Special Operations Executive (SOE) - History, Locations, Operations, Agents, Communications, Equipment, Transport
An organization set up with British war cabinet approval in July 1940 in response to Churchill's directive to set Europe ablaze; it later also operated in the Far East. It promoted and co-ordinated resistance activity in enemy-occupied territory until the end of World War 2.
The Special Operations Executive (SOE), sometimes referred to as "the Baker Street Irregulars" after Sherlock Holmes's fictional group of spies, was a World War II organization initiated by Winston Churchill and Hugh Dalton in July 1940 as a mechanism for conducting warfare by means other than direct military engagement. SOE directly employed or controlled just over 13,000 people. It is estimated that, worldwide, SOE supported or supplied about a million operatives.
History
The organisation was formed out of three existing secret departments: Section D, a sub-section of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, aka MI6) commanded by Major Lawrence Grand; The propaganda section would later be broken off from SOE to form the Political Warfare Executive.
The mission of the SOE was to encourage and facilitate espionage and sabotage behind enemy lines and to serve as the core of a resistance movement in Britain itself (the Auxiliary Units) in the possible event of an Axis invasion. SOE was also known as Churchill's Secret Army and charged by him to "set Europe ablaze".
As an organisation, it was ultimately responsible to the Minister of Economic Warfare (initially Dalton, later Lord Selborne).
There was a certain amount of rivalry between SOE and SIS, which hindered cooperation. Where SIS preferred placid conditions in which it could gather intelligence and work through influential persons or authorities, SOE promised turbulent conditions and often backed anti-establishment organisations such as the Communists in several countries.
The first chief of the service to be appointed was Sir Frank Nelson, who had been formerly head of a trading firm in India, a Backbencher Conservative MP and Consul in Berne.
Hambro had been a close friend of Churchill's before the war and had received the Military Cross for his efforts in the Great War. Hambro believed that SOE should remain a separate body and not become part of the British army. He felt that this loss of control would cause a number of problems for SOE in the future. When the decision was taken by the Cabinet to coordinate SOE's activities with those of the British army against Hambro's advice, he resigned from his position.
As part of the closer ties between the General Staff and SOE, Hambro's replacement from September 1943 was the former Deputy Head of SOE, Major General Colin Gubbins. He was generally known within SOE by the title, "CD".
SOE was dissolved officially in 1946, and much of its sphere of influence reverted to MI6. (It was reported that Selborne told the Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, that SOE still possessed a world-wide network of clandestine radio networks and sympathisers. Attlee retorted that he had no wish to own a British Comintern.)
Locations
The headquarters of SOE was at 64 Baker Street.
Under the cover name ISRB (Inter Services Research Bureau) SOE set up an establishment where development of equipment for use in the secret war could be undertaken.
The initial training centre of the SOE was at Wanborough Manor, Guildford.
SOE maintained a large number of training, research and development, or administrative centres. (See List of SOE establishments.)
Operations
France
SOE's operations in France were directed by two London-based country sections.
On May 5, 1941, Georges Bégué (1911-1993) became the first SOE agent dropped in France who then set up radio communications and met the next agents parachuted into France. AMF sent 600 (although not all of these belonged to SOE).
SOE included a number of women (who were often recruited from the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry); The Valençay SOE Memorial was unveiled at Valençay in the Indre département of France on May 6, 1991, marking the fiftieth anniversary of the despatch of F Section's first agent to France. The memorial's Roll of Honour lists the names of the 91 men and 13 women members of the SOE who gave their lives for France's freedom.
See SOE F Section timeline for a list of significant events in the history of F Section. See also SOE F Section networks for details of the individual networks operated by F Section.
To support the Allied invasion of France in 1944, three-man parties were dropped into various parts of France under Operation Jedburgh, to coordinate widespread overt (as opposed to clandestine) acts of resistance.
Germany
Due to the dangers and lack of friendly population few operations were conducted in Germany itself. Austrian section of SOE was run by Lt. Col.
Netherlands
Section N of SOE ran operations in the Netherlands. They committed some of SOE's worst blunders in security, which allowed the Germans to capture many agents and much sabotage material, in what the Germans called the Englandspiel. SOE apparently ignored the absence of security checks in radio transmissions, and other warnings from Leo Marks that the Germans were running the supposed resistance networks.
Eventually, two captured agents escaped to Switzerland (in August 1943). The Germans sent messages over their controlled sets that they had gone over to the Gestapo, but SOE was at last more wary.
SOE partly recovered from this disaster to set up new networks, which continued to operate until the Netherlands were liberated at the end of the war.
Belgium
Section T established some effective networks in Belgium, but in the aftermath of the Battle of Normandy, British armoured forces overran the country in less than a week, giving the resistance little time to stage an uprising.
Italy
As both an enemy country, and supposedly a monolithic fascist state with no organised opposition which SOE could use, SOE made little effort in Italy before mid-1943 when Mussolini's government collapsed and Allied forces already occupied Sicily. SOE appears to have made no effort to recruit agents from among the many thousands of Italian Prisoners of War.
In the aftermath of the Italian collapse, SOE helped build a large resistance organisation in the cities of Northern Italy, and in the Alps.
SOE established a base at Bari in Southern Italy, from which they operated their networks and agents in the Balkans.
Yugoslavia
In the aftermath of the German invasion in 1941, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia fragmented.
Through the royalist government in exile, SOE at first supported the Chetniks. After the Teheran Conference, SOE switched its support to the Partisans. Although relations were often touchy throughout the war, it can be argued that SOE's unstinting support was a factor in Yugoslavia's maintaining a neutral stance during the Cold War.
Greece
Greece was overrun by the Axis only after a desperate defence lasting several months. In late 1942, SOE mounted its first operation into Greece as an attempt to disrupt the railway which was being used to move materials to the German Panzer Army Africa.
Unfortunately, relations between the resistance groups and the British soured. EDES received most aid from SOE, but ELAS secured many weapons when Italy collapsed and Italian military forces in Greece dissolved. ELAS and EDES fought a vicious civil war in 1943 until SOE brokered an uneasy armistice. Some SOE liaison officers in the field were executed by undisciplined ELAS groups.
Eventually, the British army occupied Athens and Piraeus in the aftermath of the German withdrawal, and fought a street-by-street battle to drive ELAS from these cities and impose an interim government under Archbishop Damaskinos. SOE's last act was to evacuate several hundred disarmed EDES fighters to Corfu, preventing their massacre by ELAS.
Albania
Albania had been under Italian influence since 1923, and was occupied by the Italian Army in 1939.
SOE's envoy to Albania, Brigadier "Trotsky" Davies, was captured by the Germans early in 1944. Other SOE officers warned that Hoxha's aim was primacy after the war, rather than fighting Germans.
Czechoslovakia
SOE sent many missions into the Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia, and later into Slovakia. In 1944 SOE sent men to support the Slovak Uprising.
Norway
In March of 1941 a group performing commando raids in Norway, Norwegian Independent Company 1 (NOR.I.C.1) was organized under leadership of Captain Martin Linge.
Denmark
The Danish Resistance was able to mount few overt actions before the end of the war. They did assist SOE in its activities in neutral Sweden. For example, SOE was able to obtain several shiploads of vital ball-bearings which had been interned in Swedish ports.
Poland
The distance involved in air travel to Poland was the chief obstacle to SOE's efforts to aid the resistance there. SOE did assist the Polish government in exile to send agents and some equipment to the Armia Krajowa. SOE had little or no contact with the pro-Communist Armia Ludowa, and the London Poles as the government in exile was known, always maintained their own counsel.
Large amounts of arms were finally sent to Poland during the doomed Warsaw Uprising, at heavy cost in aircraft.
Romania
In 1943 an SOE delegation was parachuted into Romania to instigate resistance against the Nazi occupation at "any cost."
Other Operations in Europe
Through cooperation with the Special Operations Executive and the British intelligence service, a group of Jewish volunteers from Palestine were sent on missions to several countries in Nazi-occupied Europe from 1943 to 1945.
Abyssinia
Abyssinia was the scene of some of SOE's earliest and most successful efforts. In support of the exiled Emperor Haile Selassie, SOE organised a force of Ethiopian irregulars under Orde Charles Wingate.
South-East Asia
As early as 1941, SOE was preparing plans for operations in South East Asia. As in Europe, after initial Allied military disasters, SOE built up indigenous resistance organisations and guerilla armies in enemy (Japanese) occupied territory.
Agents
A variety of people from all classes and pre-war occupations served SOE in the field.
In other cases, especially in the Balkans, a lesser degree of fluency was required as the resistance groups concerned were already in open rebellion and a clandestine existence was unnecessary.
Exiled or escaped members of the Armed Forces of some occupied countries were obvious sources of agents. In other cases (such as Frenchmen owing loyalty to Charles De Gaulle and especially the Poles), the agents' first loyalty was to their leaders or governments in exile, and they treated SOE only as a means to an end.
SOE employed many Canadians; the Canadian government routed Canadian volunteers for clandestine service to either SOE or MI9.
SOE was prepared to ignore almost any contemporary social convention in its fight against the Axis. Although some of these might have been considered a security risk, there is practically no known case of an SOE agent wholeheartedly going over to the enemy.
Communications
SOE was highly dependent upon the security of radio transmissions.
SOE's first radios were supplied by SIS. SOE acquired a few, much more suitable sets from the Poles in exile, but eventually designed and manufactured their own.
Operating procedures were insecure at first;
As with their first radio sets, SOE's first ciphers were inherited from SIS. Leo Marks, SOE's chief cryptographer, was responsible for the development of better codes to replace the insecure poem codes. Eventually, SOE settled on One-time pads, printed on silk.
Equipment
SOE was forced by circumstances to develop a wide range of equipment for clandestine use.
An agent working clandestinely in the field obviously required clothing, documents and so on which would not arouse suspicion. SOE maintained centres which specialised in producing foreign clothing and forging identity cards, ration cards etc (even to the extent of manufacturing cigarettes which would pass as the local product).
Although SOE used some assassination weapons such as the De Lisle carbine, it took the view that weapons issued to resisters should not require extensive training or care. For issue to large forces such as the Partisans in Yugoslavia, SOE used captured German or Italian weapons.
SOE developed a wide range of explosive devices for sabotage, such as limpet mines, shaped charges and time fuses.
Some of the more imaginative devices included exploding pens with enough explosive power to blast a hole in the bearer's body, exploding rats and land mines disguised as cow or elephant dung. For specialised operations or use in extreme circumstances, SOE issued small fighting knives which could be concealed in the heel of a hard leather shoe or behind a coat lapel. Given the likely fate of agents captured by the Gestapo, SOE also disguised suicide pills as coat buttons.
Transport
With the continent of Europe closed to normal travel, SOE had to rely on its own air or sea transport for movement of people, arms and equipment.
SOE controlled several "Special Duties" flights or squadrons of aircraft. There was often conflict with Bomber Command, which was invariably unwilling to make long-range aircraft available to SOE.
There were similar difficulties with the Royal Navy, which also was usually unwilling to allow SOE to use its submarines or Motor Torpedo Boats. However, SOE often used clandestine craft such as fishing boats or caiques, and eventually ran quite large fleets of these, from Algiers, the Shetland Islands (a service termed the Shetland Bus), Ceylon etc. The Secret History of SOE - Special Operations Executive 1940-1945, BPR Publications, 2000, ISBN 0-9536151-8-9 David Stafford, Secret Agent - The True Story of the Special Operations Executive (BBC Worldwide Ltd, 2000), ISBN 0-563-53734-5 Frederic Boyce & Islands Centre, Arisaig 2001) An account of SOE training around the Arisaig area. Ian Valentine, Station 43: Audley End House and SOE's Polish Section, ISBN 0-7509-4255-X, Sutton Publishing 2006
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