 of the chiefs of staff and the president roosevelt and prime minister churchill which and this is

00:08:38.920 really hard to believe but it actually happens mount baton fires a pistol into the pikerete to so 1.00

00:08:44.760 show how strong it is this was of course incredibly dangerous in a closed room the bullet ricocheted off

00:08:50.080 the pikerete and almost hit one of the chiefs of staff so it almost ended in disaster but you know it was 1.00

00:08:55.120 taken very seriously it was almost used but they decided not to use it in the end for two reasons

00:09:00.460 really one they had enough aircraft carriers and two they were going to use these harbors which of

00:09:05.860 course they did eventually the mulberry harbors off the d-day normandy coast so you said that he

00:09:10.920 wasn't really a trained scientist he's more of like a gentleman scholar type guy but how did why did

00:09:16.700 people like why did people in the british leadership take him seriously well i think it all comes down to

00:09:22.340 well two things actually brett i mean it's partly the british character we these eccentric people who are

00:09:28.240 amateur inventors or gentleman inventors as you say there's been a long history of that in fact

00:09:33.420 you know a lot of the great breakthroughs in british science were actually made by people who

00:09:37.160 weren't trained scientists but there's another thing here and that and that's churchill churchill had a

00:09:42.600 great interest in quirky ideas you know he thought outside the box himself and he was always looking

00:09:48.740 for people who could approach a traditional problem from a different angle and pike was very much this sort 1.00

00:09:55.540 of character how can we disable an enormous number of the enemy certainly the enemy troops the enemy

00:10:01.640 war effort with a relatively small force and that's exactly what pike was offering him all right so they 1.00

00:10:07.620 the british with pike got this idea we're going to create a snow vehicle and it basically looked like

00:10:12.200 a spiral like cylinder thing that sort of just moved and it just went through the that was the idea it

00:10:18.180 went through the snow they had to take this to the americans what did the americans think of project plow

00:10:23.620 well it's interesting because i think my belief is that when this crucial meeting took place in april

00:10:30.960 1942 when the idea of project plow was first mooted to the americans churchill was already on board mount

00:10:37.120 baton was already on board there was a big discussion about strategy the british seemed to have moved

00:10:42.480 towards the american direction in terms of overall war strategy and i think that the acceptance of

00:10:49.220 project plow was a bit of a quid pro quo actually it was like okay you've given us something we'll take

00:10:54.040 this nutty idea on board and we'll see where we'll see where it goes they didn't promise anything

00:10:58.800 at this stage but marshall uh effectively said we'll we'll have a look at it you know we'll we'll make

00:11:03.520 sure some senior people in the war department have a look at it and we'll see where it goes and

00:11:06.900 and if it's viable we will fund it and i think that's the key thing here the british simply didn't

00:11:13.500 have the resources either to pay for and create and train this force and more importantly to

00:11:19.560 actually develop the snow vehicle all right so marshall took the idea and i think he passed it on

00:11:24.100 to eisenhower and said hey you take a look at this eisenhower then delegated this thing to a guy named

00:11:29.860 bob frederick and bob frederick he basically just did this report analysis is this feasible will it do

00:11:34.960 anything etc etc what was frederick's initial analysis on this well given the fact that frederick

00:11:41.560 becomes the father of the first special service force and i hope i'm not giving the game away too

00:11:45.840 much by saying that it's pretty remarkable that his initial appraisal having spoken to all the key

00:11:51.340 people and looked at an awful lot of documents was it'll never work i mean i think one of his main

00:11:56.900 concerns was yeah you need an awful lot of air assets to to transport this force and you'll never

00:12:04.200 be able to get these in in wartime when you know big planes are required for bombing runs basically um

00:12:10.660 but he you know he he was skeptical about other elements of the plan and so submitted his report

00:12:15.980 to eisenhower who was one of the operations chiefs chiefs at the war department at that time and

00:12:21.460 eisenhower was infuriated when he got back from a trip to britain when he received this report because

00:12:26.040 basically he'd promised the brits that he would he would get it done and so for frederick to say it

00:12:31.460 can't be done he didn't want to hear that he goes back to frederick and you know and he says you know

00:12:36.240 look at this again now it's at this point when frederick probably realizes okay there are some

00:12:42.100 you know seriously high level people backing this that he began in my view to see the possibility

00:12:48.260 of his own involvement his own personal ambition i mean what could be more brilliant for someone who's

00:12:54.360 really a staff officer who's unlikely ever to see combat in the second world war actually creating

00:12:59.460 and leading this type of special force in combat i you know i'm convinced that something clicked in

00:13:05.720 his head and he he saw the opportunity and at that point he maneuvered himself into the position of

00:13:10.780 actually taking command of it yeah he made a big jump in rank and he was a young guy too he was like

00:13:15.060 only 32 or so yeah he's he's mid-30s he you know he's someone who is done reasonably well in his

00:13:22.300 career he's no question he was a fine staff officer but fine staff officers rarely make good combat

00:13:27.700 leaders but he he certainly had you know this x factor that allowed him you know both to inspire

00:13:34.700 men but also great attention to detail and that is exactly what was required in creating this force he

00:13:39.760 he had to be able to inspire the young recruits particularly given the training regime they were

00:13:44.560 about to undergo but he also had to keep keep abreast of enormous amount of detail a lot of planning

00:13:50.340 meetings a lot a lot of admin to deal with as well all right so the americans signed off and i guess at

00:13:55.120 this point pike kind of went into the background he's like all right my idea is taken over my work 0.93

00:14:00.180 is done well not entirely he he does actually go over to america he wants to keep an eye particularly

00:14:05.300 on the development of the snowmobile but the americans find him you know they don't have quite

00:14:09.460 the same willingness to put up with eccentrics like pike and they found him very obstructive and 1.00

00:14:15.100 actually a combination of eyes and how frederick and one or two others managed to get pike sent back to 0.97

00:14:20.720 the uk look we'll we'll carry on with the project but we don't need him interfering so that so that's

00:14:25.580 pretty much what happens to pike but nevertheless you know his original idea was beginning to fly

00:14:31.560 by the summer of 1942 they launched the force that that is they start looking for recruits and they're

00:14:37.980 also well into the development of the snowmobile well let's talk about the launch of the the force

00:14:43.000 this is a unique unit because they decided it was going to be combined american and canadians

00:14:47.860 unit why did the british and americans decide to do that it's an amazing fact when you think about

00:14:53.680 it first time it's ever happened in history probably brett the last time it ever will happen in history

00:14:58.600 that you have this joint u.s canadian force commanded by officers from both sides you know the leader

00:15:05.840 ultimately was going to be frederick but it was you know it was very much a force with with equal

00:15:10.240 input from both these armies and there was one very good reason for that actually and that was that

00:15:15.260 they needed to recruit people who would be suitable for this type of winter warfare and and there was a

00:15:21.580 feeling that you know canadians they live in this sort of climate anyway they're obviously ideal i think

00:15:26.980 there was also an element of this is still allowing a kind of british uh connection to the story i mean

00:15:32.220 bear in mind that the canada at that time still had the union jack as its flag of course you still had

00:15:37.420 the royal connection and so i it was probably a little bit of a sop to churchill on the one hand and a

00:15:42.600 feeling that we're going to get some damn good recruits from canada as well yeah we'll talk about

00:15:47.240 some of the people that both countries recruited from but what another interesting fact about the

00:15:51.020 the force is that it wasn't under any branch of the military in the united states it wasn't like

00:15:57.120 part of the army or navy it was actually just part of the war department well frederick was very much

00:16:02.420 of the opinion that you there was going to be all kinds of interference that traditionally there's

00:16:06.740 always been a sense brett that you know that special forces are frowned upon by by you know

00:16:12.200 the traditional elements of the military it was it was the case then and it's still the case today and

00:16:16.840 i think frederick realized this and therefore he wanted to keep the force you know with the small

00:16:21.900 as as smaller chain of command as possible basically he wanted he wanted to answer only to

00:16:28.380 the army chief of staff and that's exactly what happened at the start it was just the war department

00:16:33.920 led uh kind of operation and frederick's given complete carte blanche he's he's literally given

00:16:39.400 a document that says you know this is priority war work anything i need i get we're going to take a

00:16:44.940 quick break for your word from our sponsors and now back to the show so you mentioned that one of

00:16:52.020 the reasons they brought in canadians they wanted people who were you know used to this sort of the

00:16:56.040 climate that they thought they were going to fight in snow mountains etc and so as a consequence

00:17:00.980 they recruited heavily amongst like lumberjacks miners hunters and this also happened it seemed

00:17:06.280 like in the united states they were primarily recruiting like from like the northwest the montana

00:17:11.320 area so the same sort of climate so i mean who are the type of guys like that joined up i mean

00:17:17.340 what was this what was the pitch when you know the when frederick went out and trying to get people

00:17:22.560 to join this thing what was what was he selling them well the first thing is interesting is that

00:17:27.580 they sent the pitch to pretty much everybody so there was no unit in the u.s army and the canadian

00:17:33.060 military forces that that didn't actually receive the pitch the question is who were they going to

00:17:37.160 get and who were they going to select but but the picture was quite specific in canada they were

00:17:41.200 looking for so-called active personnel with high physical standards military trained and ideally

00:17:46.500 possessing the combined qualities of mountaineer north woodsman and skier as you as you've already

00:17:51.660 pointed out and the americans were looking for something similar they were a bit more specific

00:17:55.260 actually they wanted single men between the ages of 21 and 35 three grades of grammar school and you

00:18:01.040 know the occupations you you've already mentioned and it's true that the majority of the force did

00:18:05.860 come from those sort of backgrounds but they it wasn't entirely it wasn't exclusive and what's

00:18:10.820 interesting about the force is that there were people from all over the united states from all over

00:18:15.080 canada and there's even one guy who who actually figures quite prominently in the story a guy called

00:18:21.400 percy critchlow who's a sergeant who's a 29 year old classics teacher from the caribbean you know

00:18:27.920 this is this is a bright intellectual guy almost the opposite of what they're looking for but if you

00:18:32.460 had the right stuff and you said the right thing in interview and you appeared to be the right type

00:18:37.880 of guy you were determined enough and you were fit enough they took you on so percy was one guy that

00:18:43.300 you highlight in the book any other guys that you highlight in the book that you know kind of

00:18:47.100 epitomize the type of man who joined up with the force yeah well i mean i'll give you one example

00:18:51.960 on each side i mean on the canadian side i mean one of the most attractive figures as far as i was

00:18:56.340 concerned because again quite an unusual type to pick was a guy called captain tom mcwilliam i mean he

00:19:03.280 was 27 years old a school teacher he came from the eastern maritime province of new brunswick he wasn't

00:19:09.480 particularly tall he wasn't particularly heavy what he was was a talented athlete deceptively strong

00:19:15.180 and frankly in my view a born leader and you know it was what's so brilliant about the the the

00:19:21.060 selection process is they were able to find people like mcwilliam now that was the canadian side on

00:19:27.300 the on the american side of course you had people from uh you know as you've already pointed out the

00:19:31.520 northwest in particular but that wasn't just they were also looking for people who had experience from

00:19:37.440 that region and i think probably the you know the the best example of all someone who again figures

00:19:43.020 very prominently in the story is a man who wasn't that young in fact he was out of the age range he

00:19:47.880 was 37 years old a man called howard van owsdale who was actually half dutch and half native american

00:19:54.280 he'd been a gold prospector and trapper in in the northwest state of oregon for many years i mean

00:20:00.860 you know exactly what they're looking for but he had the added advantage of being someone who

00:20:06.340 had a great kind of sense of you know he he could track people he could he had a great sense of of

00:20:12.780 the relief of the mountainside and this would be a a talent that was going to become very useful when

00:20:18.260 they actually get to the mountains in italy and there's another thing to point out we've been

00:20:22.120 calling it the force but like that's what frederick decided he wanted to call it he called it the force

00:20:26.380 like that's what it was referred to as yeah that was its shortened version i mean he actually chose

00:20:31.160 the full name the first special service force because he thought it would mislead people i mean

00:20:35.700 he thought it was a very kind of bland name that was almost like the the entertainment troop that the

00:20:41.700 u.s army had at the time and and indeed they they were sometimes mistaken for that entertainment

00:20:46.880 troop he was trying to pull the wool over people's eyes but actually when you think about it first

00:20:50.940 special service force you know in modern terms you think yeah okay these these guys sound quite tough

00:20:56.480 to me but uh it was shortened to the force that was what they were known then and that's what they

00:21:00.760 still call themselves today all right so they they started recruiting these guys they set up a training

00:21:05.360 camp in montana and the leaders there were they were charged with basically getting these guys into

00:21:11.780 shape and but also you know making the most elite soldier possible and so they came up with this you

00:21:18.060 know one of the most rigorous advanced training programs for fighters in world war ii and this was

00:21:23.220 one of my favorite parts of the book because it was just it was like a movie montage almost i could

00:21:27.860 like imagine them doing all these different things what was their training like can you give us a bit

00:21:31.780 of uh exam some examples of that well i've looked at training for military forces through the ages and

00:21:38.560 in particular modern day special forces and i have never seen a training regime that is as tough as

00:21:44.320 this one certainly if you consider that they had to go from you know pretty much being very few of them

00:21:51.100 had actually been in combat in fact hardly any of them had been in combat so it's not as though they

00:21:54.960 were they were you know trained hard-bitten soldiers these were young men with with talent with

00:22:00.820 determination and they were thrust into a training regime that was incredibly brutal so within just

00:22:09.020 days of them arriving at the camp near helena montana they were expected to go through their

00:22:14.860 parachute training now normally that would take about six weeks they were expected to do it in in a

00:22:19.600 week i mean everything was accelerated so once they got their wings and plenty of them didn't get

00:22:24.660 their wings you know they broke their legs or they and they were immediately returned to their units if

00:22:28.660 that happened but once you got your wings after just two jumps then the real tough stuff started so

00:22:35.860 you know just to give you a sense of what they went through i'll i'll talk a little bit about the

00:22:39.720 training regime from august to october as well as parachuting they weren't they learned weapons and

00:22:45.280 demolition usage unarmed combat and small unit tactics october to november 1942 large unit tactics and

00:22:52.760 problem solving november 1942 to march 1943 skiing rock climbing adaption to cold climates and operation

00:23:00.460 and maintenance of the weasel snow vehicle that that is the snow cloud which which they developed and

00:23:06.460 from april to june 1943 amphibious landing techniques and while all of this is going on brett they're put

00:23:14.340 through the most brutal physical training program that you can imagine that included the fatigue of combat

00:23:21.520 unfavorable terrain or adverse weather it consisted chiefly of crawling rope rope climbing boxing push-ups

00:23:28.400 games doubling running i mean they did it all they and and what's interesting about this physical regime

00:23:34.640 is that you think on the one hand you need you know guys who can get through it of course they did but they

00:23:40.960 also needed thinking soldiers just like the special forces today they were looking for a combination of a

00:23:46.580 physical superman but also someone who could think outside the box it was really a brutally tough as i say

00:23:53.240 training regime and those people who came through it and plenty didn't became in my view some of the finest trained

00:23:59.760 soldiers of the second world war yeah i mean as you you're describing all the skills they learned i mean for most of

00:24:04.920 the military in the british and americans like there'd be like the airborne division that would learn how to skydive well these

00:24:10.340 guys had to learn how to skydive and then like amphibious that was for the marines well these guys

00:24:14.520 had to learn amphibious assault so they were they were doing it all they were jack of all trades they

00:24:18.880 were and and it's worth pointing out that when they were doing all these various different skills and

00:24:24.000 they were being tested on their ability in these skills they were generally off the charts that you

00:24:29.040 know a good example is during the amphibious training in the spring of 1943 of course the marines have been

00:24:34.940 through that there were records of you know getting on and off landing craft all those records were

00:24:40.360 broken by the forcemen and if you bear in mind they only had a week or two to train to break these

00:24:45.200 records you just get a sense of the sort of people that they had you know that they had created in this

00:24:50.720 force and they you know their their ability to to shoot their aggression their physical capability

00:24:57.640 their multi-skills capability was really outstanding and on a metric of of up to 100 100 of course being

00:25:06.780 the highest they were usually way off that that that scale they were they were into the 140s 150s

00:25:12.720 they had never seen soldiers like this before did the soldiers as they were training at this camp near

00:25:18.620 Helena Montana they they know what they were going to be used for exactly or were they just sort of

00:25:23.640 there and they're just whatever they had to do that day they did they didn't know for sure there

00:25:27.980 were lots of rumors they were they were occasionally working in sort of cutouts of hydroelectric dams and

00:25:34.180 and power stations so they had a they some of them had a suspicion it might be something something to do

00:25:40.180 with hydroelectric power but they were never officially told where they were going as as soldiers of course

00:25:44.920 never are right up until the last minute so there were a lot but one thing they knew for sure though

00:25:50.200 they were going behind the lines and the likelihood of them coming back from this mission were very low

00:25:55.600 so they were training the troops getting these guys ready we forgot about the plow because this is the whole

00:25:59.960 thing that kick-started it what how was the development of this uh snow vehicle going while they were training

00:26:05.560 these soldiers well it went very well actually and it went well of course because the resources were

00:26:10.560 pretty much unlimited that Studebaker was was given the job of of developing this vehicle

00:26:15.740 in in in cahoots with you know various uh technical branches of the of the American military

00:26:23.000 they were doing it with various research bodies both in the United States and Canada and Canada in particular

00:26:28.560 already had some form in this field and they came up with admittedly having to refine it through various

00:26:34.180 different modifications but they came up with something that was really really effective the so-called

00:26:39.420 weasel the m29 vehicle was developed and used in large numbers actually later on in the war and you

00:26:46.100 you find it popping up in various different campaigns but for reasons i'm sure we'll come on to in a second

00:26:50.740 it was never actually used in combat by the force even though it was developed for them okay well let's talk

00:26:57.120 about these guys are getting trained so we got to remember these are American and Canadians

00:27:00.580 and every combat unit has their own unique culture and i imagine this one developed a really unique culture

00:27:06.440 because not only the type of training they were doing but also the fact that they were soldiers

00:27:10.280 from two different countries what was the culture like in the force i mean it was fascinating when

00:27:15.160 they first came across each other whether when the recruits first arrived at helena in early august 1942

00:27:20.920 they had different uniforms they had different ways of marching they had they had different

00:27:26.520 equipment i mean you know if you think of this the learning curve that they had to go through to

00:27:32.360 become you know to create a kind of esprit de corps in this single unit was really again incredibly steep

00:27:38.600 but they were prepared to do it and it's very interesting i think you know by the by the end

00:27:43.360 certainly by the time that you know they go into combat there's a real sense of unity even though

00:27:50.480 they come from very different backgrounds does that mean there wasn't any tension between the

00:27:54.560 nationalities no it doesn't there certainly was there there were fistfights between them particularly in the

00:27:59.800 early days there was a certain amount of bad blood uh between one particular uh platoon in my view

00:28:07.040 between the the americans and the canadians you know there's a lot of fighting there's even some

00:28:11.080 firing going on during a live firing exercise that wounds one of the soldiers you know these were tough

00:28:16.780 men tough men who were you know who took no prisoners and there wasn't a feeling that particularly the

00:28:23.980 canadians felt that the americans you know were better paid which they were their their parachute pay

00:28:28.920 was higher than the canadians were getting you know and there was inevitably going to be some

00:28:33.280 uh sense of national competition but despite all of that as as the training continued slowly but surely

00:28:40.980 their their real pride was in their unit in their company and even down to their platoon and their

00:28:47.500 section as happens in all of these elite military forces so as i was reading this it reminded me of the

00:28:52.700 story of the 10th mountain division we did a podcast about them a couple months ago and the thing

00:28:58.080 with the 10th mountain division they developed sort of this reputation in the the military thanks to

00:29:03.080 some you know some pr things that they did sort of like these it's really glamorous like you had these

00:29:07.500 skiing gi's and the the force reminded me of that a bit did the force they develop a reputation 1.00

00:29:13.280 amongst other branches in the military they did and it was a reputation that that basically

00:29:19.620 other people in the army particularly people who'd seen combat didn't feel was deserved they'd heard

00:29:25.860 about this force they'd obviously heard about its training they heard about its glamorous uniform

00:29:30.080 they heard about its its its feeling that it could you know it could pretty much accomplish anything

00:29:35.620 and they weren't convinced and you know and understandably they weren't convinced because

00:29:39.640 it hadn't seen any action and it wasn't going to see any action for a while in fact i think the fact

00:29:44.180 that it doesn't see action for for quite a long time brett is one of the reasons why it was so

00:29:49.020 superbly trained i mean one of the problems you have in wartime is the speed with which soldiers

00:29:53.660 get trained and thrown into action luckily because of various delays in in finding the right target

00:29:59.440 for the force it had a good year to train properly and i you know and it was all the better for that

00:30:04.780 but certainly there was a lot of jealousy among the rest of the military and it's interesting you

00:30:08.840 mentioned the 10th mountain division because in the early days when they were thinking of how they

00:30:13.000 were going to develop the force they were thinking you know we'll match the two together we might

00:30:17.860 even equip the 10th mountain division with with weasels but that never actually happened

00:30:21.980 do you mention they have glamorous uniforms how are they different from the other uniforms

00:30:25.460 they well they they had developed this you know if you think about it it's not going to be american

00:30:31.000 it's not going to be canadian it's going to be a mixture between the two incredibly smart so that

00:30:35.180 even a private soldier basically looked like he was an officer they had this you know this very

00:30:39.860 natty lanyard which uh red white and blue lanyard that that ran through one of the soldier epaulets

00:30:45.740 and you know if you saw these guys in the street you would have thought there's an officer

00:30:50.000 and every single member of the force and there were about 1500 combat soldiers in the force

00:30:54.800 was wearing this uniform of course they didn't go into combat in that uniform but off duty that's

00:30:59.440 what they were wearing and if people saw them in the street they must have been thinking who are

00:31:02.840 these guys yeah i'm looking at a picture right now it's it's pretty sharp looking so you so one of

00:31:08.500 the issues they had the the military so they're training these guys and originally they're supposed to

00:31:12.560 go to norway but then the high command they started figuring well maybe we're not going to do that

00:31:18.260 and they had a lot of problems trying to figure out what exactly they were going to do with them

00:31:22.020 and this started becoming a problem because like a lot of the leaders were worried these guys are

00:31:25.660 going to get stale like they've trained they're ready they're raring to go but if we don't let

00:31:30.020 them get action now they might go bad so what happened why did they decide not to send them to

00:31:35.080 norway and why were they sort of in limbo for a while well the the original plan to send them to

00:31:39.900 norway was predicated on enough planes being available to fly them and the weasels to norway and drop

00:31:47.200 them in there of course there was an alternative they could have gone by sea but that was pretty

00:31:50.740 quickly rejected they felt they needed to insert them into the you know the wastelands of norway

00:31:55.900 where they wouldn't be located by the germans and the only way they could do that was by air

00:32:00.460 there were other factors involved interestingly enough the norwegians themselves weren't that keen

00:32:05.400 on these various uh industrial targets being destroyed because they felt it would affect their own

00:32:10.180 population and there were other you know secretive units like soe the special operations executive who

00:32:16.020 also carrying out similar targets who very much were feeling this you know you're muscling in on

00:32:20.800 our patch so there was a lot of opposition to using them in norway and the decision was taken

00:32:25.960 interestingly enough by the americans to you know rethink how they were going to be used if we if we

00:32:32.220 if we can't get the planes to drop them for these behind the lines targets we need to rethink how

00:32:37.520 we're going to use them and the and the idea really comes we're going to use them as elite commander

00:32:40.940 units they may still be behind the lines but when they're not going to be dropped miles behind the

00:32:46.100 lines we could possibly operate them behind the front in a much more conventional type of military

00:32:51.320 warfare and while they're figuring this out what they're going to do with them in europe they actually

00:32:55.240 one of the first missions they went on was to kiska which is alaska so they were actually trying to

00:33:00.020 fight the japanese the pacific theater and they the 10th mountain division was also at kiska how did the

00:33:05.760 the troops fare from the force how'd they do yeah they do very well at kiska actually i mean

00:33:10.100 kiska has gone down in history as a bloodless victory it was a landing that was unopposed by

00:33:14.480 the japanese because they'd bugged out a few days before but what you realize from the the actual

00:33:20.700 landings on kiska is what a brutal terrain it would have been to fight in kiska of course being one of

00:33:25.180 the aleutian islands in the pacific and you know up near alaska this this is tough terrain to fight in

00:33:30.620 and and so it proved and one of the interesting things about the the force and the job of the force was

00:33:36.520 to go in first they're both going to land first but they're also going to be used as a strike force

00:33:40.900 but by dropping them by parachute as well and what what you see with them is this incredible discipline

00:33:46.600 i mean one of the scandals well not the scandals but one of the criticisms of the of the kiska campaign

00:33:52.360 is there were a lot of friendly fire incidents a lot of people getting shot by their own side because

00:33:57.080 the troops were very jittery before they realized that the japanese weren't there and actually the

00:34:01.520 the force when were much more disciplined and there's a sense that these guys are properly under

00:34:06.860 control and also physically the you know the kind of distances they had to march and the speed with

00:34:10.860 which they did it it was all pretty impressive and it was a very good dry run to be truthful for what

00:34:16.360 they were eventually going to have to accomplish in italy all right so that's right so they went to

00:34:20.360 kiska they went to that limbo period they didn't know what they're going to do with them finally high

00:34:24.000 command decided we're going to send them to italy where in italy exactly were there was the force sent to

00:34:30.100 well the connection interestingly enough brett is eisenhower eisenhower is now the supreme commander

00:34:35.380 in the mediterranean and has been since the landings in north africa towards the end of 1942 and his

00:34:42.120 feeling is we need a force that we can use for the landings in sicily first and then and then ultimately

00:34:48.640 the landings in italy now sicily goes by without the force being used that's the summer of 1943 but by

00:34:54.740 the autumn of 1943 when the landings in italy proper have taken place there's a bit of a stalemate

00:35:00.500 and there's a stalemate in the mountains in in southern italy mainly involving the u.s fifth army

00:35:06.700 commanded by general mark clark who's one of the proteges of eisenhower and clark is demanding he hears

00:35:12.580 about this force and he asked for it specifically he's thinking they could be a big deal breaker in the

00:35:17.120 mountains that this is what they're trained for we can't get through the mountains mainly because the

00:35:21.500 germans are holding all these high mountain passes and if we can get the force to actually 1.00

00:35:26.080 strike against one of these passes you know we may be able to force our way through and so there

00:35:31.540 was one pass that they were really focused on it was la defensa what was this pass like what made

00:35:36.940 it so difficult and why was it so so an important part of the italian campaign well monte la defensa

00:35:41.960 has been a you know a stronghold since roman times hence its name i mean you know it's known as the

00:35:47.440 defendable mountain it's a sheer cliff basically and to get up it you have to scale it you can go

00:35:53.780 up the easy route which well the easy relatively easy route which was which of course was the way

00:35:58.600 you would have walked up it but that was mainly from the back of the mountain and that was the bit of

00:36:02.520 area that was controlled entirely by the germans so to get up the main bit of the mountain you either

00:36:07.880 had to go up a ramp which of course the germans were readily defending or you had to climb cliffs and 1.00

00:36:14.420 the germans were absolutely of the of the opinion quite understandably that the allies didn't have 0.93

00:36:18.920 troops who could do that just to give you a bit of sense of context where where the pass was it was

00:36:24.240 really the keystone in a defensive system known as the winter line which is a really a chain of

00:36:29.120 mountains and the monte la defensa is on the on the shoulder of a pass known as the leary valley which

00:36:37.320 the americans the american fifth army wants to advance up with its armor but it can't do that until

00:36:43.500 it's taken the two shoulders of the past so to take first monte la defensa and then the other

00:36:48.380 shoulders is going to require an extraordinary effort and various attempts have been made to do

00:36:52.620 this and they've been beaten off with heavy losses and when the force finally arrives towards the end of

00:36:58.540 november 1943 and clark is planning for the next attack you know it's like manna from heaven okay we can

00:37:07.140 use the force to take monte la defensa that was the that was the idea and how did they do it what was

00:37:11.880 the approach i mean you couldn't go around you couldn't go up the ramp so what do these guys do

00:37:15.620 well they scouted out and very quickly the scouts who include the the character i mentioned earlier

00:37:22.740 van oursdale oursdale goes on a personal scout with a major and they walk behind the lines actually it

00:37:30.480 was in the even this even the scouting mission was incredibly dangerous and they go behind the lines

00:37:34.720 and it's at that point that van oursdale notices this this sheer cliff and this cliff is on the

00:37:40.960 northern side of the of the mountain and that was well behind german lines so not only are the

00:37:46.060 germans thinking well no one's gonna no one could climb this even if they could get to it they're

00:37:50.240 also thinking well they can't get to it because the lines are you know are further the other way so

00:37:54.500 and it's van oursdale's recommendation that this is the route they take to get up the mountain

00:38:00.060 and so they just climbed it up like at this sheer cliff yeah it's you know you you the pictures of it

00:38:06.520 are really quite extraordinary it it's it's just a sheer slab of of rock 200 feet long and even to

00:38:13.560 get to that point and that's the final bit that's just before the peak even to get to that bit you've

00:38:17.820 got to climb up you know the mountain itself is a thousand meters we're just under a thousand meters

00:38:23.780 i mean we're talking three thousand feet high this is a sizable but also brutal conditions the time of

00:38:29.440 year this is december it's you know it's wet it's cold it's snowy uh you know the chances of getting

00:38:35.500 up this mountain for any normal soldier at night and it's held by some of some of you know some of

00:38:41.940 the most effective soldiers in the german army panzer grenadiers who are all veterans really you know

00:38:46.860 no one else apart from the force in my view would have even considered that it was viable to attempt

00:38:52.080 and it's in it's in the climbing of this mountain really that i think the all the different elements of

00:38:57.680 the of the force training come together to allow them to pull it off and i imagine that they were

00:39:02.380 victorious they they took the mountain in the end yeah it's really you know it's the climax to the

00:39:07.600 book it's you know i don't want to give too much away but it's it's an astonishing story really and

00:39:13.840 just getting up to the top of the mountain is one of the great military feats in my view and once

00:39:18.660 they're up there they've got to take the mountain against these crack troops and they do it because of 0.98

00:39:23.360 their training and because of their aggression and because of their determination you know all

00:39:28.040 these things come together and they capture the mountain it you know it's one of the great feats of

00:39:32.640 the second world war why it isn't better known i i honestly don't know funny enough brett there was a

00:39:37.740 film made in the 1960s so you know if you're long enough in the tooth and some of your listeners will

00:39:42.520 be they might have seen that film called the devil's brigade which which actually deals with the

00:39:46.900 capture of this mountain and talking a bit about the you know the early days for the force but

00:39:51.080 but since that film and since one or two books it's you know it's it's sort of gone disappeared

00:39:56.120 into history and i'm still slightly mystified as to why no your description of the battle was just

00:40:00.820 fantastic really engaging action-packed and that you mentioned they were called the devil's brigade

00:40:05.040 and that was from the germans like from that encounter the germans had this encounter with the

00:40:08.780 force and they basically called them devils and the name stuck yeah the force goes on to do other

00:40:13.940 extraordinary things actually at anzio they are the first troops into rome they're the first troops to

00:40:20.420 invade the south of france so just after um the d-day landings you know they're always at the

00:40:26.260 forefront of any any tough fight fighting and they go on to you know really carry out some extraordinary

00:40:32.920 achievements i in my view the the the capture of monte le defensa is still their greatest single

00:40:37.600 achievement but but as you say the germans were were frankly in awe of them and gave them a number of

00:40:43.060 nicknames one of which was the black devils which is where you get the name the devil's brigade from

00:40:47.400 and they gave them that name the black devils because during the anzio standoff i suppose you'd

00:40:53.480 call it when when the beachhead was being controlled by the germans the only bit of the beachhead that

00:40:58.700 the germans wanted to stay well away from was the bit the force were defending because they would 1.00

00:41:03.760 aggressively patrol every night they would arrive where the germans weren't expecting them they would 0.99

00:41:09.040 find dead bodies in the morning with cards on them with with a little you know symbol and that's where

00:41:14.460 they got their name because of course they'd always be blacked up when they went out on these night

00:41:17.560 operations that's why they were known as the black devils so yeah after little defense that you said

00:41:22.260 they were basically used as commandos and campaigns throughout italy what happened after the war what

00:41:26.480 happened to the force i think one of the reasons why the force isn't better known is because of its fate

00:41:31.980 towards the end of 1944 the force is actually disbanded at the beginning of december 1944 and given its

00:41:38.400 achievements in the year earlier you know it's only really been in combat for a year but it's done some

00:41:43.560 astonishing things so you might ask the question why is it why is it disbanded actually one of the

00:41:48.740 main reasons it's disbanded is because of its binational nature um the canadians simply didn't

00:41:55.420 feel they could devote the resources to you know to putting in reinforcements therefore their element of

00:42:02.080 the force was being diluted all the time and they didn't think that was acceptable there was a possibility

00:42:06.700 of continuing it just as american only but there was a feeling that that you know that that would take away

00:42:11.320 from its essential esprit de corps and so the decision was taken to disband it while the war

00:42:16.720 was still ongoing and there was another reason for this actually which is that by the end of 1944

00:42:21.400 d-day's come and gone the various allied armies are approaching or are into bits of germany and there's

00:42:29.220 a feeling that really you don't need this kind of specialized force anymore it's really about you know

00:42:33.560 using the big sledgehammer to crack a nut and not the stiletto which is what the force was

00:42:38.520 but then you know they were disbanded but did they have an influence on the respective militaries in

00:42:43.580 the in canada and the united states yes i mean i think that's the real point is that the legacy of

00:42:48.440 the force carried on in particular in the early late 1950s and early 1960s in the u.s when when the

00:42:55.720 first green beret units were being formed and they very much were formed in not just in honor but in

00:43:01.840 the in in you know with with the whole kind of sense of training and and use that the force had

00:43:07.980 been created for so you get this unbroken line albeit that the force has been disbanded at the

00:43:13.500 end of the second world war between the force and special forces today and the same goes for canadian

00:43:18.920 special forces you know they're all all these units look back on regularly attend the force reunions

00:43:24.440 which are still happening you might be surprised to hear brett there are one or two forcemen still alive

00:43:28.720 that i was able to interview and at every one of these gatherings these association gatherings

00:43:34.140 there is a member of the u.s and the canadian special forces which you underlines the bond between

00:43:39.300 them that's crazy that there's some still alive who's still alive uh well there's a man called callow

00:43:43.880 hill jack callow hill who's a canadian he's the last man alive who actually went up monte lo defensa

00:43:48.760 and he's he's in his late 90s now i interviewed him three or four years ago for the force his his his mind

00:43:54.780 was as sharp as it must have been when he actually went up the mountain uh you know really an

00:43:59.660 extraordinary guy ordinary guy came back got married worked in a tinning company in hamilton

00:44:05.000 ontario for the rest of his life you know hides his light under a bushel to be truthful very modest

00:44:10.280 guy brett and i i think most of these special forces guys that that's fairly typical that's who

00:44:15.220 they are they don't shout about what they've done but they did some extraordinary things yeah here's

00:44:19.520 the i see a picture here of uh callow hill right now good looking guy says here he joined the force

00:44:24.240 to get out from under his family and look for a bit of adventure there was they all had very

00:44:29.180 different ideas for why they were going to do it some wanted to get into combat some wanted to

00:44:33.100 venture some wanted to see the world and some as as in callow hill's case just wanted to get

00:44:37.920 get out of the you know out of their family and and to grow up a bit i mean you know he's he's 18 or

00:44:43.180 19 at the time and he wanted to experience you know life well sol this has been a great conversation

00:44:49.060 where can people go to learn more about the book in your work well you can go to my website

00:44:52.740 www.sauldavid.co.uk but also you can find my books in particular the force at most bookshops in the

00:45:00.740 us and the uk and also on most of the websites amazon and and the like all right well sol david

00:45:07.000 thanks for your time it's been a pleasure cheers brett my guest today was sol david he's the author

00:45:11.800 of the book the force the legendary special ops unit in world war ii's mission impossible it's

00:45:16.040 available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere you can find out more information about the work

00:45:19.460 at our show notes at aom.is slash the force

00:45:22.240 well that wraps up another edition of the aom podcast check out our website at artofmanliness.com

00:45:33.660 where you find our podcast archives well there's thousands of articles written over the years and

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00:46:02.240 mckay reminding you not only listen they win podcast but put what you've heard into action

00:46:14.920 is

00:46:30.500 so

The Art of Manliness - September 21, 2020

#645： The Forgotten Story of the Lumberjack Commandos of WWII

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