Winston's War_ Churchill, 1940-1945 - Max Hastings [211]
Maj. Earl Jellicoe, son of the World War I admiral, led the SBS with notable courage and exuberance. On the night of September 9, Jellicoe, abruptly plucked from the fleshpots of Beirut, was parachuted onto Rhodes with a wireless operator and an Italian-speaking Polish officer, who served under the nom de guerre of “Major Dolbey” and had never jumped before. Dolbey broke his leg on landing. Jellicoe, finding himself under fire as soon as he hit the ground, felt obliged to swallow the letter which he carried from Gen. Maitland Wilson to the Italian governor, Adm. Inigo Campioni. When the shooting stopped, however, Italian soldiers transported the British party to Campioni’s quarters. There, with Dolbey interpreting amid acute pain from his shattered leg, Jellicoe set about persuading the governor to throw in his lot with the Allies.
At first, Campioni seemed enthusiastic. But when he learned that the British could hope to land only a few hundred men on Rhodes, while strong German forces were on the spot, his zeal ebbed. He was still prevaricating about active, as distinct from token, belligerence when the six-thousand men of the German assault division on Rhodes staged their own coup, overran the whole island and made prisoner its thirty-five-thousand-man Italian garrison. Jellicoe and Dolbey were fortunate that Campioni allowed them to sail away and avoid capture. Gen. Maitland Wilson wrote later that the admiral’s spirit “was clearly affected by the delay779 and by the fact that the Germans were there while we were not.” The unfortunate Italian had the worst of all worlds. Having disappointed the British, he was later shot by the Germans.
Possession of Rhodes and its excellent airfields enabled Hitler’s forces to dominate the Aegean. The only prudent course for the British was now to recognise that their gambit had failed, and to forsake their ambitions. Far from doing this, however, they set about reinforcing failure. If they could seize other nearby islands, they reasoned, these might provide stepping stones for an October landing on Rhodes, to reverse the verdict of September 11. This was a reckless decision, for which immediate blame lay with Maitland Wilson, but ultimate responsibility was Churchill’s, who dispatched a stream of signals urging him on. Not only did the British lack strong forces to fight in the Dodecanese, but an opposed assault on Rhodes would have required a bloodbath, in pursuit of the most marginal strategic objective. The Times of September 18 reported the launching of operations in the Dodecanese, and commented: “Presumably the Germans will try to oust the allies by landing parachutists, but it is hoped … that the allied forces will be sufficient to thwart the German efforts. Thus the situation in the Aegean becomes pregnant with possibilities.”
These were not, however, to the advantage of the British. What followed in September and October 1943 was a debacle, punctuated by piratical exploits and dramas, each one of which was worthy to become a movie epic. Patrols of the Long Range Desert Group, deprived of sands on which to fight since the North African campaign ended, began descending on the Dodecanese by landing craft, plane, naval launch, caique, canoe and boats of the superbly named Raiding Forces’ Levant Schooner Flotilla. A company of the Parachute Regiment was flown into Kos by Dakota transports. Men of Jellicoe’s SBS reached Kastellorizo in two launches, and thereafter deployed to other islands. Companies of the 234th Brigade, the only available British