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Great and Bold World War II Raids

Khalid Elhassan January 3, 2025 16 min

Raid - Italian frogmen in manned torpedoes launched from submarine near Alexandria Harbor, by Ivan Berryman. World Naval Ships

8. Missteps and Mishaps

Lieutenant Colonel Geoffrey Keyes, VC, who led the assault on Rommel’s HQ, and perished in the process. Imperial War Museums

The Commandos were directed to kill or capture Rommel at his residence in a headquarters villa in the Libyan town of Bayda; destroy a nearby intelligence center and wireless station; attack the nearby headquarters of an Italian division; and otherwise attack and destroy upon targets of opportunity in the vicinity. On November 10^th, 1941, two submarines set out from Alexandria, Egypt, carrying a force of 59 Commandos between them. They reached their landing site on the night of November 14^th, where an advance team that had been parachuted in earlier awaited them. One submarine landed its contingent, but the other was struck by a squall and ran aground. As a result, only 7 of its Commandos reached shore, while the rest were stranded. With the available attack force thus drastically diminished, the mission was revised and reduced to only attacking Rommel’s headquarters and that of the Italian division.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.