Canada Ping!
Posted on 08/19/2012 8:15:22 AM PDT by Squawk 8888
Date: Aug. 19, 1942 Time: 5 a.m. Location: A stone beach on the northern coast of France.
Operation: More than 6,000 Allied forces infantrymen attempt to penetrate a German stronghold.
Outcome: Unmitigated disaster. Less than six hours later, 60 per cent of the infantrymen were dead, injured and/or captured; 907 Canadians died.
Why the Allied forces allowed the poorly planned Dieppe Raid to move forward has been a mystery for decades - until now. Montreal historian David O'Keefe has solved the mystery and, in the process, has rewritten a defining moment in military history.
O'Keefe, a military historian by profession, is featured in the History Television documentary Dieppe Uncovered, which airs Sunday - the 70th anniversary of the disastrous raid. The documentary is produced, directed, written, edited and shot by History Television veteran Wayne Abbott.
It took O'Keefe 15 years to piece together what actually was intended to happen in the wee hours of Aug. 19, 1942. It is the stuff of spy novels.
(Excerpt) Read more at edmontonjournal.com ...
Canada Ping!
It is good to know that the Dieppe Raid was for a good cause.
Canadian troops have been underappreciated for their contributions to many wars.
Interesting story. Thanks for posting.
Canada was in The War? I thought it was just The U.S. vs Germany and Japan, except in Africa where the British were running around in short pants.
Is “History TV” the same as the “History Channel?” Wondering if we will be able to access the program...
Canadian troops were respected in both wars for being the greatest shock troops the allies had. Presumably, this is why they were chosen to conduct the raid. If the Canadians couldn’t make a success of it, nobody could have done...
No, History Television is a Canadian cable channel not affiliated with the History Channel. The good news is that most of their programs are available online at the Global TV website starting the day after the broadcast. If this one is posted I’ll ping you with the link.
(( ping ))
The Dieppe Raid raid took place August 19,1942, so I suppose the “news” of the raid will shortly be forthcoming in your NYT-70 series.
I always understood the purpose of the Dieppe Raid was to steal some German Radar equipment and that this was accomplished. Churchill also wanted to use the Raid to serve as an example to the USA of what a possible invasion of Western Europe would look like.
I don't get it. So if they were able to steal the code books and the code machine, the Germans would know it and change both.
Oh, there it is on page 6.
Thanks for the heads up.
Thank you for posting! Going to check out the Global website to see if they make the program available.
I don’t recall the book, but I recall reading this revelation 25 years ago, about the time an amount of classified WWII info was released. At this time, it became known that the first computers were built to decrypt bits of the Enigma code that the captured machines couldn’t fully decrypt, rather than solving naval gunnery computations, which was the cover story.
The Polish underground also delivered an Enigma machine to Britain, but I don’t recall if that happened before or after Dieppe. And one came off a captured U-Boat at one point during the war.
The trick was to get the book with the daily wheel settings for the machine. Knowing how the machines worked was a help, but without the daily settings book, the final job was left to the big, hot, clacking vacuum tube computers at Bletchley Park.
I’ll repost this part , about the radar at Freya.
When Hawkins caught up with Nissenthall, he told him that he, Hawkins, would be commanding the ten-man unit assigned to help Nissenthall steal the secrets of Freya, a German radar station near Pourville, just east of Dieppe. Neither man mentioned it, but both knew that an order unique in the annals of the Canadian military now rested on Hawkins’ shoulders. Nissenthall was not a Canadian soldier. He was, in fact, a twenty-two-year-old British Royal Air Force officer with top secret knowledge of the radar system that had stymied the Germans during the London Blitz. Hawkins’ job was to get Nissenthall, known to the Canadians of the South Saskatchewan Regiment as Spook, out of France. If for any reason Hawkins could not do so, he was instructed to kill him.”
http://walrusmagazine.com/articles/2012.09-history-deconstructing-dieppe
Thanks for the clarification, and possible link! Sounds very interesting!
The “History Channel” wouldn’t be interested in this kind of documentary, which completely ignores the space alien involvement in the Dieppe Raid.
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